PNOY SIGNS MOA FOR PEACE AND DEVELOPMENT 25 YRS AFTER CORY SIGNS PEACE ACCORD WITH CPLA
This led to the signing of EO-220, creating the Cordillera Administrative Region.
On Monday, July 4, President Benigno Aquino III signed a Memorandum of Agreement between the Government of the Philippines (GPH) and the Cordillera Bodong Administration-Cordillera People’s Liberation Army (CBA-CPLA) towards the CPLA’s final disposition of Arms and Forces and its transformation into a potent socio-economic unarmed force (closure agreement).
A closure of the peace effort Cory Aquino started now ends with the pen of her son, President Noy-noy (PNoy) for the transformation of an armed group into an instrument for socio-economic change.
The signing of the agreement was held at Malacanang at 10:a.m at the Rizal Hall.
The agreement will be signed by the President, representing the government, with Arsenio Humiding, chairman of the CPLA and Marcelina Bahatan, president of the Cordillera Bodong Administration.
The MOA is aimed towards the CPLA’s final disposition of Arms and Forces and its transformation into a potent socio-economic unarmed force.
Earlier, the CPLA-CBA has signed a joint declaration commitment for the development of the Cordillera with the government as represented by the Office of the Presidential Adviser on the Peace Process.
Among the salient points of the declaration are proposals for economic development for the Cordillera region are: community development packages for identified barangays influenced or under the CPLA control; arms and force de-mobilization (for CPLA members); the documentation of the history and struggle of the Cordillera region; livelihood and employment support for CPLA members; sub-regional development projects; and the transformation of the CBAd and the CPLA into a socio-economic organization for peace and development in the region.
The original members of the CPLA was composed of the Lumbaya command of the New People’s Army, the first company in the country made up of purely Indigenous Peoples.
The group has since severed its ties with the NPA sometime in the mid ‘80s and has entered into a peace agreement with the government in 1986.
More than one thousand CPLA members have already undergone the integration process with the government and are now members of the Philippine Army while others members of the CAFGU (Citizen’s Armed Forces Geographical Unit).–larry madarang
