Philippines Peace Process to Reignite with New Gov't Panel Chair Appointment

DAVAO CITY (MindaNews / 03 July 2026) – The chairperson of the government’s Peace Implementing Panel (PIP) will be named on July 15, after which the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) is expected to lift the “temporary pause” it declared four months ago, according to Secretary Mel Senen Sarmiento, Presidential Adviser on Peace, Reconciliation and Unity. "Malacañang is going to announce it on the 15th,” Sarmiento told convenors of the Civil Society Summit for the Bangsamoro: Strengthening Constituencies for the Peace Process, during a listening session on Thursday morning at the Ateneo de Davao University. Mohagher Iqbal, chair of the MILF's Peace Implementing Panel (PIP), told MindaNews on Friday that the MILF will lift the “temporary pause” it declared four months ago, “not later than ASAP, after GPH panel has the appointment document.” Sarmiento, who was appointed Presidential Peace Adviser on April 21, said vetting sessions were done for the new GPH PIP chair, but “unfortunately, the very first one, who was supposed to be appointed” begged off upon the request of his family. He did not name the “very first one.” “So, July 15th, may chair na po sa GPH,” he assured. In a press statement on June 30, Sarmiento recalled what he shared during the Commission on Elections event in Zamboanga City last week: that the appointment of the next GPH PIP Chair was already on its “third and final round of vetting” and that Malacañang “has informed our office that a decision is expected by 14 July.” The GPH and MILF signed the Comprehensive Agreement on the Bangsamoro (CAB) on March 27, 2014 under the Aquino presidency but the Organic Law on the BARMM, RA 11054, was passed only in July 2018 and ratified in January 2019, under the Duterte presidency, paving the way for the establishment of the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM). Duterte appointed members of the Bangsamoro Transition Authority (BTA), the BARMM’s transition government, in February 2019. The BTA’s inaugural session was on March 29, 2019. “Temporary pause,” suspended decommissioning The MILF in a statement signed by chair Al Haj Murad Ebrahim on March 12 but made public on March 16, declared a “temporary pause” in their engagements in the Bangsamoro peace process until a “full-fledged chairman” of the government PIP is named. Murad served as Interim Chief Minister from February 2019 until he was replaced in March 2025 by Abdulraof Macacua, who succeeded Murad in 2003 as the Chief of Staff of the Bangsamoro Islamic Armed Forces (BIAF). The MILF, Murad said, “cannot negotiate and engage with a headless counterpart.” In July last year, the MILF suspended the decommissioning process until there is “substantial compliance” by the national government in the other tracks of normalization, such as the provision of socio-economic package to the 26,145 decommissioned combatants. A month later, Murad issued a memorandum prohibiting its commanders and officials from participating “in any decommissioning or normalization activities” organized by the national government and the Office of the Presidential Adviser on Peace, Reconciliation and Unity (OPAPRU) “without prior written approval or authorization” from him. A total of 40,000 combatants and 7,200 weapons are to be decommissioned, and as of the third phase that ended on July 4, 2024, the decommissioned combatants (DCs) number 26,145 (65.4%) and decommissioned weapons at 4,625 (64.2%). The remaining13,855 combatants and 2,575 weapons are awaiting decommissioning. Most of the armed combatants have not been decommissioned. Records show that only 5% or 1,286 out of the 26,145 decommissioned combatants are from the six MILF camps previously acknowledged by the national government. The seven front commanders, at least 30 base commanders and the Chief of Staff of the BIAF, and the other combatants have yet to be decommissioned. Yano’s two resignations The former GPH-PIP chair Cesar Yano tendered his resignation on February 12 but this was not publicly known. Appointed by President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. as panel chair on August 10, 2023, Yano first resigned in August 2025 but the Office of the President (OP) did not accept his resignation. Yano tendered his resignation then because he felt he was not empowered to exercise his mandate as chair under the OPAPRU. Yano told MindaNews that in his letter to President Ferdinand Marcos, Jr. on February 12, he said he was resigning “to give way to OPAPRU.” PAPRU Carlito Galvez tendered his resignation in April citing health reasons. Sarmiento, who served as Local Governments Secretary from September 2015 to June 30, 2016, was appointed to succeed Galvez. “Full cooperation” In his speech at the CSO Summit on Thursday afternoon, Iqbal said the MILF offers its “full cooperation on every needed step forward to move the Bangsamoro peace process back on track.”“We remain fully committed to work with the National Government, particularly, Secretary Sarmiento and offer our full cooperation to work together with him to overcome current issues and challenges,” he said. But Iqbal acknowledged that from the perspective of the MILF, the implementation of the peace agreement “has lost much of its momentum.”He said formal engagement between the two PIPs has been temporarily halted “due to the absence of a duly constituted Government Peace Implementing Panel.” As a result, many important issues requiring joint decision-making remain unresolved. He noted that only the ceasefire mechanisms like the Coordinating Committees on the Cessation of Hostilities (CCCH) and the Ad Hoc Joint Action Group (AHJAG), have been functioning. From transitory to democratically elected parliament Sarmiento’s June 30 press statement described the implementation of the CAB as having “entered a critical phase.” “The first Bangsamoro Parliamentary Elections this September will mark an important transition from the Bangsamoro Transition Authority to a democratically elected parliament, consistent with the Bangsamoro Organic Law. Ensuring that this transition is peaceful, credible, and supported by functioning institutions remains one of the government’s foremost responsibilities,” it said. The statement noted that alongside preparations for the parliamentary elections, the government has “sustained the work of the jointly established mechanisms” and that throughout this period, the OPAPRU, remaining members of the GPH PIP, other government agencies involved in the peace process, and the “GPH-side mechanisms have continued to discharge their respective responsibilities in support of the implementation of the CAB” and that technical preparations, implementation planning, and inter-agency coordination have not stood still. “The incoming Panel Chair will therefore assume leadership over an implementation agenda that has been substantially prepared for immediate execution upon appointment,” Sarmiento’s press statement said. The next PIP chair will be the 6th since 2016. The fir