The President’s meeting with the MILF rebel chief drew reactions, both positive and negative, from both sides of the political divide.
Even one of the President’s closest allies, Senator Francis Escudero, found reason to question the propriety of the President secretly meeting with Murad.
“I think the President may have been ill-advised to meet personally as he (Murad) is not even his counterpart. And it might not be a good tactic in the negotiations,” he said.
He said Deles should “protect the President from such things.”
“She should just do her job and give her President deniability with respect to this early stage of the negotiations,” Escudero said.
House Minority Leader Edcel Lagman on Friday said that Mr. Aquino broke his own promise of full transparency and took unnecessary risks without any tangible gains in meeting with the MILF leader.
“The country is not the personal fiefdom of President Aquino. Any presidential move which has a bearing on national interest and national security must be transparent and discussed with the Cabinet and the National Security Council. The President’s secret trip to Japan to meet MILF leaders violates his avowed policy on transparency,” said Lagman in a phone interview.
Lagman questioned the urgency or necessity of having the President himself meet with Murad.
Unnecessary risks
“Can’t the President send an emissary instead of he himself going? There is more than meets the eye in the President’s excursion. He has much explaining to do. Such as what has he achieved, what are the commitments?” said Lagman.
Lagman said the President also took unnecessary risks in his meeting the MILF leaders. “If something happened to him there, what would happen to our country? He is the President, that should be foremost in his mind,” he said.
But House Majority Leader Neptali Gonzales II said: “If it will lead to real and lasting peace, I fully support P-Noy.”
Senator Francis Pangilinan welcomed the move as “an out-of-the-box solution” that showed the President was willing to step out of his comfort zone to ensure that peace is achieved.
Senator Loren Legarda, chair of the Senate foreign relations committee, said “pass muna” to mean no comment for now.
Act of treason
A diplomat who asked not to be named said what the President did was “an act of treason.”
“A President is not supposed to go on secret missions. A head of state can never be the equal of a rebel leader, but he probably does not know that. He should be meeting with someone on his level,” the diplomat said.
She said the Department of Foreign Affairs was left completely out of the loop.
“I hear that the peace panel was the one that recommended it. What was their agenda? Did they just shake hands? A goodwill [meeting]?” she said.
With reports from Gil C. Cabacungan Jr., Christian Esguerra and Jerome Aning and AP, AFP, Reuters
First posted 12:25 am | Saturday, August 6th, 2011
MNLF Founding Leader & Central Committee Chairman Professor Dr. Nur P. Misuari call it a "WRONG SIGNAL". "Pinoy-Murad Japan talk was a wrong signal. We (MNLF-OIC-GPH) talks are almost at the finish line.
