DAVAO CITY (MindaNews / 14 July 2026) – There will be a new chair of the government’s Peace Implementing Panel in the Bangsamoro peace process by Wednesday.
“Our liaison has informed me that Malacañang is expected to make the announcement tomorrow (Wednesday, July 15),” Presidential Peace Adviser Mel Senen Sarmiento told MindaNews Tuesday evening in a text message.
The new GPH PIP chair will be the 6th since 2016.
On July 2, Sarmiento told civil society leaders at the Civil Society Summit for the Bangsamoro hosted by the Ateneo de Davao University, that “Malacañang is going to announce it on the 15th.”
“So, July 15th, may chair na po sa GPH,” he assured then.
Mohagher Iqbal, chair of the Peace Implementing Panel (PIP) of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), told MindaNews on July 3 that the MILF will lift the “temporary pause” it declared four months ago, “not later than ASAP, after GPH panel has the appointment document.”
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.
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.”
6th in 10 years for GPH; 1 in 10 years for MILF
The new GPH chair will be the 6th in ten years. On the MILF side, Iqbal, the chair of the MILF peace negotiating panel from 2003 to 2014, has been the only chair of the MILF peace implementing panel since 2016.
The GPH and MILF PIPS are turning 10 years old on July 21.
The PIPs are not peace negotiating panels as negotiations ended with the signing of the Comprehensive Agreement on the Bangsamoro (CAB), the peace agreement signed by the GPH and MILF on March 27, 2014, under the administration of then President Benigno Simeon Aquino III.
They are not stipulated in the CAB but were created on the first month of the Duterte administration — specifically on July 21, 2016 — when then Presidential Peace Adviser Jesus Dureza met with MILF chair Al Haj Murad Ebrahim in Camp Darapanan, Sultan Kudarat in what is now Maguindanao del Norte.
Dureza and Murad agreed that there will be no more negotiating panels because the peace process was now on its implementation phase.
Initially, it was supposed to be a ten-member joint implementing team but Dureza later told MindaNews it would be separate panels of five members each.
Irene Santiago was the first chair of the GPH PIP and Iqbal, of the MILF. The peace implementation phase under the Duterte administration was launched in Kuala Lumpur on August 13 and 14, 2016.
Nabil Tan succeeded Santiago as chair from 2017 to 2018, followed by Dr. Gloria J. Mercado in 2019, Undersecretary David Diciano from 2020 to 2022, and retired Gen. Cesar Yano from 2022 until early this year.
Two months to election
When the GPH-PIP chair is named on July 15, it will be two months before the 1st Bangsamoro Parliamentary Elections (BPE) on September 14 and one day before the start of the election period.
Up for election are 80 Members of Parliament — 40 party representatives, 32 district representatives and eight sectoral representatives. The winning candidates will take their oath on October 30, 2026 and will serve in office until June 30, 2031.
October 30, 2026 also marks the end of the long-extended transition period. The transition was supposed to end on June 30, 2022. (Carolyn O. Arguillas / MindaNews)
0 Comments