SUMMARY
The Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) is a Muslim rebel group located in the Southern Philippines fighting for self-governance. The group is based in what is called Bangsamoro by the Philippine Muslim nationalists (the term comes from the Malay word bangsa, meaning nation and the arcaic Spanish word Moor connoting Arabs or Muslims) and the term was appropriated in an attempt to forge a new identity uniting the south’s thirteen Muslim tribes. The area covers the southern portion of Mindanao, the Sulu Archipelago, Palawan, Basilan and the neighboring islands.
In the 1960s and 1970s, Moro nationalism became increasingly more self-assertive; partially expressing itself in the birth of an underground organization, Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) in 1972. Soon, MNLF became the symbol for independence that the Moro struggle rallied around. An armed struggle broke out in 1972 between MNLF and the government. In the ensuing peace negotiations in 1975-76, MNLF dropped its demands for independence and settled for autonomy. When MNLF dropped its demand for independence, breakaway factions emerged - the most prominent faction, the “New MNLF”, seceded in 1978 and was led by the vice-Chairman of MNLF, Salamat Hashim. In 1984 Salamat officially changed the name of his organization to the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) to underscore Islam as the rallying point of the Bangsamoro movement.
The foundation of MILF’s ideology was already established by 1981, in "Jihad in the way of Allah", a party program written by Salamat. In it the ideological differences between MNLF and MILF were evident; MILF’s principal aim was to entrench Islam in Mindanao whereas MNLF sought the creation of a separate Moro state (later, the creation of an autonomous region). Though MILF broke away from MNLF on the latter’s reneged claim of independence, MILF has not been ideologically firm on the issue either. By the late 1990s, MILF had however begun negotiations with the Philippine government for an autonomous Muslim region just as its predecessor, MNLF.
MILF has been accused of having links to several governments, regional networks and domestic rebel groups, primarily the Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG). Among the governments, Libya allegedly was the key sponsor and primary source of funds and weapons for MILF during the 1980s. In the year 2000, the Saudi and Malaysian governments were respectively accused by the Philippine government of providing military training and advice, as well as protection to MILF. This was neither confirmed nor denied by MILF.
MILF’s ties to al-Qaeda and the regional militant Islamist network Jemaah Islamiyah (JI) were allegedly forged in Afghan training camps in the mid-1980s. After the supposed Libyan funding declined in the mid-1990s, MILF reportedly turned to other sources of external funding, one being al-Qaeda. Since then, there have been off-and-on rumors of training cooperation between al-Qaeda and MILF. The alliance with JI is purportedly deeper than with al-Qaeda – the collaboration is believed to be focused to the areas of training and carrying out special operations in tandem, like the Rizal Day Manila Bombings in 2000. MILF has consistently denied any links to the above networks and the leadership has stated that the Bangsamoro issue is not part of the problem of global terrorism, stressing that their struggle is purely a domestic one.
Turning to domestic ties, MILF has often been accused by the Philippine government of aiding the Abu Sayyaf Group (a terrorist-labelled, Islamist separatist group). Though MILF has publicly denounced ASG’s harsher tactics, several reports assert that the ties between the groups deepened in the first five years of the 21st century; taking the shape of joint training and operations.
Salamat Hashim was the chairman of MILF from its inception until he died of natural causes in 2003. Salamat, both an ethnic Maguindanaon and Maranao (it has been noted that much of his ability to mobilize the tribally diverse Moros rested in his mixed heritage), studied at the prestigious Islamic Al-Azhar University in Cairo and later lived in Libya, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. It was during these formative years that he came to be highly influenced by the ideas of the Muslim Brotherhood ideologue Syed Qutb as well as the writings of the Pakistani scholar Sayyid Abul Ala Maududi. Upon Hashim’s death in 2003, Al Hadj Murad Ebrahim, MILF’s former chief of military affairs was chosen as chairman. Like Salamat and many of MILFs lower-level political leaders, Murad Ebrahim, was a former mujahideen who had volunteered to fight the Soviets in Afghanistan.
MILF has been involved in the intrastate, non-state and one-sided categories of UCDP organised violence.
