P-Noy-CPLA ‘closure agreement’ dispute: Cordillera heads slam OPAPP ‘machinations’

BAGUIO CITY –Regional directors of some line agencies in the Cordillera Administrative Region slammed the leadership of the Office of the Presidential Adviser on the Peace Process for its alleged misinformation campaign to discredit them from higher authorities to pressure them in throwing their support to the controversial “closure agreement” entered into by the OPAPP and a faction of the Cordillera Peoples Liberation Army.

In an interview with a regional director of an influential agency who sought anonymity for personal and political reasons, he claimed Presidential Peace Adviser Teresita Deles reportedly wrote secretaries of regional line agencies which are members of the Regional Development Council in the Cordillera, who voted in favor of a resolution requesting President Benigno Simeon C. Aquino III to suspend the implementation of the controversial closure agreement until such time that all issues and concerns arising from the same shall have been effectively and efficiently addressed by the government and that the OPAPP leadership is trying to pressure them to withdraw their signatures from the said resolution.

According to another regional director, she claimed the letter sent to the secretaries of the regional line agencies seemed to be filled with misinformation geared towards making their heads of offices believe that they might have committed a mistake in voting in favor of the resolution when in fact the same was extensively discussed before it was voted upon during the second quarter meeting of the RDC-CAR.

Obviously, some regional line agency directors believe that OPAPP is trying to cover-up a grave mistake it committed in signing the closure agreement with the faction of Arsenio Humiding of the CPLA despite the existence of other CPLA factions that are recognized by the Armed Forces of the Philippines.

If OPAPP is really honest that it signed a closure agreement with the legitimate CPLA faction which has a greater following compared to the others, an officer of the Cordillera Association of Regional Executives said the supposed poison letters allegedly sent by OPAPP to their respective secretaries is a clear indication that there is something wrong in the signing of the agreement and it deserves a second look, thus, the passage of the resolution requesting its suspension done by the RDC-CAR, the region’s policy-making body.

Considering that they are the ones who are fully aware of the situation on the ground, the embattled regional directors appealed to their respective department secretaries to first conduct appropriate consultations with them to clarify the contents of the poison letter sent by OPAPP to them which were clearly designed to discredit them for favoring the resolution suspending the implementation of the closure agreement since the same did not pass through the necessary consultations with concerned Cordillera leaders and long-time CPLA stalwarts who were part of the signing of the peace agreement between former rebel priest Fr. Conrado Balweg representing the organization and former President Corazon C. Aquino on September 13, 1986 in Mount Data, Bauko, Mountain Province.