Analysis: Tough test for Philippines president

An injured hostage: Victim of government muddle?

By Far East analyst Olivia Stewart

The serious flare-up of unrest in the Philippines' southern region of Mindanao poses the most serious challenge so far to the two-year-old presidency of Joseph Estrada.

It is a complex situation in a remote and lawless part of the country, where Muslim separatists have been fighting for almost three decades for independence from the predominantly Roman Catholic rest of the country.

The seizure of foreign hostages has increased international pressure on Manila to move quickly and effectively.

But observers have pointed out what appears to be a lack of co-ordinated stategy towards the problems in Mindanao.

Mr Misuari is not the only negotiator

The handling of the kidnap crisis on the island of Jolo, where the foreign hostages are being held, has prompted the German Government to demand international mediation.

The Filipino government's chief negotiator, former guerilla leader Nur Misuari - described by one critic as a man more suited to the pace of academic life than crisis management - appears still unable to verify exactly what the hostage takers are demanding.

Meanwhile the government has appointed a second separate emissary to the kidnappers.

Government troops surrounding the kidnappers are refusing the negotiators' demands to move back, and the kidnappers themselves appear to be in communication with several different government officals and media outlets.

The multiple lines of communication and lack of a clear chain of command is clouding an already chaotic and precarious situation.

Beyond the immediate confusion and the pressures of the latest kidnappings, the government also needs to address more longstanding issues in Mindanao.

Peace deal

A peace-deal signed in 1996 between the previous Philippine Government and the largest rebel group, the Moro National Liberation Front, led to the establishment of the autonomous region of Muslim Mindanao.

But the promise of peace never materialised as more hardline groups, notably the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, or MILF, have continued to fight the central government.

Filipino Muslims have long held grievances

In subsequent years, the government's failure to deliver on promised economic help and development for this backward part of the country has only encouraged defections to these groups.

Sporadic negotiations between the government and the MILF have failed to bear fruit.

President Estrada had agreed to hold peace talks with the MILF starting in May, while threatening at the same time to launch an all-out war against the group if peace was not agreed within two months.

In the event the talks were suspended, but Mr Estrada's vacillation between negotiation and military action reflects an apparent split within both the government and the armed forces over whether to treat the Islamic separatists as bona fide political groups or simply as bandits using Islam as a convenient cloak for their criminal actvities.

The fact that the separatists themselves are split - between the moderate Moro National Liberation Front, the more radical MILF and the splinter group Abu Sayyaf - only serves to confuse the situation further, with some analysts arguing that only piecemeal negotiation with each group, rather than a large scale solution, will be effective.

In dealing with Muslim separatists, the government also runs up against demographic problems.

Muslim minority

The Philippines Senate is due to consider a plebiscite that would propose extending the Muslim autonomous zone to more parts of Mindanao.

But after decades of immigration from the Christian north, Muslims now find themselves in the minority in many parts of the region, and a popular vote to extend autonomy would inevitably be defeated.

Meanwhile, the government has to take heed of public opinion in the rest of the overhwlemingly Catholic country where sympathy for Muslim guerillas is not high and where there is widespread support for a military solution to the separatist problem in the so-called "Wild South".

The Filipino president is also currently fighting off allegations about his personal conduct.

Whether he can now orchestrate a satisfactory outcome to the seemingly intractable problems in Mindanao could be a crucial test of his ailing presidency.