Unfinished business

The incident comes on the heels of the signing of the Framework Agreement on the Bangsamoro between the GPH and MILF, which is expected to bring a lasting political settlement to the Mindanao conflict. While MILF has denounced previous terrorist attacks and denied links with the JI, there are compelling reasons to believe that violent extremists remain capable of launching attacks despite the prospects for peace.

While the Philippine government has focused efforts in dealing with the communist insurgency through the Internal Peace and Security Plan Bayanihan, maintaining “credible deterrence” against the secessionist MILF and pursuing the Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG), it  seemed to have given less attention to the presence of foreign militants in the country. The presence of JI and what Philippine security services dub as other “foreign militant jihadis” (FMJs) has been monitored since the December 2000 Rizal Day bombings in Manila.

FMJs have been viewed as ancillary threats whose numbers never breached the “20-30 operatives” estimated to be in-country. These miniscule numbers – when compared to the 11,000-strong MILF, can nonetheless derail the peace process. In 2003, the bombings of the Davao Airport and Sasa Wharf led to a cascade of military responses – culminating in the Buliok campaign against MILF. More recently, the Armed Forces of the Philippines stated in May that it was keeping tabs on five JI operatives in Mindanao but denied any specific information of a plot.

Fikrie’s case illustrates how suspected JI and FMJs can slip under the radar by integrating themselves into social and kinship networks. Marriage has been used by foreign extremists to blend into society; creating cover for support activities or, if need be, attacks. Fikrie’s circumstances illustrate the mobility accorded through such a modus operandi. He and his wife, originally from Luzon (the political and economic hub) was able to move into position to launch an attack in Davao City, a major economic hub in eastern Mindanao, beyond the traditional arenas of MILF (central Mindanao) or the ASG (southwest Mindanao).

The attempted bombing indicates the capability of foreign extremists to operate at a distance from “traditional” allies in Mindanao. Complementing this ability to keep a low profile, the dissemination of technical know-how has accorded foreign extremists greater resilience. IED fabrication techniques have been disseminated widely among various groups in Mindanao, in spite of the dismantling of training camps once operated by MILF, before the all-out war launched by the military in 2000. These skills have been acquired by a wide array of parties, which include organised criminal groups who don’t even attempt to couch their activities as ideologically-motivated.

Foreign bomb-makers have been held responsible for diffusing IED technology to extortion groups such as Al Khobar, a group that gained notoriety in using mortar shell-based explosives against bus companies. Skills once the preserve of ideologically-motivated groups have become marketable in the relatively ungoverned space of Mindanao, where low-profile foreign extremists thrive by offering their skills to the highest bidder. The complex milieu of violent elections, gaps in law enforcement, weak governance and limited state presence makes Mindanao a viable environment for men like Fikrie to continue in a post-peace agreement scenario.

For the wider Southeast Asian region, this persistence of foreign violent extremists in Mindanao belies the optimism of some observers. The argument that the GPH-MILF Framework Agreement on the Bangsamoro (FAB) will deny the JI space for training, recruitment and manoeuvre in Mindanao over-emphasises the ideological dimensions of the conflict. The MILF is largely a response to flawed state-building and socio-economic deprivation; its genesis traces back to before the emergence of post-9/11, counter-jihadist discourse. The signing of a prospective peace agreement, the follow up to the FAB, is but a start to drain the pond where extremist fish breed.

The opportunism of foreign militants to successfully entrench themselves in a permissive environment is a serious matter for state security actors in the region. Law enforcement must remain vigilant and poised to counteract the emergence of terrorist operatives in deep cover in the Philippines. The same amount of effort must also be focused on denying extremists access to explosives and other materiel necessary for their nefarious activities. Suffice to say there remains substantive unfinished business before Mindanao can be deemed free of the latent threat of Islamist terrorism.

 

Joseph Franco is an associate research fellow at the S Rajaratnam School of International Studies, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.