The 2014 peace agreement between the Philippine government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front ended more than 50 years of armed struggle for self-determination in the Muslim-majority region of Mindanao. It was one of the oldest armed struggles for independence in the world and claimed more than 100,000 lives. One trigger of the conflict was the mass migration of Christian settlers to the ancestral lands of Muslim and non-Muslim indigenous people in the first decade of the 20th century. However, the conflict scenario in Mindanao is multi-causal and multi-dimensional. In addition to the armed struggle for self-determination, there are other forms of violent conflict in Mindanao: the communists’ fight against the Philippine government, feuds between families and clans (“rido”), the indigenous communities’ fight for the rights to their ancestral land, and ideologically motivated gang crime. Our programme work focuses on the armed conflict in connection with self-determination in Muslim Mindanao.

The peace negotiations lasted 17 years. PeaceWoman Miriam Coronel-Ferrer was the chief negotiator and the first woman in the world to co-sign a major peace agreement. It took another five years for a law establishing the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region for Muslim Mindanao to be passed in March 2019. Since then, the transitional government has faced the challenge of simultaneously achieving political and fiscal autonomy for the region and building peaceful communities after the long conflict.

Thanks to pressure from women activists, in addition to PeaceWoman Miriam Coronel-Ferrer, two other women took part in the negotiations. Together they ensured that women – including those under 30 – were represented in the government negotiating panel und the negotiating panel for the Moro Islamic Liberation Front. Women's organisations and networks actively supported the negotiations and, after the agreement was concluded, lobbied both houses of Congress for legislation that would most consistently implement the provisions of the peace agreement.

Women peace negotiators advocated for women's rights to meaningful political participation in the transitional government of the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region for Muslim Mindanao. Thanks to the activists' persistence, the government decreed that each office must allocate 5% of its budget to the advancement of women. In addition, the Bangsamoro Women's Commission, which is responsible for gender-equality measures, was established in 2020.

The ongoing phase of establishing the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region for Muslim Mindanao has been in progress since 2014. It is a crucial moment for Muslim, indigenous and Christian women to define their demands for a gender-equitable society and anchor them in the new government structures. 

We have been working with the Gaston Z. Ortigas Peace Institute (GZOPI) since 2003 and the launch of the “1000 Women for the 2005 Nobel Peace Prize” initiative. GZOPI began organising local Women's Peace Tables in Mindanao in 2015. Parliamentarians and experts in transitional justice also took part, but the main participants were women from the conflict-affected region.

Women affected by the conflict and involved in civil society organisations working for peace, human rights and development took part in the meetings, which often lasted several days. The participants discussed the violence they had experienced during the conflict, attended workshops on how to use the transitional justice mechanisms for conflict transformation as set out in the peace agreement, and developed advocacy strategies. Key figures from the government and administration as well as the media were invited to ensure that the women's concerns reached decision-makers. Some of the meetings also included public forums and awareness-raising events.

Strengthening women's leadership

We are working with GZOPI to ensure that women play an active role in conflict transformation and peacebuilding through local and national meetings, congresses and advocacy activities, thus helping to shape a gender-equal and sustainable peace.

From 2025, the programme with GZOPI focuses on strengthening the leadership and voices of women as co-creators of sustainable peace, their meaningful participation in the implementation of the Bangsamoro Peace Agreement, and the effective communication for peace aimed at a broader public.

An important component of the programme is the exchange of knowledge between the partners in the Philippines, Colombia and Nepal. This began in 2019 with an initial face-to-face meeting and culminated in 2021 with the joint development of the publication “From transition to transformation: strengthening women's effective participation in peacebuilding and transitional justice processes”. We will continue this exchange of knowledge in our programme work with GZOPI as well as in the Feminists Connecting for Peace network.