Pres. Rodrigo Duterte recalled the government’s peace negotiators from negotiations with the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) until being given “compelling reason” to resume talks. Research group IBON, however, points out that the most compelling reason for having peace talks are the economic and political reforms on the agenda that can address the roots of armed conflict. Ending the peace talks with the NDFP also ends talks on important social and economic reforms which makes the prospects for their implementation and achieving benefits for the people dimmer.

IBON noted that ceasefires are at most only momentary respites from fighting. The government and the NDFP reaching agreements on genuine reforms, on the other hand, are among the clearest steps towards peace based on social justice. The government and NDFP each prepared their proposed draft for a comprehensive agreement on social and economic reforms (CASER) and exchanged these in mid-January 2017. IBON reviewed these and compared their respective proposals for key reforms.