Editor's note: This is the seventh in our series of year beginners.

More men and money are at the top of the wish list of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) for 2009.

The AFP has received additional funding of P1.8 billion from Malacañang last December to sustain its fight against the “rogue” forces of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), but AFP Chief of Staff Gen. Alexander Yano said that the supplemental budget would stretch their operations only for the first quarter of 2009.

As early as September 2008, National Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro Jr. has asked for P1.8 billion to buttress the AFP’s offensives against the MILF rogue groups headed by disgruntled commanders Ameril Umbra Kato alias Kato, Abdullah Makapaar alias Bravo and Aleem Sulaiman Pangalian.

The military has been locked in renewed skirmishes with these MILF forces since August last year after commanders Bravo and Kato led attacks in North Cotabato, Lanao del Norte, Sarangani and Maguindanao following the government’s decision to scrap its  unsigned memorandum of agreement (MOA-AD) with MILF.

The MOA-AD expands the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) with at least 700 more villages, subject to a law passed by Congress and voters’ approval in a plebiscite. It also grants wider economic and political powers to the new autonomous region, such as 75:25 sharing in its favor from the exploitation of natural resources.

Vice Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Cardozo Luna earlier said in reports that the war against Bravo and Kato’s group has cost the AFP around P1 billion. Last October, Luna said that the AFP has spent P500 million in their pursuit of Kato and Bravo.

From this P1 billion, around P600 million reportedly went to fuel and ammunition.

Price of war

In 2008, the AFP’s budget was P26 billion. Teodoro requested Congress to add another P10 billion to the P56.5 billion budget earmarked for the AFP in 2009.

He also asked for the realignment of the AFP budget in 2008 so that the P1.8 billion supplemental budget will be focused on its operations against the MILF.

Army spokesperson Lt. Col. Romeo Brawner said that the supplemental budget, originally meant for the procurement of equipment, would be used for “gasoline, ammunition and weapons.”

It would not cover yet the funds necessary for another six battalions or additional 3,000 soldiers that they aim to put on the frontlines in Mindanao.

“That’s up to Congress,” he said, when asked about funding for the additional troops.

According to Brawner, there are around 35 battalions or 17,500 soldiers deployed now in the south.

High points of the search for the two MILF commanders include the takeover of Kato’s camp in Pusaw, Mamasapano and Camp Vietnam in Maguindanao, Camp Bilal, headquarters of the 102nd Base Command of MILF in Lanao del Sur, and more than 10 other camps in the 102nd and 105th  base commands .

But the three MILF commanders, who have around a total of P25 million-bounty on their heads, have yet to be captured.

In the four months of the fighting between the two forces, the National Disaster Coordinating Council posted 163 civilian casualties as of December 2008.   

The hostilities also resulted in damages worth millions among the affected communities. NDCC records show that government and international humanitarian bodies have extended P196 million worth of relief assistance to 60,000 families or 300,000 persons affected and displaced from their homes in around three provinces.

Stuck 

According to documents gathered by abs-cbnNEWS.com/Newsbreak, the Army had around 200 engagements with communist forces and 56 encounters with separatist groups in early 2008.

Brawner said that clashes with the Abu Sayyaf have shrunk the latter’s forces from 500 in 2007 to 300 last year.

But he added that in order to meet their 2010 deadline in crushing insurgent forces and in the light of the Mumbai attacks where alleged Pakistan-linked terrorists killed almost more than a hundred people, local security forces need stronger intelligence. 

Sen. Rodolfo Biazon, defense committee chair and former AFP chief of staff, shares the same view. “The success of the AFP is not just a matter of having more soldiers or better equipment. We need intelligence,” he told abs-cbnNEWS.com/Newsbreak in a phone interview.

He added that he has filed a bill in the Senate asking “for the reconstitution of the intelligence committee” which would look over how intelligence activities are managed and sustained.

“I think there would be a consensus in the Senate to put into place the intelligence committee very soon,” he said.

Sen. Manuel “Mar” Roxas II has filed a similar bill, seeking the creation of the joint congressional intelligence committee which would be tasked to ensure “transparency and accountability” in intelligence funds and the effective organization of intelligence activities.

But aside from these bills, there are measures pushing for reforms in the defense sector that have gathered dust.

These include legislation setting a three-year fixed term for AFP chief of staff and commanders and barring retired AFP heads from taking on the defense portfolio a year after they retired.

“I filed these bills to basically keep the system from being politicized,” Roxas said.

Biazon said that the two have already been approved by the Senate, but versions of these bills in the House have yet to move forward.