BAGUIO CITY (PIA) — Malacañan Palace has declared September 13, 2024, as a special non-working holiday in the Cordillera Administrative Region to commemorate the 1986 Sipat or the Mount Data Peace Accord.
“It is fitting and proper that the people of Cordillera be given the full opportunity to participate in the occasion,” states Proclamation 672 signed by Executive Secretary Lucas Bersamin by the authority of President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. on August 29, 2024.
The day commemorates the 38th anniversary of the peace accord which was forged on September 13, 1986 between the Cordillera Bodong Administration-Cordillera People’s Liberation Army (CBA-CPLA) led by rebel priest Conrado Balweg and the government of the Philippines with then President Corazon Aquino at the Mount Data Hotel in Bauko, Mountain Province, that ended the hostilities between the armed group and government forces in the region.
This historic event led to the signing of Executive Order 220 in 1987creating the Cordillera Administrative Region to serve as a transitory structure towards the establishment of an autonomous Cordillera region.
The 1986 Mount Data Sipat Agreement was the first peace pact successfully entered into by the national government during the Corazon Aquino’s administration.
The Mount Data Peacepact commemoration is one of the highlights of the Cordillera region’s observance of the National Peace Consciousness Month 2024 this September with the theme “Transforming Minds, Transforming Lives.”
Proclamation No. 675, s. 2004, declares the month of September of each year as National Peace Consciousness Month to instill greater awareness and understanding among the people of the comprehensive peace process and to strengthen support for such effort of the government. The celebration is spearheaded by the Office of the Presidential Adviser on Peace Reconciliation and Unity. (RMC- PIA CAR)
