Manila: President Benigno Aquino has appointed Marvic Leonen, the Philippine government’s chief peace negotiator during talks with a former separatist Filipino-Muslim group as Supreme Court associate justice.
Leonen, who will turn 50 at the end of December this year, is the country’s youngest appointed member of the High Tribunal.
Supreme Court Chief Justice Maria Lourdes Sereno, now 52, was 50 when appointed associate justice of the Supreme Court in 2010.
Leonen will fill the post vacated by Sereno.
Starting 2010, Leonen headed the government’s peace panel which held talks with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), at the onset of the term of President Benigno Aquino.
Leonen was responsible for the government’s strategy to get support from various sectors the topics of agreement still to be finalised by the Philippine government and the MILF.
The Philippine government and the MILF forged a “framework agreement” in Malaysia before mid-October, the signing of which was held in Malacanang, the presidential palace on October 15.
Both parties are still talking and they put into details the final form of the aspects of the framework agreement.
It is not known who will replace Leonen as government’s chief negotiator in talks with the MILF.
Leonen was former dean of the University of the Philippines College of Law.
He was a co-founder of the Legal Rights and Natural Resources Centre Inc — Alliance with Nature, which gives free legal assistance to poor people and minority ethnic groups.
In 1983, he graduated from the UP School of Economics for his undergraduate course. He finished a law degree also at UP in 1983.
