MANILA - A home-made bomb exploded in front of a public market in the southern Philippines on Saturday , injuring seven people, the military said.
The victims, who included a traffic enforcer, were rushed to nearby hospitals for various injuries, said Major Arvin Encinas, an army division spokesman. The bombing occurred hours before a scheduled ceremony in nearby Maguindanao province to start the decommissioning of 12,000 fighters of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front , which signed a peace agreement with the government in 2014.
In January, voters in Mindanao ratified a law creating a new entity that would have greater autonomy over matters such as budgeting, revenues, natural resources, administration of justice, ancestral domain and civil service for Filipino Muslims.