Mindanao peace stakeholders confident of Senate’s nod on BBL

COTABATO CITY -- Securing imprimatur for the Bangsamoro Basic Law (BBL) from a mere committee in the House of Representatives was an uphill struggle, but local folks are certain the bill can get through the legislative mills of the two chambers of Congress just the same.The 75-member House committee handling House Bill 4994, led by Cagayan Rep. Rufus Rodriguez, had voted in favor of the creation of a Bangsamoro political entity through the draft BBL during sessions from Monday until Wednesday afternoon.The House Bill 4994 is the enabling measure for the replacement of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao with a new Bangsamoro political entity based on the government’s two compacts with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, the Framework Agreement on Bangsamoro and the Comprehensive Agreement on Bangsamoro.Maguindanao Rep. Sandra Sema, who is identified with the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF), which signed a final peace deal with government on Sept. 2, 1996, said she is thankful to her colleagues in the Ad Hoc committee that voted in favor of the draft BBL.Sema is spouse of the chairman of the largest of three factions in the MNLF, former Cotabato City Mayor Muslimin Sema, whose group is not hostile to the MILF. By voting in favor of the draft BBL, me and my colleagues restored hope among people in the Moro homeland and bolstered their conviction that they can live in peace together, regardless of religion, cultural identities and ethnic divides,” Sema, who representing the first congressional district of Maguindanao, said on Thursday.Peace activists in Central Mindanao are optimistic Senate would also favor the enactment into law of the draft BBL without major changes in its content as drafted by government and MILF representatives to the Bangsamoro Transition Commission (BTC).The BTC, comprised of seven representatives each from the government and the MILF, is led by the chief negotiator of the rebel group, Muhaquer Iqbal. We will continuously initiate peaceful actions intended to show to all members of the House of Representatives and the Senate our being one in heart, one community for BBL,” said ARMM’s chief executive, Mujiv Hataman.Hataman said the ARMM’s rank-and-file employees will initiate ecumenical prayer services every Monday morning at the parade ground of the 32-hectare regional government compound in Cotabato City to show to the Senate their collective wish for the BBL to become a law. There can never be any better way of building peace in the autonomous region other than enshrining via legislation a meaningful Moro rule in Mindanao in the spirit of self-determination under the Philippine flag,” Hataman said.A Maranaw peace activist, Norodin Alonto Lucman, who is a scion of the Lanao del Sur nobility, said there are three issues in the BTC’s original November 2014 draft of the BBL which the legislature ought to resolve and approve.The three issues Lucman pointed out were the traditional authority, which delves on the ramifications of the 19 royal houses of Mindanao and Sulu, the Bangsamoro airspace, and the wealth-sharing and utilization of strategic minerals and other fossil fuels obtainable in the Bangsamoro territory.Lucman, son of the late Datu Rashid, who had served as congressman during the pre-martial law era, said lawmakers need to tackle extensively the Bangsamoro airspace agenda owing to the recorded destruction of peasant enclaves and the deaths of innocent Muslim and Christian villagers as a result of the military’s aerial bombing sorties against enemy forces in years past.Lucman said the wise utilization of the Bangsamoro homeland’s strategic minerals and fuel deposits will benefit the economy of Mindanao, Visayas, Luzon and Metro Manila.Maguindanao Gov. Esmael Mangudadatu and his constituents in the business communities in all 36 towns under his jurisdiction are optimistic the Rodriguez-led committee’s approval of the draft BBL will usher in improvements in ARMM’s investment climate. Even if it’s quite a long way still, the blessing for the BBL coming from the committee assigned to work on its passage already sent good signals to our friends in the business communities abroad,” Mangudadatu said.Mangudadatu said he is convinced the Senate will favorably act on the BBL just the same.Bai Sandra Siang, president of a big bloc of Muslim traders in Maguindanao and surrounding provinces, said their contacts and benefactors abroad are monitoring keenly the developments in the government-MILF peace efforts. Practically all of them wants peace in Southern Mindanao and are cognizant of the good business potentials our homeland has,” Siang said in a text message.