BTC convenes to work on draft Bangsamoro law

COTABATO CITY — Members of the newly expanded Bangsamoro Transition Commission (BTC) convened here Monday for a two-day maiden session.

 

The main objective of the BTC is to craft a congressional measure needed to replace the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) with a Bangsamoro entity based on a peace compact between the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF).

 

The BTC’s two-day session at EM Manor Hotel here is being presided over by its figurehead, Ghazali Jaafar, the first vice chairman of the MILF’s central committee.

 

The reconstituted BTC was launched in Davao City last month by President Rodrigo Duterte, replacing the originally only 15-member group led by the MILF’s chief negotiator, Mohagher Iqbal.

 

The output of the commission Iqbal had led, the draft Bangsamoro Basic Law, was disapproved by Congress for containing unconstitutional provisions.

 

Besides Jaafar, the MILF has 10 more members in the new BTC, where the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) and the national government have three and seven representatives each, respectively.

 

The three MNLF officials in the expanded BTC, lawyers Omar Sema and Firdausi Abas and former ARMM assemblyman Hatimil Hassan, belong to a group not hostile to the MILF.

 

A smaller MNLF faction led by Nur Misuari is rabidly opposed to any convergence with the MILF in charting a common peace roadmap that can put closure to the now four-decade Moro issue.

 

Peace talks between the government and the MILF started on Jan. 7, 1997. Both sides had crafted a final compact, the March 27, 2014 Comprehensive Agreement on Bangsamoro, which aims to replace ARMM with a more politically and administratively empowered Moro-led regional government.

 

The ARMM cannot be deactivated without any imprimatur from Congress owing to its being covered by a congressional charter, the Republic Act 9054.

 

The MNLF signed a final peace agreement with Malacañang on Sept. 2, 1996, but is not contented with how past presidents complied with some of its sensitive provisions.