SWS: Filipinos have ‘neutral’ attitude on the Bangsamoro Organic Law

Filipinos are “neutral” on the passage of the Bangsamoro Basic Law (BBL), now called the Bangsamoro Organic Law (BOL), according to a survey from the Social Weather Stations (SWS) released on July 20.

According to the survey, 40 percent of Filipinos are undecided whether the Congress should pass the BOL while 31 percent said they agree. Meanwhile, 28 percent said they do not agree on its passage.

This gives a net agreement score of +3 or “neutral,” SWS’ statement read.

Most Filipinos, however, moderately believe that the BOL would bring peace to Mindanao with +13 net agreement.

The survey was conducted from June 27 to 30 with 1,200 respondents. This was before the bicameral conference committee adopted the harmonized version of the BOL on July 18.

READ: Bicam approves Bangsamoro Organic Law

SWS reported that Mindanao recorded the highest agreement rating at 36 percent, Luzon recorded 29 percent, while Visayas was at 26 percent. Visayas had moderately negative attitude or 42 percent disagreement rating, the survey showed.

In terms of religion, 65 percent of Muslims agree on its approval. Catholics and other Christians are also neutral with 29 and 25 percent respectively.

The SWS, however, noted that most Filipinos had moderately positive attitude about the BOL back in its 2012 survey, where the net rating ranged from +16 to +26. There was no draft of the law at that time.

It also noted the public’s sentiment towards the law died down in 2015 from -8 or neutral to -24 or poor net agreement.

2015 was when the 44 members of the Special Action Force of the Philippine National Police were killed in an encounter in Mamasapano, Mindanao.  /muf