Mindanao-wide caravan call: Extend Bangsamoro transition

KORONADAL CITY, South Cotabato, Philippines — Aboard motorcycles and cars, thousands of Bangsamoro people, including members of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), held a peace caravan in various parts of Mindanao on Wednesday to make a “final call” on the country’s political leaders to give the Bangsamoro transition three more years.

Also on Wednesday, leaders of the Senate, House of Representatives, the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM), and local governments in the region were expected to meet to thresh out issues regarding the proposal to forego the scheduled election for regional parliament members in 2022 to give way to an extended institutional life of the Bangsamoro Transition Authority (BTA) with the MILF at the helm.

Wednesday’s meeting was in preparation for another meeting with President Duterte on Thursday to discuss the same concern.

According to Senate Majority Leader Juan Miguel Zubiri, no consensus was reached during the June 16 meeting with the President hence the June 23 gathering was convened.

The caravan on Wednesday was led by civil society organizations with support from members of the interim BARMM parliament.

Thousands of participants

In Cotabato City, the caravan started past 6 a.m. for a 100-kilometer, three-province journey. Participants converged in Buluan town, the seat of the Maguindanao provincial government, for a short program where a manifesto was read.

Samsodin Amella, coconvenor of the Civil Society Organizations Movement for Moral Governance, said the caravan went smoothly and was allowed to pass through checkpoints despite the large number of participants, aboard more than 13,000 vehicles.

From Buluan, some vehicles headed to Sultan Kudarat province while others went to Cotabato province.

In Lanao del Sur, more than 31,000 people aboard more than 6,000 vehicles traveled from Marawi City for a 252-km caravan route that took them to Iligan City, Lanao del Norte province, on to Malabang town in Lanao del Sur and back to Marawi.

Some of the participants proceeded to Cagayan de Oro City from Iligan.

Unity

According to Dr. Acram Latiph, director of the Institute of Peace and Development in Mindanao at the Mindanao State University, they are asking Congress “to act promptly and favorably” on the pending measure to postpone the regional election in 2022.

At the Senate, the proposal has been on the plenary for second reading while it is still being heard at the committee on suffrage of the House of Representatives.

Simultaneous caravans were also held in Metro Manila, in the cities of General Santos, Davao and Zamboanga, and in Sarangani province, Amella said.

“Our message is for the political leaders in the BARMM to unite behind our call to extend the transition period until 2025,” Amella told the Inquirer in a telephone interview.

The clamor stems from the necessity to provide enough room for the government and the MILF to fulfill their obligations under the signed peace agreements considering delays brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic and other bureaucratic hurdles.

“We believe that this massive support from different peoples and sectors in our society manifests our common desire for peace and development in the Bangsamoro homeland,” according to the manifesto issued by the Bangsamoro Leadership and Management Institute, League of Bangsamoro Organizations Inc., Union of Muslim Youth Organizations and the Consortium of Bangsamoro Civil Society. INQ