Comelec Chair George Garcia COMELEC
MANILA, Philippines — The Commission of Elections (Comelec) has extended for another two months the deadline for accreditation of political parties that will participate in the historic parliamentary elections in the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM) in May next year.
Comelec Chair George Garcia said the deadline for accreditation had been moved to June 30 even as he called on the regional political parties to get accredited now that the implementing rules and regulations (IRR) of the Bangsamoro Electoral Code had been published.
No regional political party had been accredited by Comelec for the parliamentary election as the deadline for accreditation ended on April 30, Garcia said.
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He said that regional political parties without Comelec accreditation would not be allowed to participate in the first Bangsamoro parliamentary election.
Even the United Bangsamoro Justice Party (UBJP), the political party of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) whose leaders govern the BARMM, has yet to get Comelec accreditation for next year’s polls.
“The UBJP is accredited as a regional political party but it is not yet accredited for purposes of the parliamentary election. They (party members) still have to file a petition (for accreditation),” Garcia said at the sidelines of the National Investigative Journalism Conference 2024 organized by the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism in Quezon City, where he was among the resource persons.
Up for grabs in next year’s Bangsamoro parliamentary election are 40 seats for the political party system, 32 single-member parliamentary districts and eight sectoral representatives.
The election will be held simultaneously with the country’s midterm elections in May.
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Political players
On April 17, the Comelec promulgated the IRR of the Bangsamoro Autonomy Act No. 35 (Bangsamoro Electoral Code).
Rule II Section 1 of the IRR states that a regional political party shall be established by at least 10,000 members who are residents and registered voters in the BARMM. “The members shall be distributed throughout the different provinces, cities and municipalities comprising the Bangsamoro territory,” it says.
In March, the Westminster Foundation for Democracy-Philippines gathered political parties in the BARMM in a forum in Davao City dubbed “Defending Election Integrity in the BARMM.”
Aside from UBJP, the other political parties in the forum included the Bangsamoro People’s Party (BPP) led by Basilan Rep. Mujiv Hataman; Bangsamoro Party affiliated with the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF)-Muslimin Sema faction; Rayyat Development Party headed by lawyer Jose Lorena, a parliament member of the Bangsamoro Transition Authority (BTA); Indigenous Peoples Democratic Party headed by BTA parliament member Froilyn Mendoza; and Al-Ittihad Mindanawe Darussalam-Ungaya Ku Kawagibu (UKB) Bangsamoro headed by Suharto “Teng” Mangudadatu, a former Sultan Kudarat governor now serving as director general of the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority.
Also present were Serbisyong Inklusibo-Alyansang Progresibo (Siap), a political party founded by Lanao del Sur Gov. Mamintal Adiong Jr.; and Mahardika, a political party associated with the MNLF-Nur Misuari faction.
In the previous week, Adiong’s Siap announced its coalition with Mangudadatu’s Al-Ittihad-UKB, Hataman’s BPP and the Salam Party of Sulu Gov. Sakur Tan.