Senate panel to resume BBL deliberations on April 13

MANILA, Philippines — After suspending  the hearings on the  proposed Bangsamoro Basic Law  (BBL) following the January 25 Mamasapano incident,  the Senate  committee on local government   is now ready to  resume its  deliberations  on April 13, 2015.

“I have scheduled the  hearing  April 13 to specifically  look at the ceasefire mechanisms in case of  encounters like what happened in Mamasapano,”  the  committee chairman, Senator Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos  Jr., said in a press conference on Monday.

Marcos noted  that   during the Mamasapano incident  where 44 elite policemen were killed,  the ceasefire  between the government and the  Moro Islamic Liberation  Front  (MILF)  took effect only after 11 hours.

“That’s eleven hours.  I really  want  to reduce that 11 hours, if that happens again,   to 11 minutes,” he said.

“But to proceed on that hearing on that subject, I really need to see the MILF report , which they mysteriously sent to Malaysia instead of the Philippines. Up until now I could not understand,” the senator added.

He was referring to the  MILF report  on its  own  investigation on the  incident, which   it sent to Malaysia, facilitator of the peace talks between the  Philippine government and the Moro rebels.

“There’s no point on  my having a hearing if we don’t know what happened to the MILF side…We can’t  find out what went wrong if there’s no MILF report…” said Marcos.

“I don’t see a good reason why they won’t  give  it  to  us…? I don’t know what the reasons  are behind,” he  further said.

Marcos  said he would write the   Office of the  Presidential Adviser on the Peace Process, the Department of   Justice, the MILF and the Malaysian  team to get a copy of the said report.

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