House panel resumes BBL hearings, tackles unconstitutional security provisions

THE House of Representatives resumed its hearing on the proposed Bangsamoro basic law (BBL) on Monday, this time over the security and defense provisions that may be deemed unconstitutional.

During the ad hoc Bangsamoro committee hearing, lawmakers grilled defense, interior and local government and police officials over the provisions that require the President to coordinate military operations with the Bangsamoro chief minister and that will empower the chief minister to have operational control over the Bangsamoro police.

The chamber suspended the BBL hearings last February in the aftermath of the Jan. 25 Mamasapano incident, which succeeded in killing international terrorist Marwan at the cost of  the lives of 44 elite policemen and 18 Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) who were engaged in a 12-hour gunbattle, and five civilians who were caught in the crossfire.

The chamber suspended its hearings then pending the official results of the investigations. The botched operation put into doubt the entire peace process with the MILF, the main benefactor in the BBL that seeks to implement the peace deal and create another Bangsamoro entity.

Zamboanga City Rep. Celso Lobregat pointed out the provision in the bill that requires the central government and the Bangsamoro to coordinate, especially in terms of the movement of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) in the Bangsamoro region.

He said the Constitution grants the President the sole power in the command control of the AFP.

“If you put this in the law, you are tying now the movement of the AFP,” Lobregat said.

He also said the reserved powers of the central government according to the bill are limited to defense and external security, but it does not involve internal security.

This goes against the Constitution and another provision in the bill that said all matters of defense and security would be the responsibility of the central government.

“How can you support the passage of the BBL when you are limited knowingly to defense and external? How about internal security? Papayag kayo na external security lang?” Lobregat said.

Defense Undersecretary Pio Lorenzo Batino said the coordination with the Bangsamoro is general and not on specific operations, and that the bill complies with the Constitution that all matters of defense and security were under the responsibility of the central government.

But Lobregat found it bothering that Batino’s statement was based on his own interpretation of the bill.

“That is what we’re trying to avoid. We want to make it very clear that there are no misinterpretations,” Lobregat said.

Cagayan De Oro Rep. Rufus Rodriguez, who chairs the Bangsamoro committee, asked Batino if he thinks the provisions were unconstitutional.

He said such a provision that require government to coordinate with the Bangsamoro government seemed akin to the demands by the MILF that the government should coordinate with them to avoid another Mamasapano incident, or the botched “Oplan Exodus” in Mamasapano, Maguindanao that was marred due to lack of coordination with the MILF about the operation.

“How can you reconcile the constitutional provision that it shall be the responsibility of the national government and that you do not need coordination and protocols or permission for the deployment or mission, just like what the MILF demanded in the ceasefire and caused the deaths of 44 police men?” Rodriguez asked.

“There is a need to harmonize these provisions and we manifest our complete trust in the honorable committee,” Batino replied.

Lobregat also pointed out the provisions that grant the Bangsamoro chief minister operational control over the Bangsamoro police, when under existing laws only the mayors have operational control over them.

“Why are we taking out the operational control from the mayors… and giving it to the Chief Minister? Is this not giving so much power to the Chief Minister?” Lobregat asked.

Peter Irving Corvera, Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) Undersecretary for Public Safety, acknowledged that such a provision steer away from the usual practice of operational control practiced by local government units (LGUs) over the police.

“We admit that this is a divergence from what is existing in terms of the relationship (between police and LGUs)… I believe this is because of the peculiarity of the Bangsamoro as compared to the other LGUs… I can just speculate on that,” Corvera said.

Meanwhile, Police Senior Superintendent Cesar Hawthorne Binag, representing the Philippine National Police (PNP), told lawmakers that the bill is silent on the relationship between the PNP and the Bangsamoro police.

“The bill does not recognize the internal movement, deployment and placement and utilization of powers of the chief PNP,” Binag said.

Peace panel member Senen Bacani admitted that the law has some “imperfections” but maintained that the bill complies with the constitutional provisions on operational control of the police and the President’s sole control of the military.

“We have never said it is a perfect document. It has imperfections… We leave (that) now to the wisdom of the organization,” Bacani said. AC