Commentary: Poll results to shape fate of BBL

THE FATE of the proposed Bangsamoro Basic Law rests on any of these five presidential candidates, who took part in their first debate in Cagayan de Oro City on Feb. 21. JIGGER JERUSALEM/INQUIRER MINDANAO

Aside from generating disappointment and dismay among peace advocates, the failure of the 16th Congress to enact the proposed Bangsamoro Basic Law (BBL) has left the fate of the measure in the hands of whoever will succeed President Aquino.

The BBL spotlight is shifting from the incumbent ruler to the five candidates aspiring to succeed Mr. Aquino—Jejomar Binay, Rodrigo Duterte, Grace Poe, Mar Roxas and Miriam Defensor-Santiago.

As history has shown, how the President acts shapes the dynamics of the peace process between Moro rebels and the government.

In the case of the Moro rebellion, peace negotiations started in 1976, under the auspices of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC). It bore fruit in the form of the Tripoli Agreement on Peace of 1976 between the government and Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) that spelled out in broad strokes the formula for addressing the Moro people’s aspiration for self-rule.

Strongman Ferdinand Marcos, however, chose to implement the accord without the participation of the MNLF.

As a result, the MNLF refused to recognize so-called Regional Autonomous Governments in central and western Mindanao that the Tripoli agreement called for.

The MNLF, instead, pursued the armed path to self-governance.

The regional governments, the MNLF believed, were not consistent with self-rule and were meant only as a divide-and-rule tactic.

It took the visit of the late President Corazon Aquino to the camp of Nur Misuari in Sulu province in 1986 to re-energize the peace process with the MNLF, but excluding the then nascent Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) that broke off from the MNLF in 1977.

While embedded in the 1987 Constitution, the MNLF was unhappy with the limited powers given the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM). Then President Fidel Ramos sought to address this by opening negotiations with the MNLF that led to the 1996 Final Peace Agreement (FPA), which defined the details of the full implementation of the 1976 Tripoli pact.

While the ink on the 1996 FPA had yet to dry, Ramos also sought to open talks with the MILF that started in January 1997.

When President Joseph Estrada came to power, the peace talks were still a purely domestic affair. But after Estrada launched an all-out war in 2000, the dynamics changed. After Estrada’s ouster in 2001, it took President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s invitation to Malaysia to serve as facilitator for the MILF to return to the negotiating table.

While the negotiations took great strides under Arroyo, her stance on the controversial memorandum of agreement on ancestral domain (MOA-AD) changed the outcome of the peace process.

The MOA-AD came under attack from a largely uninformed public and was rejected by the Supreme Court.

War broke out in 2008, lasting for about a year and displacing at least 500,000 people from their homes and communities.

That Arroyo signed a declaration of continuity of the peace process was a consolation.

The hands-on involvement of President Aquino can be credited for the new heights that the peace process has reached.

His meeting with MILF chief Murad Ebrahim in Tokyo in 2011 was unprecedented and set the tone for the success of the negotiations that led to the signing of the Comprehensive Agreement on the Bangsamoro (CAB).

The second Aquino administration, through tripartite efforts, was able to merge peace processes with the MILF and the MNLF in the proposed BBL.

Had it become a law, the BBL would have set into motion major portions of the CAB that took 17 years to hammer out and sought to address the Moro people’s aspirations for self-determination.

The CAB embodies the government commitment to provide the Moro people with a meaningful autonomy setup with broader powers.

This should lead to the MILF decommissioning its armed wing to fulfill its commitment to end the armed rebellion against the Philippine state and be transformed into a democratic political force.

But while Mr. Aquino succeeded in forging peace with Moro rebels, he failed to muster enough political support in Congress for the BBL. It raised doubts over the President’s influence in Congress, but imagine if Mr. Aquino did not go all out for the BBL.

The first presidential debate on Feb. 21 in Cagayan de Oro City was a good opportunity to take a peek into the thinking of presidential aspirants on the BBL.

Unfortunately, only Senator Poe and Davao City Mayor Duterte had the chance to tackle the question. Hence, a review of the public pronouncements of Vice President Binay, Senator Santiago and former Interior Secretary Roxas on the subject is necessary.

But so far, these are the positions of the candidates on BBL:

Binay had only praises for the signing of the CAB in 2014, saying this ushered in peace and progress for Mindanao. Amid the beating the BBL took after the Mamasapano tragedy in January last year, he still defended the measure. But by September, he endorsed the Basic Law for the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region (BLBAR) crafted by Sen. Ferdinand Marcos Jr. that peace advocates criticized for shortchanging the Moro people.

In a report on public hearings her committee held on the draft BBL, Santiago lashed at the measure for supposedly being unconstitutional although she never offered a way to make the provisions conform to the 1987 Constitution.

Duterte is consistent in his position that the only solution to the Moro conflict is a federal form of government. Duterte talked about dissipating central powers as a way of addressing the disparity in the allocation of resources and political powers to the regions. Duterte said he would call for a constitutional convention to rewrite the country’s Charter to reflect this change in the design of government. He added that, in defining the powers of the state, BBL would already be a given, although he said the Bangsamoro state would “definitely get more than what is provided in the draft measure.”

Poe has expressed reservations on the CAB and the BBL long before she ran for President. In her report on the Senate investigation of the Mamasapano debacle, Poe chided government peace negotiators for a “wanton excess of optimism” over the BBL. During the Feb. 21 debate, she also said she wanted “transparent, inclusive and sustainable negotiations and agreement” with Moro rebels. She emphasized the need for “a new agreement” that would include all stakeholders.

Roxas has always emphasized that if elected President, he would continue aiming to reach the goals of Mr. Aquino. Roxas, however, has had a brush with the Moro quest for self-rule in the past when he played a prominent role in opposing the controversial MOA-AD.