Saying they are essential to Bangsamoro, Senate Majority Leader Juan Miguel Zubiri defended on Monday the anti-political dynasty provision and the enumeration of the powers of the Bangsamoro under the Senate’s version of the Bangsamoro Basic Law.
Zubiri, chairman of the upper chamber’s subcommittee on the BBL, said the issues on political dynasties has long been a problem in Mindanao so he put a provision that prohibits political families within second degree of consanguinity in the Bangsamoro parliament.
He said this would ensure that not only one family would sit in the Bangsamoro parliament.
Under the Senate version, he said, they also removed the provision stating that the Bangsamoro has reserve concurrent and exclusive powers in a bid to make the BBL organic Act simple.
The Senate version prohibits a party representative from being related within the second civil degree of consanguinity or affinity to a district representative or another party representative in the same Parliament. There is no counterpart provision in the House version.
He noted that all powers that are not stated in their proposed BBL would automatically be exclusive to the national government.
He likewise renewed his earlier statement that their version would “pass the test of constitutionality in the Supreme Court” and that the Congress would finish crafting a unified version of the BBL in time for its ratification and signing into law on July 23.
Last Wednesday, the House overwhelmingly approved on final reading House Bill 6475 or the chamber’s version of the BBL. Senate also did the same with Senate Bill 1717.
Representatives of the Senate and the House are set to meet on July 9 to 13 in a bicameral conference to craft a unified version of the BBL which seeks to abolish the ARMM and establish a new Bangsamoro government.
Senate Minority Leader Franklin Drilon, meanwhile, identified significant differences between the Senate and the House of Representative’s versions of the Bangsamoro Basic Law.
He said the Senate’s version maintains the 39 municipalities in North Cotabato as part of the territorial jurisdisction of the Bangsamoro, which will replace the current Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, once the bill is signed into law and ratified in a plenary.
The House’s version, on the other hand, deletes the 39 municipalities as part of the core areas that comprise the Bangsamoro.
Drilon said this could be a sticky point that both chambers should be able to smooth out when it goes to the bicameral conference committee for reconciliation.
The minority leader proposed various amendments to the Senate version “in order make sure that the measure will not suffer the same fate as the Memorandum of Agreement on the Ancestral Domain (MOA-AD).”
Drilon proposed changes to the powers of the Bangsamoro government, which the Senate adopted, deleting provisions pertaining to the reserved, concurrent and exclusive powers of the Bangsamo government and removing the powers to conduct inquiries in aid of legislation and subpoena powers of the Parliament.
The House, meanwhile, retained the provisions on reserved, concurrent and exclusive powers.
In the House version, the province of Palawan is included in the list of areas considered as historically part of Bangsamoro territory. The Senate, however, removed the reference to Palawan.
The Senate also added a provision stating that the Bangsamoro People are citizens of the Philippines pursuant to Article IV of the Constitution, an amendment pushed by Drilon.
The said provision is absent in the House version. Drilon also believes that the Senate and the House will have to work hard to reconcile their differences pertaining to the share in national government taxes collected in the Bangsamoro, other than tariff and customs duties.
The House proposed 25% share for national government and 75% for Bangsamoro, while the Senate version wanted a 50-50 sharing.
Drilon sees this as among the contentious issues that both chambers should be able to iron out.
Also among the sticky issues, Drilon added, is the prohibition on political dynasties, which is highly opposed by the Bangsamoro Transition Commission (BTC).
Also, the Senate version prohibits a party representative from being related within the second civil degree of consanguinity or affinity to a District Representative or another Party Representative in the same Parliament. There is no counterpart provision in the House version.
The Senate also provided a qualification on the block grant which states that when national government incurs an unmanageable public sector deficit, the President of the Philippines is authorized, upon the recommendation of the DOF and DBM secretaries to make the necessary adjustments in the block grant. The House version does not contain such a provision.
The Senate version also contains a provision preventing the Bangsamoro Parliament to include the procurement of firearms, ammunition and explosives in its annual appropriations law. The House version does not contain such a provision.
The Senate and the House also differ in the establishment of the Bangsamoro police. The Senate proposed detailed provisions on the Bangsamoro Regional Police, including that a regional director should be selected by the Chief Minister from a list of nominees submitted by the PNP Senior Officers Placement and Promotion Board and approved by PNP Chief, confirmed by the National Police Commission (Napolcom).
In the House version, it is the Secretary of the Department of the Interior and Local Government who will appoint the regional director.
The Senate, meanwhile, proposes that a Chief Minister should sit as ex-officio commissioner of the Napolcom on Bangsamoro Police matters. This provision is absent in the House version.
The Senate also removed a provision for the creation of Shari’ah Judicial and Bar Council (JBC), which will recommend nominees to the Shari’ah Courts. The House retained such provision.
Zubiri, however, expressed confidence that the differences in the versions of the Senate and the House of Representatives of the proposed Bangsamoro Basic Law will be resolved before the President’s State of the Nation Address in July.
Zubiri said there will be a pre-bicameral conference committee meeting before they formally convene on July 9 up to 13.
“Nag-usap na kami ni Majority Leader Rudy Fariñas of the House of Representatives. We will have a pre-bicam muna. We will discuss the talking points at medyo controversial issues,” he said in a television interview.
“And then nag-set na kami ng date—July 9 to 13 ang bicam. Hopefully mapasa namin diyan at kapag naipasa namin, we are confident by July 23 ay magkakaroon ng ratification,” he added.
The Senate starts its third regular session on July 23.
Aside from Zubiri, other members of the Senate side include Drilon, Senators Aquilino Pimentel III, Juan Edgardo Angara, Sherwin Gatchalian, Joel Villanueva, Francis Escudero, Francis Pangilinan, Risa Hontiveros, and Loren Legarda.
The House contingent includes Fariñas, Representatives Pedro Acharonb Jr., Mauyag Papandayan Jr., Ruby Sahali, Bai Sandra Sema, Juan Pablo Bondoc, Arthur Defensor Jr., Johnny Pimentel, Eugene Michael de Vera, Rodolfo Albano III, Amihilda Sangcopan, Wilter Palma II, Celso Lobregat, Mohamad Khalid Dimaporo, Abdullah Dimaporo, Romeo Acop, Seth Frederick Jalosjos, and Shernee Abubakar Tan.
“Ang kagandahan nito, by July 23 ma-announce ng Pangulo na tapos na ang BBL which is the government’s promise for the peace process. Ito na lang ang last na hakbang para magkaroon ng demilitarization, decommissioning of the MILF (Moro Islamic Liberation Front) para sa pangmatagalang kapayapaan doon sa aming area sa Mindanao,” Zubiri said.
Bangsamoro Transition Commission chairman Mohagher Iqbal had expressed hope that a better BBL would emerge after the Senate and House reconcile their versions of the bill.
“I think, [i]n part, we would like to see a situation wherein the best of the House and the best of the version of the Senate would be the one that the Congress would adopt,” Zubiri said.
But he admitted that the BBL version the Senate has approved was quite far from what the BTC had submitted.
“But we are hoping that [in the end] it will be basically faithful to the Comprehensive Agreement to the Bangsamoro deal signed by the government and MILF. There are areas that are somewhat quite far from (our version),” he said.
The Senate brought down the block grant from the proposed 6 percent to 5 percent of the Internal Revenue Allotment and net collection of the Bureau of Customs while the Special Development Fund was brought down from the proposed P10 billion annually for 10 years to P5 billion a year for 10 years.
The Senate also voted to hold only one plebiscite and deleted the proposed periodic plebiscites to be held repeatedly every five years for 15 years.
