THE enactment of the Bangsamoro Organic Law last week offers the hope that we can finally achieve lasting peace in Mindanao and realize all the social and economic dividends such a peace will bring to the troubled south.
After a brief delay as a result of a power shift in the House of Representatives, President Rodrigo Duterte signed the BOL into law Thursday night.
The law establishes the Bangsamoro region to replace the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, and end decades of fighting that have claimed more than 120,000 lives.
The new law will grant Bangsamoro its own parliament, a guaranteed 5-percent share of the national internal revenue, the right to impose sharia law on Muslim residents, and a 75-percent take of taxes collected in the area. Security and law and order, however, will remain in the hands of the national government.
The law must still be ratified in a plebiscite later this year, but the estimated five-million people in the region are expected to vote for it, paving the way for a transition authority to take charge until elections in 2022.
The significance of the new law has not been lost on the international community, which has supported peace efforts in Mindanao.
United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called the law “a landmark achievement on the road to lasting peace in the southern Philippines.”
In a statement, he congratulated the negotiators and all parties that contributed to the passage of the law.
“The United Nations will continue to support the Philippines in the implementation of the law, and to help build the capacity of the Bangsamoro Transition Authority as an effective conduit for peace, democratic governance, and human rights,” the secretary general said.
A spokeperson for the European Union, Maja Kocijancic, said the passage of the BOL was “an opportunity for the Filipino people to embrace peace and stability after decades of strife.”
“It comes after 21 years of formal talks after the first ceasefire agreement between the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front. It underlines both parties’ commitment to peace and their ability to tackle a variety of complex matters through a comprehensive and inclusive law,” Kocijancic said.
She added that the European Union remained a “staunch supporter of the Mindanao peace process” and was prepared to support the implementation of the Bangsamoro law for “long-lasting peace, development and prosperity in Mindanao and for the Filipino people.”
There is much more work that needs to be done, however, and the chosen leaders of the new Bangsamoro region must carry out their sacred duty to put the needs of their people ahead of politics. Our national leaders, too, must not waver at the first sign of difficulties that are bound to surface.
The President himself referred to such difficulties in his third State of the Nation Address last week.
“We will need loads of understanding and patience to endure and overcome the birth pangs or pains of the new beginning,” he said. “To me, war is not an option. We have been through the catastrophe in Marawi. We have seen the horror, the devastation, and the human toll and the displacement of both Christians and Muslims alike…. We owe it to our fallen soldiers and police officers in Marawi and elsewhere to put an end to the bloodshed and seek the path of true peace—a peace that will last beyond this lifetime, and whose dividends our children will reap.”
The road ahead will not be easy, but a commitment to this vision is reason enough for hope.