Bangsamoro Member of Parliament (MP) Mohammad Kellie Antao has resigned from the Moro Islamic Liberation Front-led United Bangsamoro Justice Party (UBJP).
Antao did not elaborate but said he would instead support MP Butch Malang who is running for a parliament seat in his district under UBJP rival party Bangsamoro Federalists’ Party (BFP).
Earlier, Interim Chief Minister Abdulraof Macacua of the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM) also quit UBJP and filed his candidacy for the third district of Maguindanao del Norte as an independent candidate. The reason was not clear, either. But a “rift” in the MILF and BARMM leaderships is becoming imminent with differences stirred by the forthcoming elections.
Antao said over the weekend that he would not be running for the Parliament anymore but will continue backing Congress’ initiative in creating the province composed of eight municipalities created by the Parliament out of the 63 Cotabato villages that opted to join the BARMM in the plebiscite in February 2020.
Speaker Yacob and Antao thanked House Deputy Speaker Raymond Democrito Mendoza, author of HB 3299, creating a province out of the so-called Special Geographic Area (SGA) of the BARMM. The measure is also backed by Maguindanao del Norte Rep. Dimple Mastura.
Earlier Antao said members of the Bilateral Philippine Congress-Bangsamoro Parliament Legislative Forum (PCBPLF) are supporting the creation of a Moro province out of the expanded BARMM-SGA territory in Cotabato province.
Under House Bill 3299 and Senate Bill 447, a province will be created out of the eight towns of BARMM’s 63-barangay SGA, Antao said.
HB 3299 is co-authored Cotabato Gov. Emilou Talino-Mendoza, Cotabato Third District Rep. Ma. Alana Samantha Talino Santos, and Cotabato First District Rep. Edwin Cruzado.
Senate Bill 447, the counterpart of HB in the Upper Chamber, is authored by former Senate President Vicente Sotto III and Senator Sherwin Gatchalian.
“On behalf of the 115,443 SGA residents,” MP Antao said “we are deeply grateful to and thank Cotabato Governor Emmylou “Lala” Jacolo Taliño-Mendoza, as well as the members of the PCBPLF for supporting the creation of a province out of the eight predominantly Muslim towns in Cotabato Province,” Antao said.
The PCBPLF is a bilateral legislative body created by Republic Act 11054, the Bangsamoro Organic Law (BOL) as a venue of legislative consensus building on BARMM.
Otherwise, Antao said, the 115,443 SGA residents would be deprived of representation to the Philippine Congress, and would become a territory of municipalities without a provincial local government unit, and without district representation in Congress.
