THE fat lady has sung for the proposed Basic Law on the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region (BLBar) as it’s now considered dead at the House of Representatives.
Deputy Speaker and Liberal Party Rep. Pangalian M. Balindong of Lanao del Sur said in a privilege speech late Wednesday: “With heavy heart and a disturbing sense of foreboding, I close the book of hope for the passage of the [BLBar].”
“I hate to admit that this House of Representatives has collectively failed the Bangsamoro people. Fifty-one public hearings, 200 hours of committee level debates and eight months of consultations are all put to waste—thrown into the abyss of uncertainty and darkness,” Balindong said. “This is the lowest and saddest day of my legislative work.”
Balindong delivered his speech before the leadership of the lower chamber admitted on Thursday the measure can no longer be passed by the 16th Congress.
Balindong, Speaker Feliciano Belmonte Jr., and House National Defense and Security Chairman and Liberal Party Rep. Rodolfo Biazon of Muntinlupa blamed lack of time as reason.
Based on the legislative calendar, Congress will adjourn on February 5 as part of its preparation for the national and local elections in May.
Belmonte said, “Balindong has other angles, but no question that it [BLBar] won’t become a law even if we pass our version.”
“The Senate has not been acting on it,” Belmonte added.
Balindong said the lawmakers’ failure to pass the measure is a “perfect recipe for radicalization” in Mindanao.
“As a Moro elder who has lived through decades of war and conflict, I have never been afraid of the future of my people than I am today,” he said, adding the inability of the Lower House to pass the BLBar “is a disaster that extremists can easily exploit.”
Balindong warned that scenario should not be “simply dismissed it as a form of threat.”
“We take away the hopes of millions of people in the Bangsamoro. By the sheer tyranny of the majority, we have foreclosed all possible peaceful, legal and constitutional avenues for peace,” he added.
Balindong said, “no matter how lawmakers debate on the justness of the Bangsamoro cause, stand to legal reasoning and shout for the constitutionally guaranteed right to genuine political autonomy,” the reality is that there are only 10 Moro legislators against the more than 280 members of this house.”
The BLBar, which aims to create the new Bangsamoro juridical entity replacing the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, is currently under plenary deliberations at the House of Representatives. Originally titled Bangsamoro basic law (BBL), it is now referred to as the BLBar.
“We are only 10 lone voices in the wilderness of bias, prejudice and hatred.”
He told lawmakers he doesn’t know what he should “tell my people when I go back to my homeland?”
“How can I explain to them why we failed to pass the BBL? How can I convince my people to remain steadfast to peace without the BBL?”
Congress has been under intense pressure to approve the BLBar following the killing of 44 members of Philippine National Police-Special Action Force (PNP-SAF) in January last year in Mamasapano, Maguindanao.
The slain PNP-SAF were involved in a police operation to serve warrants of arrest on Basit Usman and Zulkifli Bin Hir, alias “Marwan,” both with alleged links to the terrorist group Jemaah Islamiyah. “With one tragic and unexpected event not of our own making—the Mamasapano ‘mis-encounter’ has labeled us again as terrorists, extremists, enemies, traitors and murderers,” Balindong said. “I have personally witnessed and heard the bashing and lashing against the Moros not only over the media but right in this hall of Congress.”
Balindong said the incident in Mamasapano led “many of those who supported the BLBar [to] wittingly or unwittingly punished the Moro people by denying us of the required votes and even the quorum to deliberate on the [BLBar].”
Aside from the Mamasapano incident’s impact, lawmakers are also opposing an opt-in provision in the BLBar that allows neighboring territories to propose their inclusion in the proposed autonomous region through a petition of at least 10 percent of the residents and approval by a majority of qualified voters in the city or province in a separate plebiscite.
For his part, Biazon said the administration should not force the passage of the “effectively dead” BLBar this 16th Congress.
“It may pass the House of Representative, but will it pass the Senate within three days? Will it be signed by the President into law? So BBL is dead. That’s the reason I think the next president, whoever he or she may be, will have to answer to the question: What will you do when you get elected to be president?” he said.
Biazon believes the next president must revive the BLBar.
“If it is going to be revived, he or she must learn from the experience of this administration on the issue of constitutionality and acceptability by all sectors.”