A partylist lawmaker from Mindanao has opposed the proposals to postpone the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao (Barmm) elections.
Kusug Tausug Partylist Rep. Shernee Tan-Tambut, in a news statement, said postponing the elections will only cover the Bangsamoro Transition Authority’s (BTA) “inadequate performance. “
Tan-Tambut said she intends to introduce an amendment to all five bills postponing the Barmm elections to the effect that the postponement be submitted to Barmm voters in a referendum, like the Bangsamoro Organic Law plebiscite.
Currently, five bills calling for the postponement of BARMM elections to 2025 have been filed in the House upon the urging of the BTA. RA 11054, or BOL , which created the Barmm out of the former Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao plus some cities and barangays contiguous to the ARMM’s area, mandated the BTA, under Article XVI, Section 2, to serve as “the interim government in the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region during the transition period.”
Sections 1 and 12 of the same article provide that the transition period shall end upon the dissolution of the BTA, which is immediate after the Barmm election and qualification of the chief minister under the First Parliament. The BOL also mandated the holding of the first regular election for the Bangsamoro Government to be synchronized with the 2022 national elections (Article XVI, Section 13).
The BTA is requesting postponement of the BARMM elections to 2025 because “based on our analysis and the experiences and challenges we had, we see that in 2022, we will not complete the implementation of both the political aspect and the normalization aspect of the agreement.”
Tan-Tambut warned that postponing the said elections may be the first step for BTA members to perpetuate themselves in power.
“It would be arrogant to say that only the MILF (Moro Islamic Liberation Front) can function and perform the unfinished tasks. You (the BTA) were given ample time to do everything that you needed to do…. and yet, you did not perform. So that’s your fault,” said Tan-Tambut during her interpellation of BTA Chairman Ebrahim Murad at the joint Zoom committee meeting of the House of Representatives’ Suffrage and Electoral Reforms, Muslim Affairs and Peace, Reconciliation and Unity committees.
“If we will allow the extension of BTA Barmm because BTA was not able to finish their tasks, who knows – they might just delay and delay and use their lack of performance as an excuse so as not to hold elections,” she added.
Giving examples of tasks that the BTA still had to do, Murad said that the comprehensive and direct relief of the Block Grant is not yet being implemented, and that there are around 14 items in the political track and 16 items in the normalization track, including the decommissioning of 228,000 MILF combatants, that are not yet operationalized.
In past news releases, the BTA officials have said that of the five Codes the BOL mandated the BTA to enact, only one, the Administrative Code, has been enacted, and that the authority’s performance has been greatly hampered by the pandemic.
Tan-Tambut also told the BTA not to use the pandemic as an excuse for poor performance because other officials like the members of the House of Representatives and President Duterte himself continue to perform their duties despite the present health crisis.
The Barmm was created through President Duterte’s signing of Republic Act 11054, or BOL, in 2018. On January 21, 2019, the first of the two-part plebiscite for the ratification of the BOL was held. The second plebiscite was held on February 6, 2019.