Cotabato City—Moving against a House bloc resolution, Bangsamoro officials have stepped up efforts to submit the Regional Expenditure Program to the national government following a meeting with President Rodrigo Duterte on Sept. 17.
Earlier, a block of Muslim lawmakers, representing the provinces comprising the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, asked the Manila government in a resolution to create a national office of the Department of Public Works and Highways to implement infrastructure programs and projects in BARMM areas.
Malacañang had set a meeting between the president and BARMM Chief Minister Murad Ebrahim, curiously the day before House Deputy Speaker and Basilan Rep. Mujiv Hataman filed Resolution No. 33 on Sept. 16.
Lawyer Naguib Sinarimbo, BARMM interior minister who accompanied Ebrahim to Malacañang, said the President signaled the need for the region to submit proposals to draw national funds and implement government programs, as provided in the region’s charter, Republic Act 11054 or the Bangsamoro Organic Law.
Sinarimbo said the meeting delved into, among others, issues of transfer of programs, projects and funds of national agencies operating in the areas of the autonomous region.
The Bangsamoro Transition Authority Parliament also passed a counter-resolution to House Bloc Resolution 33, opposing the creation of a national DPWH office to implement infrastructure projects in BARMM areas.
But Sinarimbo said he and Ebrahim were in Bangladesh on an e-governance tour when the BTA Parliament passed that counter resolution on Sept. 18.
Sinarimbo said consistent with the BOL, the President asked the Department of Budget and Management to release to BARMM funds of national programs intended to be implemented within its areas, for as long as the region had complied with required proposals on Programs, Activities and Projects spending.
“But we are glad, because that is the essence of a struggle that has kept its torch from armed battlefields to the parliament. In a democratic space, the Parliament should at times have to disagree with certain policies made at national levels on the welfare of the people,” Sinarimbo said.
Sinarimbo said he and Murad were in Bangladesh on the prospect of bringing to BARMM that country’s technology on e-governance to boost administration at the local government level.
“(Bangladesh has) a system of e-governance that we want to bring in to the BARMM, because we are coming from the same level of development. Here’s a move to make all offices do their transactions online, and that level of development did not prevent Bangladesh from going online and develop e-governance,” Sinarimbo said.
Sinarimbo was referring to Bangladesh as once a very impoverished, famine-stricken country during the Bangladesh Liberation War in the early 1970s.
Meanwhile, BARMM officials also assured Wednesday they will continue to advance the rights of Indigenous Peoples over ancestral domains in the region.
To ensure effective implementation, the region’s Ministry of Indigenous Peoples’ Affairs (MIPA) conducted an assessment and evaluation of ancestral domains in Maguindanao in an activity held Wednesday morning at the San Isidro Labrador Parish in North Upi, Maguindanao.
With the theme, “Convergence for Empowerment Towards United Indigenous People in the Bangsamoro Government,” the MIPA convened the IPs Mandatory Representatives (IPMRs), tribal leaders, project officers from different areas in Maguindanao and other stakeholders.
MIPA-BARMM Minister Melanio Ulama said his office wants to underscore the subjects on the ancestral domain as one of the underpinnings of IP rights to be included in the proposed IP Code.
Ulama said the activity “serves to clarify the duties and functions of the IPMRs and tribal council members and address some contentious issues on the Indigenous People’s Rights Act and land disputes.”
Ulama maintained that the IPs never resorted to violence or other means to advance their rights and attain peace through non-violent means.
He said the ratification of RA 11054 or the Bangsamoro Organic Law paved the way for the Bangsamoro people and the IPs to pursue ideas that would bring peace and unity in Mindanao.
In the same event, North Upi Municipal Councilor Wilfredo Ibañez called on tribal communities and the rest of the Bangsamoro to “make way for mutual trust and understanding.” With PNA
