GENERAL SANTOS CITY — This is the continuation of the previous Comment: “Why Postpone the ARMM Election?” The change of the title is in anticipation that Congress cannot pass the necessary law to postpone the election due to the lack of time or the opposition of the Senate. In fact, by the latest report, House leaders are about to concede the proposal is dead (The Philippine Star, July 31).

However, whatever happens to the election, the primary issue is: Which is the stumbling block: the election or the ARMM? With this as the primary issue, the two propositions under the first title become subsidiary issues and discussing them will resolve the primary isuue.

Hence,
Is the August 11 ARMM election a stumbling block to the peace process? Will postponing it hasten the peace process? These are fallacies.

As proposed in House Bill No. 4832, filed last July 24, the election will be postponed to the second Monday of May 2010 to coincide with the national elections. The implications are inconsistent with the rationale of the postponement.

The resolution of the primary issue will rest on the fallacies of the first proposition and on the implication of the second.

Peace Process

The peace process in question envisions the entrenchment of the Bangsamoro Juridical Entity which is more autonomous in terms of shared sovereignty, territory and resources than the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao created under RA 6734 as amended by RA 9054 which embodies the 1996 GRP-MNLF Final Peace Agreement. Towards the end of the process the ARMM will be absorbed by the BJE.

The GRP and the MILF – after reconciling last July 26 their differences that imperiled the process last July 24 — will formally sign on August 5 the Memorandum of Agreement on Ancestral Domain, the last of the 3-aspect negotiation agenda under the June 22, 2001 Tripoli Agreement. This is not the end of the process. The ARMM and its elections have posed no problems to this 7-year phase of the process.

The 712 predominantly Muslim villages and geographical areas considered in the MOA-AD to be added to the ARMM, the core territory of the BJE, will hold a plebiscite in August 2009 for the inhabitants to approve or reject their incorporation with the BJE (MindaNews, July 29). Expect problems or stumbling blocks unrelated to the ARMM and its elections – minor they may be – to mar the process.

Within 15 months from August 5, 2008 or by November 5, 2009, the GRP and the MILF have agreed to complete their negotiation on the comprehensive compact. This will be the final agreement embodying all the MOAs and communiqués pertaining to the three aspects of the June 22, 2001 Tripoli Agreement and the political settlement that will still be negotiated.

Negotiation on political settlement will be contentious. This will involve inter-governmental relations between the BJE and the Central Government and transitional mechanisms to fully and stably entrench the BJE. Looking at the MILF proposals, the haggling will tread on legal, administrative and, perhaps, constitutional issues.

The peace process will not be trouble-free after August 5. So said MILF panel chair Mohagher Iqbal: “The challenges after the signing of the MOA-AD are of greater magnitude. The hardest task ahead is implementing the would-be agreement by its letters and spirit (www.luwaran.com, July 29).”

Fallacious

That the peace process under the Arroyo government has gone through seven years without the postponement of any of the ARMM elections and that the MOA-AD was initialed and scheduled to be signed on August 5 before the August 11 election could be postponed prove the fallacy of the first proposition. Obviously, the two panels did not factor in the postponement of the election when they agreed to negotiate the comprehensive compact within 15 months after signing the MOA-AD.

Then Iqbal said it categorically: “The scheduled signing of the MOA-AD and the political exercise in the ARMM are two separate events. … so the signing on August 5 will proceed even with the election not being postponed (The Philippine Star, July 31).” And while he did not say it, the negotiation of the comprehensive compact will proceed after August 5 as agreed regardless of what happens to the ARMM election.

Then, to digress, why in the first place did the MILF ask for the postponement of the ARMM August 11 election? The Star cited Iqbal as having said that the MILF does not recognize the autonomous region as the solution to the Bangsamoro problem. The request could be mistaken as an implicit recognition.

Implications

What is the justification of the first proposition?

Peace Process Adviser Hermogenes Esperon cited the MILF, MNLF and local (ARMM) officials (The Philippine Star, July 23):

If the elections were held as scheduled, the elected ARMM officials will get a three-year term; if postponed, they will stay in office in holdover capacity until the election are held after the signing of the final agreement with the MILF after which the elections will be held according to the provisions of the final peace agreement with the MILF.

Such is the essence of House Bill No. 4832, filed last July 24, to postpone the ARMM elections to the second Monday of May 2010 to coincide with the national elections. Under Article VII, Section 7(1) of RA 9054, “the incumbent elective (ARMM) officials shall continue in office until their successors are elected and qualified (sic)”.

The implications of the second proposition as concretely proposed in HB 4832 are: (1) The ARMM will continue to exist even after the signing of the GRP-MILF Comprehensive Compact in November 2009. (2) The present elective officials, guaranteed by law in their hold-over capacity until the May 2010 national elections, will be unaffected by the BJE elections.

Why Bother?

Why bother then with the two propositions if Congress cannot pass a law postponing the August 11 ARMM elections which anyway, according to Iqbal, has no bearing on the signing of the MOA-AD and, impliedly, on the scheduling of the 15-month comprehensive compact negotiation after August 5?

No! It’s not the elections – postponed or not – that are bothersome but the apparent thinking behind the propositions and HB 4832. The MILF seems oblivious of the fact that the ARMM will not be abolished by the mere signing of the comprehensive compact. The MNLF and the local ARMM elective officials appear to support the peace process but they know that the ARMM is not easy to abolish and their tenure is guaranteed by law with or without election.

Three of the filers of HB 4832 autonomous region officials: Rep. Simeon A. Datumanong of Maguindanao, from 1975 as Regional Commissioner XII until 1982 as chairman of the Regional Autonomous Government XII that succeeded the ORC. Reps. Faysah Dumarpa and Pangalian Balindong, both of Lanao del Sur, were members of the ARMM Regional Legislative Assembly.

Together with two other filers, Party List Rep. Mujiv Hataman and Sulu Rep. Abdulmunir Arbison, they implied in their bill their inclination to let the ARMM continue, oblivious of its implication on the peace process. Could their thinking be the thinking of Congress? If so, Iqbal’s foreboding of “challenges of greater magnitude” ahead is not misplaced.

The reality is: the August 11 elections are not the stumbling block but the ARMM – the political institution, not the area of the autonomy – and more. We will discuss this in the next Comment.

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