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Sulu 1st District Rep. Habib Tupay Loong said “we cannot allow war to prevail as an option for the government and the Bangsamoro people to settle their conflict as it will only bring death and destruction to the nation and will only divide the people of Mindanao.”
But Loong said he cannot stop the Bangsamoro people if they opt to traverse the dangerous and destructive path of war to preserve their religion, protect themselves, and recover their ancestral homeland after Congress failed to pass the proposed Bangsamoro Basic Law (BBL).
The congressman from Sulu expressed hope that the Bangsamoro will not opt to return to the battlefield and start a shooting war to pursue their aspirations.
In a privileged speech he delivered at the Lower House last Monday, Rep Loong said the Bangsamoro people went to war more than 43 years ago to liberate themselves from internal colonization, injustices, and discrimination.
He said the moros are ready to die for the cause of their people, their faith, and their homeland, because to them such death is a blessed one, according to Islamic teachings.
Loong stressed that Islam is a religion of peace, the reason the Bangsamoro people sincerely accepted the challenge to negotiate and enter into peace agreement with the Philippine government which ended in failure.
He said Congress failed to pass the BBL because of differences in belief among members of the House of Representatives.
But Loong emphasized that he was sure, each one of them (congressmen), has the best interest of the nation in their heart but in spite of their best intention, they cannot reconcile their differences of belief.
According to Rep. Loong, most congressmen failed to provide the legislative support necessary to finally end the Bangsamoro secession problem and bring peace and unity in Mindanao.
Loong added that government cannot continue to stretch and exhaust the patience of the “oppressed people to wait and hope” because waiting and hoping have their “ultimate time limits.”
As former rebel leader of the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF), which has reconciled with the Philippine government, he believes that the “Bangsamoro problem is not a constitutional problem, but a political problem which should be solved politically.”
Loong claimed that after all efforts have been exerted, the BBL failed to pass at the Lower House.
“I am sad that, after more than 17 years of arduous negotiation between the Philippine government and the MILF, the BBL, as an instrument of peace, congressmen failed to pass it,” he said.
Loong said the passage of BBL was also adversely affected the unfortunate Mamasapano incident on January 25, 2015.
On that fateful day, Loong said, 44 commandos of the PNP Special Action Force were killed during the misencounter with the elements of the MILF, Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters (BIFF), and armed civilians in Mamasapano, Maguindanao.
The PNP-SAF commandos were on a secret mission on that day to arrest or neutralize wanted Malaysian terrorist and bomb-maker Zulkifli Abdhir, alias Marwan.
The unfortunate incident led some congressmen to believe that MILF cannot be trusted as partner in fostering peace, Loong said. The Mamasapano incident adversely affected the views and opinions of the legislators that eventually led to the non-passage of the BBL.
With the failure of the 16th Congress to pass the BBL, Senate President Franklin Drilon said whoever wins in the May, 2016 elections should give priority to the stalled discussions on the proposed law and eventually pass the measure that would ensure long-term peace in Mindanao.
“I would urge whoever is elected President – and I think it makes a lot of sense for him or her – to pursue this peace process and bring it to conclusion,” Drilon said in an interview over ANC Headstart.
Drilon said the Aquino administration has come to terms it is already impossible to pass the measure given the tight deadline of the 16th Congress and preparations for the upcoming May 2016 elections is already underway.
Nevertheless, the measure can still be re-filed without having to go through the whole bill again.
“It can be re-filed, and all the expert opinion, all the testimonies of the resource persons, need not be taken again, it can be incorporated in the present law,” the Senate leader said.
Asked if the failure of President Aquino’s pet bill to be passed into law would have any adverse effect in his legacy since it failed to pass under his watch, he said “yes and no.”
“Yes, in the sense that he was not able to complete the structure. No, in the sense that he was able to come up with the Comprehensive Agreement on the Bangsamoro, which, by the way, can be pursued,” Drilon pointed out.
“It is not as if the peace process died with the President. He has set the framework, we have the Comprehensive Framework on the Bangsamoro , there are the steps that outline one of them being the passage of the BBL, the change in the form of government to fit the Muslim region. It’s unfortunate that it did not pass, the President really pushed for it but as I have said in previous interviews, the stars did not align for the passage of this bill,” he said.
“The reality is that Sen. (Juan Ponce) Enrile had a thick file of questions to ask Sen. (Ferdinand) Marcos, inabutan na ng kampanya, Senator Marcos became busy and could not attend all the sessions and Senator Enrile – because he was not there during the committee hearings – had so many questions. And then the political environment, given that we are nearing elections, did not add to an environment conducive for the passage of the law. But the fact that the Bangsamoro Basic Law was not passed does not mean the end for the peace process,” the Senate chief pointed out. (With a report from Hannah L. Torregoza)
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