By HERBIE GOMEZ
Editor in chief
and CONG B. CORRALES
Associate Editor
SEN. Ferdinand Marcos Jr. yesterday sponsored what has been referred to as an “improved” substitute Senate bill on the creation of a Bangsamoro entity in Mindanao.
Marcos, chairman of the Senate’s local government committee, submitted Senate Bill no. 2894 which he said would pave the way for peace in many parts of Mindanao.
Marcos did not go to details but his televised sponsorship speech hinted of many changes in the draft BBL submitted by Malacañang to Congress.
Reports have it that Marcos’s committee changed at least 80 percent of the BBL draft being pushed by Malacañang and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF).
“We cannot have peace at the expense of our sovereignty,” Marcos told the Senate. “We will not have peace if we surrender our sovereignty. Autonomy is a continuous process.”
Marcos noted the existence of the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters (Biff) and other radical groups seeking a separate Mindanao state.
He said, “The BBL can never be used as vehicle for the establishment of a separate state.” At the Senate gallery were government and MILF peace negotiators, including the Front’s chief peace negotiator Mohaguer Iqbal.
Marcos spoke of the Mamasapano killings in Maguindanao in January, saying that the incident “taught us a lesson” that peace and order in the proposed Bangsamoro territory should be the main responsibility of the national government.
He also questioned Malaysia’s role in brokering the peace agreement between Malacañang and the MILF, the “haste,” and “secret meetings” that took place abroad.
Marcos said the quest for peace should be inclusive. “Peace cannot be and should not be exclusive. Peace must embrace all faiths and cultures.”
He said the Framework Agreement on the Bangsamoro (FAB) and its product, the Comprehensive Agreement on the Bangsamoro (CAB), were not inclusive.
Both agreements were discussed “behind closed doors,” he said. “What can be undone are the flaws” in the BBL as a result of haste, he said.
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