The creation of a reconstituted Bangsamoro Transition
Commission (BTC) and an advisory council for Indigenous People (IP), which
would ensure a more inclusive and transparent peace process, is now underway.
In a statement, Office of the Presidential Adviser on the
Peace Process (OPAPP) Secretary Jesus Dureza said there is a need to involve
other stakeholders in the peace process.
Ethnic groups and tribal leaders will form part of an
advisory council that will serve as "voices of national minorities"
in the peace negotiations with the communist rebels and the creation of a
Bangsamoro enabling law.
Dureza said recommendations of ethnic minorities would be
valuable in the implementation of signed peace agreements.
“[T]he IPs compose a very important sector in our work. I
have already taken that with the President and he approved,” Dureza said.
“[T]his will be the first that we will be having what we
will call the IP advisory council that will advise the panels -- panel that is
handling the BTC, panels handling the CPP-NPA-NDF -they have inputs on what
would happen,” he disclosed.
There, Dureza expalined IPs will have an opportunity to
express their intention to join be included in the law so we will be creating an
IP advisory council that will advise the PAPP and provide inputs to all the
panels.
He also noted that an executive order on the reconstitution
of a "more inclusive and more transparent" BTC is now awaiting the
signature of the president.
“We are now re-crafting, reconstituting the Bangsamoro
commission that will craft a new bill that hopefully Congress will also approve
to replace the BBL (Bangsamoro Basic Law),” he said.
He said instead of 15 members in the BTC that will work
again on a new, proposed bill in Congress, the MILF agreed to make it inclusive
from 15 to 21.
"We have additional members from the MNLF, concerned
stakeholders, IPs and more," he said.
The commission will be tasked to draft a new enabling law
for the implementation of all signed Bangsamoro agreements including the 1996
Final Peace Agreement with the MNLF and the 2014 Comprehensive Agreement on the
Bangsamoro (CAB) with the MILF.
"These are people, stakeholders. They are not members
of the CPP-NPA-NDF; they are not members of the Moro National Liberation Front;
they are not members of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front; but they are a part
of the negotiations. They have a bigger table and they should have inputs in
our work today,” Dureza said.
There is danger in continuing a "track of exclusivity
and closed door negotiations" if such reforms are not pushed through, he
added.
"We therefore have to gauge the public already so we
are very transparent in our media, communications work, organizing several
tables," he said.
The government has ongoing peace talks with the CPP-NPA-NDF
(Communist Party of the Philippines/New People's Army/National Democratic
Front) and the Bangsamoro.
The BTC was first convened in 2014 through Executive Order
No. 120 which gives the body the mandate to: to draft the proposed Bangsamoro
Basic Law with provisions consistent with the 2012 Framework Agreement on the
Bangsamoro; and to recommend to Congress or the people proposed amendments to
the 1987 Philippine Constitution whenever necessary.
Speaking on the envisioned new enabling law of the 2014 CAB
in a press conference last July, Dureza maintained that its passage remained up
to Congress.
The enabling law can be the pilot for the proposed
federalism being espoused by the president, he said.
http://www.pna.gov.ph/index.php?idn=1&sid=&nid=1&rid=935488
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