Alyansa ng mga Mamamayan para sa Karapatang Pantao (AMKP), a tripeople grassroots human rights movement in Maguindanao, North Cotabato and Sultan Kudarat provinces and Cotabato City since the late 1980s unanimously during its 2024 General Assembly held on December 10 in time of the 76th International Human Rights Day call for non-postponement of the 1st Regional Election in the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM) in the coming May 2025.

The election has been postponed already once when the Bangsamoro Transition Authority's term was extended last 2022 till 2025 for the reasons that the transition period was affected by the COVID-19 pandemic mainly and other important legislations required in the transition were not enacted like the Election Code, IP Code including all other transition mechanisms like the decommissioning and intergovernmental bodies. This led to appointment of new Interim Parliament members by the Marcos Jr. administration. After the recent postponement all required legislations were passed and political parties were established.

For AMKP, another postponement is a violation to the Bangsamoro Organic Law itself and the Philippine Constitution. 

Instead, AMKP calls for a full-swing of preparations for the Bangsamoro Regional Election alongside with the 2025 National and Local Elections ensuring a full democratic, peaceful and transparent process. Election is a democratic right of the people that must be fulfilled and to hold leaders accountable to the people.

The Philippine republic and the BARMM agencies thru the existing mechanisms and programs must ensure that Sulu got substantial attention and services despite the Supreme Court’s decision on its dismembership to BARMM and not be used to deprive the peoples in the BARMM of their right to suffrage.

As Minister Mohager Iqbal, an icon of the Bangsamoro struggle for Self-Determination in an interview with the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism said, “When you are elected by the people, you have more legitimacy. But when we are appointed by the President, although he has that appointment power, our authority is less”.

Having said before that the defunct Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) is a failed experiment since the previous leaderships were not freely determined and voted by the Bangsamoro because it was always by the hands or backings of the Malacanang. Another appointment and not election is of the same weight that external authority and not the mandate of the Bangsamoro populations run the region. 

We believe that there is no substitute to the mandate given by the people. We believe that Right to Self-Determination as a people should not be upon the appointing power which is an external interference but the constituency of the People and the region. Thus, Malacanang should end its interference and influence in the BARMM political processes.

In the remaining months, the National Government, the Commission on Election, Interior and Local Government Office, Social Welfare and Development and other line agencies concerned must ensure that no government resources, services and programs be used in any partisan politics and electoral activities by any political party or candidate in the region and provinces. There shall be no excuses that there are no complaints filed, it must be integral in the duty of these offices and of the whole government to safeguard government resources from vested interests.

We also call on the BARMM leadership and regional and national concerned agencies to effectively help and facilitate the fast-tracking of the delineation process of the Teduray and Lambangian Ancestral Domain. All other implementations, projects, programs and interventions inside Ancestral Domains of the Non-Moro IPs must abide and observe by the national law Indigenous Peoples Rights Act of 1997’s guidelines on Free, Prior and Informed Consent process with the NMIPs and the legitimate Indigenous Political Structure known by the National Commission for Indigenous Peoples and the ethnic community as enshrined also in the Bangsamoro Organic Law.

Further, we call for a serious investigation on the killings in Maguindanao provinces and Cotabato City that has become on a daily basis and justice be served to the victims and families. Particular concern is the killings and threats caused against the Non-Moro Indigenous Peoples. The 87th fatality since 2018 was Datu Baywan Angan, a respected Mënubu Dulangan leader in Mantao, Datu Hoffer, Maguindanao del Sur who was brutally murdered on December 7, 2024.

We fear that the extended year or years would only be a year for violent outmaneuvering of political forces and dynasties inside the region.

Finally, we call on the Tri-People in the Bangsamoro to actively participate and focus on the democratic content and fulfillment of the right to self-determination and all other democratic rights of all peoples and sectors inside the BARMM and not be deceived, divided and diverted by the squabbles of national and regional politicians.

Karapatan at Kapakanan ng mga Mamamayan at Kalikasan, una sa lahat!

Alyansa ng mga Mamamayan para sa Karapatang Pantao

General Assembly 2024

Cotabato City

December 10, 2024

amkpsecretariat@gmail.com

—--- The Alyansa ng mga Mamamayan para sa Karapatang Pantao 2024 General Assembly unanimously agreed to oppose postponement of the BARMM May 2025 AND 1st Regional Parliament Election. The General Assembly was held on December 10, 2024 in Cotabato City. AMKP is a people and human rights and environmental advocacy alliance of grassroot community organizations, OFW returnees and families, faith-based formations, workers, farmers, youth, women, NGOs and Indigenous People’s Organizations in Maguindanao del Norte, Maguindanao del Sur, North Cotabato and Sultan Kudarat provinces and Cotabato City.