Arab News | As Bangsamoro heads to historic polls, Philippines eyes Middle East role in peacebuilding, investment

MANILA: As voters head to the polls in Bangsamoro for the Muslim-majority region’s first parliamentary election on Monday, the Philippines says it counts on Middle Eastern partners to support peace and its reconstruction following decades of armed unrest.

The Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, or BARMM, covers five provinces in the southwestern portion of Mindanao, the Philippines’ second-largest island. It was created in 2019 to move a former conflict zone from an appointed transitional administration to an elected autonomous government.

Home to about 4.5 million people, the name Bangsamoro is derived from the Malay word “bangsa” — nation — and “Moro,” which comes from the Spanish term designating Muslims.

Nearly 2.4 million people are expected to cast their ballots to choose their first regular parliament — an 80-member legislature that will combine party-list, constituency and reserved sectoral representatives, and will elect the region’s chief minister.

To the youngest voters, many of whom will go to the polling stations for the first time in their lives, the possibility of choosing their leaders offers a hope for change.

“I think that this parliamentary election will help us to look for leaders who are truly committed,” said Nadah Edris, a 20-year-old student leader in Cotabato City, the largest city in BARMM.

“I hope that this election will give us opportunities … This election is (proof) that we succeeded and that we have gained the thing that we fought for, and that is peace and development.”

The historic poll marks the latest stage in the region’s decades-long struggle for self-determination. The modern phase of the movement emerged in the late 1960s and early 1970s, when grievances over land, political marginalization, and the treatment of Muslim communities fueled the Moro National Liberation Front insurgency.

The MNLF originally pursued independence. In 1976, however, the Tripoli Agreement — negotiated with the involvement of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation and Libya — shifted the talks toward autonomy within the Philippines.

Not all factions of the MNLF agreed, and one of them separated from the group and developed into the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, which became the dominant insurgent organization in the region.

The armed conflict was a multi-pronged insurgency involving several armed factions that frequently splintered and realigned. As a result of it, an estimated 150,000 people have been killed and 1 million internally displaced.

Eventually, under a Malaysia-brokered 2014 peace deal, the MILF agreed to decommission tens of thousands of fighters and drop its bid for independence in exchange for broader autonomy in the southern Philippines.

The Middle East has also been closely involved in the peace process. The OIC provided the international framework for negotiations, with Libya hosting the 1976 Tripoli agreement, and Saudi Arabia the 1987 Jeddah Accord to resolve the Mindanao conflict.

The role acquired another dimension following the 2017 siege of Marawi, the second-largest city in Bangsamoro, when Daesh-linked militants seized parts of it and fought Philippine forces for five months. Following the siege, in 2018, the OIC mobilized its member states and humanitarian organizations to support Marawi’s reconstruction.

Saudi Arabia has been particularly active in the efforts to rehabilitate the region, providing millions of dollars in aid through the King Salman Humanitarian Aid and Relief Center.

As Monday’s election will test the institutions established over the past seven years for the transition of Bangsamoro to autonomy, the Philippine government hopes the historical assistance from the Middle East will continue to help stabilize the region.

“The Middle East has a very big role,” Foreign Affairs Secretary Theresa Lazaro told Arab News.

“We’re looking at countries, particularly the Middle East, to provide more investments in the area, because of, also, the many natural resources situated in that area,” she said, identifying infrastructure, education and health care as priority sectors.

“I think infrastructure is very important because it’s just starting up … And, of course, education is of vital importance, as well as health care.”

The continued support from Middle Eastern countries is what residents of the conflict-ravaged region are also counting on, as they believe self-governance will finally let these efforts flourish.

Sham Bandila, an 18-year-old youth leader from Cotabato City, was heading to the polls hopeful that the election would be fair and would show that the progress in Bangsamoro would “still be worth supporting.”

His message to the countries that stood by the people of Bangsamoro was that they would see in the next few years that “the support you are giving will be worth it — for the Bangsamoro people who have hoped for genuine development in this region,” he said.

“This election will define the future of Bangsamoro, will define what our homeland will be in the years to come.”