The head of BARMM wants bills to make 8 new towns to pass

MindanaoHerald | The head of BARMM wants bills to make 8 new towns to pass | COTABATO CITY – The leader of the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM) has asked other members of the regional parliament to move quickly to pass two important bills that will help make government and growth in the area more stable.

On Tuesday afternoon, Chief Minister Ahod Balawag Ebrahim asked the 80-member Bangsamoro Transition Authority (BTA) to hurry up and pass the bills that would make the towns in the region’s Special Geographic Area (SGA) in North Cotabato.

Ebrahim also asked them to pass the Bangsamoro Local Governance Code (BLGC).

Residents of 63 villages in North Cotabato who voted to join BARMM in a two-part referendum in 2019 have been asking for the formation of local governments that will officially link them to the regional government, he said.

In local elections last year, more than 200,000 people in 63 villages were told they could only vote for national candidates and not for local leaders.

Ebrahim said that the plan to make municipalities in SGA is important because it fills in some of the gaps that have been seen since the 2019 referendum.

“At first, the Bangsamoro government included these barangays in its programmes and projects, but there are gaps in governance that can only be fixed by making municipalities out of the SGA,” Ebrahim told members of parliament.

There are bills in front of the BTA that would make Pahamudin, Kadayangan, Kabalukan, Northern Kabacan, Kapalawan, Malmar, Tugunan, and Ligawasan into towns.

The 63 BARMM villages in the North Cotabato municipalities of Midsayap, Pikit, Aleosan, Pigcawayan, Kabacan, and Carmen would make up the new towns that are being planned.

According to the bills, these villages would be separated from their parent cities and made into different, independent municipalities.

“These areas are special not only because of where they are, but also because, along with Cotabato City, they are the new or expanded areas of the BARMM, if we use the territory of the now-defunct Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao RMM as our starting point,” Ebrahim said.

Code for local government

Ebrahim also said that if the suggested local government code is passed, it will make it clear how the regional government and its local government units should work together.

The BLGC bill, which was filed in September of last year, would be the fifth most important bill for the BTA right now.

“The sooner we pass these high-priority laws, the better for our people, because that would give them plenty of time to understand how these laws affect their daily lives,” Ebrahim said.

In response, BTA Speaker Pangalian Balindong said that the parliament knows the chief minister’s desire to improve moral governance for the benefit of the Bangsamoro people.

He also stressed how important it was for everyone involved to work together to make sure the last two years of the changeover period went well.(via PNA)