DAVAO CITY (MindaNews / 20 February) – A group calling itself the Bangsamoro Supports Leni for Justice and Peace (BSLJP) movement is campaigning in the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao and other Moro communities nationwide for victory of a women’s team in the May 9, 2022 elections: Leni Robredo for President, Sara Duterte for Vice President, and Samira Gutoc, Loren Legarda and Risa Hontiveros for senators.
Describing itself as a group “comprising various peace organizations and networks, civil society organizations, human rights groups, indigenous peoples, non-government organizations, and social movements and well-meaning individuals in the BARMM and in other Moro communities all over the country,” they also called on their fellow Moro to vote for reelectionist senators Juan Miguel Zubiri, Joel Villanueva, Richard Gordon and Sherwin Gatchalian; and senatorial aspirants Chel Diokno and Robin Padilla.
These six male senatorial bets, along with Hontiveros, Legarda, and Gutoc “have demonstrated strong support for the extension of the transition period to 2025 and are consistent champions of the peace process,” the group said.
In their “Manifesto of Support for VP Leni Robredo,” read by BSLJP spokesperson, Ustadz Abdulhadi Daguit, during the February 19 launch in Cotabato City, the group said the decision to declare their “unequivocal and uncompromising support” to Vice President Robredo’s bid for the Presidency came “after a series of discussions and reflections.”
“We all have come to a clear consensus to vote, campaign and mobilize support to help ensure that VP Leni will win in the May 9 elections,” the group said, adding that the BARMM is facing “formidable challenges” and “we consider VP Leni as the best partner for moral governance in the Bangsamoro.”
The group is supporting Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte’s bid for the Vice Presidency but will vote against former Senator and now Presidential frontrunner Ferdinand Romualdez Marcos whose father, Ferdinand Edralin Marcos, declared martial law in 1972, a year before his second and last term as President would have ended. The group said the Marcos dictatorship brought untold sufferings to the Bangsamoro, with so many Moro people still seeking justice.
As Senator, Marcos the son, chaired the Senate Committee on Local Government which deliberated on the Bangsamoro Basic Law (BBL), supposedly the enabling law to implement the 2014 peace agreement between government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front. His substitute bill was criticized as rendering the future autonomous region less autonomous than the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao. Congress adjourned in 2016 without passing the BBL.
According to the BSLJP manifesto, the Bangsamoro people are “connected to a collective narrative of atrocities, human rights violations, and the genocidal war which killed 120,000 people in the darkest years of martial law” and it is a “collective aspiration to afford justice to all victims of these historical injustices.”
It said they are confident that as a human rights lawyer, Robredo, if elected President, “will respond to this long awaited demand for justice so that peace will be sustained and continue to thrive among the people.”
“Supporting the conspiratorial son of a rapacious Marcos dictatorship is a grievous betrayal to the lofty ideals of our forefathers who fought and died for freedom, for respect of our distinct identity and preservation of our territory. We cannot simply move on and forget without even acknowledging the historical injustice and without the slightest remorse from the Marcoses,” the manifesto stressed.
Maguindanao Governor Bai Mariam Sangki Mangudadatu and her husband, Sultan Kudarat Governor Suharto “Teng” Mangudadatu have publicly endorsed their support for the Presidency of the dictator’s only son, former Senator Ferdinand Romualdez Marcos, and the Vice Presidency of President Rodrigo Duterte’s daughter, Sara. The other ruling Mangudadatus, led by Rep. Esmael “Toto” Mangudadatu (United Bangsamoro Justice Party) who is running for Governor of Maguindanao, a post he held from 2010 to 2019, and his wife Sharifa Akeel (Aksyon Demokratiko) who is running for Governor of Sultan Kudarat, are supporting Manila Mayor Ishko Moreno’s bid for the Presidency.
For the BSLJP, Robredo is “the one and only candidate for president who is endowed with capacity, integrity, and moral standing to accompany us in our continuing quest for peace and justice, which we have pursued for more than half a century in the Bangsamoro homeland,” that her “proven integrity, probity, simplicity, honesty and sincere dedication to public service puts her in a strong vantage point to unite all peoples in Mindanao, hand-in-hand with enlightened leaders and other socio-economic forces, towards lasting peace and economic prosperity in the Bangsamoro.”
In endorsing the vice presidential bid of Davao City mayor Sara Duterte, the group’s manifesto said it is their “firm belief that it is only VP Leni Robredo, together with our fellow Mindanaoan Mayor Sara Duterte, who could help usher us into the life of peace, prosperity and dignity not only for the Bangsamoro but for the whole country.”
“With the moral integrity that VP Leni exudes, the care and concern that she showers the people of Mindanao, the principles that she lives by, the courage that she shows, and the competence that she displays in public service — there is no doubt that VP Leni Robredo is the best partner for moral governance deserving the landslide votes of the Bangsamoro people,” the group said.
In the 2016 elections, Robredo won as Vice President in the then ARMM provinces of Maguindanao, Lanao del Sur, Basilan and Tawi-tawi. The only predominantly Moro province that voted for Marcos was Sulu. (MindaNews)