Parties assure support for Comelec's BARMM polls security efforts

COTABATO CITY, Philippines — Officials of Bangsamoro regional political parties assured on Wednesday, June 17, of their willingness to swear over the Quran to abide by the electoral laws meant to ensure peaceful and honest September 14 parliamentary polls in the autonomous region.

Chairman George Erwin Garcia of the Commission on Elections was quoted in radio reports on Wednesday as saying that the poll body, the Philippine National Police and the Armed Forces are all set for the first-ever September 14 parliamentary elections in the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao.

Senior officials of the Bangsamoro Party of the Moro National Liberation Front, led by BARMM Labor and Employment Minister Muslimin Sema, the Serbisyong Inklusibo, Alyansang Progresibo, the Bangsamoro Federalist Party and the Bangsamoro People’s Party, founded by Basilan Gov. Mujiv Hataman, separately told reporters in Cotabato City on Wednesday that they are also just as prepared for the September 14 regional electoral exercise.

The four parties are among the 16, including the United Bangsamoro Justice Party of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, that Comelec permitted to pit candidates for the 80-seat BARMM parliament, presently composed of lawmakers appointed by President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.

Sema, chairman of the central committee of the MNLF and president of the Bangsamoro Party, said he and other officials of their bloc are ready to sign a covenant, in the presence of military and police officials in BARMM and Garcia and his subordinates in Comelec’s office in the autonomous region, stating their commitment to help ensure safe and clean elections in the autonomous region on September 14.

“We can also swear over the Quran, in their presence, that we shall do our best to help the Commission on Elections make the regional elections safe and credible,” Sema said.

The Bangsamoro region covers the provinces of Maguindanao del Sur, Maguindanao del Norte, Lanao del Sur, Basilan and Tawi-Tawi and the cities of Lamitan, Marawi and Cotabato, where its regional capitol is located. The autonomous region has election hotspots, where there are big clans that are locked in longtime political rivalries.

Sema said the MNLF’s Sept. 2, 1996 final truce with the national government compels them to support all peace and security initiatives in their enclaves of all state agencies, the police and military.

Non-Muslim officials of the four parties told reporters that they have no problem promising, before a bible, in the presence of priests and other non-Catholic Christian preachers, to help the Comelec achieve its goal of having the elections done safely, free from all sorts of irregularities.

BARMM parliament member Naguib Sinarimbo, spokesperson of the Bangsamoro Federalist Party, said officials of their bloc are also willing to affix their signatures to a common manifesto by officials of the 16 parties that are to participate in the September 14 polls, pledging to adhere to all Comelec rules pertaining to the electoral exercise.

“All of us in the Bangsamoro Federalist Party wants these upcoming elections written in history, remembered historically, as one which was done cleanly, not tainted with political violence and fraud,” said the lawyer Sinarimbo, chairperson of the Cotabato City chapter of the Bansgamoro Federalist Party.

Lanao del Sur Gov. Mamintal Adiong, Jr., a senior official of the Serbisyong Inklusibo, Alyansang Progresibo, said he and all other officials of their party, including mayors in their province, are also prepared to promise, over the Quran, to abide by the Bangsamoro region’s electoral laws and the Omnibus Election Code.

The Serbisyong Inklusibo, Alyansang Progresibo is the oldest regional political party in BARMM, established during the time of the now defunct Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, which got replaced with a more empowered BARMM in early 2019, a product of 22 years of peace talks between the government and the MILF.

“We in the Serbisyong Inklusibo, Alyansang Progresibo have a policy aiming to promote political solidarity, mutual respect and understanding among all political parties in the autonomous region,” Adiong said.

Hataman, elected governor of Basilan on May 12, 2025, said their Bangsamoro People’s Party has no political animosity towards all of the 15 other blocs now gearing up for the September 14 regional elections.