Datumanong’s brod is ARMM Speaker

COTABATO CITY — A brother of Public Works and Highways Secretary Simeon Datumanong was elected Speaker of the 24-seat legislative assembly of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM).

The election of Datu Ombra Datumanong (Lakas-NUCD), who represents the second district of Maguindanao in the Regional Legislative Assembly (RLA), was done through extensive consensus-building among all the newly elected assemblymen, not through individual voting.

At least three-fourths of the newly elected legislators endorsed Datumanong’s bid for the RLA speakership, prompting two other aspirants to yield in his favor.

"I’m thankful that even in our first session, we saw how this assembly adheres to the Islamic principle of consensus-building as a paramount guide in Islam’s concept of participatory democracy," Datumanong said.

Datumanong hails from Maguindanao’s Shariff Aguak town, a vote-rich area in the second district of the province.

Apart from peace and development initiatives, he said he will work on legislation that will complement President Arroyo’s peace overture with rebel forces in the ARMM and the continuing implementation of the Sept. 2, 1996 peace pact between the government and the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF).

Local peace advocates said Datumanong’s election disproved earlier insinuations by skeptics that ARMM Gov. Parouk Hussin might indirectly intervene in the selection of the Speaker to install a fellow Tausog.

"We see credence now in the avowed policy of the new administration to make the ARMM government a broad-based, culturally pluralistic governing mechanism involving all sectors in the area of autonomy," said Hadji Ahmad Bayam, a former MNLF propagandist in Central Mindanao.

Deputy Presidential Adviser on the Peace Process Nabil Tan, now functioning as ARMM’s executive secretary, said the new administration is keen on involving all sectors in managing the affairs of the regional government.

"We are introducing peace-building in the regional bureaucracy as an essential component of governance and in so doing, we need to involve all sectors in managing the ARMM because peace-building is not just an obligation of one or two sectors, but all the constituent-sectors of the ARMM government," Tan said.