Before September, the first regular elections next year in the five-year old Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM) were already shaping up to be a highly anticipated event. 

Sulu Gov. Abdusakur Tan, who announced his bid to become the BARMM’s chief minister last May, was set to face whoever would emerge as the contender of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF).  

There were speculations then that MILF might not push Chief Minister Ahod “Murad” Ebrahim to serve another term, and that Malacañang was pushing to have another MILF leader to take on the role as chief minister. 

The rebels-turned-politicians who have shaped and controlled the BARMM enjoyed the support of President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., who celebrated the regional government’s accomplishments in his 2024 State of the Nation Address. The MILF formed the political party United Bangsamoro Justice Party (UBJP).

The big political clans rallied behind Tan and formed the BARMM Grand Coalition (BGC). They hoped that Tan’s longstanding loyalty to the Marcoses would persuade the president to refrain from intervening.

On Sept. 9, just a month before the politicians were to file their certificates of candidacy (CoCs), the Supreme Court pulled the rug from under Tan’s feet. Voting unanimously, the justices dismissed petitions to declare the creation of the BARMM unconstitutional but ruled to remove Sulu from the new autonomous setup on the basis that it voted no during the 2019 plebiscite.  

One of the petitions was filed in 2018 by Tan’s own son and namesake, Abdusakur Tan II, long before the elder Tan had aspired to become BARMM chief minister.

Tan, the only person who was seen to have a fighting chance against the MILF, was no longer eligible to run for a regional post. The BGC has not announced plans to field another candidate for chief minister.

Sulu and the autonomous region have yet to see the extent of the impact of the Supreme Court’s decision. Over 5,000 BARMM employees in Sulu are poised to lose their jobs and infrastructure projects could be discontinued if they lose funding from the regional government. 

“Please do not abandon us, as we need your support. After all, the Bangsamoro Organic Law, as reflected in its numerous provisions, envisioned that Sulu, as a core territory, would share in the allocated budget,” Deputy Speaker Nabil Tan said in a privilege speech before his fellow regional parliament members. 

He also asked the Supreme Court to reconsider its decision. 

Beyond these pressing practical concerns, many Bangsamoro residents have bewailed the high court’s decision. 

Sulu is the cradle of the Bangsamoro’s struggle for freedom, the Tausug homeland and the birthplace of the Moro Nationalist Liberation Front (MNLF), the first Muslim separatist rebel group in the Philippines. The province is integral in the region’s rich history.

“The Bangsamoro won’t be complete without Sulu. This is a major blow to our efforts to push for the unity of provinces in the region),” said Basilan Rep. Mujiv Hataman, former governor of the defunct Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) and now one of the BGC’s stalwarts.

On Oct. 1, human rights lawyer Algamar Latiph asked the Supreme Court to reconsider its decision as one of the respondents-in-intervention for the case. The BARMM government has also filed an intervention before the high court.

It took the court five years to decide Tan’s petition. Who knows how long it will take to rule on the new ones and if it would overturn a unanimous decision at all. 

Meanwhile, what happens to the first regular elections in the Bangsamoro next year? 

On the eve of the first day of candidacy filing on Nov. 4, Senate President Francis Escudero told a radio program that he was going to file a bill to postpone the BARMM parliamentary elections again, stating that Malacañang wanted it. A committee hearing was immediately scheduled for Nov. 7.

Here are five scenarios for the 2025 Bangsamoro polls, based on recent developments and interviews with Bangsamoro stakeholders and experts interviewed by the PCIJ. 

Scenario 1: The first regular elections in the BARMM will be postponed again

Until the eleventh hour, it seemed unlikely, given pronouncements from President Marcos Jr. that he wanted the polls to push through. But Bangsamoro experts and stakeholders never dismissed it.

The Commission on Elections had moved the filing of COCs from Oct. 1-8 to Nov. 4-9 or a month later than the rest of the country to allow political parties time to adjust following Sulu’s exclusion from the BARMM. Comelec Chairman George Garcia said the poll body was “hell-bent” on conducting the polls next year. 

The BARMM parliament is supposed to have 80 members based on its charter. Forty should come from party nominees, 32 from parliamentary districts, including seven in Sulu, and eight from sectoral groups. 

In the wake of the Supreme Court’s ruling, BARMM Cabinet Secretary and spokesperson Mohd Asnin Pendatun said it was possible to reassign the seven Sulu district seats, but the process would be long and tedious. 

Comelec said it would proceed with preparations to hold elections for 73 seats in the BARMM parliament.

The candidacy filing opened on November 4 but Escudero’s call to postpone the elections loomed heavily over the event. He is seeking to delay the first regular elections by another year—from May 12, 2025 to May 11, 2026—to allow the autonomous region to “reconfigure its jurisdictions as well as reallocate the seats of its 80-member parliament.”

Escudero’s proposal followed a last-minute Bangsamoro Transition Authority (BTA) Resolution No. 6411, which urged to extend the transition period to May 2028.

“If Malacanang is the one calling for Congress to amend the organic law in order to postpone the elections, it will most probably happen,” said Benedicto Bacani, executive director of the Institute for Autonomy and Governance (IAG).

Sen. Juan Miguel Zubiri warned of a potential “backlash” in case of a postponement. He said it would not sit well among locally elected leaders.

Earlier proposals to reset the elections and extend the elections were generally dismissed.

The League of Bangsamoro Organizations called to extend the BTA’s term for three more years and postpone the parliamentary elections until 2028. It was first postponed in 2022 because of the coronavirus pandemic.

The group argued that the BTA, led by the MILF, needed more time to complete the normalization process. 

The MILF and the national government have yet to fully decommission armed rebels, disband private armed groups, and ramp up transitional justice efforts. Only when normalization is fulfilled can the two parties sign an exit agreement.

“If we’re gonna accept that argument, there won’t be an election in 100 years in the BARMM because, number one, there’s not gonna be any exit agreement without charter change (Cha-cha),” said Bacani. 

Several other issues await the Supreme Court’s resolution.

In June last year, a group of BARMM officials and residents urged the high court to nullify the Bangsamoro Electoral Code for “violating” the 1987 Constitution, the Bangsamoro Organic Law and the Omnibus Election Code.

According to them, the code infringes upon Comelec and the Supreme Court’s mandates and employs “restrictive” qualifications that hamper political parties’ ability to seek parliament seats. The code mandates the political parties to have 10,000 members.

Scenario 2: Elections proceed in May 2025, and MILF wins majority to continue leading BARMM

Only the BARMM has a parliamentary system in the Philippines, and political parties must secure a majority of the seats to control the government. This means that political parties need to win at least 41 of their political party nominees, district candidates, and sectoral nominees to secure the position of chief minister without outside support.

The Supreme Court’s ruling to remove Sulu from the BARMM changed the dynamics of next year’s elections. With Tan out of the way, many believe that MILF’s UBJP has an improved chance of winning a majority of the parliament seats and continue to lead the autonomous region although it is now smaller in land area and population. 

The court has given the MILF a “tactical advantage” and it doesn’t make sense for the group to support calls for postponement, said an NGO worker.  

Malacañang has indicated support for a scenario in which MILF would continue to rule.

An Institute for Policy Analysis and Conflict report showed that “some of President Marcos’ advisers are suggesting that keeping the MILF in power… will help ensure security and stability.” The report was based on interviews with politicians in BARMM.

On June 24, a leaked voice recording surfaced of a known Marcos political supporter, South Cotabato Gov. Reynaldo Tamayo Jr., allegedly threatening local executives in the BARMM to support the UBJP lest they would be investigated by the Commission on Audit. Tamayo is the president of the president’s party, Partido Federal ng Pilipinas.

Scenario 3: Another party secures the majority and UBJP becomes the minority.

All political parties must submit a list of 40 nominees ranked first to last. To get one parliament seat, the political parties need to obtain 4% of total votes.

Other than UBJP, BGC is the only other party capable of winning more than 41 combined seats from its political party, district, and sectoral candidates, according to Rona Caritos of the Legal Network for Truthful Elections (Lente). 

The BGC remains a powerful contender even without Tan, owing to the influence of the other parties and political clans behind it:

• Al-Ittihad-UKB, led by Maguindanao del Sur Gov. Mariam Sangki-Mangudadatu and husband Teng Mangudadatu

• Serbisyong Inklusibo Alyansang Progresibo Party (SIAP), led by Lanao del Sur Gov. Mamintal Adiong Jr.

• Bangsamoro People Party (BPP), led by Basilan Rep. Mujiv Hataman

Bacani believes that many of the elected members from parliamentary districts will still come from BGC because of the clans’ constituencies.

BARMM voters will come from Lanao del Sur, Maguindanao del Norte, Maguindanao del Sur, Basilan (except Isabela City), Tawi-Tawi and the Special Geographic Area, a loose collection of 63 barangays in North Cotabato. 

“If the MILF’s nominees are their current BTA members… majority are Maguindanaon. That’s just one province,” Bacani said.

“Given the control of governors in the local elections and their alliance, that means they will just have to deliver the province to BGC and they get the majority,” he added.

What will become of the peace process if traditional politicians wrest regional power from the MILF?

They promised to implement all signed peace agreements. BGC also said that the coalition will “push for the annual P5 billion SDF (special development fund) to support the transition of combatants and communities.”

Scenario 4: No party secures a majority, a coalition government is formed. 

If neither the UBJP nor the BGC will win a majority of the seats in parliament, the political parties will have to forge coalitions to form the regional government. 

It could happen, depending on developments before the elections. Several parties have a viable chance of winning a few seats. (LIST: BARMM regional parties accredited for the May 2025 parliamentary elections)

All political parties can form different permutations of coalitions to secure the majority.

The following scenarios could further play out:

• The MILF forms a coalition government with smaller parties and keep the leadership of the BARMM

• The BGC forms a coalition government with smaller parties

• The MILF and the BGC form a coalition government

• If they have enough votes to form a majority, smaller parties form a coalition government, and both the MILF and the BGC become the minority

In this scenario, peace advocate Augusto “Gus” Miclat Jr. said parties in the minority can play a bigger role in the parliament, he said.

“(If you don’t secure a majority), struggle to consolidate the forces you have within Parliament and your constituencies outside to ensure that there are checks and balances,” said the director of the Initiatives for International Dialogue.

The political parties that may have lost members after Sulu was removed from the region were instructed to recruit new members and comply with the requirement of having 10,000 members. 

Two factions of the MNLF have registered as regional political parties. The BAPA party of the Muslimin Sema faction was granted accreditation. The Mahardika party of the Nur Misuari faction was denied accreditation, but it filed a motion for reconsideration. It is pending as of this writing.

Scenario 5: Failure of elections is declared in a number of localities, delaying the determination of majority vote.

Election-related violence in the BARMM has continuously risen since 2018, the Council for Climate and Conflict Action Asia (CCAA) reported.

CCAA executive director Francisco Lara Jr. believes that a failure of election in some localities is not far off. “It is a reality,” he said in a press briefing last August.

Most incidents occurred in Lanao del Sur, while most deaths transpired in Maguindanao, the region’s seat of political power.

“The violence in the mainland during the past two election years may be a prelude to the 2025 elections,” the report said. CCAA also predicted that violence will be “fueled by the challenge of former rebel groups against traditional politicians who (aim) to strengthen their political legitimacy in the region.”

In general, violence has been on the rebound since 2021, it further said.

The leading cause is still the shadow economy, which includes illegal drugs and guns. This was followed by identity issues stemming from land disputes, clan feuds and extremist violence.

Lara raised important questions if BARMM elections are derailed: “Who operates in the interim if a failure of election is called? Doesn’t it extend the power and the authority of the incumbent?”

“We are not here to make the BARMM look bad, or OPAPRU (Office of the Presidential Adviser on Peace, Reconciliation and Unity) look bad, or the Comelec look bad. But they have to be abreast of what is happening. And they have to honestly look at the figures of violence,” he added.

For Miclat, the Bangsamoro and national governments will have to join hands to ensure that the polls materialize in the region. But he reminds everyone that the elections only form part of the peace process. 

“(T)he heart and soul of the peace agreement is not the elections but the full implementation of the peace agreement by ensuring … the creation of the transitional justice board … holistic approach to peace and security addressing displacement and providing the social economic packages, compensation to displaced communities in Marawi and the like,” he said.

After all the ballots have been counted and the candidates proclaimed, the work continues, he said.

“The peace process will have to be hand-in-hand with the governance of the government of the day, whoever that is,” Miclat said. —With a report from Carmela Fonbuena

This article was first published on Oct. 2, 2024. It was updated on Nov. 4, 2024 due to recent developments.