Featured image above is 1Bangsa Movement Founder Maulana Alan Balangi gesturing to emphasize a point in his group’s advocacy for the welfare, economic uplift, and unity of the estimated over 10 million Muslims in the Philippines, in and out of the Bangsamoro region. (Photo: SDN)
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- EDD K. USMAN | Twitter: @edd1819 | Instagram: @bluestar0910 |Facebook: SDN – SciTech & Digital News
PASIG CITY, December 5, 2024 (SDN) — Despite being shut out from the bureaucracy of the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM), 1Bangsa Movement continues to focus its struggle and advocacy on uniting the estimated 10 million Muslim Filipinos.
Led by Maulana Alan Balangi, 1Bangsa has been seeking to unite the Bangsamoro people as well as pushing for their economic uplift, political maturity, and harmony with their fellow Filipinos.
Balangi, who has been since his student days — and continues to be — an activist to this day, is still going strong with his group’s various advocacy for the Bangsamoro people.
He told SDN — SciTech & Digital News that he was promised juicy positions in the BARMM, but “napako lang” (Filipino slang for broken promise), but he shrugged it off because he did not ask for any position, anyway.
Never believe in promises seems to be the lesson from the 1Bangsa leader’s experience.
Balangi was one of the guest speakers on Wednesday, December 4, at the weekly Kapihan sa Metro East Media Forum here, in this urban jungle in the National Capital Region.
He took advantage of the opportunity to soft launch his group’s new advocacy, 1Bangsa 1Vote2025, which he said will be holding voters’ literacy campaign across the country to get more of his compatriots to register and cast their votes on May 12, 2025, the National and Local Elections (NLE).
He told the gathered reporters they will formally launch the movement this third week of December in Metro Manila. He expects more than 300 Moro community leaders to attend the event.
The 1Bangsa founder said part of the information drive is to open the eyes of the Moro people to senatorial aspirants who are known to have been active advocates of the causes and welfare of the Muslims in the Philippines.
He said in the last senatorial elections 1Bangsamoro supported now-Senate President Francis “Chiz” Escudero, No. Senator Robin “Abdul Aziz” Padilla, Senator Loren Legarda, and others.
Postponement of BARMM parliamentary polls gives time for BTA’s uncompleted work
He said at the media forum that part of the information campaign is on the issue of the island province of Sulu which the Supreme Court shut out from the Bangsamoro region in September this year, cutting if off from the umbilical cord of the BARMM family.
The Maranao activist said the shutting of Sulu out from the BARMM shutters the historical unity of the Bangsamoro region and the truth that it was in the province that the Moro struggle was lit and the fire spreading to other Moro dominated provinces in Central Mindanao.
Acknowledging the High Court’s final and executory decision, Balangi nonetheless hoped against hope the magistrates would reconsider putting Sulu back to the fold of the BARMM family.
1Bangsa has been active and doing its share in the Moro struggle for more than 20 years and, as a federation-type movement, it has many member organizations in its fold.
He said the Bangsamoro autonomous region has more than three million registered voters; not included are Muslims outside the BARMM who are now living in various parts of the Visayas and Luzon and numbered in the millions as well.
The movement wants to tap these voters to help elect aspirants for the Senate who are advocates of Bangsamoro economic uplift and progress and peace. He said Muslims registered in their respective municipalities outside of BARMM should also help elect Moro-friendly aspirants who espouse unity, equality, harmony, peace, and understanding between and among people of various religions and culture.
Balangi also discussed the forthcoming inaugural parliamentary polls in the BARMM synchronized with the national elections.
He said 1Bangsa supports the bill of Senate President Francis “Chiz” Escudero for a one-year postponement of the regional elections.
The Bangsamoro government, he stressed, will have another year to finish all the work it was mandated to do and also afforded the time to fully process the issue on Sulu, which loses thousands of BARMM employees, if the Supreme Court decision stands.
He added the Bangsamoro Transition Authority (BTA), if the parliamentary election is postponed for one year will have a year to create new province out of the North Cotabato barangays or villages now under the Bangsamoro jurisdiction after voting yes in the plebiscite in January and February 2019.
Established in 2018 by the Bangsamoro Organic Law (BOL) to implement the 2014 Comprehensive Agreement on the Bangsamoro (CAB), the Bangsamoro region is made up of the provinces of Basilan, Lanao del Sur, Maguindanao del Sur, Maguindanao del Norte, and Tawi-Tawi, the cities of Cotabato, Lamitan, and Marawi, as well as the Special Geographic Area’s (SGA) 63 barangays or villages that voted “Yes” in a plebiscite in February 2019 to be under the BARMM jurisdiction. With the recent plebiscite at SGA, the BARMM now has eight new municipalities as residents voted “Yes”.
According to the Philippine Atlas BARMM has 4,404,288 people. It has 116 municipalities (plus eight newly established under the SGA: Basilan, 11 municipalities; Lanao del Sur, 39; undivided Maguindanao, 36; Sulu, 19; and Tawi-Tawi, 11. Its component cities are Cotabato (the regional center and capital) in Maguindanao; Lamitan in Basilan; and Marawi in Lanao del Sur. (✓)