Featured image above shows BARMM officials Chief Minister Al-Haj Murad Ebrahim, Education Minister Mohagher M. Iqbal with senators at the Senate on January 27, 2025. (Photo: SDN)
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MANILA (SDN) — October 13, 2025, holdover capacity, those with Certificate of Candidacy (COC) for May 12, 2025, automatically considered aspirants for 80-seat seat Bangsamoro Parliament.
If you have not learned about it yet, these are the three major provisions of Senate Bill No. 2942 which Congress’s Bicameral Conference Committee adopted today, February 4.
Members of the committee assembled this morning to try to reconcile the House of Representatives’ version of its bill that sought to defer the first parliamentary polls in the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM) from May 2025 to 2026.
In the end the members from the Senate and the House of the joint committee adopted the Senate version sponsored by Sen. Joseph Victor “JV” G. Ejercito as stated above.
United Bangsamoro Justice Party (UBJP) Vice President for Settlers Community, and Member of the Parliament Atty. Mary Ann A. Arnado relayed this today to SDN – SciTech & Digital News.
She said the Bicam was set to ratify this afternoon the bill’s agreed and final version
A day before, the Senate approved on third and final reading its version of the bill.
President Ferdinand R. Marcos, Jr. already certified the BARMM-focused legislation as “uegent”, paving the way for its expedited treatment.
After the Senate passed SB No. 2942 on third and final reading, Ejercito noted the measure’s significance.
“The passage of this bill once again demonstrates the Senate’s commitment to establishing a final and enduring peace in Mindanao,” he said in a press statement.
Transition from ARMM to BARMM extended for second time
This was not lost on officials of the BARMM, one of them Education Minister Mohagher M. Iqbal, chair of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) Peace Implementing Panel.
Iqbal welcomed on January 27 the senators’ acknowledgement of the primacy of the Bangsamoro peace process.
The Senate bill puts the start of the term of office of elected MPs at noon of October 30 as Ejercito’s statement emphasized a “breathing room” over the removal of Sulu from the BARMM family by the Supreme Court in September.
As stipulated in the Bangsamoro Electoral Code (BEC), the province of Sulu had seven seats in the 80-member Parliament, which need to be re-apportioned if the province is not reinstated in the Bangsamoro government’s fold.
“In other words, it is a pitstop on the road to peace. It is not a dead end, as some have unfairly characterized,” Ejercito pointed out.
There would be no indefinite extension of term of the BARMM officials, he said, rather saying it “paves the way for the Bangsamoro people to finally chart their own destiny and secure their future.”
Once the bill is signed by the President and becomes law, the next BARMM regular political exercise after October 13 this year shall coincide with the 2028 national elections and, thereafter, every three years.
It could he recalled that Marcos, Jr. had time and again expressed his desire to hold the parliamentary polls as originally set.
The President’s sentiments were shared by the BARMM leadership led by Chief Minister Al-Haj Murad Ebrahim, chairman of the MILF.
In fact, Ebrahim, UBJP president, Iqbal, and others had already filed their COCs for the May 12 political exercise.
But the President changed his mind, apparently, instead certifying SB. No. 2942 as “urgent” piece of legislation.
Ejercito gave credit to Senate President Francis Escudero and former Majority Leader Sen. Joel Villanueva for helping bring the bill to the finish line.
The Marcos-time extension of the Bangsamoro Transition Authority (BTA) for five months marked the second time.
Then-President Rodrigo R. Duterte approved the transition phase from the defunct Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) to the BARMM from May 2022 to June 30, 2025, mainly the reason being the onslaught of the coronavirus pandemic that broke out in China in 2019 and barreled through across a hapless world, killing millions of people.
The Bangsamoro Organic Law (BOL) established the BARMM in 2019 as a new political entity (NPE), in the process abolishing and replacing ARMM to implement the 2014 Comprehensive Agreement on the Bangsamoro (CAB), signed by the GPH and the MILF after 17 years of protracted peace talks. — EDD K. USMAN (/)l
February 4, 2025, 4:04 p.m.: This story was updated for more details.