BARMM peace process at risk as rifts deepen, watchdogs warn
CAGAYAN DE ORO, Philippines – The political settlement underpinning the seven-year-old Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM) is facing a “crisis” as trust between the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) erodes, independent monitors warned on Wednesday, February 25.
“The Bangsamoro political settlement is on the brink of collapse. Trust is rapidly eroding between and among the Parties. Hope is under siege by betrayals from both sides,” said the joint statement of Climate Conflict Action and the Institute for Autonomy and Governance (IAG) released by CCAA communications manager Louise Marie Lara.
The watchdogs said fractures within the MILF and growing tensions among government representatives have caused cooperation at the peace implementation table to “dissolve into confrontation,” threatening gains achieved over the past decade.
They said the crisis was anticipated about a year ago, with early warnings citing a stalled decommissioning process, proliferation of illicit weapons, and political gridlock.
WHAT GUN BAN? An armed man guards the Moro Islamic Liberation Front’s Camp Darapanan in Sultan Kudarat, Maguindanao del Norte, in March 2025, weeks before the midterm elections. Inside the camp, MILF members are immune from the election gun ban. Herbie Gomez/Rappler
“The normalization agreement has remained in a vegetative state for over a year and the decommissioning of combatants and their weapons is effectively comatose,” read part of the statement.
CCAA and IAG said that “the dismal normalization record and the utter failure of decommissioning, ten years after the political settlement was signed and six years after the organic law was passed, has allowed new and increasingly sophisticated weapons to flow into the Bangsamoro region.”
They cited the recent attack on a town mayor using a rocket-propelled grenade, which showed the dangers posed by uncollected arms.
“The brazenness of the midday attack was stunning; the weapon used, even more so,” it said.
Mayor Akmad Ampatuan of Shariff Aguak town, Maguindanao del Sur, survived an early morning attack in the town center in late January when a rocket-propelled grenade struck his armored vehicle, wounding two security personnel and a civilian, authorities said.
Hours later, authorities cornered and killed suspects in Barangay Meta in Datu Unsay town.
Authorities recovered a rocket launcher and several other high-powered firearms from the suspects.
The case remains under investigation, but authorities initially suspected the attack on the mayor may be linked to political rivalry, involving or associated with former rebels.
Ampatuan, who had offered to testify against those behind the infamous 2009 Maguindanao massacre, previously survived other assassination attempts.
Election postponement
The CCAA and IAG also frowned over the postponement of the Bangsamoro parliamentary elections, describing it as a threat to democratic legitimacy.
In 2025, the Supreme Court (SC) struck down the region’s districting laws, which had been passed to reconfigure parliamentary districts and fill seven seats left vacant after Sulu’s 2024 exclusion from the BARMM. The SC then directed the Commission on Elections (Comelec) to hold the first regional parliamentary elections this March.
A new districting law, however, passed only in January left Comelec with little time to prepare, prompting it to suspend preparations. Congress is now discussing a proposal to hold the vote in September instead.
The relatively new administrative region was originally slated to hold its first parliamentary election in 2022, but the vote was postponed to 2025 due to COVID-19 lockdowns. It was then rescheduled twice more in 2025 as an offshoot of the 2024 SC ruling that excluded Sulu province from the region.
“In the absence of a legitimizing election, the MILF ruled through acquiescence, but no longer,” the watchdogs said, noting that unilateral government decisions had further weakened trust.
The interim BARMM regional government is led by the Bangsamoro Transition Authority (BTA), whose members are largely MILF leaders and associates appointed by the President. MILF chairman Ahod “Al Haj Murad” Ebrahim served as the region’s first interim chief minister, and was succeeded by Abdulraof Macacua, former Maguindanao del Norte governor and commander of the Front’s armed wing.
The watchdogs said alleged corruption within the BARMM government was identified as another factor undermining peace.
“Corruption at this scale is not merely a governance failure, it is a direct assault on the peace process itself,” they said.
Trust rebuilding
CCAA and IAG urged immediate steps to restore trust, including adherence to the 2014 Comprehensive Agreement on the Bangsamoro (CAB) and the 2018 Bangsamoro Organic Law (BOL), strengthening oversight mechanisms, addressing illicit weapons, and preventing further election delays.
“Political transition, where policies, frameworks, and intergovernmental relationships are built, clarified, and strengthened, should be prioritized,” they said.
The watchdogs also warned that horizontal violence and violent extremism were rising amid leadership friction within the MILF. They called on all parties to act “transparently and in good faith” to prevent further erosion of the fragile peace in the predominantly Muslim region. – Rappler.com
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