THE DEPARTMENT of Interior and Local Government (DILG) has vowed to assist the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM) government in ensuring the implementation of the law as the normalization process gets underway. The normalization, which includes the decommissioning of former rebel combatants along with social and economic support for their reintegration, is one of the key components of the Comprehensive Agreement on the Bangsamoro (CAB) signed by the Philippine government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) in 2014 following peace negotiations. The CAB was the foundation of the Bangsamoro Organic Law passed last year. “The DILG will see to it that we implement what the law mandates, particularly the BOL, which says that the Philippine National Police (PNP) shall create a Police Regional Office in BARMM for the primary purpose of law enforcement and maintenance of peace and order. We shall also see to it that members of the MILF and the Moro National Liberation Front shall be admitted to the police force within five years of the BOL’s ratification,” DILG Secretary Eduardo M. Año said in a statement. The DILG has also planned on how best to provide technical assistance to the BARMM government. “We have prepared a Road Map on how best we can assist the BARMM… We will make sure that the DILG exercises judiciously its general supervision over BARMM,” Mr. Año said. President Rodrigo R. Duterte’s Executive Order No. 67, issued in 2018, included the transfer of the National Commission on Muslim Filipinos from the supervision of the Office of the President to the DILG. — Marc Wyxzel C. Dela Paz

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