(CNN Philippines) – The first day of voting for the amendments in Bangsamoro Basic Law (BBL) has been tedious for the members of the House Ad Hoc Committee.
The committee adjourned on the 13th page out of 109-page working draft Monday night (May 18). Lawmakers said they would continue voting on Tuesday, but might extend their deliberations until Wednesday.
Discussions on the BBL started on Monday on which provisions they would include in the final draft, which will create a political unit to replace the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao.
The day was supposed to be a historic one, but ended with lots of discussions and deliberations that eventually ended in an adjournment.
Initially, Rep. Rufus Rodriguez released his working draft as Ad Hoc Committee chairman. In that draft, he indicated that at least 30 provisions would be removed from the original draft.
Provisions to be deleted include provisions that pertain to the Bangsamoro having its own agencies equivalent to the following:
Commission on Audit
Civil Service Commission
Commission on Elections
Commission on Human Rights
Office of the Ombudsman
The other provisions proposed for deletion pertain to the creation of a Bangsamoro police and the so-called 10% opt-in option.
This option would allow 10% of registered voters of barangays of contiguous towns or cities outside the original Bangsamoro to demand a plebiscite to propose joining the autonomous region.
According to Rodriguez, the committee would like the provisions let the central government retain its exclusive powers — like banking, immigration, and energy regulation.
Committee members are scheduled to vote on at least half of the bill before the day ends, while the voting for the rest of the bill is expected to be finished by tomorrow (Tuesday).
Meanwhile, the draft was amended with at least 100 changes.
But out of eight provisions that some members wanted to be deleted, only two provisions will now be scrapped.
These are the military coordination provision and the powers given to the Office of the Ombudsman.
The other six provisions were reworded.
In the latest and consolidated draft, Rodriguez said the provision for a Commission on Audit would remain. But it would be limited to an internal auditing body.
Originally, the plan was to vote already on each of the provisions of the bill that they would want to include in the final draft to be submitted to the plenary.
But some members said they had more amendments that were not noted in the working draft for voting.
This delayed the voting because committee members decided they would have to resolve the amendments first.
There are at least 220 provisions in the 109-page working draft of BBL.
In an interview with CNN Philippines, Rodriguez said they would do their best to keep themselves within the time table, considering that the voting had already been delayed for a week.
