MNLF veterans, non-Moro governors supports new BARMM parliament

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October 31, 2026 | 6:02pm

COTABATO CITY, Philippines — Two Christian governors and a big group of now elderly members of the Moro National Liberation Front on Saturday, October 31, took turns assuring support for the peacebuilding initiatives of the now duly-mandated 80-seat Bangsamoro parliament.

Gerry Salapuddin, thrice wounded in encounters with soldiers during the 1970s while chairman of the MNLF’s Basilan Revolutionary Committee, told reporters on Saturday that he and other veterans of the front were elated with the stay of Abdulrauf Macacua as chief minister of BARMM.

He was nominated to the post by colleagues in the parliament during their inaugural session on Friday.

“Our wish now is for Chief Minister Macacua to keep his promise to ensure inclusivity in governance of BARMM, one that shall involve the Muslims and Christian and indigenous non-Moro communities in the region,” Salapuddin said.

Members of the BARMM interim parliament, including Macacua who served as lawmakers from 2019 until the September 14 Bangsamoro regional elections were presidential appointees. Their tenures ended after last month’s first ever elections in the autonomous region.

“We will help Chief Minister Macacua forge ahead with his development initiatives for all the Muslim, Christian and indigenous non-Moro communities in the autonomous region. We also wish he could establish an office that could be his conduit to MNLF veterans who pioneered the Moro uprising for self-governance in the 1970s," Salapuddin said.

MNLF veterans, a number of them maimed by bullet wound sustained in encounters with soldiers during the 1970s, separately told reporters on Saturday that they are optimistic that Macacua, also a former Moro guerilla, will embark on humanitarian programs for them and the now elderly members of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front.

The MNLF and the MILF have separate peace compacts with the government and cooperated in managing some of the ministries and support agencies under the BARMM government while still under an interim parliament from 2019 until the election last month of 80 regional lawmakers, who nominated Macacua as their chief minister during their first plenary session on Friday.

Two non-Moro provincial governors in Region 12, Emmylou Taliño-Mendoza of Cotabato and Reynaldo Tamayo, Jr. of South Cotabato, who both have Moro constituents, among them members of the MNLF and the MILF, separately extended on Saturday their greetings to Macacua for his having secured an imprimatur, from 51 of the 80 members of the parliament, for him to continue functioning as BARMM’s chief minister.

Taliño-Mendoza told reporters on Saturday that she and her constituent-local executives shall continue supporting the security and humanitarian programs of the BARMM government in the eight municipalities in the Bangsamoro Special Geographic Area, or SGA, which is under the autonomous regional government, but are inside Cotabato, one of the four provinces in Region 12.

“Residents of the SGA are related by blood to Moro villagers in the municipalities in our province. They are connected to us in terms of commerce and trade. We will support the peace and development initiatives in the area of the now duly-mandated BARMM parliament,” said Taliño-Mendoza, chairperson of the multi-sector Regional Development Council 12.

Macacua told reporters on Friday that she appreciates the commitment by Taliño-Mendoza, a known supporter of the national government's peace overtures with southern Moro communities.

"Her administration has not stopped from extending essential services to residents of the Bangsamoro SGA in her province, which has 63 barangays now grouped into different BARMM municipalities, despite being no longer under their provincial government," Macacua said.