Bangsamoro Elections: A Crucial Test for Peace Maintenance

Read The Diplomat, Know The Asia-Pacific The peace process in the autonomous region will continue long after the votes have been counted and a new government formed. The Bangsamoro Transition Authority votes on a proposed transition plan as an interim Bangsamoro Parliament in a special session on June 17, 2019. On September 14, more than 2.3 million registered voters in the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM) in the southern Philippines will go to the polls for the first regular parliamentary election. The immediate priority is that the elections should be peaceful, orderly, and credible, but beyond that there is another question that deserves attention: what will political competition look like in communities where political loyalties are changing, particularly in areas historically aligned with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF)? The answer could have important consequences for the peace process. Election-related violence is not new to the Bangsamoro. It long predates the peace agreement with the MILF, and has often been associated with clan rivalries, private armed groups, and local political competition rooted in longstanding disputes. In many communities, elections can even appear relatively peaceful because political power is concentrated within a dominant family or network. The absence of violence, therefore, does not necessarily mean the absence of political contestation; sometimes, it simply reflects the absence of meaningful competition. As I have argued previously, the movement’s political environment has become increasingly fragmented. Former allies now find themselves competing through different political formations, including the United Bangsamoro Justice Party (UBJP) and the Bangsamoro Federalist Party (BFP). Some may remain aligned with UBJP, while others have moved toward BFP or other competing parties and candidates. This raises the question of whether former allies who once operated within a common political and organizational framework can compete against one another without reproducing the patterns of conflict that the peace process was designed to transform. There is a danger of interpreting every violent incident during the election period as evidence that the peace process is failing. This would overlook the longstanding nature of election-related violence in the Bangsamoro, which has long existed independently of the Muslim insurgency and the peace process. Thus, reports of localized violence that have appeared in recent weeks and months need to be examined carefully. The important question here is where these incidents are occurring, who is involved, and whether they are connected to the emerging political dynamics that surround them. At the same time, assuming that all such incidents are merely ordinary election violence could obscure emerging risks to the peace process. In this case, the important goal is whether local disputes can still be contained through the institutions and relationships established by the process. The government of the Philippines and MILF have taken steps to maintain a ceasefire during the election period. The security mechanisms established under the peace process have coordinated arrangements for the polls, reflecting the recognition that political competition should not disrupt the cessation of hostilities. But elections create challenges that cannot always be resolved through ceasefire arrangements alone. The difficulty becomes particularly apparent when communities that were previously aligned around the MILF become politically divided. At the community level, these divisions can cut across families, former comrades, and other longstanding relationships. This is a normal feature of political transition. Former combatants are expected to become citizens and political actors with different choices and interests. However, it also represents a significant transformation. The peace process once depended in part on the ability of the MILF to maintain organizational cohesion and discipline among its forces and communities. Democratic politics, by contrast, requires the acceptance of political pluralism. Thus, the challenge is to ensure that the shift from political cohesion to political pluralism does not become a transition from one form of conflict to another. The August 15 ambush of BARMM’s Interim Chief Minister Abdulraof Macacua’s convoy has underscored the uncertainty in the pre-election environment. The incident has been interpreted in a variety of ways, and there has been speculation on social media that individuals aligned with the BFP may have “staged” it, exposing deepening rifts within the MILF. The MILF and Philippine government have condemned the incident, and authorities continue to investigate its circumstances. Nevertheless, this episode illustrates that in a fragile political transition, perceptions can themselves become consequential. For a peace process built on confidence among former adversaries, this is a major concern. While a certain amount of violence may be inevitable, the important variable is whether political actors and communities continue to believe that disputes can be managed through legitimate institutions. This is why the success of the September 14 elections will likely be gauged after election day. Will losing candidates accept the results? Will political parties trust the electoral institutions? Will communities regard the new parliament as legitimate? And will political disputes remain within the institutional arena, or will they spill into clan networks, armed structures, or other forms of coercion? A credible election can strengthen these institutions by demonstrating that political authority can be acquired and contested through democratic means. But if political actors perceive the process as unfair, or if communities believe that political competition is being settled through intimidation or violence, distrust could extend beyond individual candidates to the institutions themselves, posing a more serious challenge to the peace process. Thus, the political system that emerges from them should be trusted enough to contain political competition peacefully. The current fragmentation of the MILF’s political environment could also create opportunities for spoilers. An armed group could take advantage of a clan dispute, for example, or political actors could use a local incident to deepen divisions or challenge the legitimacy of an electoral outcome. A useful post-election assessment should examine whether any violent incidents involve former conflict actors, whether they spread across MILF communities, whether political actors mobilize around them, and whether existing peace mechanisms are able to contain them. One encouraging development is that the Philippine government and MILF are already looking beyond election day. The joint implementing panels agreed to continue their engagement through a special meeting in Kuala Lumpur on Septembe