​Bangsamoro’s parliamentary election is a turning point

On Monday, the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM) in the Philippines will hold its first parliamentary election since it was established in 2018. The vote will officially mark the end of the transition period under the Bangsamoro Transition Authority (BTA), an interim regional government appointed in 2019.The election is a significant milestone in the Bangsamoro struggle. It is the outcome of decades of armed conflict and negotiations between the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) and the government of the Philippines.The vote will test the Philippine government’s commitment to the peace process and the MILF’s commitment to the democratic process.The struggle for self-determinationBARMM is located on Mindanao, the second-largest island in the Philippine Archipelago, and it covers roughly the territories inhabited by the Moro people, a native Muslim-majority group. For centuries, the Moro enjoyed self-governance in independent states and resisted Spanish colonialism. Following the Philippines’s independence in 1946, they continued their struggle for self-determination.In 1989, the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) was created by Manila to give some d...