Filed
First Reading
Second Reading — Committee
Second Reading — Plenary
Third Reading
Approved
EnactedNow
Bangsamoro Autonomy Act No. 39
In forceCabinet measureAn Act Governing the Observance of Regular and Special Holidays in the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM), Repealing for the Purpose Muslim Mindanao Autonomy Act No. 17
Four regular non-working holidays and two special non-working holidays are fixed, alongside nine special working holidays. The Chief Minister must publish next year's holidays by 31 December each year, and Islamic dates are set on the Grand Mufti's recommendation.
Filed
First Reading
Second Reading — Committee
Second Reading — Plenary
Third Reading
Approved
EnactedNow
Signed into law and operative unless later amended or repealed.
What this measure does
This is the region deciding which days it stops for, and it distinguishes carefully between three kinds.
Four days are regular non-working holidays: Bangsamoro Foundation Day on 21 January, Eid'l Fit'r, Eid'l Adha, and the Day of Shuhada on 18 March. Two more are special non-working — the Day of Arafah and the first Day of Tashriq, both falling around the Hajj. Everything else is a special *working* holiday: commemorated, marked, funded, but not a day off.
That third category is where the region's history sits. Bud Daho on 6 March, Bayang on 2 May, Shariff Kabunsuan on 19 December, the signing of the Comprehensive Agreement on the Bangsamoro on 27 March, and the 1996 Final Peace Agreement with the MNLF alongside the 1976 Tripoli Agreement on 2 September. Ministries, agencies and local governments must allocate funds and hold commemorative activities for them.
Because the Islamic dates move, Section 6 routes them through the Grand Mufti of the Bangsamoro Darul Ifta', who recommends the actual dates to the Chief Minister — and Section 11 requires the Chief Minister to publish the whole of next year's calendar by 31 December.
And Section 12 does the practical work: pending a Bangsamoro Labor Code, the holiday pay rules of the national Labor Code apply to private sector employees in the region.
Why it was proposed
To replace Muslim Mindanao Autonomy Act No. 17, the ARMM-era law, with the region's own. The policy section names three things at once: preserving the heritage of the Bangsamoro *and other peoples* in the region, upholding the rights and well-being of workers, and keeping the regional economy competitive — which is a fair description of the tension every holiday law has to resolve.
Who it affects
- Every private sector worker and employer in the region — the act binds the private sector expressly.
- All regional government branches, agencies and instrumentalities, and constituent LGUs.
- BARMM offices located outside the region, which are covered too.
- Local governments wanting their own founding anniversary recognized.
- Anyone whose legal deadline falls on a holiday.
Who would implement it
- Office of the Chief Minister, which proclaims holidays and issues the annual calendar by 31 December
- Grand Mufti of the Bangsamoro Darul Ifta', who recommends Islamic dates on the Hijri calendar
- Bangsamoro Commission for the Preservation of Cultural Heritage, which recommends localized proclamations and formulates guidelines
- Ministries, agencies and LGUs, which must fund and conduct commemorative activities
Funding
Carries an appropriation. No amount is stated. Section 8 requires every ministry, agency, office and LGU to allocate funds from their own budgets for activities commemorating the holidays.
What changes if it becomes law
- The region has its own holiday law in place of the ARMM's.
- Four regular and two special non-working holidays are fixed, with nine working commemorations.
- An annual proclamation must publish next year's dates by 31 December.
- Islamic dates are set through the Grand Mufti rather than administratively.
- Private sector holiday compensation is expressly governed by the national Labor Code pending a regional one.
- A deadline falling on a holiday moves to the next business day.
Raised during deliberations
No published record of the debate on this measure. Parliament’s journals cover sittings up to March 2023 only, and no committee report on it has been published.
What to notice
The division between non-working and working holidays is where the act's real judgement lies, and it cuts in a particular direction. The days off are religious — the two Eids, Arafah, Tashriq — plus the region's founding and its martyrs. The battles, the treaties and the peace agreements are working holidays: commemorated with funded activities, but not at the cost of a day's production. The policy section's reference to the vibrance and competitiveness of the regional economy is doing visible work in that choice.
Section 12 is the quietly important one. A regional government can declare holidays; whether a worker is paid for them is labour law, and the Bangsamoro has not yet written its own. Rather than leave that gap open — which would have made the holidays worthless to exactly the workers least able to insist on them — the act plugs it by applying the national Labor Code's compensation rules in the meantime. It is a small clause that determines whether the rest of the act means anything in a private workplace.
One inclusion worth noticing: Bangsamoro Indigenous Peoples' Thanksgiving Day, set for the day the IP Code is enacted. A holiday whose date does not yet exist, held open for a law not yet passed — the calendar equivalent of a reserved seat.