Filed
First Reading
Second Reading — Committee
Second Reading — Plenary
Third Reading
Approved
EnactedNow
Bangsamoro Autonomy Act No. 60
In forceCabinet measureAn Act to Declare the Burial Site of the Late Sheikh Salamat Hashim, Moro Islamic Liberation Front Founding Chairperson, and the Late Alim Abdul Aziz Mimbantas, Moro Islamic Liberation Front Vice Chairperson and Vice Chairperson for Military Affairs, as “Hashim and Mimbantas Memorial Site,” to Provide for the Preservation of the Same, and for Other Purposes
At least 1,000 square metres is declared a memorial site. A management board — chaired by the cultural heritage commission and including a representative of each family — supervises its reconstruction, preservation and management, and issues its own rules.
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Signed into law and operative unless later amended or repealed.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 makes a grave into a monument. The burial site of Sheikh Salamat Hashim, founding chairperson of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, and of Alim Abdul Aziz Mimbantas, its vice chairperson and vice chairperson for military affairs, at Camp Bushra Somiorang in Butig, Lanao del Sur, is declared a Bangsamoro Memorial Site.
At least a thousand square meters is set aside, with the exact boundaries left to a management board to determine. The site is to be preserved and, where necessary, reconstructed as far as possible in its original form, and it enters the region's recognized tourism and heritage network.
The board that runs it is chaired by the Bangsamoro Commission for the Preservation of Cultural Heritage and seats the education, public works and tourism ministries and the Darul-Ifta'. And then Section 5(f): a representative of each family, sitting as full members. ₱5 million is appropriated to begin.
Why it was proposed
Salamat Hashim founded the movement that fought the war and then negotiated the peace agreement out of which this Parliament was created. The act does not editorialise about that; it declares, funds and protects. But the Parliament passing it exists because of the process he began, which is the context in which a burial site becomes a matter for legislation.
Who it affects
- Residents of Butig, Lanao del Sur, where the site sits.
- Visitors and pilgrims, for whom it becomes a recognized heritage site.
- The families of the two men, each holding a seat on the governing board.
- Bangsamoro taxpayers, through the initial ₱5 million and continuing ministry appropriations.
Who would implement it
- Hashim and Mimbantas Memorial Site Management Board, with supervision and control over reconstruction, preservation and management
- Bangsamoro Commission for the Preservation of Cultural Heritage, which chairs the board
- Ministries of Basic, Higher and Technical Education; Public Works; and Trade, Investments and Tourism, as board members
- Bangsamoro Darul-Ifta', as a board member
Funding
Carries an appropriation. ₱5,000,000 initial appropriation, with necessary funds thereafter included in the annual appropriations of the Bangsamoro ministries, offices and agencies concerned. No total cost is estimated and no schedule is given.
What changes if it becomes law
- A burial site acquires a legal status, a boundary and a governing body.
- It joins the region's recognized tourism and heritage sites.
- The two families gain a formal, permanent voice in how the site is treated.
- ₱5 million is committed to preservation.
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 composition of the board is the whole act. A memorial to founders of an armed movement could have been placed entirely in the hands of the state that movement fought — and this one is chaired by a government commission and staffed by 4 ministries. But Section 5(f) seats a representative of each family as a full member, which means the descendants of the men buried there are not petitioners at the site of their own relatives' graves. In a post-conflict settlement where the question of who controls the memory is rarely neutral, that is a deliberate piece of drafting.
So is the presence of the Darul-Ifta'. A burial place is a religious matter before it is a heritage one, and seating the region's body of Islamic jurisprudence alongside the tourism ministry keeps the site from being managed purely as an attraction.
What the act does not do is protect the site against anyone. It declares, funds and governs, but creates no offence for desecration, damage or trespass — the omission is the same one found in the flag and emblem acts, and here it is more conspicuous, because a grave is exactly the kind of place such a provision exists for. The management board may issue rules, and whatever protection the site has in law will come from those rather than from Parliament.