Filed
First Reading
Referred to the Committee on Bangsamoro Justice SystemNow
Parliament Bill No. 174
In committeeAn Act Mandating the Creation of Barangay Justice System Multisectoral Traditional and Customary Laws Advisory Council
Filed
First Reading
Referred to the Committee on Bangsamoro Justice SystemNow
Under committee study or floor debate. Amendments are still possible, and this is the stage where public input carries the most weight.
What this measure does
This creates, in every barangay of every city and municipality, a Barangay Justice System Multi-Sectoral Traditional and Customary Laws Advisory Council — a body to advise the barangay justice system on the customary law of the community it is settling disputes in.
The Council is chaired by the city or municipal mayor and seats a representative of the city or municipal police office, a purok leader, a traditional leader, a religious leader, an indigenous people’s leader, a tribal leader, and representatives of women, youth and persons with disabilities, each drawn from the barangay concerned.
Its functions are advisory and expressly without prejudice to the Katarungang Pambarangay Law, the national barangay justice statute. It provides specialised information, skills and experience on the community’s existing traditional and customary laws to aid the people running the barangay justice system; provides guidance and technical advice in areas outside the Lupon members’ usual expertise; encourages retirees from government and the private sector to join the barangay justice system; supplies customary and traditional laws that have fallen out of use through non-practice; and acts as the system’s advocate in the barangay.
Mayors must convene the Councils within 6 months of approval. Members receive no remuneration.
Why it was proposed
The policy section is short and states the aim: that the customs, beliefs and traditions of the Bangsamoro people are recognized, respected and guaranteed, and that disputes are resolved justly and peacefully.
The practical case is that the Lupong Tagapamayapa — the barangay conciliation panel under national law — applies a national framework in communities whose disputes are actually governed by customary law, whether Moro or indigenous. The Council is meant to put that knowledge at the panel’s disposal rather than leave it to whichever member happens to have it.
Who it affects
- Parties to barangay-level disputes, whose settlement would draw on customary law explicitly.
- Lupong Tagapamayapa members, who gain an advisory body for matters outside their expertise.
- Traditional, religious, indigenous and tribal leaders, given a formal role in the barangay justice system.
- Women, youth and persons with disabilities, each given a seat.
- City and municipal mayors, who chair every one of these Councils in their jurisdiction and must convene them within 6 months.
Who would implement it
- City and municipal mayors, as chairs and as the officials required to convene the Councils
- The Councils themselves, in every barangay
- City and municipal police offices, which supply a representative to each
Funding
No appropriation. The bill makes no appropriation and states that members receive no remuneration for their duties. It is designed to cost nothing, which is a defensible choice for an advisory body — and also the reason to ask how often bodies with no budget and no paid members actually meet.
What changes if it becomes law
- Every barangay in the region gains a customary law advisory council for its justice system.
- Traditional, religious, indigenous and tribal leaders acquire a formal advisory role.
- Women, youth and PWD representatives sit on the council by right.
- Customary laws that have fallen out of use through non-practice are to be supplied back to the system.
- Mayors must convene the councils within 6 months of approval.
- The Katarungang Pambarangay Law is expressly unaffected.
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 chairmanship does not scale, and it is the first thing a committee should look at. The Council exists in every barangay, and the chair of every one of them is the city or municipal mayor. Lanao del Sur has municipalities with dozens of barangays; a mayor there would chair dozens of separate councils. The bill gives no provision for a designated representative, no quorum rule, and no meeting schedule. As drafted, the person who must sit at the head of each council is the one person in the municipality who cannot be in all of them.
The function about disused customary law is the most interesting line in the bill and the least noticed. Providing the barangay justice system with "customary and traditional laws that may not have been in use for reasons of non-practice" is a revival mandate, not merely an advisory one — it invites councils to bring back rules that fell out of use. Whether that is restoration or invention will depend entirely on who sits on the council, which is why the composition matters as much as it does.
The seats for women, youth and persons with disabilities are worth noting for what they do in this context. Customary dispute resolution in the region is, in practice, largely conducted by senior men. Writing those three seats into the statute is a deliberate correction, and it sits in tension with the traditional and tribal leadership seats beside it in a way the bill leaves unresolved.
Read alongside Bill 159, which builds a whole PASAD office structure for alternative dispute resolution, this is the same instinct at a fraction of the cost — and both are before the Committee on the Bangsamoro Justice System.
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