An Act Establishing Social and Economic Reparation and Benefit Initiatives for Orphans of War, Appropriating Funds Therefor, and for Other Purpose

This provides social and economic reparation for the orphans of the conflict, and unlike most of the package it names every figure.

An orphan of war receives a one-time monetary reparation of ₱50,000. On top of that comes an educational stipend, paid annually and capped by level: ₱10,000 a year for elementary for up to 6 years, ₱15,000 for junior high for up to 4 years, ₱15,000 for senior high for up to 2 years, ₱20,000 for college for up to 4 years, and ₱20,000 for a vocational course for up to 2 years. An emancipated orphan who opts not to study receives livelihood benefits instead.

Beyond the money: psychological consultation and trauma therapy, and preference in employment in Bangsamoro government agencies. Section 11 extends benefits to relatives standing in loco parentis to an orphan, and Section 12 gives the unemancipated orphan priority where resources are limited. Section 13 requires other government agencies to run their own programmes alongside.

The funding structure is an Endowment Fund for Orphans of War, administered with disbursement rules, able to receive donations in kind and other non-monetary gifts, with the Commission obliged to ensure immediate release. Section 19 prohibits double benefits.

The declaration begins from Section 9 of Article II of the Constitution — the State's duty to promote a just and dynamic social order and free the people from poverty — and applies it to the population the conflict left without parents.

The practical argument is in the structure of the benefits. A one-time payment acknowledges a loss; a stipend through every level of schooling, a livelihood alternative for those who do not study, trauma therapy and hiring preference address what the loss actually costs over a life. The bill treats being orphaned by the war as a continuing condition rather than a past event.

The stipend schedule is the most carefully costed thing in this package, and running the arithmetic shows what the bill is really promising. A child entering elementary school and continuing to a degree draws ₱60,000 over 6 elementary years, ₱60,000 over junior high, ₱30,000 over senior high and ₱80,000 over college — ₱230,000 across roughly 16 years, plus the ₱50,000 reparation. That is a modest sum spread over a schooling life, and it is the only measure in the registry that follows a beneficiary from 6 years old to a degree.

Including trauma therapy is the provision that distinguishes this from a compensation statute. Reparation programmes routinely pay money and stop, leaving the psychological consequence of losing a parent to violence entirely unaddressed; naming psychological consultation and trauma therapy as an entitlement, alongside the stipend, treats the injury as what it is. In a region where a generation grew up inside the conflict, that is the provision whose absence elsewhere is most striking.

The endowment structure is the right instrument and the bill does not say how it is capitalised. An endowment implies a principal that generates returns, which suits a liability running decades into the future — an orphan aged 6 today draws stipends until the 2040s. But the bill establishes the Fund, sets its disbursement rules and authorises gifts in kind without naming the sum that starts it, so the most durable design in the package rests on an appropriation that is left to be decided later.

Section 12's priority rule is an unusual admission for a benefits statute to make. Giving the unemancipated orphan priority "considering the limited" resources concedes on the face of the Act that it may not be able to pay everyone, and then decides in advance who is paid first. Most bills in this registry create entitlements and leave the rationing to administrators; this one does the rationing itself, in favour of the children who are still children.

MP Alamia filed 9 bills on 19 September 2022, the first filing day of the Second Parliament, and 5 of them are a transitional justice programme rather than 5 separate measures. Bill No. 20 protects internally displaced persons; Bill No. 21 documents the conflict's human rights violations and recognises its victims; Bill No. 22 pensions the ageing combatants; Bill No. 23 compensates the orphans of war; and Bill No. 25 creates the commission to run it. Only Bill 25 became law, as BAA 89 in January 2026. The other 4 are still at Committee Stage.