FULL TEXT: 3rd State of the Bangsamoro Youth Address
Audhu billahi minashaytan nir rajim. Bismillahi rahmanir raheem.
Assalamu ’alaykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakaatuhu!
Greetings of peace and solidarity to all.
This is the 3rd State of the Bangsamoro Youth Address or SOBYA that the Bangsamoro Youth Commission annually holds, and I am about to present the current situation of the Bangsamoro Youth and the accomplishments of the commission.
It was in 2020 when I was appointed by our Interim Chief Minister Ahod Balawag Ebrahim as the Chairperson of the Bangsamoro Youth Commission. Since then, Alhamdulillah, we were able to institute reforms in the office, lay its foundation, and made BYC one of the most performing agencies of the regional government.
Today, as we celebrate International Youth Day 2022, we would like to recognize the significant contributions of our youth. Their active participation in society only proves that we can work hand in hand in addressing the issues and concerns of our community.
But, “Who are the youth?” They ask.
We say the youth are the powerful force in our society. They are the change-makers, the idealists, and the dreamers for a better nation and future for all; they challenge the status quo and confront problems with courage and intellect.
This is apparently true in the Philippines. We have seen so many instances of how the youth braved the tides to bring about meaningful change in our nation.
According to the Commission on Elections, there are about 65.7 million voters in our country. More than half of these registered voters, or about 37 million Filipinos, are young people aged 18 to 41 years old.
In the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, more than 40% of our population is made up of youth.
Just look how powerful this force can be if we put importance on their craft and empower them — by developing their capacities in the pursuit of their endeavors and advocacies, providing them opportunities for growth, and polishing and amplifying their potential to its optimum extent — these actions will indeed create significant results.
Looking back at our rich history, the armed struggle was led by lionhearted members of the youth who fought for our cause for justice and self-determination for the Moro people. It was arduous, long, and tiring. But neither did they surrender, nor did their hearts waver, because what they fought for was what they believed would end the atrocities against our people.
With the youth’s efforts, coupled with the wisdom of our elders, we are able to establish a government that represents the Bangsamoro. The Bangsamoro Government we have right now is a government that caters to the needs of its constituents, including the youth.
Republic Act 11054, also called the Bangsamoro Organic Law, is the law that created the BARMM. It recognizes the important role that young people play in building a country and works to improve their physical, moral, spiritual, intellectual, and social well-being.
This then led to the passing of the Bangsamoro Autonomy Act No. 10, which established the Bangsamoro Youth Commission, or BYC. It is the Bangsamoro Government’s lead agency in youth development and empowerment. Its mandates included policy-making and coordinating with the different ministries and offices that have programs for the youth. It is also implementing programs and projects aiming to develop and capacitate the Bangsamoro youth in the region and in the diaspora.
In the past 12 months, we are proud to say that we have delivered these mandates and functions, and we have reached and engaged as many youths as we possibly can.
Since the constitution of the Commission En Banc, it has passed 60 resolutions that are now the policies of the Commission.
During our first regular session for 2022, we were able to pass 27 resolutions.
These resolutions were sent to other agencies for their consideration and adoption.
One of BYC’s mechanisms on the policy-making mandate is allowing the youth to have an avenue to come up with proposed bills that will benefit the youth.
In December 2021, we were able to implement one of our biggest programs, the Bangsamoro Youth Parliament, or BYP 2021.
In this program, 76 young parliamentarians from all provinces and sectors in the BARMM were chosen and given lectures on how parliament works, how to lobby and write policy papers, how to get resources, and how to build their skills so they can lobby effectively.
After many days and nights of pretending to be in parliament, they were able to pass two bills and two resolutions that would help the youth grow and improve their lives.
That is how dynamic and strong the Bangsamoro youth are. They were able to discuss prevailing and emerging issues affecting them and craft policy recommendations as possible solutions through a parliamentary set-up that simulates a legislative process.
This program ensures that the youth are given avenues to understand and experience firsthand how the parliamentary system of government works and to encourage their engagement and participation in the legislative process. This year, we will hold the BYP 2022 for another batch of brilliant young parliamentarians.
On January 6 of this year, we were able to air the pilot episode of the Bangsamoro Youth Hours: An Avenue for the Youth to Speak.
It is BYC’s social messaging tool and weekly online conversation program aiming to introduce youth organizations in our region and stream their advocacies and programs to continue to inspire change in the communities and move fellow youth to follow similar initiatives.
From then on, we continued our online program every Thursday afternoon, where youth leaders, representatives of ministries, and line agencies of the Bangsamoro Government as well as development partners, were engaged to invite the youth to participate and take opportunities in their youth-related programs.
Tomorrow, we will stream our thirty-fourth episode. At the end of the year, we will be able to stream more than fifty episodes. In the coming months, we will also start our weekly youth affairs program, highlighting news and stories that are relevant to youth.
The youth are undeniably a critical player in our social landscape. Despite the threats of violent extremism and their vulnerability to joining groups with extreme ideologies, they were able to become among the forerunners in preventing and countering the spread of these beliefs. Thanks to the region-wide training and education programs on preventing and countering violent extremism, our youth are informed, educated, and will be among the peacebuilders for a better social change.
We have also initiated programs aiming to boost young Bangsamoro’s faith and develop their compassion, including Interfaith Dialogues, Ramadhan symposiums and iftar programs, peace forums, and so much more. Our Rise Madrasah Program aims to reach Islamic schools and be provided with the necessary help to augment the needs of the students. This way, we can say the BARMM Government pays so much attention to the students of our faith.
Our Young Ulama and Alimat Conference are also given their platforms to promote peace and security in their communities, as they are among the respected and trusted institutions of their place.
With the Covid-19 pandemic still taking hold of our lives and having caused many setbacks, we can always find ways to help mitigate the harsh effects of this crisis. That is why our Commission came up with the Lingkod Kabataang Bangsamoro, or LKB.
The LKB is BYC’s relief assistance that aims to reach 2,500 vulnerable youth across the region’s five provinces and opt-in areas as part of its efforts to lessen the adverse effects of the pandemic. The program started its first wave in 2020 since the beginning of lockdown and border limits due to the pandemic. It has already reached about 300 youth organizations with about 2,000 individuals.
The LKB’s fourth wave, which started in January, will provide food packs to Toril and Markadz centers this year.
The youth have also gone through a number of education advocacy programs on Covid-19, which have taught them about the facts of the pandemic and tried to stop them from spreading false information.
These were strengthened by a series of programs on Journalism, and Social Media Education for youth organizations with advocacies on active citizenship, responsible social media use, and factual information sharing.
With our series of BOL Awareness Programs and Voters’ Education in our provinces, more youth are educated about the new form of the BARMM government, and they are more knowledgeable of the election process. These programs were timely and relevant during the national elections in May and the upcoming Barangay and Sangguniang Kabataang Elections come December 2022.
The list goes on for the programs conducted by the BYC in the span of one year. It is not surprising how these initiatives have encouraged more youth to be organized in their locality and become more active in their advocacies. We’ve seen how much these figures have risen in recent years.
In 2020, we were able to accredit 307 youth organizations from the region’s five provinces, opt-in areas, and Moro communities outside our region. This year, the numbers have shown significant development. We have now 536 strong and powerful youth organizations.
Accreditation at BYC serves as the youth organizations’ legal identity and will open opportunities for their engagement and participation in development-related programs of the BYC, other ministries and instrumentalities of the Bangsamoro Government, and other development partners.
Our commission has achieved another milestone this year. Being an attached agency to the Office of the Chief Minister, our budget was lodged with the OCM. And we wanted to have fiscal autonomy for better and faster financial transactions within the Commission.
We started by requesting authorization to open an official bank account. Our staff went through a series of coaching and mentoring sessions with the OCM for budget and accounting guidelines and policies.
After about 17 months of going through the process, the Commission was eventually granted fiscal autonomy.
The fiscal autonomy will provide the Commission with maximum opportunity and right to spend resources for the delivery of our programs necessary for performing our mandates. Maraming salamat, Interim Chief Minister Ahod Balawag Ebrahim.
Seeing several Moro graduates excel in their respective licensure exams makes us extremely proud. It manifests that the Moro youth are also on par with the youth of other regions. We hope that these youth will work in our homeland so our people can experience the best services from the best people.
At this point in time, let me recognize the different ministries and offices that have been partners of the Commission in delivering different programs for the youth.
We thank the Ministry of the Interior and Local Government, or MILG, for keeping their commitment to training our Sangguniang Kabataan across the region. The BYC, on the other hand, provides a pool of speakers and trainers for these pieces of training. Since the signing of the MOU with MILG for Engaging the SK, Empowering the Youth, or ESKEY, we have been able to train about two thousand SK officials, including local youth development officers across the region. Just this month, LYDOs from Maguindanao and Lanao del Sur attended training on the crafting of the Local Youth Development Plan to provide the framework for youth development in a municipality.
We have reached out to the Ministry of Social Services and Development, or MSSD, and came up with the “Alay Kabuhayan Program para sa Kabataang Nangangailangan.” It is a program that aims to provide seed funds for vulnerable youth in order to establish their microbusinesses and lessen the effects of the pandemic. Since 2020, 155 young people have been given P15,000 each to start their own small businesses.
The Ministry of Basic, Higher, and Technical Education, or MBHTE, as the lead agency to ensure the delivery of quality education, is a forerunner in providing opportunities for the youth in the region. They are true to their vision of delivering a balanced, quality, and inclusive education for all Bangsamoro learners so they can achieve their full potential. We are also happy that the classes are now being held face-to-face. Alhamdulillah!
With the goal of intensifying its campaign for a food-secure and resilient Bangsamoro region, mobilizing youth to become agriculture and fisheries frontliners is critical. The Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries, and Agrarian Reform or MAFAR’s internship program for youth graduates with fisheries and agriculture degrees will mobilize, capacitate, and develop our next agriculture and fisheries leaders. The program will develop a young cadre of highly skilled, committed, innovative, and highly competitive agribusiness entrepreneurs.
Our health heroes from the Ministry of Health, or MOH, have several programs for the youth. In this time of the pandemic, we have partnered with them for information dissemination efforts to tap our youth leaders and champions to advocate for vaccination against COVID-19 and to fight misinformation and disinformation. They are also implementing adolescent health and development programs.
The Ministry of Trade, Investment, and Tourism, or MTIT, is offering a Youth Entrepreneurship Program with comprehensive package interventions to our young entrepreneurs this month. Through this initiative, the young entrepreneurs will be able to join a network of industry leaders by facilitating their memberships in local chambers of commerce, entrepreneurship clubs, and more. This program will also give entrepreneurs wider access to markets and resources which will bolster their businesses.
Our Ministry of Indigenous Peoples’ Affairs or MIPA makes sure that IP youth in the region will not be left behind with the opportunities that the BARMM government is offering. Among several programs for the youth, they provide various activities and services for their educational, financial, and health well-being. More than 1,000 IP youth in conflict or disaster-stricken areas will benefit from these initiatives. Fiyo bagi, meuyag!
Bangsamoro Government’s Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST) opens up educational assistance and other opportunities to the less privileged yet deserving Bangsamoro youth to develop and capacitate them in science- and technology-related courses. The Science Education Scholarship and Grants programs were established to improve scientific and technological advancement in the BARMM, enhance quality education through scholarship programs, build capacity, and upgrade school laboratories in the region. These scholarships provide cash assistance ranging from P8,000 to as much as P20,000 every month. Thank you, MOST, for these opportunities for our youth.
These sustained programs make the BARMM Government a government that truly supports the idea that the agenda of the youth is an agenda for all. Maraming salamat sa ating ministries, offices and agencies.
Since the Commission’s inception, we have maintained a meaningful and collaborative partnership with our counterparts in the ecosystem of non-governmental organizations, civil society organizations, and informal sectors in co-creating initiatives that have significantly benefited our target constituents in a variety of areas, including leadership, peacebuilding, networking, entrepreneurship, and policy development, among others. Indeed, our development partners have supported us in advancing our potential to a productivity level that is beyond commendable.
In just one year, we worked together with about 15 institutions at different levels to run about 20 programs.
One of these various milestones is the conduct of the Bangsamoro Youth Volunteers Summit in September 2021, which was themed “Lifehacks: Volunteer, Inspire, and Influence.” It was conducted together with almost 100 youth champions from different backgrounds across the region. This initiative is in collaboration with the United Nations Development Programme, or UNDP. It is aimed at mainstreaming the narratives of renowned youth leaders and instilling inspiration to motivate more youth in local communities to engage deeper in civic engagement and volunteer activities.
Together with UNDP, we also spearheaded the formulation of a Manual of Operations for the Bangsamoro Youth Volunteers’ Program to establish a mother document that can serve as a guide for government institutions, legislators, non-government organizations, and civil society organizations in cementing an enabling and inclusive volunteering system for young people in the Bangsamoro, especially the vulnerable and marginalized, that will further promote their meaningful involvement in community building. The writing of the manual is already in its final stage as of today. Such efforts have provided us with tangible experiences to advocate for youth civic participation in the region.
Another policy document that we have also been co-developing with UNDP until this time is the Bangsamoro Action Plan on Youth, Peace, and Security (BAP-YPS). It outlines mechanisms of participation for young people to engage in shaping the development agenda on conflict transformation, community resilience from radicalization and extremism, and youth peacebuilding in forging sustainable development. Once finalized, we will be the first in the country and the third in the world to institutionalize a localized action plan on youth peace and security.
In support of local youth initiatives, in the same year, BYC and UNDP successfully awarded a total amount of P805,000 to almost 25 youth organizations from different provinces in the BARMM, each receiving a seed grant ranging from P20,000 to P50,000.00. This was made possible through the Ideation Impact Challenge (IIC) 2021, a project incubation initiative that trained leaders of accredited youth organizations of BYC on social innovation, leadership, management, and entrepreneurship.
We also had the similar project together with Ayala Foundation, Incorporated, which is the Bangsamoro Young Leaders Program, which offered an intensive fellowship experience to almost 30 youth fellows in the Bangsamoro and gave them opportunities to explore and immerse themselves in successful innovations through a learning circuit. Similar to IIC, they were also given start-up funds amounting to P50,000 to support their “change projects.” Currently, we are undergoing monitoring and evaluation of the projects of our fellows and are excited to witness the Culminating Activity that will happen sometime in September 2022.
In October 2021, together with the United Nations’ International Organization for Migration (UN-IOM), we collaborated on the realization of its STEP-BARMM Project which trained young people in two things: project designing and management, and policymaking. One component of the project is an incubation platform that allowed our partner youth organizations to learn about conflict sensitivity, peace promotion, leadership, management, and initiative designing. In the later parts of the engagement, they were provided with fund support amounting to P50,000 to P80,000 to implement their tailor-fitted initiatives. The second component is capacitating youth in aspects of policy-making wherein youth organizations from across the region were gathered and underwent a series of learning exchanges to improve their skill sets in policy-making and lobbying.
This is another significant milestone for the Commission that I consider. We have seen youth organizations mature as they transcend their efforts to the corners of their Sanggunians lobbying their policy proposals that highlighted certain causes that they believe are crucial to their development as a sector. Maa sha Allah!
For an institution that is still trying to find itself in the realm of legislation, we are happy that, with the support of our partners, we were able to fulfill, though not yet as perfectly as we and others wanted it to be, the core functions bestowed upon us by the law.
These efforts left us with an enormous amount of inspiration after directly witnessing the creativity, passion, and grit of young people in co-creating impacts in their communities at a very young age. Indeed, our power as a sector is strong and boundless.
To the Ayala Foundation, Inc., UNDP, and IOM, I cannot find the appropriate terms to express our extreme gratitude for the support that you have passionately shown the Commission over the years. Maraming Salamat!
In another context, speaking on building important internal mechanisms, one of our paramount priorities is fortifying the foundational bureaucracy and systems within the Commission to improve our service delivery to the Bangsamoro youth.
We highly believe that with robust, inclusive, enabling, and pro-active mechanisms in place, we can assure that we can co-stimulate sustainable impacts in the communities of our constituents or even beyond. In this aspect, the European Union’s Support to Bangsamoro Transition Project, commonly known to many as SUBATRA, has been of significant help. Through its efforts with us, in December 2021, we had the opportunity to conduct an institutional review of our performance in the discharge of our mandates, functions, and powers as the lead agency for youth development.
This year, we started writing our Manual of Operations with the help of SUBATRA. This comprehensive document will define the systems and protocols of the Commission in the exercise of its mandates as a policymaking and coordinating entity of the Bangsamoro government for the youth. We were also provided by SUBATRA with eight pieces of high-end office equipment for the use of our employees.
Without a doubt, we will be very grateful for their kindness in helping the Commission build up its institutional capacity to give our clients better and stronger services.
To improve certain competencies in our workforce, we received training scholarships intended for our employees from the German government through GIZ-Civil Peace Service and the Mindanao Peacebuilding Institute, or MPI.
Such scholarships provided us with intensive learning opportunities to acquire skill sets in different thematic areas of peacebuilding that are essential to our respective work, such as environmental peacebuilding, monitoring and evaluation of youth initiatives, and culture and the arts. This is only among the many pieces of training that our employees were able to have access to in the couple of years that have passed.
BYC will also send more scholars to the Annual Peacebuilding Training of MPI in October 2022 to learn from international peace experts in areas such as trauma healing, conflict-sensitive journalism, and peace promotion. To GIZ, we thank you for continuously investing in the development of our office and the Bangsamoro young people in general.
In 2020, BYC partnered with United Voices for Peace Network, Inc., or UVPN, and The Asia Foundation in the implementation of the Activate Young Bangsamoro Project which sought to contribute to raising social awareness of the Bangsamoro Government’s parliamentary system and people’s voting rights. UVPN and TAF also turned over to BYC in January 2022 a comprehensive communication plan, which is a tangible output of this program.
In February and March 2022, we also implemented the Adolescent Youth Peacebuilders’ Training of Trainers in partnership with Voluntary Service Overseas Philippines, or VSO, which gathered together 60 young peace advocates, clustered into two cohorts, from different municipalities in Maguindanao to be trained on different themes in peacebuilding through interactive and experiential methodologies.
BYC also supports and works to ensure the welfare and development of our young women in the region. Since May this year, there have been a series of conversations happening with the United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund, or UNICEF, and Plan International regarding the digital application named “Oky App” which they launched in BARMM in July 2022. This is a menstrual cycle tracker designed for and with young women that aims to help them better manage their sexual and reproductive health and wellbeing. Through this innovation, our young women can be guided and can acquire access to better and safer reproductive health practices.
Parallel to this advocacy, we are working with the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) to strengthen our advocacy for comprehensive sexual education among young people in the region. In April 2021, we also collaborated with UNFPA in distributing 120 dignity kits, which were distributed to selected beneficiaries in SPMS Box along with other relief assistance given by BYC during the roll-out of our 2nd Lingkod Kabataan Bangsamoro program.
We are also currently discussing certain matters with University Research Co. (URC) to explore possible collaboration on adolescent and youth reproductive health programs to strengthen and improve health systems and enable communities to care for themselves.
BYC has operated and addressed multiple arrays of issues that confront young people, and to reiterate, these were made possible with the massive support of our development partners. To GIZ-CPS, MPI, SUBATRA, UNICEF, Plan International, UVPN, The Asia Foundation, and VSO, may your support for the Commission and your passion for the entirety of the Bangsamoro youth sector continue to be an instrument for delivering more sustainable and meaningful change in their lives. BYC’s promise and willingness to work with you on this agenda will always be real.
More great news to share: we partnered with the International Labour Organization, or ILO, during the observance of the World Day Against Child Labor on July 8, 2022. We gathered BARMM partner agencies, youth leaders and organizations, civil society organizations, and the media, among many others, to celebrate and raise social awareness about the Bangsamoro’s fight against forced child labor.
We also want to recognize and proudly share with you the ongoing exploratory dialogues and partnerships BYC is having with various organizations that work relatively on these distinct themes.
Equal Access International Philippines has agreed in a Memorandum of Understanding, which we signed in January 2022, to co-create the OurMindaNOW Kutawato Messaging Hub Regional Node in Maguindanao.
With the Al Qalam Institute for Islamic Identities and Dialogue in Southeast Asia of Ateneo de Davao University, we started discussing the component activities of the KEEP Peace Project, and in our discussion, we highlighted the implementation of the Youth, Peace, and Security Summit 2022, which is ideal to be conducted sometime in September 2022.
Ultimately, our ongoing dialogue with the International Jurists Union, which began in April this year, revolves around the plan to conduct benchmarking activities and access empowerment opportunities for youth under the Ministry of Youth and Sports of the Republic of Turkeyi. We have been discussing possible fully-funded learning exchanges with the aforementioned organization on certain topics such as media peacebuilding, political party development, policymaking, leadership, and management. We are confident that this collaboration will bring significant competencies to our partner agencies and our accredited youth organizations as we learn from global perspectives on youth development.
We put in a lot of work, and these things show that BYC is one of the BARMM Government agencies that actually works and gets things done.
In fact, a study conducted among young people across the region suggests that young people tend to always “trust” the Bangsamoro Youth Commission the most among government institutions. The young people also said our performance is “excellent” as the government institution that represents youth at the regional level. Maraming salamat sa tiwala, Kabataang Bangsamoro!
In previous years, we centered our programs on two categories: Youth Participation and Development, and Youth Empowerment Programs.
After mandate reviews and recommendations from other offices, BYC’s programs were “recalibrated” into four major group sets, namely: Stakeholders and Partnership Building, Youth Responsive Policy and Program Development, Public Engagement Programs, and Monitoring and Evaluation efforts.
The lack of disaggregated baseline data on Bangsamoro youth during the preparation of its youth transition plan has been a challenge to the BYC until today. That is why, for 2023, we are proposing P12.6 million in funding for research in order to produce much-needed data necessary for the formulation of sound policy and the crafting of a comprehensive plan.
These research initiatives include the Bangsamoro Youth Assessment Study, Policy Research Incubation, and Policy Research and Reform Courses for Youth, among others, all of which are vital for BYC as a policy-making institution for the protection and welfare of the youth sector.
We hope our Ministry of Finance and Budget and Management and my other fellow Members of Parliament help me achieve these goals by approving our proposals for 2023. Baka naman!
Our youth are the next brood of figureheads in the Bangsamoro. It will be their voices that will echo in the future. With the efforts of the Bangsamoro Government, ministries and offices, development partners, and the BYC, we will ensure the youth’s meaningful participation by developing and devising activities that will equip them to face future challenges.
We may have established a government by and for the Bangsamoro, but the struggle has not yet ended. Similar to the theme of this year’s IYD celebration, “Intergenerational Solidarity: Creating a World for All Ages,” a collaboration of youth’s strength and the elders’ profound wisdom creates the perfect combination to achieve sustainable peace and development in our region.
The Bangsamoro youth have more ways to go. Your Bangsamoro Youth Commission is perpetually committed to shape the Bangsamoro youth, our Bangsamoro youth, dahil “Kabataang Bangsamoro, Ikaw ang Pagbabago!”
Wa billahi tawfeeq wal hidayah, wassalamu ’alaykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakaatuhu!
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The 3rd State of the Bangsamoro Youth Address was delivered by BYC Chairperson Marjanie Mimbantas Macasalong, PhD on August 24, 2022, in Cotabato City. It was the culmination of the BARMM Government’s celebration of International Youth Day 2022.
