Candidates of Maguindanao del Norte vice gov forge election security pact

COTABATO CITY — The police, military and the Commission on Elections on Tuesday, December 17, brokered a covenant binding two candidates for vice governor of Maguindanao del Norte to abide by the Omnibus Election Code as they aspire for the post during next year's local polls. 

Maguindanao del Norte, which has 12 towns, is one of the five provinces in the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao and is close to Cotabato City, the seat of the BARMM regional government.

Datu Blah Sinsuat Mayor Marshall Sinsuat, candidate for vice governor of Maguindanao del Norte, and a representative of his rival, Ainee Sinsuat, signed the agreement, printed on a tarpaulin, in the presence of the lawyer Ray Sumalipao, director of the Commission on Elections for the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, Major Gen. Antonio Nafarrete, commander of the Army’s 6th Infantry Division, and Brig. Gen. Romeo Macapaz, director of the Bangsamoro regional police.

The mayor’s rival, Ainee, was elected in 2022 as vice governor of Maguindanao before it got divided into Maguindanao del Norte and Maguindanao del Sur in the same year via an enabling measure by the Bangsamoro parliament, was represented in the symbolic rite by his brother-in-law, the provincial board member Rommel Sinsuat.

The activity, to be followed by the crafting of a similar peace covenant soon by candidates for governor of the two provinces, was jointly organized by Nafarrete, Macapaz and Sumalipao. 

A senior official of the military's Western Mindanao Command in Zamboanga City, Army Brig. Gen. Taharudin Ampatuan, Lt. Col. Lester Mark Baky, commanding officer of the 5th Marine Battalion, and his immediate superior, Brig. Gen. Romulo Quemado of the 1st Marine Brigade, also helped broker the covenant that the Sinsuats signed on Tuesday.

A number of towns in Maguindanao del Norte and Maguindanao del Sur are longtime election hotspots, where Moro clans, some supported by heavily armed groups, are locked in deep-seated political disputes.

“We are thankful to the two candidates for vice governor of Maguindanao del Norte for cooperating with our effort for them to sign an election peace and security covenant,” Nafarrete told reporters after the event, held at Camp Siongco in Barangay Awang in Datu Odin Sinsuat, Maguindanao del Norte, where 6th ID’s headquarters is located. 

Sumalipao also said then that the 6th ID and PRO-BAR shall enforce tight security measures to ensure safe and clean elections in the two provinces during the 2025 local electoral exercises.