COTABATO CITY — The Philippine flag and the Bangsamoro banner are both raised half-mast in the Bangsamoro capitol in honor of Speaker Pangalian Ali M. Balindong who died from an illness early Thursday. He was 85 years old.
Members of the regional lawmaking body and the chief minister of the Bangsamoro region, Abdulrauf A. Macacua, told reporters on Thursday morning that Mr. Balindong died from an illness at St. Luke’s Hospital in Quezon City.
“We are saddened by the demise of the speaker of our regional parliament,” Bangsamoro Labor and Employment Minister Muslimin G. Sema, chairman of the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF), said.
Mr. Balindong was a scion of a large, politically influential clan whose members are scattered in Malabang and in nearby towns in the second district of Lanao del Sur, one of the five provinces of the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM).
His ancestors fought the Spaniards, the Americans and the Japanese during World War II.
Mr. Balindong, born on Jan. 1, 1940 in what is now Pualas municipality in Lanao del Sur, finished Bachelor of Laws at the Manuel L. Quezon University and passed the Bar in 1967.
Mr. Balindong was a legal counsel of the MNLF during the crafting of the Dec. 23, 1976 Tripoli Agreement between the front and the Philippine government.
The compact later became the main reference in the peace talks between the government and the MNLF and, subsequently, between the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF).
“We ought to thank him (Mr. Balindong) a lot for his contributions to the Mindanao peace process,” BARMM’s health minister, the physician-ophthalmologist Kadil M. Sinolinding, Jr., who is also a member of the BARMM parliament, said.
Mr. Balindong had served, during the early 1990s, as speaker of the Regional Assembly of the now defunct Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, replaced in 2019 with a more empowered BARMM, a product of 22 years of peace talks between the national government and the MILF.
He was also elected thrice as congressional representative of the second district of Lanao del Sur, prior to his appointment as member of the interim Bangsamoro parliament in 2019.
“His involvement in the Mindanao peace process is one for the books,” Mr. Macacua, the figurehead of the BARMM parliament, said, referring to Mr. Balindong.
A member of the BARMM parliament, Naguib G. Sinarimbo, also a lawyer, said they are saddened by the death of Mr. Balindong.
“Speaker Balindong was a staunch supporter of the Mindanao peace process, both in his private life and as a public servant,” Mr. Sinarimbo said.
Mr. Balindong was also popular for being close to BARMM’s Christian and non-Moro indigenous communities. — John Felix M. Unson
