The House Committee on Muslim Affairs has approved, subject to style, a substitute bill that seeks to establish Muslim cemeteries in cities and municipalities with a significant Muslim population.
This took place Tuesday afternoon, Jan. 24, during a hearing of the committee chaired by Lanao del Norte 1st district Rep. Mohamad Khalid Dimaporo.
The still unnumbered measure substituted House Bill (HB) No.2587 filed by Lanao del Sur 1st district Rep. Zia Alonto Adiong and Lanao del Sur 2nd district Rep. Yasser Alonto Balindong, and HB No.3755 filed by Deputy Minority Leader and Basilan lone district Rep. Mujiv Hataman.
Noting that the two bills have been extensively heard and tackled in previous meetings, Dimaporo said they agreed to adopt the substitute bill to consolidate the two different versions of the measure.
“The draft substitute bill is more or less a merger or compromise among the two. Some amendments were made or provisions were inserted by me, the chair, to make the substitute bill a little bit less hostile should it course through the different committees here in Congress,” Dimaporo told the panel.
He said the authors of the bills expressed no objection to the substitute bill.
Meanwhile, the panel approved the amended version of HB No.5045 which would amend Republic Act (RA) No.9997, or the “National Commission on Muslim Filipinos (NCMF) Act of 2009”, to provide Muslim Filipinos better access to Shari’a Courts in their absence.
Dimaporo, author of the bill, said the measure is intended to give the NCMF the mandate to help Muslim Filipinos outside of Mindanao in getting access to Shari’a courts.