Filipinos ‘neutral’ towards Bangsamoro law, SWS poll shows

Filipinos are neutral towards the proposed Bangsamoro Basic Law (BBL), the Social Weather Survey's (SWS) latest poll showed.

In its Second Quarter 2018 survey, 31 percent agreed while 28 percent disagreed that Congress should pass the bill.

Forty percent said they were undecided on the issue.

The difference between the percentage that agreed and the percentage that disagreed gave a net agreement score of +3, a number that falls in SWS' classification of "neutral."

The bicameral conference committee on the BBL approved earlier this week the proposed measure, which has since been named the Bangsamoro Organic Law.

President Rodrigo Duterte is expected to sign it on Monday, the same day he is scheduled to deliver his State of the Nation Address.

SWS said that opinion on this topic has not always been neutral.

In past years reaching back to 2012, the year where the Framework Agreement on the bangsamoro was signed, Filipinos tended to have a "moderately positive attitude towards the agreement.

The net agreement scores ranged from +16 to +26, falling on the "moderate" category.

However, uproar following the deaths of 44 members of the Philippine National Police Special Action Force (PNP-SAF) turned the moderately positive stance to moderately negative in 2015. Public opinion ranged from a neutral -8 to a poor -24.

The present survey shows that the public opposition in 2015 had died down, with Filipinos taking a neutral stance towards the BBL.

Peace in Mindanao

But while Filipinos are neutral towards the passage of the BBL, they tend to moderately agree that it will bring peace in Mindanao.

A net agreement of +13 falls in the mdoerate category. However, responses differ in all areas of the country.

Metro Manila is moderate both in its opinion towards the bill and its agreement that it will bring peace to Mindanao. The Balance of Luzon is also moderate (+19) in agreement that the BBL will bring Peace in Mindanao, but it was neutral about whether Congress should pass the BBL.

In the Visayas, where there is a moderately negative attitude towards passing the BBL, the respondents become neutral (-4) on the question of whether passage of the BBL would bring peace to Mindanao.

Mindanao as a whole remains neutral on both questions, but slightly more positive on the prospects of the BBL bringing peace in Mindanao (+7) than it was on the question of whether Congress should pass the BBL (-2).

SWS' latest survey was conducted from June 27 to 30, 2018 using face-to-face interviews of 1,200 adults (18 years old and above) nationwide: 300 each in Metro Manila, Balance Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao (sampling error margins of ±3% for national percentages, and ±6% each for Metro Manila, Balance Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao). —NB, GMA News