Denying the people what’s theirs by right

ITRIED to tune in on Wednesday to the Senate hearing on Charter change, hoping to learn something I did not learn when I used to run the was the caricature of a process from which the people, who are supposed to own it, appear to have been excluded. The President’s agents seemed resolved to railroad

“inverted federalism” at all costs, and will not be distracted by reason or simple good manners to acknowledge or answer any objection to it.

It struck me as “a dialogue of the deaf.”

What the Constitution provides

Under its own provisions, the Constitution may be amended or revised by three- fourths of all the members of Congress directly proposing the revision or amendments, and the people approving or rejecting the same in an honest plebiscite.

Or, by a vote of two-thirds of all its members, the Congress may call a constitutional convention, or by a majority vote of all its members submit to the electorate the question of calling such a convention.

Or, upon a petition of 12 percent of all registered voters, in which every legislative district is represented by not less than three percent of all its voters, the people may propose the amendments themselves by direct initiative.

There is not a single line in the Constitution that authorizes the President to propose any constitutional revision or amendment, or the manner by which any revision or amendment may be proposed. That is solely the business of Congress and the electorate.

By Congress the Constitution refers to the second branch of our tripartite system of government, as genuine and unadulterated representatives of the people rather than as mere agents or errand boys of a powerful and ruthless President.

The members of the present Congress, with some notable exceptions, cannot claim to rise to - petition among them is how to demonstrate their servile loyalty to the President. They will not mind offending God, family and country just to please their chief.

No moral authority

As a law- abiding senior citizen, a former member of the Cabinet, the interim Batasang Pambansa and the Senate for at least 25 years, and a functioning critic of the social, political and moral order, I hold the view that the present Congress does not have the moral authority to propose any amendments to, or revision of, the Constitution, in the name of the Filipino people.

If they had any right to speak for the people who had elected them— assuming their election had been fair and free —they lost that right when they abandoned their original political parties and defected to President Duterte’s borrowed party after the election.

The Constitution is supposed to be the people’s sovereign enactment. Its real authors are the people. But I did not hear anyone talking of “federalism” on behalf of the people. Instead there were the President’s legal counsel Salvador Panelo and Malacañang - noSitoy, who had no constitutional role to play in the Cha-cha, defending the indefensible.

Why were they there?

Not a single senator bothered to ask either of them, “by what right or duty have you come here?”

What cause involving the President did Mr. Panelo come to the Senate for? Since when has Mr. Sitoy—whose job is largely messengerial— been expected to speak for the President in a Senate forum on a serious constitutional question?

Did not their presence merely in tinkering with the Constitution, in culpable violation of the same Constitution?

I was hoping the two former Chief Justices, Hilario Davide Jr. and Reynato Puno, and the former Senate President Nene Pimentel, who now sits in the shade as the father of the incumbent Senate President Koko Pimentel, would point this out, but luck eluded me this time.

Don Claro lives

Sen. Ralph Recto did his illustrious grandfather Don Claro Mayo Recto, the celebrated chairman Convention, proud, with his series of penetrating questions and his conclusion that from all appearances the administration’s Cha- cha is dead in the water.

I was hoping Sen. Sonny Angara would be less circumspect and instead of simply asking what benproposed change would bring, he had asked, “ proposed Charterchange?

More pointedly, he could have asked, “Why is the government doing this to us?” He would have probably gained greater attention of the Nation Address (SONA)— the last time the big man merely reminded Sonny not to forget he was up for reelection—but it would have been worth it.

For this is the question tearing at the guts of our people. Cuibono?— to the common good are hardly discernible. But not enough men and women of convictions and conscience seem to care.

Certainly, former President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, her famous husband and their own people would benefit, much more than they may be doing right now, if the proposed change makes GMA prime minister in a French-type presidential system.

and abusive minions would suspended and they are allowed to stay on, despite their having reached the end of three consecutive congressional or local government terms. The drift to dictatorship is unmistakable, but to see it happen.

Panelo and Sitoy kept on repeating that however controversial the proposed constitutional revision or amendment, the people will be the ones to ultimately approve or reject the same. They must take us for fools. They expect us to believe that the plebiscite that would be held to ratify any and all proposed amendments or revision would be free from manipulation, even without official “inspectors” whose compulsory presence in regular elections has failed to prevent massive cheating.

Where our rights begin

More than that, they seem to have a perverted notion of the people’s rightful role in writing or rewriting their Constitution. The people’s right to write or rewrite their Consitution begins with their right to conceptualize the proposed amendments or revision, but they would like us to be content that we are allowed to approve or reject what has been written for us by others, and to accept the results of the plebiscite, without regard to their being free or not of manipulation or malicious errors.

This was Cory Aquino’s original sin against the 1987 Constitution. Installed by the military as ““Revolutionary President” on February 25, 1986 on the basis of “People Power,” after losing to Marcos the snap presidential election of February 7, 1986, Cory decided she could not trust the people, who had allowed her to sit as president, to elect their own delegates to a constitutional convention. So, she handpicked 48 “constitutional commissioners” to draft her new Constitution, some of them in gross violation of the very criteria

This is the crime against the Filipino people which is being repeated to the sound of trum administration.

Some needed amendments

Contrary to what former Chief Justice Davide told the hearing, the Cory Constitution is far from ideal; there are many obvious defects which need to be expunged from it. But we cannot allow ourselves to be swayed either by former Chief Justice Puno who said it has been overtaken by globalization and needs to revitalize itself by embracing federalism. This is pure non- sequitur.

* We copied the presidential system from the American model, but we could not leave well enough alone, so instead of making a vote for the President a vote also for the Vice President, we introduced a system in which a candidate from one party could be elected President and a candidate from another party elected Vice President, ensuring the kind of relationship that now Robredo, whose position as Vice threaten with abolition.

This constitutional defect has caused us so much disorder, it must be expunged now.

* Judicial reform. Under the so- called judicial reforms introduced in the 1987 Constitution, we abolished the old provision requiring Supreme Court justices to be confirmed by the Commission on Appointments, and decided that they vetted merely by the Judicial and Bar Council. This has produced disappointing if not disastrous results for the judiciary and the nation. We need to repeal that provision now, and revert to the rule and practice that worked well for us in the past and continue to work well in other jurisdictions.

* Political dynasties. These have wreaked havoc upon the country, despite Sec.26 of Article II of the Constitution, which provides “The State shall guarantee equal access to opportunities for public service and prohibit political dynasties as may be provided by law.” The way this provision is written guarantees that no law against political dynasties will ever be enacted for as long as the politicians who would be affected by the law are expected to write it themselves.

Thus, in a Senate of 24 mem million families across the nation and beyond, we have seen mother and son, father and son, brother and sister, brother and half- brother sitting together as members, without having any exceptional qualities to merit their being there at the same time. The Constitution should be amended to contain a self- implementing provision, which will not be subject to further legislation.

* Term limits. The Constitution provides for term limits, which have caused more ills than cured. The term limit must be made permanent, or it must be lifted altogether. We cannot have a law that says a certain of consecutive terms, stop, and then after the lapse of one election, run again for another two or three terms. It is a gross insult to the voter’s intelligence and an affront to the political system.

* Turncoatism. Politicians should be free to change political parties before an election, but anyone who decides, for any reason whatsoever, to switch political parties after an election, position or be dismissed from it altogether. This is a necessary and most timely amendment.

* Mass media ban. The prohibition of foreign equity in mass media should now be scrapped altogether. Not because of the case of Rappler, but because it does not make sense anymore. Since everyone can now access all foreign media products through the Internet, television and actual foreign media sales, the only things being barred by this ban are foreign capital and intellectual skills that could otherwise help upgrade local media establishments.

* Presidential vs parliamentary. The debate should be kept alive between the presidential and the parliamentary systems. There is so much to be said in favor of the parliamentary system that cannot be said of the other. All things being equal, it allows the nation a better choice of leaders. Since no candidate is elected by the entire population, the scope of every election is much smaller, and, there is a greater chance of guaranteeing cleaner and more transparent elections.

* Forget federalism. But there is absolutely no need, and no intelup our existing nation-state into several parts in order to put them back together again and form a big federal union. To avoid untenable inequalities between Imperial Manila or Imperial Davao and the rest of the country, political power and economic resources could be redistributed through creative development programs and national legislation, without necessarily introducing any monstrosities into the Constitution.