No basis to declare revolutionary gov’t – Palace

There are no threats at the moment serious enough to prompt President Duterte to declare a revolutionary government, his spokesman Harry Roque said yesterday.

“We appreciate the calls of the President’s supporters for a revolutionary government. But I think there’s no factual or legal basis as of now because the President has said that he will consider a revolutionary government if destabilizers will persist in their plan to have him removed from office,” Roque said in a press briefing yesterday. He stressed the Chief Executive still

enjoys the support of a majority of Filipinos, based on recent surveys.

“Now, I stress, we don’t see any threat, any such threat in the near future. The President enjoys 80 percent approval rating; he was duly elected; he had a margin of five million votes from the second highest candidate,” he said.

Duterte “is the de jure, he is the constitutional” leader, Roque pointed out.

“He enjoys tremendous public support; he has the support of Congress. So we see no reason to declare a revolutionary government,” he added.

“My prediction is his popularity approval rating will even go up from the current 80 percent,” Roque added.

For an official of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP), establishing a revolutionary government is against the law and definitely immoral.

“The revolutionary government is disturbing. The government officials have been elected to promote the Constitution, to protect the Constitution. A revolutionary government is outside the Constitution… So if they opt for a revolutionary govern- ment, it is unconstitutional,” Manila Auxiliary Bishop Broderick Pabillo of the CBCP-Episcopal Commission on Laity (ECL) said.

“It is against the law, therefore, they go beyond their mandate. Therefore it is immoral, we have no obligation to follow them,” he said. “Everybody including the military should not follow them because we have to protect the Constitution. This is extra-constitutional, therefore, it is wrong.”

He said he found it “very worrying” that some people were entertaining the idea in the first place.

The prelate surmised Duterte’s pronouncement was intended to scare the opposition.

He reminded Duterte that “he cannot rule by himself” and that having an opposition “is part of the check and balance of a democracy.”

“If he cannot handle (having opposition), he is not fit to rule in a constitutionally constituted body,” Pabillo said.