A primer on charter change

FROM A DISTANCE

By Carmen N. Pedrosa
The Philippine Star

This column is in reply to Alexander Yalung, a Filipino electronics engineer in Taiwan <alexyalung@e-lead.com.tw". He asked for a primer that he can use to spread the word for charter change. That is a reasonable request. He wrote: "I’m for charter change because I am an open-minded person and believe that we need to try everything in this world to come out with a solution to a problem named "Philippine Banana Republic". However, I need to know the advantages of this type of government to the maximum. This is because I want to convince as many people as I can to go for this charter change, but need some bullets to do so.

"Can you list down some advantages for me or better yet write it down in your column next time."

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Here is a short primer you can cut and send off to your friends and to as many people as you can:

There will be three areas for review by a constituent assembly: the form and structure of government; some economic provisions and the transitory provisions.

First: We will shift from a presidential unitary to a parliamentary federal. At present we have a presidential government. In theory 42 million Filipinos, more or less, vote for a President who is both head of state and government. The Philippine president is one of the most powerful figures in the world. Because of this system there is no real relationship between the elected official and the voter. Most voters elect the President because of name recall, money and/or celebrity. That is why incompetent individuals get elected and stay on to complete their term. In the past we have had to resort to public massing as we did in EDSA1 and 2 at a great damage to our political institutions. Moreover, this type of elections is the single most notorious reason for graft and corruption in the country.

In parliamentary government the political constituency is reduced to smaller groups. A voter elects a member of parliament whom he knows and he believes will be accountable for governing his or her district.

Therefore the hullabaloo about the general public losing the right to vote is wrong. What it means is a voter votes only for those he knows directly. Ang sabi nga ng isang constitutional analyst ‘Puede niyang batuhin ang bahay ng member of parliament kung hindi ito nagpeperform kasi kilala niya kung sino iyon.’ This is of course, an exaggeration but that is the reason why so many countries with stable governments are better off than those with presidential governments. Indeed, almost all the countries where Filipinos have gone to work are parliamentary federal governments.

More importantly, in presidential government, a president serves a six year term whether he or she does or does not do the job well and can be removed only by impeachment at a great cost to the nation, (like what is happening today) while in a parliament all that is needed is a no-confidence vote. The country can go ahead with business as usual because parliament does the job of removing a bad leader, the Prime Minister in this case which would be the equivalent of the President in a presidential system.

Second: The amendments will include a commitment to federal system that will be developed within a five- to ten-year period. Through a federal system we will bring government closer to the people. Power from what has been called Imperial Manila will be politically devolved to the different states (equivalent to electoral districts). Provisions in the 1987 Constitution to be amended for this are Article VI and Article VII for the shift to parliamentary government. and articles X, VIII and IX for the shift to federal system.

Third: We will review some economic provisions. The purpose of this amendment is to modernize government policies to enable the country to develop. We cannot move forward or create jobs, housing and livelihood for our teeming millions or indeed catch up with our neighbors without foreign and local investments. Therefore we will amend provisions that hinder the growth of our country. We will modernize policies that can attract investments without sacrificing our national interests. It is not one or the other, but both. The economic amendments will be delicately balanced. To be reviewed are Section 19 of Art. II and Section 10 of Article XII.

All other parts of the present Constitution will be retained except for the above.

Transitory provisions refer to the execution of the amendments so that the shift from the old to the new is orderly. Some drafts I have seen include this important provision: All existing laws, implementing rules and regulations, executive orders, proclamations, and other executive issuances not inconsistent with this constitution shall remain operative until amended, repealed or revoked. It also deals with such matters as what to do with elected officials from the president down to local officials who will be affected by the transition.

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Lastly, it is not true that charter change is only being resorted to by President GMA because of the threat of impeachment. The issue of charter change has been with us for decades. Here is what the late Raul S. Manglapus, a delegate to the 1971 Con-con, a Centrist Democrat and one of the founders of Lakas CMD said in explaining why we have to change the present presidential system: "It all began in 1934, when the delegates to the Constitutional Convention agreed that the American separation of powers and presidential system were worthy of emulation indeed – but not the American federal system. Therefore a presidential unitary government was designed, and all the powers of the American presidency and of the American state governors were massed together and deposited in the Office of the President of the Philippines.

Because a president of the Philippines is so powerful, he or she would not want to surrender these powers. Charter change will do that. By declaring herself behind charter change, and making it the legacy of her presidency, President GMA has broken the political curse. She is making charter change possible. It may be a supreme paradox but all Filipinos must support charter change now unless we want the country to go down the drain and into a path of chaos. Its first victims will be the middle class and the poor. It is easy to identify the personalities behind the impeachment. These are the same personalities behind the discredited Marcos and Erap regimes. The extreme left, on the other hand, want the revolutionary situation that would ensue.

That will happen if we do not support GMA and her legacy for charter change. We, the centrists, the silent majority, have to make sure a new system is in place before the extremists, whether of the left or the right, move in for the kill. We have a very narrow window to make these reforms possible once and for all. President GMA is not faultless. She may be the accused but she is also the savior.