Cha-cha by 2013 on P-Noy’s initiative, yes! Philippine Daily Inquirer
07/26/2010
IN ITS July 8 editorial, the Inquirer declared it was the wrong time to consider Charter change, and gave these reasons in effect.
There was no mandate given to President Aquino to change the Constitution. His election even meant rejection of former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s failed Cha-cha initiative which she, as a representative, has revived in a proposed law. It would be distracting to President Aquino whose priority should be to push his legislative agenda. Better to have his proposed commission study the need for Cha-cha, and to effect the change in connection with the elections in 2013.
As an advocate of constitutional and institutional reforms I regard as urgent and long delayed, I believe on hindsight that former President Arroyo’s Cha-cha initiative from 2005 onward suffered mortally from wrong sponsorship by her, by the wrong method of a constituent assembly without the Senate, or by a People’s Initiative, and therefore from wrong timing.
I agree that 2013 at the latest would be a good time for a national plebiscite on the proposed constitutional amendments.
I strongly believe that it is the primordial duty of P-Noy to initiate policy and institutional changes in our Constitution by asking Congress to act on this idea. No need for a commission or a referendum to consult the people on the question. Initiative for Charter change is a supreme act of the national leadership. The President’s legitimacy and popular trust will make his initiative to change the Constitution welcome and least subject to suspicion.
A constitutional convention would be the most acceptable mode of Charter change because of lingering distrust of Congress and the formidable difficulties of a People’s Initiative.
For our popular and reformist new President, his historic initiative would enable him to leave a major legacy of basic innovations. And also, he would be correcting basic flaws in the 1987 Constitution, also known as the “Cory Constitution.”
We can then be hopeful and confident that in due course our reformed constitutional policies and political institutions will lead our country to sustainable political, economic and social development and modernization.
—JOSE V. ABUEVA, UP professor emeritus of Political Science and Public Administration |
