Con-com chairman: It’s now up to Congress

Congress now has to decide whether to accept the presidential consultative commission’s proposed amendments to the Constitution and submit them to a plebiscite, the con-com chairman said yesterday.

"The ball is now in the court of Congress," Dr. Jose Abueva said in a radio interview.

The commission completed the drafting of its proposed amendments within two and a half months and submitted its report to President Arroyo at Malacañang last Friday.

Abueva said the con-com focused on proposed changes including the shift to the parliamentary system, formulating a law that would define the powers of local government units, and renaming autonomous territories and states as federal states.

If the proposed constitutional amendments are approved in a plebiscite next year or in 2007, he said the con-com would recommend that the 2007 elections be scrapped and that incumbent elected officials retain their posts until members of parliament are elected in 2010 for a five-year term.

"These are in the transitory provisions. There is the recommendation to postpone the elections in 2007 to 2010 to give (term) extensions to all elected officials for three years," Abueva said.

The recommendation to postpone the 2007 elections, he said, became an emotional issue that practically divided the commission.

Abueva said Congress will still decide on postponing the 2007 elections but it was also proposed for the country’s leaders to engage in "silent politics" and observe a moratorium on politicking during the three-year transition period.

He added that the President and Vice President Noli De Castro will continue to serve and perform their functions until 2010, when their terms would officially end.

"Under a parliamentary form of government, the president is called the head of state. In a presidential system, the president is the head of government," Abueva noted.

The commission also considered the President’s suggestion to conduct a nationwide consultation with local government units, non-government organizations, youth groups, members of the academe, representatives of the business sector, labor and religious groups on the proposed revisions to the Charter instead of submitting these to the people and deciding only during a plebiscite.

Keep debate going

Rather than shooting down the con-com’s proposed changes to the Charter, Malacañang called on senators and other critics to just keep the debate going to reach a final agreement on which amendments to accept and which to reject.

Press Secretary Ignaco Bunye Jr. said the need to amend the Charter to make it attuned to the current times should not be disregarded, and that it was unfair to denigrate the con-com’s members as mere puppets of Mrs. Arroyo.

Critics said the commission’s recommendation to scrap the 2007 elections and extend the terms of incumbent elected officials were "carrots" being dangled in front of lawmakers to support the move.

"Put plainly, it is organized bribery... Now it is being dangled before us, but we should know better and we should resist temptation," opposition Sen. Panfilo Lacson said.

But Bunye said he does not believe the con-com’s members "will think of a provision that would be tantamount to bribery. I think we have to grant or give them the benefit of the doubt. They made the necessary study and consultation for the welfare of the people."

He also denied that former President Fidel Ramos had anything to do with the con-com’s proposals.

"I think it is unfair to even insinuate that they operated under the dictation of a former president," he said.

Bunye pointed out that the con-com, "once it was created, operated independently and (the commissioners) had a free hand in their discussions."

The President, in transmitting the recommendations to the House of Representatives, said the country must not be left behind and should keep up with the changing times. — With Aurea Calica