House starts plenary debates on economic Cha-cha

MANILA, Philippines - Plenary debates on a resolution seeking to ease restrictive economic provisions of the Constitution start today at the House of Representatives with leaders of the chamber vowing to block any attempt to insert provisions aimed at removing term limits for elected officials.

Authored principally by Speaker Feliciano Belmonte Jr., Resolution of Both Houses No. 1 (RBH 1) will have Davao City Rep. Mylene Garcia-Albano, chairperson of the committee on constitutional amendments, as its first defender on the floor.

At least four lawmakers have signified their intention to interpellate.

Majority Leader and Mandaluyong City Rep. Neptali Gonzales II said Reps. Walden Bello and Ibarra Gutierrez of the Akbayan party-list, Neri Colmenares of Bayan Muna party-list, and Fredenil Castro of Capiz are among the interpellators.

The resolution was approved by the committee last March, and was sponsored in plenary in May by Garcia-Albano, Cagayan de Oro Rep. Rufus Rodriguez, and Cavite Rep. Elpidio Barzaga.

“This (RBH 1) signals to the world that in the Philippines, they (investors) will get fair treatment and they’ll get the assurance of consistency in policies, and the country is ready to receive investments,” Belmonte said in a telephone interview.

“The proposed amendments are not automatic. Once this is approved and ratified by the people, the rules remain the same, and there’ll still be another process in Congress, and with the President,” he said.

The RBH 1 seeks to include the phrase “unless otherwise provided by law” in certain provisions that limit foreign ownership in some industries, which means the limitations remain until Congress enacts laws to remove them.

He declined to give a timetable for RBH 1’s passage but said the House is also prioritizing the proposed P2.606-trillion national budget for 2015, as well as other measures designed to help the country attract the right kind of investments.

The proposed measures include the National Competition Law, the Rationalization of Fiscal Incentives Act and the Tax Incentives Management and Transparency Act.

He also said there is an urgent need to amend the Electric Power Industry Reform Act as the country’s growth momentum is at risk due to the precarious power supply.

Belmonte said Senate President Franklin Drilon gave assurances that the Senate would support the RBH 1. Sen. Ralph Recto has filed a counterpart measure.

He vowed to oppose any attempt by some lawmakers to insert provisions in RBH 1 that would amend the political provisions of the Constitution and allow President Aquino to seek another term.

“If you talk about term extensions, the people will oppose that. I’m just pushing and only pushing for economic reforms,” Belmonte said.

Gonzales earlier said it was possible that some lawmakers from the Liberal Party, led by Caloocan Rep. Edgar Erice, could try to introduce amendments to RBH 1 to push their agenda of extending Aquino’s term in office.

Negros Occidental Rep. Alfredo Benitez, leader of the Visayas bloc, earlier said any proposal to lift term limits should not benefit incumbent officials.

Leyte Rep. Ferdinand Martin Romualdez, leader of the independent bloc, vowed full support for Belmonte’s position to limit proposed amendments to the Constitution to economic provisions.

Romualdez said he and his group would strongly oppose moves to extend the term of elected officials “even if I am on my last term myself.”

He called on his colleagues to concentrate first on easing poverty and creating jobs.

“The number of the jobless and the poor are increasing. So are crimes. Prices of food and basic commodities are on the rise. Costs of fuel products and electricity are more often increasing than decreasing. Tuition and other expenses for education go up yearly. Anomaly after anomaly are being uncovered in government, with no one being punished up to now,” he pointed out. “Is a second term for President Aquino more important than acting on the burdens of the people?” 

Romualdez warned that if Aquino allies insist on a second term for him “without any clear-cut remedy to the people’s sufferings, dictatorship won’t be far behind and the people will lose trust in government.”

“Instead of a government of the people, by the people and for the people, we will be a government of one man, for one man and by one man. When that happens, God have mercy on our country,” he said.

IBP vs term extension

The Integrated Bar of the Philippines (IBP), meanwhile, released a statement yesterday expressing its opposition to constitutional amendments intended to allow President Aquino to seek another term as well as clip the powers of the judiciary.

In a statement titled “No Way And Never Again, No and Never!” the IBP said the plan to change the Charter “puts to great doubt the ability of the President to govern under a Rule of Law” as it was based on “implausible, if not ridiculous” reason that the Supreme Court has overstepped its judicial power. The IBP has 55,000 members.

By citing the decision of the Supreme Court last month voiding acts under the Disbursement Acceleration Program as one of the reasons for the need to clip judiciary’s powers under the Constitution, the President has demonstrated a logic that “simply taxes our credulity and undermines and defies reason.” 

The IBP said the commission that created the so-called “freedom Constitution” had valid reasons for giving judicial powers to members of the court who must be “men and women of probity, competence and integrity.”

In urging the President to drop such plan, the IBP reminded him of the example set by his late mother, the late former President and people power icon Corazon Aquino.

In a speech before a mammoth crowd in Rizal Park on Sept. 21, 1997, Mrs. Aquino voiced her opposition to a similar plan of then President Fidel Ramos to amend the charter and lift the term limit for president.

“Former President Cory Aquino called on then President Ramos to remember that the presidency is a rare gift that one person – any person – could and should only have once,” the IBP pointed out.

The group said Mrs. Aquino was one of the voices in history “who did not only oppose constitutional amendments for the sake of opposing them, but opposed constitutional amendment for extension of term limit even if it would have benefited them.”

“It is thus the hope of the IBP, as the exponent and guardian of the Rule of Law in our nation, that the President would heed these voices of wisdom from a not so distant past, and listen to the lessons they impart,” the lawyers’ group said.

“The President must listen to the history cadenced in these words… and to the memories of the sufferings and sacrifices of the Filipino people under the former dictatorship which gives substance to the lessons learned in the same words of his mother former President Cory Aquino,” the IBP statement read.

After issuing the statement, IBP officials and members led by their national president Vicente Joyas joined the anti-pork barrel protest in Rizal Park.