‘Slump in economic freedom report highlights need for Cha-cha’

MANILA, Philippines — The country’s declining performance in the Economic Freedom report for three straight years highlights the need to amend the 1987 Constitution, Cagayan de Oro City Rep. Rufus Rodriguez said yesterday.

Citing the 2023 Index of Economic Freedom report of the United States-based think tank, The Heritage Foundation, the Philippines is now at 89th place out of 176 countries with a score of 59.3 points.

This is the third straight year that the country fell back in the ranking, from 70th in the years 2019 and 2020, to 73rd in 2021 and then 80th in 2022.

Singapore is the world’s freest economy, topping the economic freedom index, followed by Switzerland, Ireland, Taiwan and New Zealand.

The report stated that among 39 Asia-Pacific nations, the Philippines ranked 18th, behind its Southeast Asian neighbors – Malaysia at No. 42 in the overall ranking, Indonesia (60), Vietnam (72) and Thailand (80).

Rodriguez, who chairs the House committee on constitutional amendments, said this is proof that Congress needs to work on “rewriting” the restrictive economic provisions in the 36-year-old Constitution.

“We are now considered ‘mostly unfree,’ after being ‘moderately free’ for nine consecutive years. We have to do something about the reported deteriorating economic freedom in our country,” he added.

Last week, the House of Representative approved on second reading a resolution that will amend the Charter through constitutional convention (Con-con). The House is expected to pass the measure on third reading next week.

Rodriguez said the aim is to tweak the Charter’s economic provisions to further open up the economy to foreign investments. “That is our goal. More investments would mean more jobs and income for our people,” he said.

He believes the country’s economic freedom ranking would prompt senators to consider the House resolution when it is sent to them.