Is Sugbuak doomed by the Local Gov't Code?

For our topic on our talkshow tonight on Straight from the Sky, we bring you a discussion on the Pearl 2 Project (which stands for Private Enterprise Accelerated Resource Linkages) by the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) a project funded by the taxpayers of Canada designed to help reduce the poverty in the Philippines through equitable, sustainable development. With us to give a backgrounder of the Pearl 2 Project is Mr. John V. Manzana,s Senior Program Officer Sectoral Enhancement for Pearl 2.

One of the projects of Pearl 2 is helping the Toys and Gifts wares group professionalize the basket weaving industry, specifically in the towns of Bohol. By watching their video on this project, it made me realize how much the government of Canada have given to our poor people, all these funded by Canadian taxpayers who someday believe that with their help, the Philippines will also be a developed country and in the end, a new crop of taxpayers from here would also help the other poorer nations of the world. See Mr. Manzanas tonight on SkyCable's channel 15 at 8:00 pm.

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I doff my hat to Gov. Gwen Garcia for revealing to us the provisions of Sec.461 of the Local Government Code which states that new provinces can be carved out of an old one, so long as these new provinces will each have no less than P20 million in potential annual income and either one of the two other requirements of territory of at least 2,000 square kilometers or a population of no less than 250,000. More importantly, that the creation of new provinces should never diminish the original province.

With this provision alone, I would like to believe that Sugbuak is doomed from the start because slicing up Cebu Province into four separate provinces would undoubtedly diminish the performance and capability of the original Province of Cebu. This is something that the LGC sought to prevent and let's hope that this issue dies a sudden death on this proviso alone.

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Last Saturday morning, I met Dr. Jose Veloso Abueva of the Citizen's Movement for a Federal Philippines (CMFP) who was with Mr. Klaus Preschle, Country Representative for the Konrad Adenauer-Stiftung (KAS) and Mr. Lino Faelnar of the Save our Languages through Federalism (Solfed) at the Waterfront Hotel lobby. We learned that the members of the administration Lakas Party was given a briefing on Federalism by the Local Government Development Foundation (Logodef) and the KAS of which Mr. Abueva was one of the main speakers.

Indeed, this is a much welcomed move because a lot of people here seem to embrace the concept of a Federal State for the Philippines, but still don't have a damn idea of what this banana is. Later that evening, I had long discussion with Dr. Abueva (we're somewhat related because of the Veloso side, plus the Abueva family was very close to my mother's Segura clan) on the CMFP's proposal for a Federalized Philippines, to which, he presented me with his latest book, entitled, "Charter Change for Good Governance" which is a continuing series from his earlier book "Towards a Federal Republic of the Philippines with a Parliamentary Government A Reader."

As they say, democracy works better with an enlightened electorate. Hence if you like this country to shift from its present Presidential, unitary form of government into a Parliamentary, Federal form, then try getting a copy of this book. I really don't know where it is sold, but you can email Dr. Abueva at [email protected] and ask him where you can get one.

This book contains the CMFP's Draft Constitution and so far, this is the only draft for a Parliamentary-Federal system that I have seen. But true to our reputation, I told Dr. Abueva in no uncertain terms that while concurred with their Draft Constitution, I dislike the use of Taglish words, like in Art.XI which calls for a Punong Ministro, Gabinete, and Gobyerno (The Prime Minister, the Cabinet and the Government. They also use "Estado" for States and "Parlamento" for Parliament.

I strongly recommended to Dr. Abueva to print the Draft Constitution totally in English; after all, it is already mostly in English except for the titles of the various Articles. I would rather have the whole Draft Constitution translated fully into Tagalog, Cebuano, Waray, Illonggo and all the major languages in use in this country because this is one of the best characteristics of the Federal system… it helps preserve all our languages and dialects. Dr. Abueva noted how compassionate we were when it came to preserving our languages and he just might experience a paradigm shift in his way of thinking about the language polices under the centralized form of government.

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For email responses to this article, write to [email protected]. Bobit Avila's columns can also be accessed through www.thefreeman.com