Use technology for better politics and government

Last Thursday I attended a briefing entitled “Crowdsourcing a new Constitution for a new Philippines.” At the helm of the briefing were young social media technocrats, with expertise on how to use social media for nation building.

They were concerned that the discussion be spread as wide as possible by using technology.

It means anyone who knows how to use the Internet. The term for getting opinions from a large public is known as crowdsourcing.

At first glance it seems like a new word. But as one pundit remarked it is a modern way of expressing an old tradition. We will engage people to speak up through a website. For the moment its name is angbagongpilipinas.com: This is the modern version for gathering under the tree that later became town hall meetings

Crowdsourcing means only to get the opinions from a crowd. It can be a crowd of 100 million or 1 million. In the Philippines there are about 33 millon users of social media.

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Technology is one thing, but for what will it be used? Former Chief Justice Reynato S. Puno spoke that evening.

He had a refreshing tack on political problems. “If you look at our current news you will discover that they are repeats of past news, with little modifications but repeats nevertheless…”

Excerpt from his examples.

“First. During the Spanish time, the problem was the lack of representation of the Filipino people in the Spanish Cortes, the Spanish lawmaking body. Rizal, del Pilar, Lopez Jaena, created a lot of noise and news against this anti-democratic practice….

What is new? Today, so many centuries after, the news is still lack of democratic representation of some significant sectors of our society…I refer especially to the complaint of our Muslim brothers and sisters of their utter lack of representation in the Senate and the Supreme Court and underrepresentation in the Executive Department. This unequal treatment is a principal ground of the secessionist movement of the MILF in Mindanao. …Second. Another recurring news is cheating during elections, involving public or private office. We had our first, sad experience in this regard while choosing our leaders during our armed revolution against Spain. The revolution was led by Bonifacio and Aguinaldo. Soon, due to irreconcilable differences in style, intelligence and temper, rivalry between Bonifacio and Aguinaldo developed. They split and they formed the Magdalo and Magdiwang factions. Soon they realized that an armed revolution against the super power that was Spain, cannot be waged by revolutionaries with divided loyalty.

Hence, Bonifacio and Aguinaldo had the inevitable showdown on who would be the real leader of the revolution. They conducted an election of sort. Aguinaldo won. Bonifacio lost and he protested the alleged use of fraud and force by the Aguinaldo camp. Bonifacio did not have the opportunity to prove his election grievance. He was executed…The use of violence, force, and fraud was news then, it is still news now...

Third. Look at the complaints about too much power given to the President…and the historic abuse of the exercise of excessive Presidential powers to the detriment of democracy. Again, centuries ago, we read in history books, allegations on how some of our past Executives used or misused their overwhelming powers, starting from Aguinaldo when he ruled as our first dictator fighting the war against Spain…. Today, the use or misuse of presidential powers is again top of the line news. …

Fourth.  Another recurring news is the internecine conflict between Congress and the Chief Executive and his Cabinet. Not a few Presidents considered Congress as an obstacle to their reform programs and criticized legislators as incapable of reformation. Hence, Pres. Marcos abolished Congress when he declared martial law. Similarly, Pres. Aquino refused to revive Congress under the Freedom Constitution. On the other hand, sometimes it is Congress that entertains the unpalatable view that the President is chief of the evil empire. The result of the squabbling was deadlock between the two great branches of government and the paralysis of our progress.

This is still news today..There will be no end to the friction between the President and Congress...It was believed that this friction would prevent tyranny on the part of one branch of government over the others. After years of experience, we can conclude that at best, that idea is pure romanticism and at worst, is damaging to our democracy.

Fifth. The recurring news about the lack of independence of the Judiciary. Again, read our legal history. The message it imparts is that for the most part, our courts have not attained that independence enjoyed by their counterparts abroad. Certainly, during the years of American occupation, our Supreme Court lacked independence for its decisions were reviewed by the US Supreme Court... Fast forward its history and still, the complaint is that under the 1935 Constitution, the Judiciary failed to stand its ground against the two other branches of government...Today, the issue still is whether the Supreme Court is independent. Its financial independence leaves much to be desired. Impeachment is a sword of Damocles that continues to hang over the heads of justices. Indeed, it has been announced that when Congress resumes its session, impeachment charges will be filed against some members of the High Court.

Sixth. The recurring news is that a great many of our local government units cannot leapfrog to progress because of too much control of the central government. During the Spanish colonial rule, they called this control as the imperialism of Madrid, it became the imperialism of Washington, now it is known as the imperialism of Manila…

The squabble continues.

Yes, we have decentralization but still, our governors and mayors have to make a beeline to DBM with their begging bowl for the release of their IRA. On the other hand, a great number of our Muslim leaders in Mindanao feel that the ARRM autonomy is a failed experiment. They are now revising their demand from autonomy to a substate…Again, the point is that the overconcentration of power in our national government continues to be a burning issue…

We can go on and on but we don’t have the luxury of time. With the degradation of our democracy under the present Constitution, with the decadence that has taken place in our country for centuries now, what do we do? ….

I submit that the call for the review of the structure of our government, thru the change of our Constitution is timely as it has been a consistent one from Recto, from Laurel and from almost all of our great constitutionalists. Our experience of centuries of failure to solve our problems because of our ineffective system of government, is more than enough…

We, the People, matter, we count and this is the rationale for initiating Constitutional Change thru crowdsourcing. Crowdsourcing is a recognition of the democratic verity that sovereignty resides in the people. The Constitution is the creation of the people. Its owners are the people. Hence, the right to change the Constitution to make it conform to their preeminent needs, belongs to the people and no other.”