The need to overhaul the barangay system

For our special presentation on our talkshow on Straight from the Sky, we give you an analysis as to what is happening to our country today. Many pundits are saying that we are living in a time very much similar to the days just prior to the EDSA Revolution. That’s because our democratic processes especially the check and balance system of a democratic government is no longer working. Last week in the height of the DAP controversy, Pres. Benigno “PNoy” Aquino III dared his critics “Go ahead, impeach me!” This smacks of arrogance that Filipinos have never seen from Pres. Aquino.

We’ve already written articles that when Pres. Aquino appointed Supreme Court Chief Justice Lourdes Sereno into the Highest Court of the land, it was the death knell of our democratic processes. Pres. Aquino now rules all the three independent branches of the Philippine Government. All the Constitutional bodies, the Comelec and the Office of the Ombudsman were led by Aquino appointees. The last time a president of this country had so much power was during the Conjugal Marcos Dictatorship.

The president’s arrogant boast to have him “impeached” has only further angered the Filipino people…that the political elite would see nothing impeachable against Pres. Aquino. A few days ago, the senators were given the opportunity to correct their Statement of Assets and Liabilities, which then Sen. Joker Arroyo and Teditorial host Teddy Benigno said was something that convicted chief justice Renato Corona could have availed of. But the senators convicted him anyway. Now the cards have been turned against the senators who convicted CJ Corona. This is called karma.

To help me analyze what is going on in this country, we are blessed with the fact that former national security adviser and former national defense secretary Bert Gonzales was in town to visit his eminence Ricardo Cardinal Vidal when I bumped into him. So I asked him for this interview and he agreed for as long as it is a “No-holds-barred” interview. It’s not easy to get a former Cabinet Secretary here in Cebu so please watch this very interesting show on SkyCable’s channel 61 at 8 p.m. with replays on Wednesday and Friday same time and on MyTV channel 30 at 9 p.m. and 7 a.m. on M-W-F.

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The Freeman headline last Friday which blared, “Pushers Supporting Barangay Officials” is our proof that drug lords are using the barangay elections in order to put these barangay officials firmly into their pockets. I just hope that Regional Intelligence Division-7 Chief Pablo Labra II will complete his investigation and name who are these barangay officials so we could warn the barangay residents whom not to vote before its too late.

This brings us to the question…if the barangay officials are getting funds from drug lords…and many of them are supported by our current elected government officials, can we also say that these local government officials are also into narco politics? Who knows…but people talk in whispers and let us hope that we can encourage whistleblowers to come out and point fingers at these politicians whom we call narco politicians.

Speaking of the barangay elections, you can already see that our political leaders from both sides of the political landscape are not ashamed to be photographed with their favorite barangay leaders. Again this is clear proof of the constitutional violation committed by all politicians because the barangay elections is supposedly apolitical…and that includes the Sangguniang Kabataan. This is why today, politics in this country has become so ugly, it needs to be replaced with a new system and we can only do this via a constitutional convention (con-con).

But with Pres. Aquino vehemently against changing the charter, then the Filipino people are now looking for out-of-the-box solutions to amend the charter. Some suggestions are to come up with a Malolos type of Constitution that will be called by the Filipino people and its finished product will be presented to Congress for ratification. It’s a longshot, but this is what happens when the Aquino Regime prevents the Filipino people from moving forward to improve our system of governance, especially with the barangay system, which is already outdated and ineffective.

If I were a con-con delegate, I would scrap our city and municipal councilors and revamp the barangay system. Here in Cebu…we have barangays that have a smaller population and therefore they should be merged with their neighboring barangays in order to reduce their number. Then we should scrap the barangay councilmen because they are a waste of money.

In place of all this, the barangay captains would now double as city or municipal councilors. In lieu of barangay councilmen, we will replace them with deputy barangay captains for administration, for Health and Sanitation Services and lastly for Security Services. This is real reform.

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