SENATE President Juan Ponce Enrile and House Minority Leader Edcel Lagman are heading for “war” over arguments on the unconstitutionality of a “legislative constituent assembly” in the proposal to amend the economic provisions of the Constitution.
This developed as the independent think tank Ibon Foundation Inc. said that the proposal to amend the Constitution to lessen restrictions for foreign investments showed that legislators are just insisting on an economic strategy that has clearly failed to develop the economy.
It said that foreign direct investments (FDI) have already been pouring into the country during the last decades but with little to show in terms of overall economic development. “This is because the fixation on attracting foreign investment at all costs has led to foregoing any long-term gains for the domestic economy.”
At the House of Representatives, Lagman said that Enrile must be joking when he said that the congressman anchored his arguments on the unconstitutionality of a legislative constituent assembly on the 1935 Constitution.
“Certainly, I was looking at the 1987 Constitution, and not at the 76-year-old Charter. It is Enrile who is looking at the 1935 Constitution when he agreed to the proposal for a separate voting of the members of the Senate and the House of Representatives despite the obvious absence of this provision in the 1987 Constitution,” said Lagman.
Lagman said it should be Enrile who should reread the provisions of the 1987 Constitution and comprehend the grant of power to propose constitutional amendments to the Congress as a constituent assembly in the light of the leading and prevailing case of Gonzales v Commission on Elections wherein the Supreme Court categorically distinguished legislative authority from constituent power.
SC ruling
LAGMAN explained that the SC ruled in 1967 that: “Indeed, the power to amend the Constitution or to propose amendments thereto is not included in the general grant of legislative powers to Congress hence, when exercising the same, it is said that Senators and Members of the House of Representatives act, not as members of Congress, but as component elements of a constituent assembly.”
He said that Section I (1), Article XVIII, of the 1987 Constitution clearly provides that “Any amendment to, or revision of, this Constitution may be proposed by: (1) The Congress, upon a vote of three-fourths of all its Members.”
This, Lagman said, empowers congressmen and senators to jointly convene in a constituent assembly to consider and propose Charter change (Cha-cha), not as legislators representing their respective chambers but as “component elements of a constituent assembly” in the precise language of the Supreme Court.
He said that if there is any relevance of the 1935 Constitution to the current debate, it is on the fact that it confirmed that in a constitutional assembly, the Congress must convene in joint session and in contrast, it called specifically for a separate voting of the members of the Senate and the House of Representatives, while the 1987 Constitution does not.
Step backward
IBON said changing the Charter out of a fixation to attract foreign investment fails to learn lessons from the past and is going to be a step backward for Philippine development.
It recalled that Presidents Fidel Ramos, Joseph Estrada and Gloria Arroyo gave liberal privileges and generous incentives to FDI over the last two decades and the net result is that foreign investors have been able to make their profits but the supposed gains for economy and the people in terms of jobs, poverty reduction, industrialization and an advanced economy have not materialized.
“In fact, increasing FDI has actually been accompanied by increasing unemployment, increasing labor export, falling real wages, shrinking domestic manufacturing and more volatile growth. The share of manufacturing in the economy has been steadily falling and, at 22.2 percent of gross domestic product [GDP] and 8.3 percent of employment in 2010, is already as small as in the 1950s or over half a century ago. There have also not been any real increases in domestic capital formation or in government revenues which have increasingly relied on regressive taxes on personal consumption.
Party-list Rep. Luzviminda Ilagan of Gabriela dared President Aquino to shoot down Charter-change efforts, saying there are hundreds of measures pending in Congress that are more important than Charter change.
“Congress should tackle measures that will impact on the needs of the majority of Filipinos such as the repeal of the expanded value-added tax and the repeal of the oil-deregulation law. There are hundreds of measures pending in Congress that are more important than Charter change. Let us not waste people’s money on a measure that is not only considered insignificant by Malacañang, but is also potentially detrimental and deadly to our economy and national patrimony,” said Ilagan.
Cha-cha ‘not necessary tool’ for economic growth
PRESIDENT Aquino said on Monday that while he is willing to discuss with Congress leaders their proposed amendment in the economic provisions of the 1987 Constitution, he believes that it is “not a necessary tool” for economic growth as claimed by its proponents.
Mr. Aquino made the statement when asked if he would support the initiative of Congress leaders to push for amendments in the economic provisions of the Constitution through the bicameral assembly.
When asked, Mr. Aquino said that Enrile had mentioned “in passing” the plan to adopt a bicameral constituent assembly as a mode of amending economic provisions in the Constitution.
“There were other topics that we were discussing that day then he mentioned that review and we’re in a democratic country, at least all of these ideas should be explored. But if I’m asked my personal opinion, I don’t think Cha-cha is a necessary tool; a necessary move at this time,” he said.
The President noted that he had earlier objected to convening Congress into a constituent assembly as a mode of constitutional amendment.
He also said that “the reasoning on [amendments in the] economic provisions, I will discuss it with the [Congress] leadership. Of course, I have to listen to both sides. But I don’t agree that that is the solution to grow the economy.”
The President cited as an example China, which has managed to accelerate its economic progress without amending its rules or political system.
“We know their legal system but their market is huge, and this has drawn investors…the economic advantage of setting in a country rather than the prevailing political system—that perhaps would be the initial basis for having or not having investors,” he said.
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By: Fernan Marasigan with M. Gonzalez
Source: Business Mirror, Oct. 3, 2011
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