Congress urged to deepen understanding of federalism

FILE: Senate Pres. Aquilino Pimentel III (PNA Photo)

MANILA — Senate President Aquilino Pimentel III on Thursday asked his colleagues in Congress to “deepen” their understanding on the proposal to shift to a federal form of government to be able to help explain the concept to the public.

“I will urge my colleagues and our friends — especially our partymates — in the House to continue our study of the 1987 Constitution, and for those of us advocating for federalism, to brush and to deepen our understanding of the concept so we can help explain the concept,” Pimentel said in an interview.

Pimentel is president of the ruling party Partido Demokratiko Pilipino–Lakas ng Bayan’s (PDP-Laban) where President Rodrigo Duterte is chairman.

He made this statement a day after meeting the Senate and House of Representatives leadership to discuss the review of the 1987 Constitution and the finalization of specific constitutional amendments or revisions.

The Senate President said they had agreed to “momentarily” set aside their differences on what mode to take in amending the Constitution-constituent assembly (con-ass) or constitutional convention (con-con) and whether to vote jointly or separately.

However, Pimentel said that they had informally discussed some specific provisions including the separation of powers and the system of government.

“The system of government to adopt the federal form, meaning to say that we clarify now the powers of national government, and now we strengthen local government by also clarifying the powers at least up to the regional level,” Pimentel said.

Pimentel said that the sharing of the resources, as well as the extent of powers and jurisdiction of each level, would be very clear in the Constitution.

Moreover, he said that among the specific economic provisions that were brought up was determining the extent of foreign ownership in different aspects of the Philippine economy “more flexible by not fixing the percentages but by delegating the power to determine the percentages to the national congress.”

The Senate President, meanwhile, expressed confidence that the PDP-Laban would be able to convince at least a majority of the Filipino people in the plebiscite.

At present, he said that both chambers of the Congress had yet to come up with a specific timeline to come up with specific proposals.