{"id":115000,"date":"2017-08-30T04:33:35","date_gmt":"2017-08-30T08:33:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=115000"},"modified":"2017-08-30T04:34:27","modified_gmt":"2017-08-30T08:34:27","slug":"115000","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2017\/08\/30\/115000\/","title":{"rendered":"Alvarez says federalism remains as legislative priority"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Photo:<\/a>
FILE: House Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez (Photo<\/a>: Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez\/Facebook<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

While there are no specific bills yet in respect to President Rodrigo Duterte\u2019s proposal of a government shift to federalism, Speaker of the House of Representatives, Pantaleon Alvarez said that it is still the top priority of the House, on Wednesday.<\/p>\n

Alvarez told the reporters \u201c\u2019Yung<\/em> federalism, kailangan nang maumpisahan na talaga natin, magpupulong kami ng liderato ng<\/em> Senado kung kailan \u00a0kami puwedeng mag<\/em>-convene into a Constituent Assembly (Con-Ass) (With federalism, we really have to start the discussions. We need to discuss the with the Senate leadership when we are going to convene the Constituent Assembly).\u201d<\/p>\n

He said it was during the second Legislative Executive Development Advisory Council (LEDAC) meeting on Tuesday night, when House and Senate leaders agreed to it.<\/p>\n

The LEDAC was headed by the President who was the chairman of the council.<\/p>\n

While the Con-Ass is one of the three ways in which proposals on amendments on the constitution can be proposed. According to Alvarez they are looking at \u2018early next year\u2019 to debate about the draft Charter.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut the committee hearings already started,\u201d he added. He said that the House Committee on Constitutional Amendments created four technical working groups (TWGs) that seek to approve the draft of the new Philippine Federal Constitution by November.<\/p>\n

In a statement on May, Senate President Aquilino \u201cKoko\u201d Pimentel III, Partido Demokratiko Pilipino (PDP) \u2013 Lakas ng Bayan wants to adopt a \u2018uniquely Filipino\u2019 federalism model with two constitutionally established orders of government. He was present in the meeting.<\/p>\n

Earlier this month, it was reported that PDP-Laban had yet to get the support of his colleagues. During the mass oath taking of new party members in Pampanga, Pimentel said \u201cSi<\/em> Speaker Alvarez walang problema sa kanya sa<\/em> House. Ako, may problema sa aking <\/em>House sa<\/em> federalism, kailangan ko ng tulong ninyo<\/em> (With Speaker Alvarez, there is no problem with the House. While I have a problem with my house when it comes to federalism).\u201d<\/p>\n

Federalism will give more power for local government units, such as: taxes, business regulations and court establishment. Currently with the Philippines in a unitary government system, most decisions and programs are concentrated in the central government.<\/p>\n

Duterte signed the Executive Order (EO) No. 10: Creating a Consultative Committee to review the 1987 Constitution last December 7, 2016, granting only six months to finish the constitution amendment.<\/p>\n

The shift to federalism was part of Duterte\u2019s platform as a candidate.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

While there are no specific bills yet in respect to President Rodrigo Duterte\u2019s proposal of a government shift to federalism, …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":92889,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1145,16,95],"tags":[22409,9948,22410,12230,2444],"class_list":["post-115000","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headline","category-news","category-news-ph","tag-aquilino-pimentel","tag-federalism","tag-ledac","tag-pantaleon-alvarez","tag-rodrigo-duterte","mauthors-bea-kirstein-t-manalaysay","mauthors-philippine-canadian-inquirer"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/115000","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=115000"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/115000\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/92889"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=115000"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=115000"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=115000"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}