{"id":220458,"date":"2019-06-26T20:01:36","date_gmt":"2019-06-27T00:01:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=220458"},"modified":"2019-06-26T20:01:36","modified_gmt":"2019-06-27T00:01:36","slug":"sotto-supports-dutertes-change-of-heart-in-federalism-push","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2019\/06\/26\/sotto-supports-dutertes-change-of-heart-in-federalism-push\/","title":{"rendered":"Sotto supports Duterte&#8217;s change of heart in federalism push"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_214659\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-214659\" style=\"width: 2400px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/049a8260.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-214659\" src=\"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/049a8260.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2400\" height=\"1600\" srcset=\"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/049a8260.jpg 2400w, https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/049a8260-768x512.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2400px) 100vw, 2400px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-214659\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">&#8220;I&#8217;m of the same thinking. The transition period to federalism will take too long,&#8221; Sotto told reporters in a text message. (PNA photo by Avito C. Dalan)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p><strong>MANILA<\/strong>\u00a0&#8212; Senate President Vicente Sotto III on Wednesday agreed with President Rodrigo Duterte&#8217;s decision to no longer insist on pushing for federalism to solve the overconcentration of powers and resources in the national government.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m of the same thinking. The transition period to federalism will take too long,&#8221; Sotto told reporters in a text message.<\/p>\n<p>Duterte, however, said he would still prefer to make \u201cchanges\u201d in the 1987 Constitution.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf you do not want federalism, fine. But change the Constitution that would really change this nation,\u201d Duterte said in his speech during the oath-taking of newly-elected senators and local officials endorsed by the Hugpong ng Pagbabago (HNP) in the recent mid-term polls on Tuesday.<\/p>\n<p>Sotto said it would be better to simply amend the local government code to give full autonomy to local government units.<\/p>\n<p>The Senate leader also suggested amending some economic provisions in the Constitution.<\/p>\n<p>Senator-elect and former presidential aide Christopher &#8220;Bong&#8221; Go earlier bared that Duterte has accepted that a shift to a federal system of government may not happen within his term.<\/p>\n<p>\u201c<em>Nagkausap rin po kami ni Pangulong<\/em>\u00a0Duterte\u00a0<em>tungkol sa<\/em>\u00a0federalism.\u00a0<em>Sabi niya mukhang mahihirapan po tayo sa ngayon<\/em>\u00a0(The President and I talked about federalism. He said it looks like we\u2019ll have a difficult time passing it for now),\u201d Go said in a press briefing in Casa Roces restaurant across Malaca\u00f1ang on June 10.<\/p>\n<p>Go emphasized what should be prioritized for now is boosting the information dissemination campaign on federalism.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>MANILA\u00a0&#8212; Senate President Vicente Sotto III on Wednesday agreed with President Rodrigo Duterte&#8217;s decision to no longer insist on pushing &hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":214659,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,95],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-220458","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","category-news-ph","mauthors-filane-mikee-cervantes","mauthors-philippine-news-agency"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/220458","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=220458"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/220458\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":220464,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/220458\/revisions\/220464"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/214659"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=220458"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=220458"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=220458"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}