Watch Out! CHA CHA is Alive and Kicking
“People will have to be vigilant. It could come very fast. We may all wake up one day and find the Constitution has been drastically changed, triggering a series of events leading to the perpetration in power of GMA and her cohorts,” says Dodo Macasaet, CODE-NGO Executive Director and C4CC Co-Convener.
On February 3, House Resolution 737 was passed by the House Committee on Constitutional Amendments. The Resolution seeks to allow foreign corporations and associations to own lands not exceeding 25 hectares, and to explore and develop the natural resources of the country (like mining concessions) irrespective of the area involved, through joint venture or production sharing arrangement.
“The insensitivity of this government is so gross. It has the boldness to give land to the foreigners to the extent of changing the Constitution, yet it cannot act on the demands of thousands of marching farmers around the country to extend the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program and ensure 1.4 million landless farmers get a chance in life by having a land they can call their own,” added C4CC National Coordinator Soc Banzuela.
The Resolution has 162 authors and is led by the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Prospero Nograles, making it most likely to pass the Plenary. Once the Resolution is on the floor (13 April-5 June), it will be opened for amendments. And there will be no limit to possible amendments, including extending the term of office of currently sitting officials (Mandanas Resolution), granting the President permanent immunity from prosecution, or even changing the form of government to parliamentary.
According to the HOR Speaker, Resolution 737 will be “treated like an ordinary measure that would pass through the committee and approved in plenary requiring 3/4 or 179 votes in the House of Representatives (HOR).” It is expected that the Senate will not be able to pass a counterpart Resolution requiring 3/4 or 18 votes, given their earlier unanimous resolution against a House-only Cha Cha. A broader civil society coalition led by former senior government officials, projects that “without declaring itself as a constituent assembly, and if it gets 197 votes or 3/4 of the total number of both Houses of Congress, the House of Representatives will insist that the constitutional requirement of 3/4 vote of Congress for a constitutional amendment has been met.”
A separate initiative by Congressman Villafuerte has caught headlines. A signature campaign (no one has a copy except Villafuerte) for a House Resolution transforming Congress into a Constituent Assembly to change the Constitution is said to be only 17 signatures short. In both initiatives, with 197 votes, the case becomes “justifiable” and will be raised to the Supreme Court for decision. The HOR may even send the Resolution straight to COMELEC for a plebiscite as a full-fledged proposal to amend the constitution.
Given the current composition of the Supreme Court with most of them appointed by GMA, and with their worrisome record in 2008 (decision on Neri’s case), it is feared, the Resolution will get positive SC decision. “Then we would have a plebiscite sometime third quarter and our elections in May 2010 may not be Presidential but Parliamentary. Then, we may have GMA forever. Unless the people exercise their sovereign power,” Soc Banzuela concluded.