House discards constituent assembly, pushes Constitutional Convention

THE House is gearing for plenary debates on a resolution calling for a Constitutional Convention and the election of 250 delegates to amend the Constitution.

Speaker Prospero Nograles said Congress would give priority to the debate because the House and Senate were expected to decide in two months which mode to adopt for Charter change.

“Con-Con [the convention] is acceptable to me and most of us,” Nograles said, backing away from his earlier proposal to convene congress as a constituent assembly with or without the Senate to amend the Constitution.

La Union Rep. Victor Ortega, chairman of the House committee on constitutional amendments, said Congress was bent on finding the best way to amend the Charter.

“If our destination is Baguio, and there are three ways to go there—Naguilian, Kennon Road or by plane—if the plane is not available because of bad weather and Kennon is deemed impassable because of a landslide, then we use Naguilian road, which is safer and we get to our destination. That is the main objective,” Ortega said.

There are three modes by which the Constitution may be amended: through a constituent assembly, a Constitutional Convention, or a people’s initiative.

The previous Congress, under former Speaker Jose de Venecia Jr., tried supporting a people’s initiative but failed.

Ortega said the House panel was giving lawmakers two choices to get their objective.

“We will let the plenary decide. The plenary will debate on which mode they believe is best to amend the Constitution,” Ortega said.

But Bayan Muna Rep. Teodoro Casiño opposed both approaches, saying the present Congress had lost its credibility as far as its motives for supporting charter change were concerned.

“Let the next Congress, the 15th Congress, and the next government handle the issue of amending the 1987 Constitution,” he said.

Most senators favor holding a Constitutional Convention, but Senators Miriam Defensor Santiago and Rodolfo Biazon yesterday said they doubted if there was enough time to include the election of delegates in the May 2010 elections.

Santiago said the Commission on Elections was against the proposal that was approved by the House committee on constitutional amendments.

The Comelec said that would lengthen the ballots and make voting more taxing, and also further complicate and possibly delay preparations for the the 2010 elections.

“If that is the response of the Comelec, and they really cannot do it, then we should not insist on it,” Santiago said.

She said that even if the Senate and House passed a joint resolution to synchronize the regular and the convention elections, that would be useless because the Comelec was incapable of implementing it.

Biazon said the House appropriations committee was moving in the right direction by shelving the plan to convert Congress into a constituent assembly.

But he also recognized the constraints that the Comelec faced if if it carried out the new proposal.

“I don’t think that this is still possible. It would be very very difficult for Comelec to do it,” he said.

Senators Edgardo Angara and Richard Gordon are against a convention, saying it would be too costly and difficult to control. They cited their experience as delegates to the l97l Constitutional Convention that drafted the 1973 Constitution. –Christine F. Herrera and Fel V. Maragay, Manila Standard Today