Interview with Mr. Ramon Casiple, executive director of Institute for Political and Electoral Reforms (IPER) on President Rodrigo Roa Duterte’s first 100 days. (Last of three parts)
“…He (President Duterte) is certainly set on changing the landscape. The particular, I wouldn’t call it enemy, at this point in time, I call it obstacle, is the political elite because most of these changes will impact on the current power structure at the national level.”
DMS: The move towards Federalism has been in the backburner for so long, and only became dominant because Duterte became president, you think this move will succeed?
Mon Casiple: Well there are still lots of discussions on that and actually I’m a member of the federalism study group of the PDP Laban. They asked us for help.
But one thing I think is sure, there is no intention even for the president or any of those who are proposing it to weaken national unity or the national strength. It's basically related to a campaign promise or a campaign line when he campaigned against what he called Imperial Manila and his solution he said in the campaign is the distribution of power towards the provinces.
The current concept, which is basically the dominant concept now, is four regions to be established, not states.
Because there is unanimity (in) rejecting the shared sovereignty feature of federalism. There are some who say it’s not federalism if you are doing that, but there are others who are comfortable with this. So its more on the decentralization. The difference between current devolution and decentralization in the constitution is that wider powers, independence and authority will be given to the regions which will be the new…political centers.
The president said something about more or less giving more resources, giving more authority to the regions outside Metro Manila while maintaining (Metro) Manila as a special federal region.
That kind of concept, I don’t think, will depart much from what is already there. For example, when he said he wants the French system, the current concept says, yes it's possible, we call it a semi-parliamentary system where you have a strong president yet we have a prime minister who runs government, with the president as head of state but with powers over national security, national defense, and foreign affairs.
We will retain the Senate but with a new set of powers and will not be anymore the initiator of laws that is solely the problem of the proposed Parliament.
So these are slowly being conceptualized but I think the bottom-line here is no unnecessary change in the set-up, meaning you change it only where it is necessary to fulfill the decentralization and devolution.
We don’t know yet how it will go.
DMS: What about term limits?
Mon Casiple: Well that’s also in the early stages of discussion, the proposal on the table of course that the president gets elected and is the only official elected by the entire country for a 7-year term, 1 term of 7 years.
You have the parliament, basically that’s the lower house today, still elected by legislative district. The difference is that 50 percent will be by the party-list system, the real party list like in Europe not the party list we have.
The Senate and the senators will be from the regions and not anymore a national electorate and this is actually part of the feature of Federalism.
The parliament, of course, is elected but the proposal is four years with two terms. We go back, and the whole election system is desynchronized there will be no synchronized election.
The Parliament of course will have the power to elect the prime minister and appoint the cabinet and it can also by, vote of no confidence. replace the prime minister.
And the President can also dissolve parliament and call for election upon the recommendation of the prime minister.
There are still lot of details but basically it’s a federal parliamentary system.
DMS: What about timelines?
Mon Casiple: Well the president wants to finish the whole thing in 4-5 years before he leaves office. The current deadline says by the end of the year there should be a draft because there is a proposal on the table to convene a constitutional commission which will actually formalize the draft.
And supposedly it will go to a constituent assembly, that’s the proposal by the legislators. That is another thing altogether because the campaign promise was a constitutional convention. I don’t think the debate has already ended, I think it has already just begun because there are still a lot of questions on legislators making their own rules.
DMS: So we are looking at a midterm plebiscite?
Mon Casiple: Well the target is in two years time, there should be an approved constitution so the ratification will be simultaneous with the 2019 general elections, and the transition will be from 2019 to 2022.
DMS: So moving forward you see all these initiatives, peace talks, reforms as doable?
Mon Casiple: Well at the rate it’s going he will either succeed in two years or he will have a big, big problem but he is certainly set on changing the landscape. The particular, I wouldn’t call it enemy, at this point in time, I call it obstacle, is the political elite because most of these changes will impact on the current power structure at the national level.
Federalism, even that shift in foreign policy, particularly social reforms and the terms that may be agreed upon in the peace talks, I think most of these will impact on the 30-year, we call it, elite democracy.
To be sure my own analysis on his victory is that period in our history has been practically ended by the presidency of President Duterte.
But as I said, this is a transition presidency. We don’t know where he is trying to bring us, we may know later….
