Experts assure regions cannot secede under a federal form of gov't
Experts on Wednesday assured the public there will be no secession of regions as there only be one state under a proposed federal system of government.
"We are not a separate state. Region is not (a) state. We are not dividing state power. What we are dividing is governmental powers. Power to govern the welfare of the Filipino people but we have only one armed forces, one police. We post before the world as one nation," Ramon Casiple, executive director, Institute for Political and Economic Reforms said in a media forum in San Juan City.
Casiple said the system is not in favor of secession, citing Spain as an example when one of their provinces attempted this.
"The danger in secession is... if someone wants to secede but the system does not favor it. In fact, example is our model, Spain. One of their provinces attempt to secede and it made the federal government step in and arrest the president there.... it's part of their constitution that the agreement is no secession, only one state," he explained.
Susan Ordinario, a member of the Consultative Committee to Review the 1987 Constitution said the post-federal constitution has strengthened the powers of the government.
"Should there be any even one suggestion of a region to secede, the federal government immediately takes over that federal state and then they will already belong to the federal government," she said.
Ordinario said once the region fails to comply with their role as a federated region, the federal government can take over that region.
In terms of handling corruption cases, she said there will be six constitutional commissions that will address this issue.
"One is civil service, another is the COMELEC (Commission on Elections), the other one is COA (Commission on Audit), the two constitutionally created offices of the Ombudsman and the Commission of Human Rights has been raise to a full constitutional body and we have the Federal Competition Commission," she said.
"Why did we have these two constitutionally created bodies? Because we want them to be independent and capable of deflecting political influence or economic influence in handling cases," she explained.
Under the proposal, the Ombudsman will be a five-man commission to ensure cases will move faster and not be limited to the decision of one person.
"There would be an Ombudsman in every region," Ordinario said."Court of Appeals will also be in every region."
Under federalism, she said everyone can check the budget in their region.
"It's easier for the citizenry to follow actions of the government. You can easily complain," she said.
On political dynasties, the committee understands that some political families are not interested in the shift to federalism.
"The truth is, there's no other way- it's a non-negotiable provision. If there will be no anti-political dynasty provision, it will not succeed," Ordinario tells The Daily Manila Shimbun.
The proposed anti-dynasty provision states if a family is going to run (in the election), only one member of the family can run up to the second degree. They are not allowed to run at the same time, and they cannot replace family members in the same position.
Professor Edmund Tayao said they cannot tell if this shift to federalism will pass the Congress that's why they are aggressive in their information drive.
"We can't answer that because it's political that's why the Executive Department is really aggressive in information dissemination in the hopes that the people will be the one to inform those members of the House (of Representative) and the Senate," he said.
Tayao said they received a lot of positive response from officials in the Visayas and Mindanao regions.
"They shared their concern and (are) very positive on this shift (to federalism)," he said.
Tayao said shifting to federalism will make the regions more focused on the economic side.
"You are empowering the region to look at the economic side. In other words, if you look at the 50-50 sharing the NCR (National Capital Region) many think it's not enough but for the other regions it's an opportunity for them to catch up," he said.
The Duterte administration has been pushing for Charter Change by shifting the form of government from unitary to federal.
President Rodrigo Duterte created a 22-man consultative committee that prepared a draft of the new constitution that was submitted to Congress. Ella Dionisio/DMS
