Position paper on the proposals to amend the Constitution or to revise it

The proper time is whenever it is determined that one provision or the other of the Constitution makes it difficult for the body politic to respond to challenges that may arise, in the degree to which a meaningful response is demanded. In short, any time that there is a genuine need to revise or to amend it is the proper time, even one year before a national election. It is necessary to point this out because whenever the proposal to amend the Constitution or to revise it arises, there is always the objection that “now is not the propitious time.”

Having made that point I must complete my answer by demanding to know why we should resurrect the issue of Charter revision or Charter change at this particular time. I am honest about wanting to know the urgency that prompts this revival of a proposal that has long been made but has not earlier won the favor of our lawmakers. I will make no attempt to conceal or disguise my disappointment over the fact that in 2018, President Rodrigo Duterte constituted a committee to study the 1987 Constitution in view of proposing a draft that he could submit to Congress that would revise the Constitution, principally to put in place a federal system. The proposals we made took us several months to study. We conducted hearings and deliberated, often acrimoniously. But Congress did not seem to have much interest in Charter change then. So, why now? If, as has been loudly professed, the purpose is to liberalize the economic provisions of the Constitution, was this supposed need not already felt long before 2021?