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Wednesday, August 17, 2005
Editorial: ‘Leave it to the people’
* If the House committee limits its review of the Sugbuak proposal to formal requirements, which chairman Rep. Emilio Macias would like to do, and if Congress will just toss the issue to the voters without examining its wisdom, which Rep. Nerissa Ruiz proposes, that will be an abdication of legislative duty
Rep. Emilio Macias, chairman of the House committee studying the bills seeking to split Cebu province, says it needs only to look at requirements; it doesn't have to examine the proposal's wisdom.
That violates the purpose of committee review. Committee task is precisely to help the House plenary decide by showing merit or demerit of the bills.
Limiting itself to requirements is shirking from its duty to assess the proposal. It can also be deciding, prematurely, that the plan of cutting up Cebu and creating three new provinces promotes public welfare.
Not the least, it re-enforces perception among many people that the committee work is a sham and the body has already made up its mind about giving the would-be end-termers a new lease in political life.
If less significant local bills get the full treatment from a House committee, why not the Sugbuak bills that want not only to mangle Cebu's territory but also to overhaul its historical, social and economic environment?
On the same groove of reasoning runs Rep. Nerissa Ruiz's position that favors leaving the decision solely to the people. Meaning, pass the bills now and toss them to the voters.
True, it is ultimately the people that will judge the bills of Reps. Clavel Martinez, Antonio Yapha and Simeon Kintanar. It is the voters who will say yes or no to giving the honorable gentlemen and lady mini-kingdoms which can serve as political bastions for themselves and their families.
Yet, the legislative mill was set up precisely for a thorough scrutiny of the proposal to determine if it deserves to go to a plebiscite or the archive. The public hearings are aimed to help not just the legislators but the public as well.
Other than checking the wisdom of the bill, legislature is supposed to scan people's mood.
Leave-it-to-the-voters is a cop-out, an abdication of legislative duty.
It is also, unfortunately, a political gambit: to rush the battle to the plebiscite, which like any other election in their respective fiefdoms, can be controlled and bent by resident political warlords.
(August 17, 2005 issue)
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