Wednesday, June 04, 2008 Editorials: Snap election proposal
A HOUSE of Representatives panel is urging the holding of snap elections if only to preempt political action against the incumbent President.
The call was made in the face of impending efforts to impeach President Arroyo come the re-opening of Congress, thus deepening the crises in political leadership and the economic instability.
Indeed, political and social threats have been hounding the republic since this year began.
Prices of basic commodities that have risen by almost 30 percent, and the continuing increase of prices of fuel (oil firms have just proposed a P2 rise every week), is a matter that can no longer make us smile.
On top of this is the publication of an investigative report that shows a case of profligacy in the President’s office no less.
Profligacy
The report was based on a Commission on Audit (COA) study of presidential spending last year, showing “unliquidated cash advances, loans without records, donations diverted to uses not prescribed by donors, understated expenses, overstated accounts in the hundreds of millions of pesos…”
It revealed that the Office of the President had received a total cash inflow of38 billion, which is said to be 13 percent more than its budget in 2006.
Most of the amount was “sourced from taxpayer’s money” and have all been expended by the end of 2007.
It is more hurtful in the face of current hard times and public suffering.
Purging
The sum total of all the scams and scandals of the Arroyo presidency, from the Garci tapes, to the NBN-ZTE overpricing case and the COA report of presidential profligacy hang heavy on the national conscience, and demand a purging once again of our republic’s collective soul.
For some sectors, elections are among the instruments to generate such cleansing.
They say election is the most ideal means through which the President can prove to the nation her innocence of the charges that brought against her by political detractors who are equally sure of the truth of their issues against her.
But won’t a snap election compound our problems further?
Considering the ramifications, the proposal needs deeper study.
