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Thursday, September 21, 2006
Estrada group, 6 lawmakers join plea against Charter change
FORMER President Joseph Estrada, his political party Pwersa ng Masang Pilipino and six opposition senators on Wednesday asked the Supreme Court (SC) to be allowed to intervene in the petition of Charter change advocates to amend the 1987 Constitution through a people's initiative.
Among the senators who filed an intervention were Senate Minority Leader Aquilino Pimentel, Jr., and Senators Sergio Osmeña III, Ma. Ana Consuelo “Jamby” Madrigal, Jose “Jinggoy” Estrada, Alfredo Lim and Panfilo Lacson also filed a similar petition through their lawyer Aquilino Pimentel III.
In his 22-page comment-in-intervention, Estrada - through lawyer Rufus Rodriguez - said the Commission on Elections (Comelec) did not err in denying the petition filed by Raul Lambino and Bohol Governor Erico Aumentado, representing Sigaw ng Bayan and the Union of Local Authorities of the Philippines (Ulap), respectively.
Estrada, who is facing plunder and perjury charges before the Sandiganbayan, said the petition violates the Constitution as it deprives the people of their right to elect the head of government.
He further said the petition should be junked due to several infirmities such as the absence of a substantive enabling law to implement initiative, defective signature-gathering process, failure to attain the required 12 percent of the total number of registered voters.
Quoting the SC's 1997 ruling in the Santiago versus Comelec case, Estrada said RA 6735 (Initiative and Referendum Act of 1989) is "inadequate, incomplete, and insufficient in standard" insofar as initiative on amendments to the Constitution is concerned.
"Clearly, not until a sufficient enabling law shall have been validly enacted to provide for the appropriate guidelines and implementation of the system of people's initiative can respondent act on any petition intended to pursue a people's initiative to amend the Constitution. The rejection and outright dismissal of the instant is therefore most warranted under the currently pervading legal environment and circumstances," he said.
Estrada also questioned the signature gathering process of Sigaw and Ulap saying that the petitioners failed to brief the people about the purpose of the signature campaign.
"It was of common public knowledge that the signatures were gathered through the direct intervention of elective and appointive public officials and with the reported use of public funds in direct violation of the requirement that the initiative must be purely the undertaking of the people themselves," he said.
In a similar motion filed by opposition lawmakers, they said there is still no validly enacted law which sufficiently provides for the implementation of the system of initiative in amending Constitution.
The senators said the failure of the SC to come up with a conclusive vote on June 10, 1997, when the justices decided on the motion for reconsideration on the said case, can only mean that the Court decided not to amend their March 19, 1997 decision.
"The Comelec was merely following and enforcing the prevailing jurisprudence on the matter which forms a part of the legal system of the Philippines. Hence, the decision dated March 19, 1997 has remained," they said.
They further said only petitioners Lambino and Aumentado knew the specifics of their planned "people's initiative." "Since the specifics or details of the proposed amendments had been hidden from signatories (for not having been clearly indicated on the signature sheets), petitioners Lambino and Aumentado could theoretically make up any amendment and pass it on as "will of the alleged 6,327,952 other signatories," the senators said.
In a six-page en banc resolution last August 31, the Comelec said although the petition filed by Sigaw and Ulap "appear to meet the requirement of at least 3 percent of voters in all districts and 12 percent nationwide, the petition cannot be given due course in light with the ruling of Court in Santiago versus Comelec." (ECV/Sunnex)
(September 21, 2006 issue)
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