NOW that presidential daughter and Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte has come forward declaring openly that she is against changing the country’s form of government from presidential to federal, as advocated by her father and ranking members of the PDP-Laban party, we better believe that what she says goes and a status quo will prevail.
One cannot have a more foretelling sign that Sara is indeed her father’s heir apparent because anybody who does not have ambitions to be president will not be talking about this heavily-loaded subject and categorically implying that she is against it, this, even as President Duterte still has three years to lead the country.
What makes it even more credible that the presidential daughter will be succeeding her father in 2022 is the fact that as early as now President Duterte has already admitted that Sara is the one calling the shots in the political decisions of the first family.
The good thing is that Sara knows whereof she speaks about the advantages and disadvantages of federalism being a lawyer and coming from Mindanao, as opposed to the tried and tested presidential form of government.
What could be concerning to Sara are the pitfalls that might befall her administration during the transition because of a failed experiment that will impact upon all Filipinos including the Muslims in Mindanao and the different ethnic groups all over the country. This will only speak ill about her inadequacy in governing a country.
It would not be as bad perhaps if the population lived in a solid mass of island. But no, we are an archipelagic country of over 7,000 islands and that alone adds to the complexity of a federal form of government.
One could just imagine therefore the upheaval the country will undergo when power is divided between the national and local government units.
It is something new, something untried and definitely something that Sara does not want to go through.
In effect this is what prompted Sara to say that she is opposed to federalism, because wider political and fiscal autonomy, when granted to areas long held by political clans, could spell trouble.
“If you can see, Mindanao is filled with ‘kingdoms’ of local politicians, local warlords. I don’t think it’s right that we grant them wider powers,” she said.
Federalism advocates should take a serious thought about pursuing this form of government soon enough. Sara’s views are worth pondering.
It does not mean to say that Sara is conclusively shutting the door against federalism. What she is just trying to convey to the federalism advocates is that they could continue pushing for it, but not during her watch as president.
So at the moment federalism can’t be anywhere else but in limbo. (By Jesus Sievert)