The House of Representatives will spend the remaining session days this year discussing the proposed amendments to the Constitution, Speaker Gloria Macapagal Arroyo said, with an eye toward creating a presidential-bicameral federal system through a constituent assembly.
Under the 1987 Constitution, Congress, sitting as a constituent assembly, is empowered to make amendments to the Charter, including the establishment of federal states.
Arroyo said almost all priority measures that President Rodrigo Duterte mentioned in his last State of the Nation Address have been approved by the House, giving them time to work on a draft federal charter.
She said the draft charter has been amended to return the vice president in the line of succession to the presidency but remains pending in the plenary as Congress is scheduled to begin its Christmas break on Dec. 15.
“Well, it’s undergoing interpellation. It’s the last of President Duterte’s SONA agenda. Everything else has already passed. So, I guess, we’ll be concentrating on that next week,” Arroyo told reporters on Thursday.
Arroyo also maintained that the proposed shift to a federal form of government will materialize during her term as Speaker.
“Of course, we know that there will still be many steps. But the thing is, we will bring it as far as we can bring it in the hope that the next Congress can continue the work,” Arroyo said.
The draft charter lifts the term limits for members of Congress and the first election under the proposed Constitution will be held on the second Monday of May 2022 and the incumbent president is prohibited from running in the 2022 elections.
Arroyo, meanwhile, said entering into joint projects and partnering with China is a major step in developing friendship and cooperation despite the ongoing territorial conflicts in the West Philippine Sea.
Arroyo said she adopted the same formula when she was the President, recalling that Malaysia and Thailand also entered into joint projects with China despite their conflicting territorial claims.
“In general, I’m in favor of joint projects because they foster friendship and cooperation,” Arroyo said Thursday.
She added that leaders of nations with conflicting claims in the disputed waters should consider themselves as one big family and China, as the economic superpower, as a “senior uncle.”
Earlier, Mrs. Arroyo assured Chinese President Xi Jinping that the House of Representatives fully supports his and President Duterte’s undertakings toward economic growth and modernization of the
Philippines and China despite the territorial dispute in the WPS.
During Xi’s state visit to the Philippines on Nov.19 and 20, he and President Duterte signed a memorandum of understanding on oil and gas development cooperation and 28 other deals.
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