A Congressional leader on Saturday added voice to the perceived growing clamor against Charter Change amid the worsening COVID-19 pandemic.
“After more than three decades, we need to evaluate our Constitution, but today is not the right time,” Assistant Majority Leader Precious Hipolito Castelo said.
“Our people and the international community, especially our Southeast Asian neighbors who are wondering why we have not been able to contain COVID-19 despite having the longest lockdown in the world, will see us as insensitive and arrogant if we tackle Cha-cha now,” she added.
On Friday, Speaker Alan Peter Cayetano echoed the Palace’s pronouncement that Charter change was not a priority as the country was grappling with the pandemic.
Earlier, several lawmakers led by the Makabayan bloc opposed the Charter Change effort being pushed by the Department of the Interior and Local Government and the League of Municipalities of the Philippines.
The League of Municipalities of the Philippines is pushing to amend the Constitution to increase local governments’ internal revenue allotment and lift restrictions on foreign investments in unspecified industries.
“So if we can solve COVID-19 by next month and we’re up on our feet next January, February then we can talk about ‘Cha-cha,’” Cayetano said in a television interview.
“It’s right for people to question the timing. But as I have said, there also lies the hypocrisy, because I agree that we cannot hold a plebiscite during the COVID-19 pandemic, which also necessarily has to have a campaign, and you’ll have open rallies with a lot of people,” he said.
Castelo, who represents Quezon City’s second district, expressed fears that putting constitutional amendment proposals on the legislative agenda in the coming months would derail the country’s COVID-19 response.
“Cha-cha is a highly divisive issue. It will sap the nation’s attention, resources, logistics, and manpower, which will all be diverted to this untimely effort,” she said.
Instead of putting so much energy on Charter Change, Castelo appealed to her fellow legislators to focus on COVID-19 response and economic stimulus measures, including those that the House had approved and which had been pending in the Senate.
“We are seeing spikes in big numbers in infections that require our collective and single-minded attention. Let us not be sidetracked by issues we can postpone debating and fighting on and resolving,” she said.
Castelo added she and her politician colleagues who were not health experts should zero in on providing relief, livelihood assistance and other forms of help to millions of Filipinos affected by COVID-19.
“Let us leave the matter of containing the spread of coronavirus to the experts. Speaking our mind even if we don’t have the technical, medical and scientific knowledge and expertise would just add to the cacophony of voices that will further confuse and annoy our already beleaguered people,” Castelo said.