"If ever an argument were needed to clinch the case against a shift to the federal form of government, the present crisis would be that argument."
"If ever an argument were needed to clinch the case against a shift to the federal form of government, the present crisis would be that argument."With only two years left of President Rodrigo Duterte’s term, it is virtually certain that this country will not see a shift to the federal form of government before June 30. Still, the federalism-under-Duterte zealots talk and write as though that governmental change remained a possibility. Give the political and legal resistances that it is bound to encounter, a late-in-the-day push for a federalized Philippines will be a highly unrealistic enterprise.
It is just as well that this is the case, because if one were to go by what is happening today in the world’s largest federal State—the United States of America—the handling of the coronavirus pandemic in this county by a federal government would have been attended by disorder, discord and disparity. There is discord between the US federal government, represented by President Donald Trump, and the 50 states of the Union, represented by their governors. Yet, the relationship between the federal government and the states—more specifically, the distribution of powers between the Presidency and the state capitols—has been generally stable and discord-free for almost two and a half centuries. That is, until the US’ fight against COVID-19 has seen President Trump lock horns often with a great deal of acrimony, with the governors on issues relating to the respective powers and responsibilities of the federal government and the state governments. At one point Trump declared, completely without basis, that the President had “total authority,” only to do a full about-face the following day. One of the first discord-causing issues was whether the stockpiles of essential medical supplies belonged to the federal government or to the 50 states; the latest issue is whether or not the state governments have the power to terminate the lockdowns under which they placed their citizens and reopen their state economies. With Donald Trump focused on wanting to escape blame for his administration’s handling of the pandemic, there is bound to be more discord between the White House and the state capitols in the coming days.
If this can be the state of affairs, during the present crisis, in a country with a very long history of federal government, how would things have been in a country that only just shifted to that form of government? The answer? Much worse.
The questions that were raised about federalism during the Congressional hearings would simply have come into play during the handling of the coronavirus pandemic by a federalized Philippine government. What would be the respective accountabilities of the central government and the proposed 13 federal states and the administrative regions? Taking into account that some of the federal states would be economically stronger than the others, how would a fair distribution of central-government resources be assured? Who would be responsible for the stockpiling and transportation of the medical frontliners’ requirements? And would the testing of people for COVID-19 infection be the function of the federal states solely?
A further question raised in the Congressional hearings on the federalism proposal related to this country’s political culture. Since Philippine politics is definable as palakasan plus favoritism plus dynasticism, the federal states’ programs for fighting COVID-19 would surely have been made more complicated and messy by the entry of non-health-related issues into the picture.
The handling of the pandemic by the present presidential government has been far from perfect; there have been numerous inadequacies and inefficiencies. But the frontline governmental entities, especially the Department of Health, the Department of Social Welfare and Development and more local governments, have been functioning in well-directed we-know-our-role fashion, They have been doing their best and deserve the nation’s thanks.
A federal government would have done a messy job of combatting the coronavirus pandemic. If ever an argument were needed to clinch the case against a shift to the federal form of government, the present crisis would be that argument.