There is no more inter-parliamentary courtesy between the House of Representatives and the Senate, it was pointed out by Senator Ronald “Bato” dela Rosa. What we have is inter-chamber bickering that might metamorphose into an incendiary feud, that might make a quantum leap to a constitutional crisis that the Marcos government cannot afford to have.
All these have happened because pieces of paper are going around the country, with proponents asking registered voters to sign and agree to a People’s Initiative (PI) to amend or revise the Constitution. Bongbong has never been more right when he said earlier that PI will divide the nation. Coming from one who won the elections on the platform of “Unity,” we must believe the Chief Executive.
The Legislative Department is composed of the two chambers of Congress—the 24 senators and 316 representatives. Together, they represent the more than 100 million Filipinos in the country and abroad who never get tired of electing them every three years, believing that these lawmakers truly have their best interests at heart.
Let us not dance around. They don’t.
The current quarrel between the two chambers suggests that both the House and the Senate are intrinsically old boys’ clubs (including some girls) who think and act only for themselves. Consider the following: when SMNI commentator Ka Eric Celiz asked if it was true that Speaker Martin Romualdez spent P1.8 billion as travel expenses, almost the whole House membership pounced on him. The congressmen and women angrily acted as one, summoning both Celiz and Dr. Lorraine Badoy of the TV program “Laban Kasama ang Bayan.” Not satisfied with their answers during the House public hearing, the representatives detained the two media personalities for a couple of days. The House said the Speaker and the congressmen spent only P39 million on trips in 2023, a figure very much less than what is allocated in the national budget for that year.
Meanwhile in the Senate, the senators got wind of the People’s Initiative to amend or revise the 1987 Constitution which was being pushed by several congressmen, allegedly using public funds to bribe voters to affix their signatures to the document to be used to support a petition to the COMELEC. Speaker Romualdez denied that he was involved, but several senators were once members of the House, and their representative-friends spilled the beans.
And so, what remains for the senators to do? They unanimously signed a manifesto rejecting the “brazen attempt to violate the Constitution, through the people’s initiatives” perpetrated allegedly by people identified with Speaker Martin Romualdez. This “brazen attempt” was actually the idea of having all the members of Congress voting jointly to tinker with the Constitution, which in effect reduces the Senate to only 24 votes against the House’s 316 votes—the dilution of its votes reduces the Senate to the status of a non-entity.
The manifesto, a product of a 3-hour all-senators caucus, was signed by all 24 members of the Senate and read by Senate President Juan Miguel Zubiri. Senators Ronald dela Rosa, Joel Villanueva and Zubiri took turns criticizing the allegedly House-initiated People’s Initiative. The senators’ collective ego was pricked because earlier, Zubiri and President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. agreed that the Senate-House resolution on Charter Change will take the lead in the administration’s desire to change the Constitution, with Romualdez deferring to the Senate version. The senators, especially Sen. JV Ejercito, consider the continuous and vigorous collection of voters’ signatures in many districts of the country as a malicious affront by the Executive and the House combined against the Senate. They thought that by supporting Joint Resolution No. 6 the drive to collect signatures for PI would be stopped.
Indignant senators castigated the House for allegedly plotting to emasculate the Senate in the latest Cha-cha drive through people’s initiative, Senate Majority Leader Joel Villanueva said.
“Today, the Senate once again stands as a bastion of democracy, as it rejects this brazen attempt to violate the Constitution, the country and our people. This Senate of the people will not allow itself to be silenced,” Zubiri said at the plenary.
The Senate might have been duped, insulted and scorned. But it is NOT a bastion of democracy.
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