President Benigno Aquino III’s ongoing word war with the Supreme Court was the main spark that led to his declaration of interest in pursuing a second term of office and drawing fire from the public.
Chief among those who criticized was former senator Joker Arroyo, the former executive secretary of the president’s mother, the late president Corazon Aquino.
The elderly Arroyo joined others in saying that President Aquino is undoing the legacy left by his mother, namely the 1987 Constitution.
But the President’s own words belie his intention to seek a second term, the principal bone of contention that opponents of Charter change find most disagreeable.
Mr. Aquino said “he would have to seek consultation from his boss”, the Filipino people, for their response on whether they agree that he should seek a second term.
After all, the most visible contenders as his successors –– Vice President Jejomar Binay and Interior and Local Government Secretary Mar Roxas— still have to win unanimous public support despite Binay’s leading edge in the surveys.
But Mr. Aquino’s main reason for seeking Charter change was to clip the Supreme Court’s power to interfere with government decisions and policies that he feels are best left to the executive department.
If that was his main reason, he should have let Congress do the job for him. Already, Congress is seeking ways to legalize the Disbursement Acceleration Program (DAP), the true replacement of the pork barrel to get around the Supreme Court ruling that declared parts of the program as illegal.
There is a need to actually reform the 1987 Constitution, seeing as it is unable to cope with existing economic realities like e-commerce and so on.
But amending the Constitution to clip the powers of the Supreme Court goes against the Constitution’s intent for all three branches of government to balance each other out to avoid grave abuse of power by either of them.
The President must be reminded that it wasn’t the Supreme Court, but the public themselves or a growing number of them, who elevated the case against the DAP months back.
The High Tribunal, in its collective wisdom, decided that parts of the program were illegal.
If there is to be Charter change, let it not be about rendering the Supreme Court inutile in serving as a check or safeguard against the abuses of the executive and the legislative departments.
Rather, introduce amendments to the Constitution that would require all branches of government to be held accountable in the use of public funds.
The Supreme Court, despite its lofty stature, should also be questioned and penalized for any abuse of public funds like their executive and legislative counterparts.
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