UNDER the federal system, there are the executive and legislative departments and the judiciary in the central government as well as the state governments for check and balance purposes.
The state government is headed by the governor as the chief executive, the state Congress as the legislative and the state Supreme Court as the judiciary.
The federal government is headed by the president, the national legislature is Congress and the Supreme Court is the top judicial entity.
The state government functions and enforces its laws within its territorial jurisdiction. The state Supreme Court settles actual controversy involving laws of the state while the national Supreme Court settles issues involving national laws.
The state government shall also have its own respective departments like the national government. These state departments handle education, health, public works, economy and police while the national government continues to exercise jurisdiction over currency and national defense.
The state government shall also exercise budgeting powers like the federal government. What is good about the federal system of government is that it empowers the state government which has its own budget to attend to the problems of its constituents.
The federal system can bring the government closer to the people. In prosecuting corruption cases, the people can closely monitor them since they happen within their state.
It’s unlike today when graft cases get lost in the maze of red tape and bureaucracy and the hearings are held in Manila. Under the federal system, the state governors act as “mini-presidents” and they know every nook and cranny of their states.
Personally I am in favor of President-elect Rodrigo Duterte’s proposal to shift the highly centralized unitary presidential system of government to a federal system of government.
One thing about the federal government is that it is going to free the state governments from the authority and failure of the president.
Let there be a referendum so the people can debate on the advantages and disadvantages of the shift to a federal system of government.
The presidential system has not been beneficial to us because it has been set up by the Spaniards and the Americans who wanted to keep the country manageable during their rule.
Now the country’s population is over 100 million and so power needs to be decentralized so the local leaders can attend to the problems and needs of their constituents immediately.
Local leaders know the terrain and the culture of their constituents better than the leaders in the Palace.
This is unlike now when presidents from Manila and Luzon cannot be expected to know the solutions to the problems in the Visayas and Mindanao because they haven’t lived there in the first place.