Why Pinoys today favor cha-cha
Posted on September 29, 2003 - Filed Under Editorial |
MILLIONS of Filipinos working abroad, including countless others here faced with the temptation of easier and more money gained by working abroad, are presumably part of the broad masses of disenchanted Filipinos who can't make both ends meet here and are miserably at a loss to do anything about it. They are the silent majority who, most presumably too, could prove to be the strongest most irrefutable argument for a shift from the kind of government we have now to something better. Specifically, from our presidential bicameral system of government to the type that reigns in the lands our disenchanted millions are hoping to migrate to, like Singapore or Brunei or Malaysia.
This unspoken desire for a chance in style of government is basically an implied support for a change or a substantial amendment, not total overhaul, of the Constitution.
The move to cause shift from presidential to parliamentary government, initiated and led by Speaker Joe de Venecia (admitted originator of the billion-peso export of Filipino labor and skills abroad), has thus gained support nation-wide which belied claims made by Vice Pres. Teofisto Guingona that "Reject Cha-Cha Now" has become a national clamor with the youth, religious workers, academicians, labor leaders, farmers and fishers folk. This is far out-weighed by confirmations expressed and implied by the countless millions of the masses now working profitably abroad coupled with a larger group here which is saddled with low-paying jobs or no jobs at all. A situation made no easier by the uncontrolled growth of population in the country at present.
The alleged need for a massive information drive to inform the people on what a parliamentary system is all about, which Guingona espouses, would be of no avail since most Filipinos would base their judgment on what they actually see or experience in the Southeast Asian neighborhood where the bicamerally-run Republic of the Philippines still remains an embarrassing tail-ender.
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