en. Richard Gordon has
asked Gloria Ar-royo to state publicly that she wants her term extended, using
her call for constitutional amendments in the guise of accommodating the
agreement on ancestral domain with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front.
The United Opposition earlier issued a similar dare, and has
not elicited a response from Arroyo one way or the other.
It’s "dead-ma" all the way and Gordon and the opposition
probably know why.
Gloria, for starters, is not interested in extending her stay
during some kind of transition to a new framework of governance. Her obsession
is to stay in power, period. The proposed shift to federalism of Sen. Nene
Pimentel is, for her, just the latest vehicle to pursue her agenda, which is a
shift to a parliamentary form of government. Following that shift, she would run
for a parliamentary seat representing Pampanga and have herself chosen by the
ruling party as prime minister.
That was the game plan during the people’s initiative drive
mounted by her toadies in the Union of Local Authorities of the Philippines.
That was the same game plan when constituent assembly was floated to salvage the
proposed Cha-cha after the Supreme Court ruled that people’s initiative was a
"gigantic fraud" sought to be foisted on the people. Nothing has changed, except
that Jose de Venecia has been thrown away like a used rag and replaced by
Prospero Nograles as Speaker.
Sen. Nene Pimentel is still insisting that Congress could
convene as a constituent assembly with the agenda limited to the proposed shift
to a federal system. He believes he could come up with an iron-clad resolution
that would ensure no other proposed amendment would be entertained. Nene’s
judgment clearly is clouded by his life-long federalism advocacy. How else could
one explain his new-found trust in Gloria and her allies in the House?
When Gloria and De Venecia were still thick as thieves, the
latter had this idea that the House could convene on its own as a constituent
assembly with the participation of one or two senators loyal to Gloria. It’s a
travesty of the principle of a two-chamber legislature, but desperation respects
no principle.
Gloria is more desperate now than she was in 2006 when she
orchestrated the campaign for constitutional amendments. It is a scant 18 months
to June 30, 2010. The House and Gloria’s scabs in the Senate are running out of
time in pushing a shift to the parliamentary system.
The barbarians will soon be pounding at the gates. The senators should lock
the door. Let it not be said that in their hubris they thought they could
civilize those who are bent on sacking and pillaging the Republic.
