The House of Representatives is pushing for a shift to a federal form of government from unitarian once again as 2020 begins – a measure which was proposed by President Rodrigo Duterte during the start of his term back in 2016.
The committee on constitutional amendments, headed by Cagayan de Oro City Representative Rufus Rodriguez, included the shift to a federal form of government in its report on proposed amendments to the 1987 Constitution, which was already approved by the House of Representatives during the 17th Congress in 2018, as per a report from the Philippine Star.
Rodriguez furthered that the election of senators by region is a feature of federalism, following “the rule of subsidiarity”, and it adopted the proposal of the Puno draft to have nine federated regions instead of sixteen.
The panel also adopted the proposal for election of the president and vice president as one ticket to ensure united leadership in the executive branch.
“We have considered the Puno draft in the committee deliberations and we will also consider it in the plenary debates in relation to the four sets of proposed amendments,” Rodriguez told The Philippine Star.
In 2019, Duterte already conceded on pushing shift to federalism but he noted that the Constitution needs to be changed.
