Bacolod dads condemn HR 1109
BACOLOD CITY -- Sangguniang Panglungsod (SP) Member Jocelle Batapa-Sigue along with SP Members Wilson Gamboa Jr. and Celia Matea Flor sponsored yesterday a Resolution condemning the passage of House Resolution 1109 last June 2, 2009 by the House of Representatives to convene a constituent assembly for being unconstitutional, illegal, untimely and done in complete haste and defiance of the overwhelming sentiment of the Filipino nation.
They also urged the congressmen to stop on their tracks in order to restore the faith of the Filipino nation towards the government.
Batapa who joined the Anti-ConAss Protest last Wednesday said that many Filipinos are now expressing their protest over the act of the House of Representatives in approving HR 1109, which called for the convening of the said house as a constituent assembly without the three-fourths vote concurrence of the Senate to amend the 1987 Constitution.
"The hasty passage of HR 1109 at about midnight of June 2, 2009, only shows evident bad faith on the part of its proponents and decision-makers, disregarding the sacred provision of the Constitution, all laws of the land,” part of the SP resolution reads.
Batapa stressed that HR 1109 is not only unconstitutional and therefore unlawful, but it is a manifest act of grave abuse of discretion amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction on the part of the lower house, which acted without the participation of the Senate.
The SP affirmed the stand of the Negrense United Against Constituent Assembly (NUNCA) believing that the Filipino people now stand to suffer from the danger of politicians tinkering with the Constitution instead of legal scholars, known experts, statesmen and women, equipped with more than adequate knowledge to study and draft constitutional amendments free from political pressures and external influences as can only be lawfully realized through a Constitutional Convention.
"The injudicious passage of HR 1109 makes obvious the plan to unreasonably expedite constitutional amendments in only a matter of months, considering that the members of the House of Representatives barely have twelve months left for their current terms," Batapa-Sigue said.
The SP likewise appealed to the conscience of the members of the House of Representatives as true and genuine representatives of their constituents to listen and follow the decision of their respective principals -- their constituency -- and ideally not to follow their own will but rather to convey and defend the will of the people that they represent.