Poe ‘extra careful’ amid looming change in form of government

Sen. Grace Poe (File photo from the Philippine Daily Inquirer)

Sen. Grace Poe said she would be “extra careful” amid a looming change in the present form of government.

On Tuesday, Speaker Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo filed a resolution, calling for separate voting on the charter change proposal should the Senate and the House of Representatives agree to convene in a constituent assembly.

READ: Arroyo files reso for House separate vote on Charter change

The House has already passed a resolution calling for the convening of Congress into a constituent assembly to propose any amendments to the 1987 Constitution.

The chater change proposal, on the other hand, remains pending in the Senate.

“Marahil si Speaker Arroyo ay mayroon nang resolusyon pero hindi ‘yon makakapigil sa mga ibang kasamahan niya na i-akyat pa ito sa corte,” Poe said in an interview at the Senate on Tuesday.

[Speaker Arroyo may already have a resolution now, but it will not stop her colleagues from taking it to court.]

Arroyo’s resolution, she said, was not an assurance that the proposed separate voting on charter change would not be reversed once raised before the Supreme Court.

The senator noted how the high tribunal succeeded in ousting Maria Lourdes Sereno as Supreme Court chief justice when the process should have been through an impeachment proceeding in Congress.

“So ngayon kahit na may resolusyon pa at kahit na may tradisyon pa na kinakailangan ay dumaan lang sa Kongreso at Senado ang pagpapalit ng Konstitusyon, baka mamaya ‘pag umakyat sila sa Korte Suprema ay sabihin ang opinyon ay voting jointly. Delikado pa rin,” Poe said.

[So now, even if there’s a resolution and a tradition that any change in the Constitution must go through the House and the Senate, the Supreme Court  would  later come out with an opinion in favor of voting jointly. So it’s still not safe.]

“Para sa akin kasi kailangang doble ingat ngayon na may nagbabadya talaga na pagpapalit ng sistema ng ating gobyerno,” she added.

[For me, we have to be extra careful now that there is a looming change in our system of government.]

Poe said many of her colleagues still seemed unconvinced about charter change.

“Hindi natin alam bukas. pero sa tingin ko, ako mismo marami akong pagaalinlangan dito,” she said.

[We don’t know about tomorrow, but I myself have a lot of apprehensions.] /atm