No economic Charter-change bill before Congress break

House of Representatives. INQUIRER.net FILE PHOTO

The economic charter change bill was not passed by the House of Representatives on third and final reading before the chamber went on sine die break.
The plenary adjourned its second regular session Wednesday night without passing the Resolution of Both Houses 1 authored by Speaker Feliciano Belmonte Jr.
This despite earlier pronouncements by House leaders that the economic charter change bill will be passed on third and final reading Wednesday or before it goes on sine die break.

READ: Belmonte: It’s now or never to make economic Charter change

The plenary needed three fourths or 217 of the 290-strong chamber for the approval of the resolution.

In an interview after the second regular session adjourned, Belmonte admitted that the bill didn’t have the numbers and will not likely be passed in time for a plebiscite synchronized with the 2016 elections.
He said he attempted to have the bill passed on third reading as a gesture “that it can be done.”
Asked if he thinks charter change is dead, Belmonte said the bill did not have a “very good prospect of getting it passed” and now only serves as a “political statement.”

“What I wanted is to show that it could be done… Frankly, given that some of them are disinterested, (this has) been just a gesture… It’s just really symbolic,” Belmonte said.

“The economic Cha-cha as an amendment of the Constitution is actually facing a difficult time because it will have to go through the Senate and as you know, there are only 21 senators and three-fourths of 24 is 18, so the margin [for passing it] is very small,” Belmonte said.

Belmonte’s resolution seeks to ease foreign restrictions in the Constitution by inserting the “unless otherwise provided for by law” phrase in the provision granting 60-percent ownership to Filipinos and 40-percent on foreign investments.

The inclusion of the phrase means amending the Constitution would only require a simple legislation that needs to be approved by both chambers of Congress and subjected to a plebiscite.

Charter change has failed in the previous Congresses due to criticisms that it could be used to extend the term limits of public officials.

Belmonte said the bill once approved by Congress need not be signed by the President because it needs only to be ratified through a plebiscite synchronized with the 2016 presidential elections.

Militant solons opposed the passage of the bill, which they said seeks to delete pro-Filipino provisions and open up the economy to foreign exploitation.

Bayan Muna Representative Neri Colmenares said Belmonte’s resolution essentially deleted the constitutional provisions for higher Filipino equity participation in educational institutions, vested Filipino control and administration of educational institutions, a higher percentage of Filipino ownership in Philippine businesses and corporations, Filipino executive and managing officers in public utilities and franchises, among others.

Militant farmers have staged camp-out protest against charter change outside the lower chamber since Monday, saying opening up the economy would only open up the local economy to foreign exploitation.

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