Palace to Binay: No term limits opens door to tyrants

 Vice President Jejomar Binay and Makati Mayor Junjun Binay, together with their bodyguards. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO

MALACAÑANG has reminded Vice President Jejomar Binay that doing away with term limits would make elected positions prone to abuse and could “open the door to a dictator.”

READ: Binay told: Presidential term limited to prevent abuse, dynasties

This is exactly why President Aquino “has reservations about lifting term limits,” said deputy presidential spokesperson Abigail Valte.

The President has said time and again that “lifting term limits opens the door to dictators who can abuse the resources of the state to stay in power, which was precisely the concern of the framers of the 1987 Constitution,” she said.

“Doing away with term limits may also make it easier for families with dynastic inclinations to perpetuate themselves in office,” Valte added.

Ask the bosses

Communications Secretary Herminio Coloma Jr. said the people would have to be heard on Binay’s statement that he was opposed to term limits.

“The most important thing is the President has one term and we have to hear the voices of the ‘bosses’ about this,” Coloma said.

On a visit to Bacolod City on Thursday, Binay announced that he did not believe in term limits and that should there be a move to amend the Constitution, “I will have these (term limits) removed.”

Elected officials should be able to serve “forever” (one to sawa) so long as people continue to vote for them.

‘Only rich and corrupt’

Speaker Feliciano Belmonte Jr. said Binay’s idea that term limits be lifted for elected officials will only leave the country in the hands of the elite.

Binay’s desire for elected officials to serve unlimited terms will mean that only the rich and privileged would have the opportunity of occupying top government posts, he said.

“Then only the rich and those who are making themselves rich in office would get the high positions,” Belmonte said in a text message.

On Friday, one of Binay’s spokespersons tried to correct Binay’s position, saying that the Vice President meant he was in favor of no term limits for local officials only.

Joey Salgado, media affairs head at the Vice President’s office, said that Binay, who is aspiring to run for President next year, actually preferred a shorter four-year term with reelection for the President.

Under the Constitution, the President is not eligible for reelection after a six-year term.

Salgado quoted Binay as saying a single six-year term is too long for a bad President and too short for a good one.

“It is the people who are punished if they will have to wait for six years for the end of the term of an inept and insensitive government,” he said.

The people should have the chance to express their sentiments about the President after four years through their votes, by either retaining him in office or choosing someone else, he added.

‘Grounded in experience’

Salgado explained that Binay’s preference for unlimited terms for local officials was “grounded on his experience as mayor.”

“As long as the people elect their leaders in an honest, free and credible election, they should not be restricted as to their choices,” he said, quoting Binay.

Since being appointed officer in charge of Makati following the 1986 Edsa People Power Revolution, Binay, or a surrogate from his family, has been at the helm of Makati.

Makati dynasty

After Binay exhausted his three terms as mayor in 1998, he fielded his wife, Elenita, for the post. When Elenita reached her three-term limit, Binay ran for mayor once again. After completing three terms in 2010, Binay’s son, Junjun, took over the post.

Binay’s daughter, Abigail, is a Makati congresswoman, while another daughter, Nancy, is a senator.

Binay and his family are now caught up in a massive corruption investigation in connection with alleged irregularities in various Makati infrastructure projects in the past three decades that they have ruled Makati unopposed.

Mayor Junjun Binay is now serving a six-month preventive suspension ordered by the Ombudsman in connection with his involvement in the allegedly overpriced Makati Science High School building.

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