CDN FILE PHOTO
President Duterte cannot scrap the barangay elections scheduled for October and just appoint the roughly 42,000 village chiefs because he is barred by law from doing so, according to the chair of the House committee on suffrage and electoral reforms.
The Local Government Code of 1991, or Republic Act No. 7160, mandates that elections be held for the chairs and councilors of barangays, according to Rep. Sherwin Tugna of the Citizens’ Battle Against Corruption.
“I believe that a certain law has to be amended first. Which one? The Local Government Code,” Tugna said in a radio interview.
House Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez agreed with Tugna’s view. “Of course, we have to amend the Local Government Code,” Alvarez said in a text message.
The Duterte administration is seeking to postpone barangay elections, claiming that 40 percent of officials in the country’s 42,028 barangays are either corrupt or into illegal drugs.
Instead of holding elections, the Duterte administration intends to appoint around 340,000 barangay chairs and council members.
Duly elected successors
“Existing laws, which must be maintained, do not provide for appointment of OICs (officers in charge) for elective barangay positions,” another lawmaker said.
In a statement, opposition Rep. Edcel Lagman of the Magnificent Seven bloc said “[a]ll barangay elected officials shall serve until their successors are duly elected and qualified, unless meanwhile they have been dismissed for cause.”
One of Lagman’s fellow Magnificent Seven lawmakers has compared the plan to the situation under the Marcos dictatorship.
Akbayan Rep. Tomasito Villarin said on Friday that barangays had become a machinery to monitor and control the people during the Marcos regime.
“That’s 344,000 people at the beck and call of the President,” Villarin said. “If barangay officials are involved in drugs, let the people kick them out through the ballot. Give that power to the people not to one person. That’s the essence of democracy.”
Upon Congress’ resumption on May 2, Tugna said lawmakers would no longer be limited to the legal implications of postponing the elections, which have been deferred from the October 2016 schedule through RA 10923.
RA 10923 reset the elections to October this year and extended the tenure of barangay officials in a holdover capacity.
“This would now involve the issue of whether it would be just plain and simple postponement of the elections and [retention of officials in a] holdover capacity,” Tugna said.
“Or would there be an additional [amendment]? That there would be no more holdover capacity and new barangay officials would be appointed instead?” the chair of the committee on suffrage asked.
If this were the case, the committee on local government would have to be involved in the deliberations, too, Tugna said.
Compelling reason
At the same time, he said the onus would be on the potential author of the bill to justify the grant of appointive powers to the President.
“If they show that there is sufficient data that … the drug lords have used their money to influence the results of barangay elections… I believe that is a compelling reason provided there is data,” Tugna said.
But the “first preference is for free and open elections,” because it is “only there where the best and the brightest are revealed through fair and square elections,” he said.
Interior Secretary Ismael Sueno said he was meeting with leaders of Congress for them to pass a law that would postpone the barangay elections.
This early, there are groups asking for money from those who want to be appointed barangay officials if barangay elections do not push through in October, according to Sueno.
Sueno said the Department of the Interior and Local Government had received reports that groups or people claiming to be close to Mr. Duterte were asking for money from those who want to be appointed to barangay positions. —WITH A REPORT FROM PHILIP C. TUBEZA