Duterte calls for Charter change via ConCom

President Duterte on Wednesday evening called for Charter change through an appointed constitutional commission (ConCom) that would revise the 1987 Constitution.

Mr. Duterte suggested that he could appoint a 24-member ConCom similar to the one appointed by the late President Corazon Aquino which drafted the current charter.

“A constitutional convention will be costly. Do not tell me that the composition of that constitutional body would be wiser, would be more honest, and would not be protecting any vested interest,” he told a business forum in Mandaluyong.

“I suggest that we appoint 24 commissioners. If you want, we can put there all the retired justices, a few civilians, maybe five, just like what Cory did. We could get rid of some offices that you no longer need. But that is my take,” he said.

The President said holding a constitutional convention would entail a hefty price tag for taxpayers.

“You will pay for two (delegates) per district, they will ask to have na office, and then they will debate when they don’t really have brains,” he said.

“I’m sure we will end up with the same structure, no,no, the same embodiment of a, maybe a democracy, maybe a structural change,” he added.

The President said the country needed to “reconfigure” the country’s unitary form of government so that the Bangsamoro in Mindanao would have their own homeland.

“If you do not reconfigure the unitary type of government now, which is the one we are using, and if there is no change in Mindanao, there will be no peace, until the end of time for the Filipino,” he said.