Arroyo files reso for House separate vote on Charter change

House Speaker Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo has already filed a resolution “expressing the sense of the House” that it will vote separately with the Senate once the two chambers decide to convene in a Constituent assembly (Con-ass).

Arroyo confirmed this on Tuesday in an ambush interview after she visited the House constitutional amendments meeting into the proposed federal Charter drafts.

“It’s expressing the sense of the House that we will vote separately,” she told reporters, referring to House Resolution 2056, which she filed on Tuesday with Majority Leader Rolando Andaya, the new chair of the constitutional amendments panel Leyte 3rd District Rep. Vicente Veloso, Bohol Rep. Arthur Yap and Ako Bicol Rep. Alfredo Garbin, Jr. 

Asked about her target date to convene the Con-ass, Arroyo said: “We don’t know because it takes two to tango.”

But she said the deliberations would be conducted just like how Congress deliberated on the Bangsamoro Organic Law.

“Like for instance in the Bangsamoro Basic Law, there were three committees. That’s heard altogether but the three committees voted separately,” she explained.

Arroyo also directed Veloso that the committee meeting should just focus on the opinions of the guests and not on the substance of the draft federal charter as this would be tackled by the Con-ass.

“It (Con-ass) will be a joint deliberation but voting separately. So we (House) don’t have to come up with our draft. The assembly has to do its own rules…” Arroyo told Veloso when she met him in the corridor outside the venue of the committee meeting.

“No committee hearings on the substance because we’ll leave that to the constituent assembly,” she added.

She also stressed her stand that the House and Senate should have joint deliberations but should vote separately.

READ: Arroyo: House to vote separately from Senate on Cha-cha

Former Senate President Aquilino “Nene” Pimentel Jr., a member of President Rodrigo Duterte’s Consultative committee, is also present at the committee meeting.

Veloso said they invited Pimentel so he could help the House “convince the Senate” to pursue the proposed Charter change to pave the way for the country’s shift to a federal form of government. The committee discussed this in an executive session.

READ: Lawmaker: No prime minister post under proposed federal Charter

Senator Aquilino “Koko” Pimentel III earlier said he is willing to give Arroyo the benefit of the doubt on her directive for separate voting in a proposed Con-ass to amend the 1987 Constitution.  /muf

READ: Pimentel welcomes Arroyo call for separate Con-ass vote