‘Duterte empowered by Constitution to appoint village execs’

Ace Barbers

An ally of President Rodrigo Duterte on Tuesday said the Constitution allows the Chief Executive to replace all barangay (village) officials with officers-in-charge (OIC) as part the campaign to weed out drugs in the most basic unit of government.

In a statement, Surigao Del Norte Rep. Robert Ace Barbers cited Article 10, Section 3 of the 1987 Constitution which allows the President to appoint barangay officials.

The said provision states that Congress shall enact a local government code which shall “provide for the qualifications, election, appointment and removal, term, salaries, powers and functions and duties of local officials, and all other matters relating to the organization and operation of the local units.”

Barbers cited the constitutional basis for the President’s plan to appoint all the country’s barangay officials after filing a bill seeking to postpone the upcoming October elections to May 2020 and three years thereafter to allow the President to replace all barangay officials with his appointees.

READ: House ally files bill allowing Duterte to appoint barangay execs

Duterte mulled this move to weed out the influence of drugs in the most basic unit of government, especially because drug lords purportedly bankroll barangay officials’ candidacies.

“The President is empowered by the Constitution in his plan to remove all barangay officials and appoint their successors pending new elections in May 2020,” Barbers said.

The congressman also cited Section 8 of the same article, which states that “the term of office of elective local officials, except barangay officials, which shall be determined by law, shall be three years and no such official shall serve for more than three consecutive terms.”

This means the President may remove all barangay officials and appoint OICs through a law passed by Congress, Barbers said.

“It is clear therefore that the President, through a law passed by Congress, may remove all barangay officials and appoint their successors. Any law passed to this effect automatically amends the local government code,” Barbers said.

Barbers made the statement as an election expert countered that Duterte’s plan is unconstitutional primarily because declaring vacant all existing elective barangay positions would violate the constitutional right to security of tenure of the current officials.

READ: Appointing barangay execs unconstitutional — election expert

In a separate statement, opposition lawmaker Albay Rep. Edcel Lagman jeered the “cheerleaders” of Duterte’s plan to appoint en masse the barangay officials.

Lagman had a different interpretation of Section 8, Article X of the Constitution, which classifies barangay officials as “elective local officials” whose terms in office are determined by law and not by the Constitution.

“Verily, the Constitution itself classifies barangay officials as ‘elective local officials,’ although their term of office is determined by law and not fixed by the Constitution,” Lagman said.

This meant that Congress is only authorized to provide for the term limits of barangay officials, but it is not authorized to allow the President in appointing the replacements, Lagman said.

“Consequently, the Congress can only provide for the term and periodic elections of barangay officials but it cannot authorize the President to appoint barangay officials who are categorized by the Constitution as ‘elective local officials’ who shall be elected by their qualified constituents,” Lagman said.
Lagman said too that Republic Act 10923, which postponed the October 2016 barangay elections, allows for the hold over of incumbents barangay officials.

“Democratic electoral processes should never be sacrificed to the questionable scheme of the President and his cheerleaders in the House of Representatives,” Lagman said.

Barber’s House Bill 5359 seeks to postpone the 2017 barangay and Sanggunian Kabataan (SK) elections to May 2020, and subsequent elections to May 2023 and three years thereafter.

The bill seeks to amend Republic Act 10923, the latest law passed by Congress in 2016 that postponed the October 2016 barangay elections to the fourth Monday of October 2017.

Barbers’ bill seeks to further postpone the village polls to the fourth Monday of May 2020, and every three years thereafter.

The bill also states that all incumbent officials should be deemed terminated upon the passage of the proposed legislation, thus allowing President Duterte to fill up all barangay posts with officers-in-charge.

The bill also mandates the Commission on Elections to promulgate the implementing rules and regulations within 90 days after effectivity of the bill to law.

If there are provisions in the bill deemed unconstitutional, according to the bill, the unaffected portions of the bill should remain in full force and effect.

In his explanatory note, Barbers said he filed the bill in expression of support to the President’s plan to appoint all the country’s barangay officials.

“President Rodrigo Duterte said that he wants the October 2017 barangay elections postponed because he does not want those financed by drug lords to win. He further said that if the barangay elections would proceed as planned, the winners might be financed by drug money,” said Barbers, who chairs the House dangerous drugs committee.

“It is therefore paramount to postpone the barangay and Sanggunian Kabataan elections to support the President’s call,” he added.

He said the drug problem is prevalent at the most basic unit of local governance.

“The barangay system is merely giving more benefit to the political patrons of these barangay officials, added to the fact that there is purported influence of drug money in the political exercise,” Barbers said.

In a radio interview Monday, Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez, Duterte’s staunch ally in Congress, said Congress has to pass a bill amending the Local Government Code to allow the President to appoint barangay officials.

Alvarez vowed that the lower house can pass the bill in time to postpone the upcoming October barangay and SK elections.

READ: Duterte inks law postponing barangay, SK polls

Opposition lawmakers in the House of Representatives, however, warned of the “dictatorial tendencies” in Duterte’s move, especially because historically, the barangays during the Marcos dictatorship served as a “machinery” to cement the strongman’s rule. IDL/rga

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