THE Mayor Rodrigo Roa Duterte National Executive Coordinating Committee (MRRD-NECC) and the Philippine National Coalition have claimed to have collected over one million signatures of Filipino citizens calling for charter change on the government system.
The PNC issued a resolution appealing to the Filipinos to join them in declaring the Republic of the Philippines under the revolutionary government and calling for charter change, presidential-federal and parliamentary system of the government.
In a press conference in Cebu City on Monday, Feb. 1, 2021, PNC secretary-general and MRRD-NECC spokesperson Abner Malabanan said they conducted an actual signature campaign and online signature campaign to support their appeal.
He said together with Omar Albano, MRRD-NECC vice president and PNC co-chairman, he traveled to different places to do public consultation and press conferences and get the signatures of those who supported the campaign.
Malabanan said the collected signatures are meant to convince President Rodrigo Duterte that this appeal is the clamor of every Filipino.
He said they will present their appeal together with the collected signatures to President Duterte during their culminating activity called “Araw ng Pagbabago” from Feb. 21 to 22, 2021.
Malabanan urged the public from different provinces that on the “Araw of Pagbabago,” they will go out and line up at the sidewalk to show support to their campaign but still following the guidelines issued by the Inter-Agency Task Force.
Albano said they aim to have more people across the country to support their campaign and surpass the number of people during the Edsa revolution, that was half a million.
He said the supporters of the campaign will open the activity with a motorcade and will go to their city halls or municipal halls to show that the public is supporting the change of the government system to federalism.
During the handing over of the signatures to Duterte, Malabanan said if the president will accept the appeal, then it will be the start of change.
However, if Duterte will not accept their appeal, then they will just try again next time, he added.
In January 2020, Malabanan said the PNC has sent a hard copy of their proposed Constitution to the Malacañang.
In that proposed amendment to the Constitution, he said the government will still be presidential.
However, in elections, the voting for President will be in tandem with the Vice President. This means that when a citizen votes for a presidential candidate, then the vice president of the same party will be voted as well.
The president will have a prime minister, who is in charge of the day-to-day operations of the government, to be nominated by the president from the members of the national assembly, said Malabanan.
The president will also be the head of state, the chief of the armed forces and in charge of the treaties or foreign affairs.
Malabanan said they also proposed a federal system because they saw that the root cause of poverty is the unitary system.
The legislation will be parliament-unicameral, which means there will be one house unlike today when there is a senate, house of representatives and others.
On the barangay level, he said there will be no longer be a party-list and each sector like the LGBTQ, PWDs, Women’s, Youth, OFW, Urban Poor and others will be well-represented.
The members of the sectors will be the ones to vote for their representative and whoever will be selected will assume the position as councilor in the barangay.
As for the city, all the barangay councilors from each sector will select a representative of their sector to assume office on a city level.
However, Malabanan said this government system can be achieved if the political dynasty will be eliminated. (KFD)