The tremendous failures of Congress

The founding fathers of the Philippine Constitution did not institutionalize Congress so that congressmen could build bridges, highways, and waiting sheds, or ever intended senators to use pork barrels by any name, and distribute dole-outs to fire victims, much less become TV hosts, radio announcers, action stars, and comedians. Congress should enact laws as ordered by the Constitution.

The first failure of Congress, especially the current one, is to ignore and to become blind to the clear mandate of the Constitution to enact laws and give life to the constitutional prohibition of family dynasties. This is a clear mandate under Article II, Section 26. The State shall guarantee equal access to opportunities for public service, and prohibit political dynasties as may be defined by law. It is very clear that the highest law of the land prohibits dynasties and the only task to be done by Congress is to define what constitutes a dynasty. But senators and congressmen are the number one violators of this constitutional provision, on two counts: First, for the last 17 years, they refused to pass an anti-dynasty law. Second, they themselves are perpetrating and perpetuating this travesty of the fundamental law.

How can the senators pass an anti-dynasty law when we have a mother and a son coming from the tiny city of Las Piñas, both sitting as senators coming from one family? We have a brother and a sister representing the microscopic city of Taguig and we have two half-brothers representing the smallest constituency of San Juan City. We have a sister of the sitting president, who is the mother of a sitting governor and an aunt of a sitting congressman. The vice president is the sister of both an incumbent congressman and a city mayor of Davao. The House is even worse. There is a party list representative who sits in the same House where the speaker is her husband. We have a husband and wife from Cebu both sitting as members of the same House.

The government looks like a family corporation. Thus, Philippine dynasties seem to exist forever. That constitutional mandate becomes a joke. Senators and congressmen do not respect that which they have taken an oath to uphold, defend, and obey. Thus, we have a city mayor in Cebu whose wife is the incumbent congresswoman representing the same constituency. We have many municipalities where the mayors and vice mayors are either spouses or brothers, mothers and sons, or fathers and daughters. There are perpetual conflicts of interests, where the control of public funds and control over appointments, promotions, and personnel movements have no checks and balances.

Both the Senate and the House also failed, for the longest time, to implement, among many others, Article XIII, Section 1, which ordered Congress, since 1987, to give highest priority to the enactment of measures that protect and enhance the right of all people to human dignity, reduce social, economic and political inequalities, and remove cultural inequities, by equitably diffusing wealth, and political power for the common good. Congress has not fulfilled this mandate at all. On the contrary, by perpetuating political dynasties, it tramples upon the very Constitutional mandate it has been called upon to implement. This is tantamount to betrayal of public trust which is an impeachable offense.

I can name more than a hundred other provisions of the Constitution which Congress continues to ignore. In this country our senators and congressmen are focusing on things that are only important for their own political ambitions and are supportive of their families' interests. The peoples' welfare is not a high priority in their legislative agenda. We should not forget all these failures in the next elections come 2025.