Charter change (cha-cha) is not among the priorities of the Senate at this time as no “priority” measures supporting it were submitted by lawmakers for the Third Regular Session of the 17th Congress.

Senate President Vicente Sotto III stressed that senators have agreed to give way to the committee on constitutional amendments, headed by Sen. Francis Pangilinan, to complete its report.

“We have asked the members of the Senate to submit a maximum of three priority bills so that we may be able to consult and sit down with the House and executive department to put it together. None of the submission contained the cha-cha. You take it from there,” Sotto told reporters.

Pressed on the chances of cha-cha in the current Senate, Sotto replied “let me say that perhaps the chances are very slim.”

“I will speak for the entire Senate, we have agreed to let the committee of constitutional amendments come up with their report and we will discuss there and that is the situation,” Sotto also said.

Yesterday, the committee canceled its scheduled hearing regarding the matter.

Senate Majority Floor Leader Juan Miguel Zubiri pointed out that senators will wait for the outcome of the Pangilinan report.

“We will not rush it, we will have a series of hearings to be done in the next few months… we have no agreement to stop the discussions on cha-cha but we have members who are against cha-cha and federalism so it’s going to be a long debate in the plenary when we discuss cha-cha,” said Zubiri.

Opposition Sen. Bam Aquino echoed Sotto’s pronouncements, citing the lawmakers’ united stance to block any attempt to postpone the mid-term elections scheduled next year.

“It was agreed upon to let the hearings on the constitutional amendments to continue for our people to be clarified. We reject no-el (no elections), we will not rush it. The most important thing is for the elections to push through,” said Aquino.

Aside from cha-cha, the senators appeared cold too on Package 2 of the Tax Reform for Acceleration and Inclusion (TRAIN) Law which is one of the legislative agenda of President Duterte.

Zubiri said that there were no measures submitted by any senator to back TRAIN 2 implementation.

“It has very little support from my colleagues and as a matter of fact no senator wants to sponsor the measure at this time,” said Zubiri.’

It was gathered that a measure in support of TRAIN Package 2 has been filed before the House of Representatives last March.

Opposition Sen. Bam Aquino said the non-filing of any measure before the Senate to support TRAIN 2 was a clear sign that no one is interested to push the proposal.

Aquino said he himself is yet to move on from the effects of TRAIN Law which he blamed for the rising prices of prime commodities.

“That’s a clear signal that no one is interested. My concern is still TRAIN 1. Are we going to allow more increases in the tax on oil products?” said Aquino.

Instead of pushing for TRAIN 2, Aquino called for the passing of his measure that will serve as “safeguard” against the effects of the tax reform law.

He said the safeguard, originally part of the Senate version of TRAIN but was struck in the final copy, is anchored on the inflation rate set by the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP).

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