Every progressive Asian country has a parliamentary government: Singapore, Japan, Malaysia, India and now Vietnam. In addition, India and Malaysia are federal republics, together with Russia and the United Arab Emirates. Pakistan, too, but forget about that.
Many are also federated. The United States is the most familiar example. Germany, the biggest economy in the European Union, is one as well.
The thing is, it appears that a federal system makes a “big” country — either in terms of geography or the diversity of cultures, or both — easier to govern. And for the Asian temperament — the need for a strong leader coupled with a demand for accountability to stem corruption — federalism also works.
But then, why did we (again) have a presidential and unitary government after Marcos Sr. was extra-constitutionally ousted in 1986?
The fault lies in the tendency of the Filipino for knee-jerk reactions and to overcompensate. A kidnap victim is killed because her rescuers couldn’t see through the heavy window tint of a getaway car and — voila! — all vehicles were (for a time) banned from having tinted windows.
A hammer was used in a smash-and-grab robbery inside a mall and — abracadabra! — it was ordered that no hammers should be sold in malls. It doesn’t matter that a big plumbing wrench would do the job just as well. We Filipinos are funny that way.
Going back to the Charter, the 48 men, women and others in-between handpicked by Cory Aquino to overhaul the Fundamental Law in 1986 via a Constitutional Commission (ConCom) were mostly liberal woketards (if the term existed then) who thought that all that was wrong with the Philippines could be cured by throwing away what they called the “Marcos Constitution” of 1973.
Never mind if the said organic act was actually a product of more than 300 delegates ELECTED BY DISTRICT to a Constitutional Convention in 1971, and populated by such notable legal luminaries (when the term didn’t refer to any rinky-dink politically-appointed law dean or law professor) such as Raul Manglapus, Jose Nolledo, Roseller Lim, Sotero Laurel, Dakila Castro, Abraham Sarmiento, Hilario Davide, Taning Fernandez, Nene Pimentel, Ed Angara and Juanito Remulla. Yes, the father of Jonvic and Boying. Unfortunately, sometimes the winds of political opportunism carry the fruits far from the tree.
But to the gang of 1986, anything associated with Marcos Sr. was automatically poison. Since the ConCom members said that Marcos tried to “perpetuate” himself in power under the 1973 Charter, ergo, it must be thrown away and replaced with one similar to that it supplanted.
Notwithstanding that, from experience, the presidential system we cloned from the American Constitution was demonstrably ill-suited for the Philippine situation.
The semi-parliamentary system of the 1973 Constitution was better suited, IMHO, to the unique characteristics of the Filipino. What should have been done was to simply amend it to remove the provisions Marcos Sr. tailor-made to himself (such as the infamous Amendment 6) and update it to the new order. But that’s water under the bridge.
Most of the troubles besetting today’s political landscape (impeachment, Senate tug-of-war, massive corruption etc.) can be either obviated or better handled under a federal and/or parliamentary system of government. But it has to be done soon.
Now more than ever, we need a Federal Express. To use the famous tagline, that’s “The way the world works.”