<\/p>\n
ALL 24 senators led by Senate President Juan Miguel Zubiri signed a manifesto expressing their rejection of the People\u2019s Initiative (PI) for Charter Change (Cha-Cha).<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n On Tuesday, Zubiri read the manifesto expressing their disapproval of the PI which allegedly involves bribery.<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n According to Zubiri, PI only seeks for both houses of Congress to act as a Constituent Assembly and vote jointly.<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n “While it seems simple, the goal is apparent — to make it easier to revise the Constitution by eliminating the Senate from the equation. It is an obvious prelude to further amendments, revisions, or even an overhaul of our entire Constitution,” Zubiri said.<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n The Senate President said the joint voting will destroy the delicate balance on which hard-won democracy rests and will destabilize the principle of bicameralism and the system of checks and balances.<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n “If this PI prospers, further changes to the Constitution can be done with or without the Senate’s approval, or worse, even absent all the senators. Should Congress vote jointly in a Constituent Assembly, the Senate and its 24 members cannot cast any meaningful vote against the 316 members of the House of Representatives. This singular and seemingly innocuous change in the Constitution will open the floodgates to a wave of amendments and revisions that will erode the nation as we know it,” Zubiri said.<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Zubiri also mentioned proposals like foreign ownership and the removal of term limits, or even a \u201cno-el\u201d (no election scenario) in 2025 or in 2028, which cannot be prevented by senators if the PI will succeed.<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u201cToday, the Senate once again stands as the country\u2019s last bastion of democracy, as it rejects this brazen attempt to violate the Constitution, the country and our people,\u201d read the manifesto.<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u201cThis Senate of the people will not allow itself to be silenced,\u201d it stressed.<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" ALL 24 senators led by Senate President Juan Miguel Zubiri signed a manifesto expressing their rejection of the People’s Initiative (PI) for Charter Change (Cha-Cha).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3402,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5,17],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3401"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3401"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3401\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3403,"href":"https:\/\/journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3401\/revisions\/3403"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3402"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3401"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3401"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3401"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}