The Narrative of changing the form of our government into federalism to answer many problems that

our country is currently experiencing is a topic that challenged the knowledge of many of our statesmen,
legal experts, Socio-Political analysts and even the common people.

Indeed, this topic is something that has to be given time for discussion and ample dissemination to all
parties involved which basically is all Filipino Citizens.

Your honors, as the 3rd speaker of the negative side, I will present to you the impracticability of adopting
federalism on the current Philippine scenario.

The proposal of changing the form of our government by adopting federalism is not practicable as of the
current times.

This is mainly because of two reasons:

1st is that the prerequisites mandated by the 1987 Constitution before any amendment or revision be
done to it is very lengthy that it requires time and resources which the Philippines cannot provide as of
the moment.

As stated in Art. XVII of the 1987 Constitution, amendment or revision of the Constitution may either be
done through (a) a Constitutonal Convention, (b) a Constitutent Assembly; (c) or People’s Initiative.

Each of which would require massive resources and long period of time before it can be achieved. The
first one would involve a popular election to choose the individuals to be included on what would be
called as the Constitutional Commission. We know that popular elections require costs and for us to see
how much would this be estimatedly, let us take a look on previous 2016 presidential elections. We
need to take note that in the 2016 Elections, the government spent an estimate of around Php35Billion
for the COMELEC to be used on this event. And this still does not include the budget given to other
government agencies involved in the polls. Php35Billion Is not a small amount your honors, ladies and
gentlemen and for a third world country like the Philippines, we cannot afford to spend such amount for
an activity which is not something that we are mandated to do.

Consequently, a Constituent assembly may be formed wherein the members of the bicameral congress
will convene to make amendments or revision to the Constitution. Indeed, this may not require
additional costs but it will delay the Congress on its legislative duties in order to give time to their role as
a Constituent Assembly. Your honors, the negative side does not believe that the status quo requires an
urgency of shifting to federal form of Government and produce massive delays on our legislative needs.

Lastly, the method of People’s initiative. The meticulous requirement of Sec. 2 Art. XVII of the
Constitution in relation to RA 6735 would tell us that it is not an easy task or perhaps an impossible
move for now.

Ladies and gentlemen, what I have mentioned is only the way of initiating the amendment or revision to
the constitution. It does not involve yet the actual amendment or revision. Moreover, should we
succeed on the former, the latter would involve numerous plenary meetings and discussions before
results can actually be made.

The Philippines on its current state still has a lot of developments that it has to cope up and this would
require the focus of our government especially the legislative branch and the executive branch to pass
statutes and implement rules respectively to further improveme the condition of the Philippines.

This period is a very critical period on the Philippine government with regards to Nation-building.

We have ASEAN Integration, the Sustainable Development Goals being implemented by the United
Nations, The recently done SK elections and the role the Philippines is holding in the international stage.
These are all significant events that we have to focus first before even giving a glimpse on the possibility
of changing our form of government.

Especially if the effects that the affirmative side expects to achieve upon implementation of Federalism
is still trivial as of the moment.

How do I say so?

This takes me to my second point.

The implementation of federalism for the Philippines would need a transformation different from other
Federal Countries have gone to.

We will be treading a path which is different from how federal governments were formed on other
countries.

If we take a look on countries currently adopting a federal form, federalization was actually a state-
building effort. Each began as a loose collection of disparate political entities that gradually, and with
painful upheavals, transformed themselves into a unified nation-state through the process of
federalization. This means that the different states comprising each of these countries have all started as
independent states capable of managing their own affairs without significant external intervention from
other neighboring states. Later on, these states created an effort to unite and thus, resulting on the
current federalized country that they have.

However, on the case of our country, it would essentially be the reverse of it since we have evolved as a
Unitarian Republican State and we will try to break our territory into different states which will be
forced to act independently upon federalization.

Basically, the transformation that the Philippines will experience does not have any precedence from
other countries making us at risk of a failure on its implementation because we don’t have any history
that would serve as our guide to transition.

This could be a problem because instead of empowering the proposed States, we might actually be
giving them a heavy burden by leaving them alone on a power and independence they are not ready to
hold.
It has been presented by both sides on this debate that indeed the Local Government Units in the
Philippines still have a significant level of dependence to the National Government and this cannot be
improved by a mere change to federalism.

This is an exposure that if ever we would be engaging our country, then we need to prepare the country
well and an immediate shift to federalism is not a manifestation of a good preparation.

Ladies and gentlemen, we know that each of us are concerned citizens who only wish for the best of our
country. But the problems we have stated cannot be answered by a sudden shift to another form of
government. It would be an irresponsible act to do such without proper preparations put place on all
aspects of governance. If things will not fall in to place as how the affirmative side expects it if
Federalism be implemented, then we will be risking our country on a breakdown for lack of security
measures beforehand.

Again, not necessary, not beneficial.

And with this, I formally rest the case of the Negative side. Thank you and Good evening.
61 – 2018 Index of Economic Freedom (The Heritage Foundation)

International Monetary Fund April 2018 estimates

April 2018 (GDP Nomina per Capita is 3095

Without a heavy need to actually amend the constitution, the attempt to do so would always be
impracticable. Especially if it

Amendment portion only

Revision total revamp of the instrument

Methods of amending the Constitution