A genuine anti-dynasty law

With the 20th Congress seemingly set to pass a law that will effectively legitimize political dynasties, multisectoral groups launched a people’s initiative last Friday to push for a genuine enabling measure for the constitutional provision banning dynasties.

The “Dapat Isa Lang” coalition of civil society groups, legal experts and clergy wants a law banning members of the same family up to the fourth degree of consanguinity or affinity from simultaneously holding more than one national or local elective post.

A people’s initiative is one of the modes for amending the Constitution, allowing the people’s will to prevail over Congress, whose members have failed to carry out their constitutional mandate to pass an enabling law banning political dynasties.

The resistance is understandable, considering that more than 80 percent of congressional districts and most local government units are controlled by dynastic clans.

Previous signature drives for a people’s initiative to amend the Constitution have failed. Dapat Isa Lang, however, is pushing only for one major reform, unlike the previous efforts, which sought to overhaul the 1987 Charter.

The initiative needs the signatures of 10 percent of all registered voters, with at least three percent in each legislative district. If the required signatures are gathered, the measure will be presented to the people for approval in a referendum.

Verification of the signatures alone, to be undertaken by the Commission on Elections, can be challenging. The process also calls for billions of pesos in funding, from the gathering of signatures to the referendum.

Dapat Isa Lang convenors, among them retired Supreme Court senior associate justice Antonio Carpio, acknowledged the hurdles ahead, especially with the next general elections just two years away.

But the signature campaign can express people’s sentiment for a genuine anti-dynasty law. The stranglehold of dynasties on political power has short-circuited the system of checks and balances in both the national and local governments, allowing corruption to become deeply entrenched and undermining broad, democratic representation in government.

Even if the people’s initiative fails, perhaps the sentiments expressed will dissuade lawmakers from hammering out a measure that will effectively institutionalize their clans’ grip on power.