SENATE minority leader Aquilino “Koko” Pimentel III yesterday said there is “no chance” that the proposed amendments to the 1987 Constitution, even if limited to economic provisions, will be approved in the Senate.
“No chance,” Pimentel said in a Viber message to the media when asked if the Senate will pass Resolution of Both Houses (RBH) No. 6, the Charter change bill filed by Senate President Juan Miguel Zubiri, pro tempore Loren Legarda and Sen. Juan Edgardo Angara.
The House of Representatives has transmitted to the Senate its counterpart Cha-cha measure, RBH 7, which it approved before Congress went on a month-long summer break last March.
Both measures seek to amend three economic provisions of the Constitution.
Pimentel made the assessment a day after Zubiri told a radio interview that there is a “slim” chance that Cha-cha will be approved in the Senate because at least eight senators are against it. The chamber needs at least 18 senators to approve RBH 6.
The Senate leader said Senators Pimentel, Risa Hontiveros, Cynthia Villar, Imee Marcos, and Francis Escudero have publicly stated their opposition to Cha-cha, while three to four more senators, whom he did not name, have also expressed the same opposition during the caucuses they have previously held to discuss Charter amendments.
In past media interviews, majority leader Joel Villanueva and Senators Joseph Victor Ejercito and Nancy Binay have also said they were against any move to revise the Charter at this time.
“So, lusaw na po ‘yung aming 18 votes para maipasa ‘yan (So, we no longer have the 18 votes needed to pass Cha-cha),” Zubiri has said.
In a press conference yesterday, Zubiri said 18 senators are also needed to approve the House’s RBH 7.
“Parang bill yan, i-reconcile ‘yan (It’s like an ordinary bill that will have to be reconciled with RBH 6). And then, of course, it will still need 18 votes,” he said.
At the same time, Zubiri said the Committee on Rules chaired by Villanueva has yet to finalize the rules on how the Senate will proceed with their Cha-cha plenary discussions.
“I will leave to the Committee on Rules to decide on how we will be able to tackle the rules on the approval of this measure on the floor. Kasi magkakaroon ng (because there will be a) committee report. After the committee report, we’ll have debates on the floor. I will find out from the leadership how they want to proceed with that,” he said.
Zubiri said he prefers that the Cha-cha discussions be held in the morning, so senators can continue their discussions on and pass Malacañang’s 20 priority measures before Congress adjourns sine die on May 24.
“Kaya hindi ko puedeng ipuno itong 3 p.m. session natin all the way up to the evenings (I cannot inject this in our daily 3 p.m. sessions all the way up to the evening). So, we may have to discuss Charter change during morning sessions. That’s a possibility… But we will have a caucus to discuss that as well,” he added.
He said another concern that they will have to resolve is how to vote on RBH 6 since there is a group of senators who want to vote on it while another group is saying that there should be no more voting if they cannot reach the required number of 18 votes in favor.
“So, ‘yan ang ire-reconcile pa natin ngayon (We still have to reconcile this). That’s also going to be part of the top topics that we’ll be discussing in the caucus,” he added.
