Imee on Cha-cha: Someone wants to be Prime Minister

Someone might want to be Prime Minister because the person can't win the presidency.

Senator Imee Marcos made the remark when asked about the renewed interest in Charter change (Cha-cha) in the House of Representatives.

"Ang kulitnaman. Talagang sinabi na ni [President Ferdinand "Bongbong" Marcos Jr.] na di napapanahon kasi dapat nakatutok tayo sa hanapbuhay ng tao at sa presyo ng bigas at bilihin," said Imee, the President's sister.

"At 2 beses na binasura yan nang todo todo ng senado. bat ba pinagpipilitan..? Baka may gusto mag-Prime Minister na hindi manalo sa Presidente," she added.

Speaker Martin Romualdez, the President and the senator's cousin, has again publicly pushed for Cha-cha to remove the constitutional limits on foreign investments and capital.

On Monday, Romualdez said the House of Representatives was keen on launching a people’s referendum to determine how the House and the Senate should vote on proposals amending the 1987 Constitution.

Romualdez said that while the 1987 Constitution provided three modes for amending the Charter, it did not explicitly state whether the House and the Senate would vote jointly or separately.

Under the 1987 Constitution, any amendment to or revision of the Constitution may be proposed by:

the Congress, upon a vote of three-fourths of all its Members (constituent assembly)

a constitutional convention during which Congress may, by a vote of two-thirds of all its members, call a constitutional convention, or by a majority vote of all its members, submit to the electorate the question of calling such a convention, and

a people’s initiative upon a petition of at least 12% of the total number of registered voters, of which every legislative district must be represented by at least 3% of the registered voters therein.

“There are three modes to amend the Constitution, but we have had problems in addressing it, procedural problems," said Romualdez during the Philippine Economic Forum in Iloilo. "I'm going to be sharing with you things that I've not shared with the public... I will actually be pre-empting our all-party leaders' caucus this afternoon and sharing it with you here in Iloilo. We are thinking of addressing the procedural gap or question as to how we amend the Constitution.

“We will highly recommend that we embark on a people-centered initiative to cure this impasse, so to speak, on how we vote. And I hope that we can undertake this as soon as possible so we can have some clarity on the procedures. We'd like to have that [procedural problem] resolved by and through a people's initiative,” Romualdez said. —NB, GMA Integrated News