Speech of former Senator Wigberto Tañada at a conference on “Implications of Liberalizing the Economic Provisions of the Constitution”, organized by the Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry (PCCI) last July 14.
Tañada is a lead convenor of the Fair Trade Alliance (FTA), a broad multisectoral coalition of formal and informal labor, industry, agricultural, non-governmental organizations, and youth pushing for trade and economic reforms.
Let me directly share with you three major points on the issue at hand.
One, amending the Constitution to make it responsive to the development requirements of a country is the sovereign right of the people. However, the present charter-change initiative has become controversial not only because the process being used is infirm but also because it is not clear if such initiative is truly in response to the development needs of the people or if it is merely a grand design to promote the narrow self-serving agenda of some politicians.