GMA allies: Opposition reviving ‘no-el’ to discredit Cha-cha

Administration congressmen denied allegations yesterday that President Arroyo has struck a deal with congressmen and local officials to scrap the May 2007 elections in exchange for their support for her Cha-cha (Charter change) initiative.

In a joint statement, Representatives Mauricio Domogan of Baguio City and Marcelino Libanan of Eastern Samar said the claims of Senate Minority Leader Aquilino Pimentel Jr. were "baseless." The two said the opposition is reviving the no-el (no elections) in 2007 idea "to discredit Cha-cha." They claimed that there is nothing in the proposed amendments that could make no-el possible.

"No-el is dead, period. The opposition should not revive it to discredit Cha-cha, which is being overwhelmingly backed by the people through the people’s initiative mode. Let us respect the people’s will and not muddle it with a dead issue like no-el," they said. The controversial no-el was a proposal of the defunct presidential consultative commission (con-com) on Cha-cha headed by former University of the Philippines president Jose Abueva.

Mrs. Arroyo had referred the con-com report to the House of Representatives, prompting opposition lawmakers and former President Fidel Ramos to suspect that she was supporting the proposal to scrap the 2007 elections and to just extend the terms of office of senators, congressmen, governors, mayors, and other local officials.

Ramos had described no-el as a "monumental blunder" and had repeatedly urged Mrs. Arroyo to reveal her stand on it.

Abueva later admitted that no-el was aimed at winning the support of congressmen, governors and mayors for Cha-cha to ensure its success.

Last weekend, the Liberal Party (LP) bloc in the House revealed that no-el is still up in the air and has not been scrapped despite pronouncements from Cha-cha proponents that it had been dropped.

LP congressmen claim that based on the amendments that the President and her allies are proposing, no-el is still possible since the planned Charter revisions do not fix the date of the next elections.

The proposed interim parliament, to be composed of the present members of the Senate and the House, would be empowered to determine such date, they said.

It is thus conceivable that the interim parliament would fix such date not in 2007 but in 2010 or beyond, they stressed.

They noted that in the original proposals of the House committee on constitutional amendments, the next election for members of Congress and local officials was clearly set for the second Monday of 2007.