Charter at fault

It is not whether the House of Representatives, or the Senate, or the president, or whoever it is that is pushing for changes in the Constitution, has vested interests or not. For as long as any initiative involves people, there will always be interests involved. Anybody who says there is none is a hypocrite. Or hopelessly lost in his imaginary world.

People push for change because they are interested in change. There is something in it for them. It doesn’t have to be money, although admittedly it is money that gives vested interest such a bad name. It can be for a less complicated life. It can be for happiness, for crying out loud. But for as long as people clamor for change, they have to have a vested interest in what they are pursuing.

It is not vested interest, therefore, that is causing all these problems pertaining to the matter of amending the Constitution. The problem lies with the very Constitution itself, or more specifically, its fuzzy language. It is not a good constitution when its language is not precise and its meaning easily understandable. To have its wordings attract as many interpretations as there are people interpreting them is to have a constitution doomed to cause trouble.

And that is precisely the trouble the country finds itself in right now. It has a provision that has set the House of Representatives and the Senate on a collision course against each other. Even former Supreme Court justices (because the matter has not yet reached the Supreme Court) who are supposed to be the great interpreters of the law, cannot agree on what the contentious provisions mean.

Section 1, Article 17 of the Philippine Constitution states that any amendment to, or revision of, the Constitution may be proposed by the Congress, upon a vote of three-fourths of all its members, or by a constitutional convention. Such ambiguous language is the reason why there is so much argument about what the words exactly mean.

The cause of the argument is the lack of any qualifier as to whether the voting by Congress should be separate and according to house or not. Both houses have their own engaging and compelling arguments. But the problem is, all of these arguments, from either side, are based on assumptions. But it is ridiculous, wrong, and highly irresponsible to dismiss the ambiguities with nothing more judicious than “it goes without saying.”

Oh yeah? “It goes without saying” applies to conversations between lovers. It does not, it cannot, and it must never be made to apply as a means to interpret something as sacred and defining as a constitution. The framers of the Philippine Constitution, damn them, should have made it expressly clear whether they meant the Congress to vote separately or not, instead of leaving something as important as a provision cartwheeling to the winds of “it goes without saying.”

A few more words of clarity would not have cost an extra centavo. And it would not have cost extra sweat to the masters of language and style to craft a slightly longer provision that not only does away with ambiguity but also spares the country and its future generations the trouble of having to argue just exactly what the Constitution means. If we ever get down to amending this Constitution, do please include a rewording of some of its vital provisions.