SAYING that the high cost of election in a presidential-unitary system is one reason to change the 1987 Constitution and shift to a parliamentary-federal system, former Chief Justice Reynato Puno warned that election-campaign spending in the billions of pesos “may be good for the economy, but definitely bad for democracy.”
In a forum on constitutional reform at the University of the East, Puno said next year’s national elections “could very well be the most critical in the last 100 years of the nation’s history,” and yet “the ugly signs” are all over the place that the forthcoming electoral exercise will “again betray the expectations of the people” and become just as “another opportunity lost.”
“The stakes could not be any higher,” the leading light and voice of the movement Bagong Sistema, Bagong Pag-asa said, stressing that whoever will be elected president next year should have not only “the capability to heal the deep divisions and cleavages in our society, [but] also the wisdom to handle with dexterity our foreign affairs and prevent our people from losing our territory to more powerful countries without provoking a war which we cannot win.”
He was referring to the West Philippine Sea problem that remains a thorn in Philippine-China relations.
But he warned that, as in years past, the next elections could again be dominated by traditional politicians and political parties that are “mere loose and temporary alliances of self-seeking individuals with no vision of the greatest good for the greatest number, and are controlled by men made mighty not by the Almighty but by the purchasing power of the peso.”
“Woefully, we may again see an election where the people’s will may be muted by the money of the elite,” he said, noting the billions of pesos that candidates for the country’s top posts have to spend.
“How much does it cost to get elected President?” Puno asked.
If candidates for president or vice president were to follow the law strictly, they could not spend more than P15 per registered voter. With an estimated 55 million voters for next year’s polls, that means each of them can spend no more than P825 million, Puno calculated, adding that if there were at least four candidates for president and vice president, as much as P6.6 billion could flood the economy during the campaign period which starts in February.
“But we all know also, that candidates spend way beyond what the law allows particularly for radio and television advertising to prop up their survey ratings—even before the official campaign begins,” Puno said.