Camarines Sur 2nd district Rep. LRay Villafuerte

What's so special about Philippine senators that they get to have the longest possible term in office among all elected officials? 

Camarines Sur 2nd district Rep. LRay Villafuerte asked this question Thursday, Jan. 25 amid the brewing spat between the House of Representatives and the Senate on the subject of Charter change (Cha-cha). 

After toying with the idea of Cha-cha earlier this month with the filing of Resolution of Both Houses (RBH) No.6, senators have since decided not to pursue the measure and are even assailing the current move to amend the 1987 Constitution. 

“The Senate is now raising the issue of political reforms in the Constitution in its Jan. 23 manifesto—although the popular clamor now is only for lifting the anachronistic economic provisions that spook foreign investors—apparently out of fear that any [Cha-cha] initiative could possibly lead to rationalizing or reforming the term-limit provisions of which our senators are the biggest beneficiaries," Villafuerte said. 

“This is because the political provisions of the 1987 Charter allow them among all our elective officials the longest time of 12 years—six years plus a relection of another six years—to serve in their legislative posts," he noted. 

But this begs one question according to the National Unity Party (NUP) president.  

“What makes our senators so special among all our elective officials that they are accorded the privilege of serving for the longest time of 12 years in the Senate when even our President and Vice President are restricted to a single term of six years?" asked Villafuerte.  

“Why not make our senators as equals of their peers in the House or with local elective officials by having all of them serve for, say, three, four or six years?”  

The country’s 24 senators have unanimously signed a manifesto condemning the Cha-cha effort and the ongoing People’s Initiative (PI) movement in particular.  

For the Bicolano, the senators only did so "in a shrewd bid to keep the door shut on any prospects for political reforms in the future that could alter for good reason the current term limits that benefit them the most in the Senate". 

“Senators should cease muddling up the issue of constitutional reform because the one and only objective of the House at this point is to amend for the first time the almost four-decade-old Constitution," Villafuerte insisted. 

"And this is to aptly rid the Charter of its anachronistic economic provisions that have barred the Philippines...from attracting the kind of huge investments long enjoyed by our Southeast Asian neighbors and that are crucial to creating a lot more jobs and better lives for our people," he added.