THE chairman of the House Committee on Constitutional Amendments on Sunday accused several business groups of flip-flopping on the issue of amending the Constitution’s “restrictive” economic provisions.
They cited the high cost of funding a constitutional convention that would propose the amendments, the investment promotion campaign of President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. and recently enacted laws that aim to relax certain economic restrictions. In a competitive global economy, we believe in lower barriers to trade and investment in general. In a dynamic global economy, we believe any barriers should be subject to modification by the President and Congress, better than being fixed in the Constitution,” the club said.
“We note that in almost all countries in the world, restrictions on foreign investments are not contained in their Constitutions. Instead, restrictions on foreign trade and investments are done through legislation or administrative orders that can be changed to suit shifting national priorities,” it said.
“So we in the House and some supporters in the Senate are on the right track. We are following the recommendations of these big business groups, including their suggested timeline,” Rodriguez said.For his part, Albay Rep. Edcel Lagman said the opposition of these big business group to Charter change echoed the position of independent-minded members of the House of Representatives against a Constitutional Convention to amend the 1987 Constitution.