Mainly Mita

The other day,  my husband was writing a post on inheritance for his Philfaqs blog.  He turned to me and asked if I knew how crazy the law was. He explained and it gave me a headache. Read what he wrote and if it doesn’t make your head spin, let me know.

This is just one example of how protectionist Philippine laws are. When you enter into a marriage, I doubt majority of us ever think of these things. When I was married  in the US, I didn’t even think about these things.  In the Philippines, if you are an alien who has invested your life savings in Philippine property you can get very badly screwed if your Filipino spouse dies and your children are all non-Filipinos.  My poor husband will be left with hardly anything if I died before he did!

My little conversation with the Spouse made me remember something I wanted to write for this blog. I always wanted to look up the 1987 Constitution and see what needs changing. So I looked it up and looked at the Family and Revised Penal Codes too.  Gee, the laws for the family are so strong, but so anti-women! And our adultery law says that women who have carnal knowledge with men other than her husband is guilty of adultery, get this, even AFTER her marriage is declared void.  For men?  Oh, it doesn’t matter if he has all the carnal knowledge with any woman any day - so long as he doesn’t “cohabit” with the woman, he’s fine!

And what is the beef with illegitimate children? I’d feel so marginalized I’d start a party list group for illegitimate offspring so they would have representation in Congress!

I’ve made an initial list of amendments I personally feel the Constitution needs, including a complete shift since this form of government doesn’t work for us. Perhaps I’ll come up with more, but for now, this is the list:

A shift to a Federation of States with four states, namely: Luzon, Bicol, Visayas and Mindanao. Each state will have its own set of laws and local government headed by the governor, who are elected by the people.

Parliamentary form of government headed by a Prime Minister duly elected by the Upper and Lower House from within their ranks. The Head of State is the President. The Presidency will be occupied by each state in rotation every 10 years. States will elect their own candidate.

Lower House representatives will number 250 and will come from the different provincial districts and party lists duly accredited by the federal election body. These representatives will carry 5- year terms, with no term limits. The Upper House will be composed of 25 members proportionately representing the 4 states.

Enactment of a Federal Election Law that will cover not only the conduct of federal elections but campaign funding provisions as well. There should be a provision for public funding of campaigns to limit patronage politics.

Abolition of the Commission on Election and replacing with a federal regulatory body that will oversee election and campaign laws. Adoption of an electoral college with electors coming from and appointed by the dominant, national parties. Electors cannot be in public office. The electoral college will strengthen the 2-party system and should be adopted until such time when the political party system has strengthened. The electoral college will also be tasked with affirming the qualification of candidates.

Separation of Church and State shall be inviolable. This text should be included: “There shall be no interference whatsoever of the sacred religious feelings in State affairs and policies.”

Reference to the spiritual development of the youth should be removed. This is not the duty of the state.

Dissolution and review of the current Civil, Family and Penal Codes. A new law should be drafted that will allow divorce, allow more equality for women, alien spouses and illegitimate children. Adultery and concubinage should be decriminalized or even scrapped altogether.  Sex between consenting adults, no matter the civil status of the adults,  is a personal matter and the state should not get involved in it.

The law on inheritance should be reviewed and made more equitable for illegitimate children and alien spouses.