Federal Snake Oil

By Antonio C. Abaya
Written on July 14, 2008
For the Standard Today,
July 15 issue

Those who claim that "federalism is an idea whose time has come" or that "there is nothing wrong with federalism" – without offering a shred of empirical evidence to justify their statements – can be forgiven their naivete since they are merely parroting the official party line.

But those who are actively pushing for federalism as a political advocacy have no excuse or alibi, other than political expediency, to explain their positions.

Sen. Nene Pimentel, principal author of Senate Resolution no.10, seeks to engineer a shift to the federal form of government before the end of President Arroyo's term in June 2010, and he wants it done through a kami-kami lang constituent assembly (ConAss), not through a nationally elected constitutional convention (ConCon).

It can be foreseen that the question will be raised on whether the Lower House and the Senate will vote separately or as one body, and that this question will be raised to the Supreme Court for a decision. And based on its most recent major decision – that on Romulo Neri's use of executive privilege - it can be assumed that the Supreme Court will rule in favor of the Arroyo government, namely that the ConAss should vote as one body.

In such a unicameral body, even if it includes six or seven senators eyeing the presidency or the vice-presidency in 2010, the numbers would be overwhelmingly in favor of Lakas and Kampi, which will dictate the thrust of the ConAss and determine its goals..

Which will certainly include a simultaneous shift to the parliamentary system, which is at present being pushed in the provinces by a road show organized and led by Albay Gov. Joey "Lucky Bitch" Salceda.

This two-pronged campaign is meant to give President Arroyo the constitutional right to stay in power beyond 2010, either as prime minister or as president without term limits..

And if Sen. Pimentel cannot see that, then he is either more naïve than I thought he was, or he is actually complicit in building a Trojan Horse for President Arroyo. Sen. Pimentel should know that people are speculating that his reward for building this Trojan Horse is that his son Koko would be "allowed to win" his electoral protest against Migz Zubiri.

And what is his motivation for pushing for a shift to a federal union? In his Senate Resolution no. 10, he alleges that such a shift would "spur economic growth."

This is naïve and uninformed. It suggests that a unitary state is not capable of spurring economic growth, at all or at least not one of sufficient strength.

In my rebuttal to Sen. Pimentel in Ricky Carandang's TV program "The Big Picture", I named the countries in East and Southeast Asia which have achieved phenomenal economic growth as unitary states: Japan, which joined the First World in the 1960s; South Korea, Taiwan and Singapore, which joined the First World in the 1990s; China and Vietnam, which for the past decade or (in the case of China) two, have registered the fastest economic growth rates in the entire world; and Thailand, which has been growing faster than the Philippines in the past 30 years, although both countries were about equal in all economic indicators in the 1970s. The Philippines used to be superior to all these countries (except Japan) in standard of living and economic growth until the late 1960s.

There are only two countries in this part of the world that are federal unions: Malaysia and Myanmar. One is a success, the other is a failure. Contrary to the fatuous claims of federalists, federalism, by itself, is not a guarantee of economic success.

So there is nothing wrong with the unitary state and there is no need to change it. It is the people running the Philippine unitary state that need to be changed. But by pushing for a ConAss before June 2010, Sen. Pimentel helps guarantee that the trapos and political dynasts who have been running the Philippine unitary state to the ground for the past 30 years will continue to run it to the ground after 2010.

The rationale that federalism "will spur economic growth" in the Philippines is based purely on wishful thinking. Sen. Pimentel offers no empirical evidence for making such claims.

So is another of his claims, aired in his interview with Ricky Carandang at the time of Ces Drilon's kidnapping, that a federal union may reduce kidnapping. What utter nonsense. Ms. Drilon's kidnappers were motivated solely by criminal greed, not by any longing for a federal union.

Crime has no ideology. Three of Third World countries with the highest crime rates are Brazil, Mexico and South Africa – all federal unions. The industrialized democracy with the highest number of crimes in the world committed with handguns (more than 11,000 a year) is the USA, another federal union. On the other hand, countries with the lowest crime rates in the world are: Japan (about 100 crimes a year committed with handguns) and Singapore, and the five Scandinavian countries, all unitary states.

Sen. Pimentel and his federal confederates are even blaming the alleged slow delivery of aid to the victims of Typhoon Frank on alleged defects of the unitary state, claiming that such aid would have arrived faster under a federal union. Again, what utter nonsense!

The whole world admires how China has been able to cope successfully with one natural disaster after another, even as it feverishly makes preparations to host the Summer Olympics in August 2008.

First there was unusually heavy snowfall last February which stranded 5.2 million passengers in airports and railway stations as they vainly tried to go home for Chinese New Year. Then there was the earthquake in Chengdu in May that killed more than 70,000 people and destroyed five million homes. Followed by heavy floods in southern China in June that displaced more than a million people. And in July, the seacoast off the city of Tsingdao – site of the Olympic yachting events – was covered by a thick carpet of algae bloom that is taking more than two weeks to remove by hand. Disasters that were swiftly and efficiently attended to by the Chinese unitary state.

Compare that record with Myanmar, which has been a federal union since independence in 1948. More than two whole months after a cyclone devastated the Irrawaddy River delta and killed 78,000 people, dead bodies remain unattended, decomposing in the open fields and entire villages are still without adequate food, water, medicine and housing, as reported yesterday (July 14) by Betty Nguyen on CNN.

If Myanmar is too poor to cite as an example, try a major First World city that was ripped apart in August 2006 by a severe weather disturbance. About 80 percent of its area was flooded, 204,000 homes were damaged or destroyed, and 800,000 residents were forced to flee. The national government was also criticized for mismanagement, delayed response and lack of preparations.

More than six months and $41 billions later, the national (federal) government finally declared in January 2007 that "the City of New Orleans has been successfully returned to its pre-Katrina state." To which a critic added:…"of decay and deterioration…and its streets are again safe for poverty and vice…"

Like snake oil salesmen, Sen. Pimentel and his confederates are making outlandish claims for their magic tonic, without offering any empirical evidence to support their claims, that it will spur economic growth; that it may reduce kidnapping, that it will guarantee speedy disaster relief. Anyone who believes these claims might as well also believe in Santa Claus.. *****

TONY ON YouTube: My interview with Ricky Carandang on federalism can now be seen on YouTube. Go to www.tapatt.org. Click Tony on YouTube. Then scroll down.

Or you can go directly to the following URLs:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vm5PgbiIzRM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vEFhcAe_Eac

All reactions to tonyabaya@gmail.com. Other articles in www.tapatt.org and in acabaya.blogspot.com.