Filipinos can and should govern themselves

Manny Valdehuesa

THERE’S no reason why Filipinos can’t govern themselves. All that’s needed is to be a concerned and attentive member of one’s community, work out what can be done can do to bring order and progress to the neighborhood, and reach out so everyone gets to cooperate and collaborate towards the same goals.

How to go about it? The Barangay Assembly is the key.

A careful reading of the Local Government Code (R.A. 7160)—particularly in creating the barangay and its Barangay Assembly—reveals that the governing mode it prescribes for this basic community is Direct Democracy. It’s a variation of the democracy practiced since the time of Plato, Aristotle, and Socrates in Greece. It was devised to enable villagers and townspeople to participate in governing their community.

Direct Democracy continues to operate in villages of Switzerland, Israel, and other places today. Constituents have inherent right to participate directly in the governing process—such as in formal proceedings where proposed regulations or ordinances are proposed and approved or disapproved.

Also referred to as “pure democracy,” this mode allows a citizen to assert his sovereignty and enable him to express views freely, along with fellow citizens. It is an inherent right and it is enjoyed by everyone.

The same right is acknowledged and respected by our laws, particularly by the Local Government Code (R.A. 7160).  And the Code provides the venue and process for its formal exercise in every community, namely, in the Barangay Assembly—whose membership comprises all residents of voting age.

Unfortunately, little notice or significance has been accorded to this Barangay Assembly. First, given the nature and status of its membership, it is literally a “constituent assembly” with all the powers inherent to it. Second, its all-embracing membership (comprising the totality of the populace) makes it the highest decision-making unit of the community, thus its supreme governing body.

Accordingly, it enjoys broad powers: to initiate legislation (ordinances), to pass upon the acts of the officials (who can be removed and replaced if found unworthy of public trust or confidence), to remedy improper or unacceptable decisions of the Sanggunian (through initiative or referendum), and to oversee or approve plans and programs including finances.

In fact, this Barangay Assembly is by definition a “parliament”—a legislative governing body. It is vested with the requisite powers of government, with a mandate to oversee public affairs—and do so collegially, just like members of a cooperative or credit union do.

In performing one’s role in this governing task, one should keep its collegial nature in mind; meaning, an individual citizen’s power is tied to the assembly’s collective power. In other words, only if the Barangay Assembly formally meets and deliberates officially can it assume its powers and privileges. And when it speaks, decides, or acts, it carries the voice of sovereign citizens. It’s People Power.

Every community of our republic possesses this power. It is real power, and it can be used for good or bad ends. It can clean up the neighborhoods. It can stop criminality or corruption. It can reform misbehaving citizens.

But it can also prop up dictatorship, just as Ferdinand Marcos did. If the officials are corrupt or incompetent, it can cause the spread of vice or crime—as when the Barangay Assembly fails to keep its officials responsible and accountable.

If the citizens are lazy, uncaring, or apathetic, there is power failure and nothing to move officials to act properly or to develop and maintain order and progress for all.

Let us govern our own communities ourselves!

(Manny Valdehuesa Jr. is a former Unesco regional director for Asia-Pacific; secretary-general, Southeast Asia Publishers Association; vice chair, Local Government Academy; and awardee, PPI-Unicef outstanding columnist. Today, he is chairman and national convenor of the Gising Barangay Movement Inc.. E-mail:  valdehuesa@gmail.com)