No to charter change?

SWS poll: 70% of Pinoys see no need for Cha-cha. That was the headline yesterday on the front page of the Philippine Star.

According to a poll conducted by the Social Weather Station (SWS), 70% of those polled believe that the Constitution shouldn't be amended at this time, versus 30%, who believe the opposite.

The clincher is that 73% of those polled had little or no knowledge about our Constitution, versus 27% who answered that they have sufficient to extensive knowledge of it.

I think that these numbers are accurate. In fact, on my unofficial and unscientific poll located on my sidebar, at the time of this posting, 71% are against charter change, versus 29% who are all for it. These results, despite the limited nature of my poll, are actually very close to what the SWS got.

Somehow, I don't think that the similarity in all of these figures is merely a coincidence.

Put in another way, 7 out of 10 people polled believe that we should leave our Constitution alone. Out of the same group of people, 7 out of 10 have little to no knowledge about our Constitution.

I can only surmise that the vast majority of people who are against charter change are also the same people who either know very little about it or don't know anything about it all. Anyone who understands our Constitution would no doubt realize that it is indeed full of flaws, and that it has become unresponsive to the needs of the people as well as the dynamics of Philippine politics.

Assuming that the impeachment complaint against Pres. Arroyo is passed by a third of the House of Representatives, the country would be experiencing its second impeachment trial in five years. With the ouster of Pres. Joseph Estrada under seemingly "questionable" but nevertheless, "legal" circumstances (referring to "constructive resignation" of Pres. Estrada as ruled by the Supreme Court), we had our second EDSA revolution in 15 years. Now aside from the possibility of being impeached, Pres. Arroyo is being hounded by all sorts of accusations left and right, ranging from profiting from illegal gambling to cheating in the last elections.

Clearly, there has to be a more efficient way of dealing with a Head of State which may have lost the confidence of the people, without the need of a protracted process which is nothing but detrimental to our morale as a people and our national economy. And make no mistake about it, the only means of instituting a more efficient way for the State in dealing with circumstances of this sort is by amending...or perhaps even revising the Constitution.

Ultimately, it will be the people who will decide. And I hope for our sake, they choose wisely.

Vox Populi, Suprema Lex.