Fake grassroots initiative won't save GMA from ouster, workers will boycott barangay assemblies

The Alliance of Progressive Labor (APL) opposes the manufactured people's initiative being cooked up by Malacañang through the Department of Interior and Local Government as nothing more than another scheme to perpetuate the beleaguered president in power and to hide all her accountabilities from public view.

The APL has been resolute from the very beginning in opposing charter change at this time because we have always believed that any structural changes in the political system must first and foremost be accompanied by system change. One cannot expect genuine change with the same set of trapos and elitists maintaining hold on power even if one experiments with different political systems such as a shift from the Presidential to a Parliamentary form of government.

What is most striking about this move is that taxpayers' money is again being wasted and misused to advance a political agenda that nobody needs and nobody wants.

Through the League of Municipalities of the Philippines baranggay assemblies are being called throughout the country, with millions of pesos pouring into dole outs and direct bribery to gather signatures to make it appear there is a real and tangible clamor for amending the Constitution. The motivation is clear at this point -- GMA wants to do away with the national patrimony provisions so she could continue courting foreign investments at the expense of our country's sovereignty and natural resources.

With foreign investments pump-priming her faltering administration, GMA will flaunt high-sounding economic statistics as a counter-balance to the political mess that has set her back for the one undeniable truth: that she cheated, and betrayed public trust when she rigged the 2004 elections.

This latest initiative gives even more cause for outrage because public funds are again being manipulated to save an illegitimate President. Under the guise of conducting nationwide "consultations", what this exercise aims at is nothing more than mapping out where the administration's hold remains strong, and where it can dupe people into supporting its bogus mandate.

Workers will not bite into this nefarious scheme. Workers have already lost more than enough under GMA's liberalized and deregulated regime. To sell out the economy to keep her away from jail is just too much. The APL calls on all workers not to legitimize this top-down "people's initiative" with their participation. And more importantly for the pubic not to attach their signatures to the initiative being peddled by Malacañang. This latest trickery must be met with a stronger response demanding for the ouster of a plundering President who is unabashedly using the poeple's money to save herself.