Juan (Tio Juaning) Borra was in one of his rare moods. He was delivering a stirring speech at the office of Convention Sec. Pepe Abueva, with an audience of three. Apparently, Marcos has told his “boys” that he did not want them to take their oaths of office as members of the interim National Assembly immediately after the ratification of the Constitution. The “boys” are revolting against this because this is the kind of “consuelo” they had expected from their master in Malacañang,” he smiled,
Does this mean the tutas will bark but will no longer wag their tails, Tio Juaning?” I asked.
The 166-man body met this afternoon but the session lasted only for ten minutes. We were given until Wednesday, two days from now, to file our amendments to the new draft prepared by the Steering Council.
This is outrageous. To begin with, we were forced to submit amendments last Friday. Now we were informed that this is already passe’; they were amendments to a draft Constitution that, in the meantime, had been revised by the Steering Council.
I had a little chat with Estoy Mendoza, Fanny Cortez-Garcia and Monet Tirol at the coffee shop. Monet told us that he had advised Tony Tupaz to try to accept some amendments because there was much grumbling from many delegates. He said they are completely surprised by the fact that apparently the Steering Council, in the graphic word of Fanny, is “steamrollering” the Constitution.
Monet, too, was quite unhappy over the situation. As a matter of fact, almost every delegate is unhappy over the fact that the Steering Council has arrogated unto itself the exclusive task of writing the new Constitution for us. Many delegates, including Fanny, are now so frustrated that they do not feel like introducing any more amendments. Estoy, for one, said he would not do anything anymore.
He told us that poor delegate Felixberto Serrano, former secretary of foreign affairs, the brilliant old man who had been so conspicuously silent in the past 18 months, had spent four nights almost without sleep, working on his amendments. He has drafted voluminous amendments. He has finally tried to do his duty after having acquiesced all along to the manipulations of the majority—due to what irresistible pressures, I wonder?—only to find out that he was amending the wrong Constitution.
Estoy is just fed up. So is Fanny.
I told them I had filed amendments last Friday. Today again, I was rushing new amendments; I was going to put in their names as cosponsors.
They were happy about this. “Go ahead,” they said, “but as for us, we don’t want to do anything anymore.”
The fire of enthusiasm is gone from many delegates. What a pity that we have an assembly of talents but only a mediocre Constitution—at best—will, in the end, be framed. Mediocre? Hopefully—and not worse—a reactionary constitution for a dictator.