Charter change or character change?

CHARTER CHANGE at this time of uncertainties will not work because our country has other urgent priorities.

Admittedly, the 1987 Constitution has many defects. But the people—Congress, judiciary and executive—who are supposedly sworn to implement and abide by it, have greater defects.

We rely on the expertise of people with PhDs in economics, education, agriculture, finance and other fields to overhaul our Constitution, but we do not give a hoot about “overhauling” the character of Filipinos.

What Filipinos need now is character change. Charter change can come later. We need to examine our souls. We need a total cleansing of our selves as human beings.

We will succeed in eliminating corruption by practicing the principle of “honesty is the best policy.” President Duterte must issue the freedom of information (FOI) executive order and work for the passage of an FOI law with a sense of urgency.

We lack integrity, honesty and concern for our people, the main reason the Chinese, Japanese and Europeans prefer to invest in other countries. We also lack transparency.

Didn’t we have a subject on character education or values formation (Good Manners and Right Conduct) during our elementary days? What about “catechism,” where we learned the existence of one God? Do we weigh our actions by the Rotarian measure: “Is it the truth; will it build goodwill; will it be beneficial to other people?”

It is the character of the people that makes a nation great. If we are a corrupt people, we will be a weak nation. Knowledge is power, but character is more powerful.

Before we change our Charter, let us change first our character. We cannot entrust the task of changing our Constitution to people with questionable character.

—ISIDRO C. VALENCIA, [email protected]