Puno favors ‘Cha-cha’ after 2010 polls

MANILA, Philippines—Interior Secretary and vice presidential aspirant Ronaldo Puno said he was in favor of amending the Constitution, but only after a new set of administration officials have been elected in the 2010 polls.

Puno, speaking before the Manila Overseas Press Club, also said that a failure of elections scenario was “unlikely,” adding that he would not be spending his time and effort pushing for his candidacy if he though the elections would fail.

Puno, during a forum at Makati City’s Hotel Intercon, said he favored amending the Constitution because of some alleged “conflicts” among its provisions.

“First of all, there are a lot of grammatical errors in our Constitution. Second, there are conflicts in its provisions. We have to resolve all of them. Third, we have to look at economic provisions. And then, after doing all of that, we should look at other aspects of our governance that need to be addressed or debated upon,” he said.

Despite saying that failure of elections is unlikely, Puno still urged Congress to come up with an “acceptable” solution to address the problem should there be failure of elections.

“I think it is not likely that there will be failure of elections. However, I encourage Congress to really address this issue and find a means of transition that will be acceptable to all and to our people,” he added.

Meanwhile, Puno said that election fraud could be averted with the help of automation.

“I believe if computerization will be implemented the way it has been explained, I think cheating will be reduced to the barest minimum, to a level where it will really not affect the results of the elections,” he added.

Puno, however, said that removing cheating completely would be difficult.

“There are 50 million voters, 1,480 towns, and about 32 names you will put on those ballots. There is no such thing as a perfect thing in this world. I think we should not expect that from the exercise that the Comelec will supervise. But we should all work for the perfection that we seek,” he said.

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