Page 116 - kpi20440

KPI Congress 20th
116
2018
Thai Democracy on the Move

As stated earlier, federalism in not new. At the core of federalism is the need to

empower subnational governments to make them responsive to the peculiar needs and
features of a certain geographical area. This is precisely what devolution and local autonomy

is all about. It will be recalled that in 1991, a Local Government Code principally authored
by Sen Nene Pimentel was enacted to transfer functions, powers and authorities to the

sub-national local governments in order to enable them to address local needs. For instance, a
landlocked municipality in the mountainous Cordillera regions has different needs from an island

fishing municipality in the Visayas. As saying goes, different strokes for different folks. No one
size fits all. That is what decentralization is all about. Devolution and federalism are modes of

decentralization. To reiterate, decentralization can be placed in a continuum with
deconcentration (administrative decentralization) on one end where minimal powers are

transferred to lower levels, and independence at the other extreme. In between them are
devolution (political decentralization as provided for in the 1991 local government code),

regional autonomy (as provided for in the 1987 constitution for the cordilleras and “muslim
Mindanao” and now in the proposed Bangsamoro Organic Law stemming from the Bangsamore

Basic Law) and federalism. It is within this context that we have suggested the federalism is
the next logical step to devolution and local autonomy. Hence the discourse on federalism is

not new when located within the context of the decentralization continuum.

This is not a simple academic theoretical discussion. This is grounded on reality where
we have seen actual local governments use their creative powers and authorities vested in

them by the local government code through devolution respond to the unique needs of their
constituencies (health, education, conflict resolution, generation of financial resource, and come

up with innovative responses to local challenges and concerns. As we mentioned earlier, our
many local governments who have been recognized by the Galing Pook and other programs

through the years are actual evidence of this: these include Upi in Maguindanao, Malaybalay in
Bukidnon, Cebu City, Naga City, Mandaluyong City, Munoz in Nueva Ecija, La Trinidad in Benguet,
เอกสารประกอบการประชุมกลุ่มย่อยที่ 3 of decentralization, we must build upon the hard earned gains of decentralization over the years.
and Aparri in Cagayan, among many, many others (www.galingpook.org)

Since the discourse on federalism is not new when properly placed within the context

For instance, in designing the proposed federal states, we can take off from the administrative
regions and the regional development councils. The process of administrative regionalization