BBM eyes 5-year term for barangay execs

Incoming President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. is considering pushing a law that would give barangay officials a five-year term of office, according to Executive Secretary-designate Vic Rodriguez.,Rodriguez made the announcement last Thursday, 23 June after he was cited by Quezon City’s 142 barangays for his achievements as a public servant and was asked if the barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan (SK) polls slated for December would push through.,“We are studying thoroughly the plus and the minuses of spending or calling for elections and there is nothing definite yet,” said Rodriguez.,“But we are open to all options that are being presented to us including the possibility of passing a law and making the term of barangay captains to five years, still subject to three terms,” he added.,Currently, barangay officials and SK members have a term of three years.,As a former barangay captain, Rodriguez believed that amending the current term to five years with a limit of three terms would better improve barangay governance than the current practice of constant extension by postponing the barangay elections.,“For me as a former barangay captain, I think there is more wisdom in making it five years than resort to extension, extension, extension, and extension because we are working against the spirit of our law, the bible of the Local Government Units – the 1992 Local Government Code,” he said.,“So instead of violating the spirit of the law, we might as well extend it and provide stability in your leadership, provide stability in governance,” he added.,In 2019, President Rodrigo Duterte signed Republic Act 11462 postponing the May 2020 Barangay and SK polls to December 2022.,The last Barangay and SK elections were held in May 2018, which were also postponed twice.,The polls were supposed to be held in October 2016.,Rodriguez also noted that it would provide a higher degree of accountability, especially with the Mandanas-Garcia ruling set for implementation this year which would infuse additional funds to the local government units (LGU) down to the barangays.,At present, LGU’s IRA comes from 40 percent of national internal revenue taxes collected by the BIR.,With the Mandanas-Garcia ruling implementation this year, it is projected that LGUs will have a 27.61 percent increase in the total IRA shares.,During the campaign, Marcos expressed his intention to include in their priority bills, measures to amend laws governing the barangay such as his proposal when he was a senator to extend the terms of barangay officials from three to five years.,The objective is to give the officials sufficient time to finish their projects in their areas of jurisdiction.