THE MURDER of Negros Oriental governor Roel Degamo and five of his constituents on Saturday morning will haunt Negrenses for a long time. President BBM reports ‘there is a clear direction as to how to proceed to bring to justice those behind the murders’. We hope so.
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The Negros Island Region (NIR) was first established in 2015 by an executive order (EO) issued by President Benigno Aquino III. At the time I wrote in a local newspaper (not PN) that I was not certain that President Aquino’s EO was compatible with the Constitution.
Article X deals with aspects relating to Local Government.
Section 10 says:
‘No province, city, municipality, or barangay may be created, divided, abolished, or its boundary substantially altered, except in accordance with the criteria in the local government code and subject to approval by a majority of the votes cast in a plebiscite in the political units directly affected.’
NIR combines part of Region 6 (Western Visayas) with part of Region 7 (Central Visayas) through the amalgamation of Negros Occidental, Negros Oriental, and Siquijor.
This amalgamation resulted in the formation of Region 18. It was not clear to me whether the full consequences of Region 18’s creation were ever implemented.
In any case, Aquino’s EO was overturned by President Rodrigo Duterte in 2017. A second attempt to establish the NIR is currently being made via a Republic Act. Last week, the proposed NIR bill’s passage was passed on second reading at the House of Representatives. The bill is soon due for a third reading before being forwarded to the Senate.
Negros Occidental’s Governor Eugenio Jose Lacson is clearly supportive of the bill, but Negros Oriental’s governor Roel Degamo was not.
It is now uncertain as to when and how any decision-making relating to Negros Island’s future can be made./PN
