Residents of Malolos City in Bulacan appealed to Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile yesterday to exercise his leadership and stop the chamber from approving a measure seeking to convert the city into a congressional district.

The circumstances by which the measure (Senate bill 1986) is being pushed through violate the Constitution, they said through their lawyers Victorino Aldaba and Carlo Jolette Fajardo.

In a seven-page memorandum submitted to the Senate, the lawyer stressed that the measure violates the Constitution’s minimum population requirement.

The Senate measure is the counterpart of House Bill 3693.

The lawyers said that the bill, which seeks to amend the charter of the City of Malolos, had been passed on second reading without proof that the 250,000 population requirement required by Constitution had been met.

The required minimum exceeds the population of Malolos City, which is only 223,069 as of August 2007, as certified by the National Statistics Office in Bulacan.

Before the 2007 Census of Population, the Malolos City population was 175,291 in 2000 showing that the city has an annual growth rate of 3.50 percent.

Projecting the population by 2010, Malolos will only reach about 247,321 which is still below the minimum requirement of 250,000 inhabitants, the opponents of the bill said.

Even according to the NSO, the country’s annual population growth from 1995 to 2007 is only 2.16 percent. “Hence, even using any method of projections, there is no way the population of Malolos City can increase to 255,000 in just a year and a half, come 2010.”

Records of the House of Representatives on House Bill 3693 do not show any document to support such contention that the 250,000 population requirement had already been reached.

“Much defilements and infringement had been perpetrated against the Constitution, regretfully, even by officials of higher echelon levels. We cannot supinely sit by and witness the commission of another one right in our midst,” said Aldaba, 83, who served as former provincial board member, vice mayor and mayor.

“We appeal to Senate President Enrile and other senators to disapprove the proposed legislation for violation of the constitutional mandates on population requirement and on prohibition against gerrymandering,” the oppositors said.

The House version is authored by Rep. Ma. Victoria Sy Alvarado. Its counterpart in SB 1986 is authored by Senator Mar Roxas. The Senate plenary last Feb. 10 approved the Roxas bill on second reading. Rey E. Requejo