Mr. President, I vote no for martial law extension.

Mr. President, I vote NO for the extension of martial law even if your party mates may vote otherwise.

I joined with the rest of my Muslim friends who stand against the extension of Martial Law.

I join with the rest of those who resist the opinion of lawyer Salvador Panelo that this country needs constitutional dictatorship.

Like any authoritarian rule, constitutional dictatorship bestows to an individual or institution to formulate binding rules, directives, and decisions over circumstances unhindered by legal checks and balance -- including the potential excesses in the exercise of authority.

Normally, in times of crisis, the executive merely announces the emergence of a crisis and congress bestows statutory grants of power. But this legislative process has been willfully sidelined by our lawmakers, thus, affording the executive such transcendence over the law. Ergo, in the absence of public deliberation, congress indirectly granted practically unreviewed discretion of the executive in the declaration of martial law.

With unchecked discretion, dominant party members can also harm the public by doing "undeclared or unpublicized "distributed dictatorship"-- where the powers of the executive are shared with de facto dictators and which may include officials of the military. This unreviewable power grants positions to alter ego of the president and because impacts to civilian communities cannot be comprehended in advance or uncertain to forecast, the structural features, guidelines, and operations can either be consistent to constitutional limits or can go beyond the interest of the preservation of republican government.

I stand for those who oppose martial rule and its extension because I believe on the power of civilian authority. We fought that right so hard in Edsa. And the respect of this civilian rights and power should not be transgressed again even if political measure means an anti-terror fight or an assault to deadly shadow economy.

In the last decades of staying within the conflict zones, martial law has never been used when government launched punitive actions against armed groups in 2003 and 2008 conflicts in Lanao. It was not even used during Zamboanga siege as an executive privilege. The martial rule policy enforced in a specific area in Mindanao before was lifted immediately and was never used to undermine civilian communities in evacuation centers.

Martial rule or constitutional dictatorship, as what Panelo label it, is itself a similar taxonomy of variant threats to democracy. This demonstrates democratic decay, authoritarian reversion and constitutional retrogression -- an incremental erosion which may end in collapse of democratic institutions.

We need to protect our democracy zealously and its predicates-- conduct of elections (e.g. barangay and youth elections); freedom of political speech and association; and the genuine enforcement of utilitarian use of the rule of law specially in civilian protection. The retrogression of democracy is a clear and present danger that people ought to safeguard against.

Let us demand responsible and accountable governance instead of militarism and martial rule.

Join this advocacy and stand for democracy.