The House of Representatives would not have time to muster threefourths of its members, or 200 representatives, to form Congress into a Constituent Assembly (Con Ass) to amend the 1987 Constitution as President Arroyo leaves for the US to meet with US President Barack Obama, Senate Majority Leader Juan Miguel Zubiri said Tuesday.

Zubiri said he doubted whether or not the Lower House could proceed with the Charter change plan being pushed by Malacanang allies without the participation of the 24-member Senate which is an integral part of Congress.

‘’I appeal to my colleagues at the House to instead pass measures listed by President Arroyo in her State of the Nation Address,” he said.

Zubiri assured his House colleagues that the Senate would act on these money bills with dispatch once they are sent to the Senate for action.

Based on the Constitution, all money bills must be passed first by the House of Representatives before the Senate could act on them.

‘’We should channel our energies on legislation,’’ he said.

Opposition Sen. Alan Peter S. Cayetano asserted that Malacanang allies at the House would most likely move to have the 1987 Constitution amended after the Arroyo-Obama meeting this week.

Cayetano said a decision may be made to call both houses to a Con Ass to amend the Charter ostensibly to extend the term of President Arroyo whose one-time, six-year term as President ends on June 30 next year.

This extension is to be done by the Con Ass by changing the current presidential formof government to parliamentary which would allow the President to run as a member of parliament in her Pampanga legislative district. If successful, she could then become the Prime Minister.

Cayetano said the US and other regional organizations are persuasive in urging President Arroyo to re-think any plans of amending the Constitution.

‘’But the Arroyo administration has a Plan A and a Plan B which is a failure of elections, a special government (revolutionary or provisional) or a Charter change. And that’s another story. Read between the lines whether Washington will allow that or not,’’ he added.

As this developed, Muntinlupa Rep. Rufino Biazon challenged Tuesday President Arroyo to tell her allies in the House to abandon their controversial bid to amend the Constitution via A Constituent Assembly (Con-Ass) if she really has no desire to stay in power beyond 2010.

He issued the challenge in the light of the pronouncement made by the President in her State of the Nation Address, which tended to dispel speculations that she was making Charter change efforts to either extend her presidential term or change the form of government to parliamentary and become the prime minister.

Biazon said if the President really intends to allow her term to expire in 2010, she has to tell her allies in the House to stop the Con-Ass move. That, he said, would eventually dispel speculations that she is extending her term beyond 2010.