The Never Ending Democratization of the Philippines 101 Presidential form for democratizing countries (Stefan and Skatch 1993 cited in Abad; Linz in Diamond and Plattner 1996: 124-42). Many stable democracies have adopted the parliamentary form of government while new democracies that have followed the presidential form of government are deemed unstable. The Presidential form of government in Latin America and Asia appears to be unable to transform into consolidated democracies. A specific type of Presidential government in Latin America and Asia which is unable to graduate into a consolidated democracy has been called by Guillermo O'Donnell as “delegative democracy”. Wolfgang Merkel asserts that this is one of the subtypes of defective or embedded democracy. The others are “exclusive, domain and illiberal democracies” (Merkel 2004: 33-54). The delegative type of transitioning Presidential government fits the Philippines in one important sense; it has what might be called executive hegemony relative to the legislature and judiciary as well as other constitutional bodies. This weakens horizontal accountability and enables leaders who adhere to the delegative notion of political authority to distort the principle that public office is a public trust (O'Donnell 1998: 117). The strong president is able to engage in clientelism, corruption and patrimonialism. The vast powers of the executive enable him to encroach on the authority of the other branches and bodies of government. This paper acknowledges that accountability has three aspects—transparency, answerability, and controllability (Gloppen, Gargarella, and Skaar 2004: 1). Transparency and controllability are emphasized in this study. The aspect of answerability could be reinforced by transparency and controllability because the rigid standard of due process could be better served. Weak horizontal accountability leads to bad governance—opaque, unanswerable, and uncontrollable governance. This hinders the development of effective political institutions needed to address the country's chronic economic and social problems. Hence an emphasis of this study is to see how the constitutional principles separation of powers and the system of checks and balances are practiced. Applicable laws implementing relevant provisions of the constitution will be looked into. Illustrative cases will be examined to find out how constitutional principles have been modified in practice that consequently weakened horizontal accountability. In particular, the executive's military power, the power over the budget, and the appointing power, among others, will be examined. The systemic reforms pushed by advocates of charter change need to be examined carefully. We must be aware of the consequences, most especially of the unintended ones, of the proposed fundamental revision of our charter.