Some nerve Senator Alan Peter Cayetano has got, if we are to go by his colleagues’ account of how he is lobbying to clinch the Senate presidency. He needs somewhere to “park” for a year before he becomes eligible for an appointive position in the Cabinet of President-elect Rodrigo Duterte.
Cayetano was Duterte’s vice presidential running mate in the elections held last month. He lost, but was supposedly told by Duterte that he could have any Cabinet post he wants—at the right time, of course.
Meanwhile, Cayetano needs at least 13 votes from his colleagues in the incoming Congress if he wants to wrest the presidency from incumbent Senate President Franklin Drilon. He brags he has 15 votes in the bag, including that of Senator Cynthia Villar, wife of Nacionalista Party head Manuel Villar who recently forged an alliance with Duterte’s PDP-Laban.
We cannot say we are too fond of the others similarly running: Drilon, who wants to retain control, and Senators Vicente Sotto III and Aquilino Pimentel III. Still, Cayetano’s attempts to secure the third-highest post in the land reeks of desperation and sense of entitlement.
Despite the grim realities of politics, compromises and power play, the Senate presidency remains an office that ideally ensures checks and balance in government. The leader of the Upper House directs its legislative agenda and ensures that laws that need to be passed are in fact passed before the frivolous ones. It’s the Senate president who is next in line should, for some reason, the president and vice president both become incapacitated to govern.
Any aspirant looking to assume it for mere convenience demeans the office and exposes himself as an opportunist. Then again, we already know that. This is Cayetano, so transparent in his desperation to attach himself to Duterte’s camp at the start of the campaign. This is Cayetano who mouths words against whoever his enemy is for the moment, as though he is deathly afraid of silence.
This is a man so ambitious he would do anything for a post, such that his sister who used to be known as a champion of women’s rights now pulls her punches amid insulting statements and actions of Mr. Duterte.
The next set of senators should look beyond their personal interests as they choose their leader. There is a reason the person occupying the post is called “Senate president”—not “stooge,” and certainly not “temp.”