A THIRD force in the House has emerged to challenge the leadership and present themselves as the “true and real opposition minority” for Monday’s election of the minority leader in protest against the supposed “game-fixing” to turn Congress into a rubber stamp.
Albay Rep. Edcel Lagman of the Liberal Party and Navotas Rep. Toby Tiangco, president of the opposition United Nationalist Alliance, have joined forces and formed the “Independent Caucus” that will serve as the voice of the true opposition in the House.
Lagman announced over radio dzBB that he and some members of the LP had refused to join former House Speaker Feliciano Belmonte Jr., who on Saturday dropped his bid to contest the minority leadership and chose instead to back Davao del Norte Rep. Pantaleon Alvarez in the super majority coalition.
Belmonte and Alvarez were set to sign a coalition agreement between Belmonte’s LP-majority wing and Alvarez’s ruling Partido Demokratiko Pilipino-Lakas ng Bayan at the Edsa Shangri-La last night.
Quezon City Rep. Winnie Castelo admitted that the “perks and projects” that they had been enjoying for the past six years had been the primary reason that drove him and 30 other members of the LP to join Belmonte in the Alvarez-led majority.
The LP members, who won 115 seats in the recent polls, also feared Alvarez would field opponents against them in the 2019 midterm elections should they attempt to grab the minority leadership, said Castelo in a separate interview over dzBB.
Castelo said the LP-Belmonte wing did not want the perks halted.
“We have to put up a fight as a symbol for what we stand for,” Tiangco said.
“We are trying to find a candidate. Of course mahirap humanap, kasi it will take a miracle to win. But we have to try to convince someone who is willing to be the symbol of our common stand that “game fixing” has no place in Congress. That there should be true and real minority.”
“I don’t believe anyone has the monopoly over public servitude. It pains me to see my colleagues trying to undermine my bid for the minority leadership in tomorrow’s speakership race,” said Quezon Rep. Danilo Suarez of UNA, who is vying for the minority leadership.
Lagman accused Alvarez and Suarez of engaging in an “unholy alliance” to control both the majority and the minority.
“I have been a minority leader before and I have my track record to back me up,” Suarez said.
“The blatant scheme of the “super majority” leaders to establish a servile minority in the House of Representatives is a patent betrayal of President Duterte’s call in his inaugural address for genuine change,” Lagman said.
Lagman stressed that Duterte unequivocally articulated that “the erosion of the people’s trust in our country’s leaders” must end, and for change to be “permanent and significant, [it] must start with us and in us.”
“Perforce, the leadership of the “supermajority” must not meddle with the formation of the House Minority and the election of the Minority Leader because this interference is a malevolent stratagem which both negates democratic processes and is counterproductive to genuine change,” Lagman said.
He said undenied reports showed that the members of the majority coalition would be lent to a favored “minority” faction to install it as the “cooperative” minority.
“Considering that those who now constitute the “supermajority” are known, the identities of the “loaned” conspirators will surface during the roll call vote for Speaker in the morning of July 25, 2016 wherein the eventual second placer will become the minority leader,” Lagman warned.
After joining the majority coalition, he said, there was neither rhyme nor reason for one not to vote for the super majority’s candidate for Speaker, unless ordered to help orchestrate the election of a majority “minority leader.”
“We call on media to expose this travesty and the personalities involved in the conspiracy. I hope no representative worth his salt would agree to be a parliamentary mercenary in establishing a company union in the House,” Lagman said.
The majority coalition’s creation of a subservient minority is anathema to democratic processes in a deliberative assembly like the Congress and would further erode the people’s trust in congressional leaders, he said.
For his part, Castelo insisted there was no concessions offered to the LP and said he believed Duterte would not leave behind the members who wished to join the minority.