De Venecia ousted

MANILA, Philippines – Jose de Venecia’s unprecedented five terms as Speaker of the House came to an end last night after President Arroyo’s congressmen-allies led by her two sons replaced him with Davao City Rep. Prospero Nograles.

Needing only 121 votes to officially unseat the beleaguered Speaker, the ax fell when Rep. Katrina Ponce Enrile, daughter of Sen. Juan Ponce Enrile, cast a “yes” vote at 11:04 p.m.

As of 12:42 a.m., 174 congressmen had voted to oust De Venecia, 35 voted against while 16 abstained.

Smelling victory, the pro-Malacañang lawmakers went for the kill despite a consensus among leaders of the ruling Lakas-Christian Muslim Democrats and other member-parties in the administration coalition to give the protagonists 24 hours to agree on a smooth turnover.

The House declared the speakership vacant and paved the way for Nograles to assume the post.

Earlier, De Venecia declared the end of his alliance with President Arroyo whom he accused of masterminding attempts to oust him and of being behind most of the controversies that rocked the country including political killings and high-level corruption.

De Venecia made the allegations in an emotional – and well applauded – speech that dragged on for almost an hour from the 10 minutes that he had been allowed to deliver it.

The House voted on a motion by Palawan Rep. Abraham Mitra to declare the position of Speaker vacant.

De Venecia said in his speech that the President herself, through her sons Pampanga Rep. Mikey Arroyo and Camarines Sur Rep. Diosdado Arroyo and partymates in the Kabalikat ng Malayang Pilipino, initiated his ouster as speaker.

He also reminded Mrs. Arroyo of his loyalty, particularly during the times when her leadership faced the most severe test.

“In every challenge in the life of President Arroyo, I was there, standing beside her. During the battle for the proclamation of her as President I was there. I stood there and we raised the hand of President Arroyo,” De Venecia said.

“I always stood by her, and in the various coup attempts against her I was there, to ensure that she continues to sit in power in Malacañang,” he pointed out.

“When (impeachment cases were filed against) President Arroyo, FVR and I joined hands to rescue her and we succeeded,” he said. FVR are the initials of former President Fidel V. Ramos.

Slay plot

De Venecia also bared in his speech an alleged slay plot against him and his son Joey III by three generals.

“When my son spoke in the Senate, three generals tried to assassinate him and assassinate me,” De Venecia said, referring to the businessman’s exposé against First Gentleman Jose Miguel Arroyo and former elections chief Benjamin Abalos in the aborted broadband network project of the government. His son was the acknowledged whistle-blower in the NBN scandal.

De Venecia said that three military generals visited his house accompanied by lawyer Raul Lambino.

“General Santos, commanding general of the Philippine Army, commander of the United Nations Forces in East Timor, came to my house accompanied by Attorney Raul Lambino, who is his friend, and who is also my friend, and he said, ‘Mr. Speaker you and your son (should) keep quiet because they want to kill you and I know they can kill you and I know they have killed other people,” De Venecia said.

He said he sent a letter to Mrs. Arroyo reporting the incident and asking her to “please do something.” His son, for his part, reported the matter to the Makati police.

“My son reported this to the Makati Police and in the same day following, General Santos, such a respected general of the Armed Forces, changed his tune and said he never said such a thing,” De Venecia said.

“How could he say that he never said such a thing when he came to my house to ask me to listen to his story, accompanied by Raul Lambino in the presence of my son Joey, in the presence of my wife Gina?”

“So I wrote a letter to President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. Dear Madam President, I write to you because General Santos came to see me and said to me, and confessed to me that they wanted to kill myself and my son and that they have killed other people,” he said.

“I asked you because these three generals belonged to your government, please do something. That was late October of last year. Do you think up to know Malacañang has lifted a finger to arrest or to investigate these attempts on my life and of my son?” he said.

“It’s simple arrogance. Just plain arrogance that Malacañang and the people of the Palace are above the law. Someday this can happen to you,” he said.

De Venecia said he is ready to join the opposition in its battle against corruption.

“I will join the battle against corruption with the opposition, and praise the President if she does things right or denounce her (if she does something wrong),” he said.

But he said Mrs. Arroyo may still redeem her administration’s tattered image by joining the movement for a moral revolution with religious and civil society groups.

At Malacañang, Interior and Local Government Secretary Ronaldo Puno said De Venecia’s allegation were “emotional outburst” and “grandstanding.”

“The matter is purely a concern of the House of Representatives. We respect the decision of the members of the majority coalition and leave it to their better judgment,” ABS-CBN News quoted her as saying.

Cebu Rep. Pablo Garcia, once De Venecia’s rival for the speakership, earlier tried to stop De Venecia from delivering a speech.

Bayan Muna party-list Rep. Teodoro Casiño told the floor De Venecia had the right to give a speech.

Makati City Rep. Teodoro Locsin and Shariff Kabunsuan Rep. Didagen Dilangalen also backed De Venecia’s right to speak.

Consultations come to naught

Mitra moved to declare the post of speaker vacant as De Venecia vainly tried to escape an imminent ouster try from the House majority that decided to resort to a floor vote.

Administration lawmakers and officials earlier sought to defuse the tension arising from the leadership crisis.

It was De Venecia’s rival for the speakership post, Davao City Rep. Prospero Nograles who pushed for party caucuses during an almost four-hour meeting among administration congressmen and executive officials at Malacañang. De Venecia insisted on a floor vote during the meeting.

“Speaker de Venecia insisted first that there should be a vote on the floor, but as everybody was saying it could turn out to be very confrontational and it will be very acrimonious. But we agreed in the proposal that we go into a caucus before voting,” House Majority Leader Arthur Defensor told ABS-CBN News Channel. Defensor is a Lakas-CMD party official.

De Venecia claimed he still has the support of President Arroyo and the majority of congressmen, but Nograles said that 143 congressmen signed a manifesto expressing loss of confidence in the House leadership.

Mrs. Arroyo’s party the Kabalikat ng Malayang Pilipino or Kampi initiated the manifesto whose signatories include presidential sons Camarines Sur Rep. Diosdado Arroyo and Pampanga Rep. Juan Miguel Arroyo.

At Malacañang, Press Secretary Ignacio Bunye said yesterday’s caucus gave De Venecia more time to consult his supporters regarding his next move.

“It was agreed that, one, there will be no showdown this afternoon (yesterday) but the actual voting will be done (today) to give time to the protagonists to have further consultations with their respective supporters as to the mode that will be employed in the selection of the speaker,” Bunye said.

“The atmosphere was like a mini-House of Representatives because the President was there, they recognized that they could not speak out of turn, they had to wait to be recognized, but everyone was quite open about his or her views and some were very forceful about their arguments,” he said.

The meeting, presided by President Arroyo, began at around 10:30 a.m. and ended at around 1:30 p.m. Leaders and members of the ruling coalition – Lakas-CMD, Kampi, Liberal Party (LP), Nationalist People’s Coalition, (NPC) Nacionalista Party (NP), Partido Demokratiko Sosyalista ng Pilipinas, and the Laban ng Demokratikong Pilipino – attended the meeting held at the Malacañang golf club house.

Among those present were Camarines Sur Rep. Luis Villafuerte, representing Kampi, Ilocos Sur Rep. Eric Singson, Albay Rep. Edcel Lagman, Parañaque Rep. Ed Zialcita, Mandaluyong Rep. Neptali Gonzales II, Environment Secretary Lito Atienza, representing LP, Justice Secretary Raul Gonzalez for NP and Defense Secretary Gilbert Teodoro representing NPC.

Mrs. Arroyo explained the purpose of the meeting in her opening statement and let Ermita moderate the meeting.

She was seated at the head of a rectangular table with De Venecia and Nograles seated next to each other to her left.

The meeting began with Mrs. Arroyo, De Venecia, Nograles and Ermita holding a closed-door meeting. In that meeting, Nograles showed De Venecia the supposed manifesto signed by lawmakers disgruntled with the current House leadership.

It was not clear how De Venecia and the others in the room reacted to the manifesto. Bunye did not say how many signatures were in the manifesto.

Bunye said that by insisting on a vote, De Venecia wanted to show that he was not shying away from a fight.

He said most of those in the room wanted to have a decision as soon as possible.

“But the President said I think it is fair to give the Speaker ample time to do the consultations,” Bunye said. He said it was only the manner of voting that was the point of contention.

“The view of many was that a regular type of voting would trigger acrimonious debate that was to be avoided because at the end, whether a status quo will continue or there will be a new leadership, at the end the objective will be to still preserve the unity of the coalition,” he said.

“If the debates were avoided there would be less hurt feelings and the reconciliation and the harmony would follow if there were less  acrimonious debates,” he said.

He said De Venecia argued that he was elected speaker five times through direct voting on the floor but Nograles countered that other forms of elections are allowed in the chamber. - With Paolo Romero, Helen Flores, Ben Serrano