Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo hands off on House minority row

MANILA, Philippines — Speaker Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo appears to be taking a hands-off stance on the squabble for the minority leadership among three groups in the House of Representatives.

“Let the parliamentarians (in the House) take care of that,” Arroyo told reporters when asked yesterday what she would do on the minority quarrel.

She said she would like less politicking and would want to focus on speeding up legislation and attending to the needs of congressional districts.

“Less politics. I think we can move on,” she said.

Under Arroyo’s leadership, the House passed this week more than 20 bills on third and final reading. On Thursday, the committee on ways and means endorsed the second package of the Tax Reform for Acceleration and Inclusion law, one of President Duterte’s priority legislative measures.

Arroyo has also offered a way out of the stalemate between the House and the Senate on Charter change by agreeing to separate voting by the two chambers.

In an interview on The Chiefs show on Cignal TV’s One News on Wednesday, Reps. Michael Romero of 1-Pacman and Ron Salo of Kabayan, both assistant minority leaders, said the majority recognized Quezon Rep. Danilo Suarez last Monday as the House minority leader.

“The committee on rules seconded such recognition the next day, Tuesday, during its regular meeting. Such act has become official,” Romero said.

Two other groups – those led by Marikina Reps. Romero Quimbo of the Liberal Party and Eugene Michael de Vera of Arts, Business and Science – are both claiming they are the minority.

The De Vera group includes ousted speaker Pantaleon Alvarez and former minority leader Rodolfo Fariñas.

Quimbo and Fariñas have threatened to challenge before the Supreme Court the new majority’s recognition of Suarez as minority leader.

In a television interview yesterday, De Vera claimed that committee meetings could not take place without the presence of minority representatives.

He was apparently unaware that the committee on appropriations has been conducting hearings since Tuesday on the proposed P3.76-trillion national budget for 2019.

Suarez attended the budget hearings and Davao City Rep. Karlo Nograles, appropriations committee chairman, acknowledged him as minority leader.            

GMA: No more zero budget for opposition

Arroyo yesterday assured all congressional districts, including those represented by opposition lawmakers, that they would be allocated funds in the proposed P3.76-trillion 2019 national budget.

“No, no, no,” she told reporters when asked if she would repeat what Alvarez did last year with 24 of his colleagues in the House of Representatives.

She said she has obtained a list of districts that the former speaker deprived of funds and she would make sure that these areas would get the funding they deserve in next year’s budget.

Majority Leader Rolando Andaya Jr. said Arroyo has relayed her instruction to him and Davao City Rep. Karlo Nograles, who chairs the appropriations committee.

The Nograles panel started hearings on the proposed 2019 budget on Tuesday.

“No more zero funding for opposition districts. All legislative constituencies will receive the funds due them. That is the Speaker’s directive to us,” Andaya said.

Last year, before the House approved the 2018 national budget, then speaker Alvarez removed the funding allocations of 24 districts, including those represented by Jose Christopher Belmonte and Jorge Banal in Quezon City and Edgar Erice in Caloocan, and the ousted House leader’s Davao del Norte colleague, Antonio Floirendo Jr.

Belmonte, Banal and Erice belong to the Liberal Party. Floirendo was a member of the ruling PDP-Laban until he was ousted following a bitter feud with Alvarez.

Rice tariff bill OK’d next week

The House of Representatives is scheduled to approve next week the rice tariffication bill, which is among President Duterte’s priority legislative measures.

The chamber will wrap up plenary debates on the measure and pass it on Monday or Tuesday.

Rep. Jose Panganiban Jr. of partylist ANAC-IP, who chairs the agriculture committee, is the principal author and sponsor of the bill, which seeks to replace volume restrictions on rice imports with tariff.

Camarines Sur Rep. Luis Raymund Villafuerte, a co-author, said the proposed law would not only pull down the price of rice by as much as P7 per kilo but also set up a huge support fund that will enable palay growers to increase their harvests while reducing their production costs.

Villafuerte had called on his colleagues in the House as early as May last year to look into the true state of the country’s rice inventory with an eye on coming up with policy proposals for the government to ensure “ample and affordable” supply.

“The rice tariffication bill will hit two birds with one stone: it will help bring down rice prices and stabilize its supply while helping farmers become competitive through the establishment of a competitiveness enhancement fund that will be used to provide them cheap loans, training, scholarships and modern facilities, among other benefits,” he said.

Under the bill, volume restrictions on rice imports would be replaced with 40 percent tariff. 

A rice watch group likened the measure to a death certificate for rice producers and consumers.

“Tariffication will not provide Filipinos affordable rice as the Duterte government promises,” Bantay Bigas spokesperson Cathy Estavillo said. – With Rhodina Villanueva