Despite super majority, Senate won’t be rubber stamp – Angara

MANILA, Philippines — Despite having a super majority, the Senate in the 19th Congress will not be a rubber stamp of the administration of president-elect Ferdinand Marcos Jr., a senator gave this assurance yesterday.

In an interview with “The Chiefs” on OneNews, Sen. Sonny Angara said senators in the 19th Congress will be “critical collaborators” and keep the tradition of overseeing the checks and balances in the executive department.

“Just the mere fact of a super majority does not mean Congress will become a rubber stamp. So I think if you look at previous Congresses, the previous Senate even where there was a super majority, administration measures were also scrutinized, and some may have been passed, but they were in a form that was not necessarily the form originally proposed by Malacañang,” Angara pointed out.

“So I think that is the role of the Senate that makes it very unique in our democracy, and that’s a role we want to preserve,” he added.

He assured the public that the role of the Senate to ensure checks and balances in the executive department will not disappear during Marcos’ time.

Angara noted that the Senate also did not approve the reimposition of death penalty even when the Duterte administration was also pushing for it.

Although only Sen. Aquilino Pimentel III and Sen. Risa Hontiveros indicated plans to be part of the minority, Angara described them as “two very capable senators.”

“I think we’ve been a critical collaborator or co-worker of the executive branch because the executive branch performs and the Senate… our role is to lay out the policies whereas the ones who execute the policies are the executive branch. You can’t always be opposing,” Angara said.

He added that “in the way to really achieve progress, everyone must work together on common advocacies. Common cooperation between the legislative and the executive branches has resulted in very good laws over the years and benefits to our people.”

Among the fruits of this cooperation, he noted, are the laws on free tuition for college and on universal health care.