Sotto: NPC backs Cayetano as House Speaker

MANILA, Philippines — Senate President Tito Sotto III on Sunday said the Nationalist People’s Coalition (NPC) would be supporting the House speakership bid of Taguig-Pateros Representative Alan Peter Cayetano. 

Sotto said 41 congressmen from the NPC have agreed to vote for Cayetano as House Speaker.

“As far as, as we speak, I am informed by the members of the NPC, we all agreed already that we will be supporting Alan Peter Cayetano,” Sotto said at a viewing party for the boxing match of Senator Manny Pacquiao. 

Likewise, ruling party PDP-Laban will also be voting for Cayetano, said the party’s executive vice president and Pampanga representative Aurelio “Dong” Gonzales said

“That’s the wish of the President kasi eh. We will respect the wish of the President. So tomorrow, Speaker Alan Cayetano,” Gonzales said. 

READ: ‘President’s wish’: PDP-Laban affirms support for Cayetano as Speaker

Earlier, President Rodrigo Duterte, who serves as the chairman of PDP-Laban, announced that Cayetano and PDP-Laban-backed Marinduque Representative Lord Allan Velasco would share their term as Speaker of the House of Representatives.

The voting for the new Speaker is set to happen before Duterte delivers his State of the Nation Address (Sona) on July 22 after incumbent Speaker Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo ended her third and final House term last June 30. /je