Cayetano on Maharlika bill being endorsed to Marcos ally: Senate should be independent

Sen. Alan Peter S. Cayetano during one of the Senate’s deliberations. Senate PRIB file photo / Bibo Nueva España

MANILA, Philippines — “The Senate should be independent.”

This was the remark of Senator Alan Peter Cayetano after the upper chamber referred the discussion of the Maharlika Investment Fund (MIF) bills to the panel of the administration’s ally.

Senate Bill No. 1670 and House Bill No. 6608, measures seeking the creation of the MIF, were referred to the Senate committee on banks, financial institutions and currencies.

Senator Mark Villar, a known ally of President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., chairs the panel that now handles the bills.

Cayetano argued that the controversial bills should be taken up by the Senate committee on government corporations and public enterprises, which he chairs.

Only the Senate minority bloc — composed of Senate Minority Leader Aquilino “Koko” Pimentel III and Senator Risa Hontiveros — has the same view as Cayetano.

“If the MIF bill would have been primarily referred to the Government Corporations committee, I would have tried to find a consensus to be able to come up with the best possible legislation on the matter at hand,” Cayetano said in a letter which was put on record at the plenary session on Wednesday.

He explained that the measures “would reveal an intention to create — first and foremost — the Maharlika Investment Corporation (MIC), a State investment body proposed to be responsible for the overall governance and management of the MIF. Thus, the creation and investment of the MIF are contingent on the establishment of the MIC.”

Forming the MIC, Cayetano said, will involve queries affecting government corporations since funding and capitalization would be sourced from other government corporations.

The senator concluded his letter by reminding his colleagues to remain independent on the issue.

“I understand that any administration would prefer that a member of the administration bloc, not an independent, be Chairperson of the committee to which an administration-backed bill is referred to. But the Senate should be independent,” he said.

Further, Cayetano pushed the upper chamber to concentrate instead on “pressing issues” such as inflation, food shortages, and the high prices of basic commodities.

The proponents of both the Senate and House versions of the MIF bill are allies of the president.

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JPV