Vice President Leni Robredo at the Meet Inquirer Multimedia forum. ARNOLD ALMACENN/PHILIPPINE DAILY INQUIRER
Still reeling from the results of the 2016 elections and the defection of many of its members, the Liberal Party (LP) was unprepared for the new administration, Vice President Leni Robredo admitted on Thursday.
“I think the LP is not doing enough at this point and I understand why,” Robredo said during the Meet Inquirer Multimedia forum when asked if she thought her party was responding adequately to the Duterte administration’s questionable policies.
She said the LP was caught off guard after its standard bearer, former Senator Mar Roxas, lost in the 2016 elections and many of its allies in Congress jumped ship.
The opposition is now looking at Robredo, who recently resigned as a member of Duterte’s Cabinet, to lead what is left of the LP.
“We were the majority party before. I think we became complacent…because the President (Benigno Aquino III) was part of the Liberal Party,” she said, adding that everything was hinged on the fact that they had the backing of Aquino.
She said the party did not expect to lose so many of its members, to the point that they would now joke that their members can fit in a Volkwagen car.
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“We were so used to the fact that we were the dominant party then all of a sudden. That’s how life is; sometimes you are on top, sometimes you’re at the bottom. Now we are at the bottom,” she said in Filipino.
Robredo said they were surprised, which is why they had not been able to react.
She said she recently attended a Christmas party with Liberal Party members from Congress and that they agreed to convene the LP during the first quarter of 2017, possibly in January.
“We originally agreed to meet in March but based on our discussion yesterday, maybe March is too late because there are so many issues already that the party needs to take a stand (on),” she said.
The Liberal Party has not been vocal since Duterte rose to power. Aquino has refused to criticize the President while Senator Leila de Lima was unseated as chair of the Senate committee on justice.
Robredo’s resignation as head of the Housing and Urban Development Coordinating Council (HUDCC) and member of Duterte’s Cabinet is seen as a sign that she is ready to become the leader of the opposition.
Robredo, during the forum, said she was willing to help unify the voice of the opposition. JE/rga