Trillanes: No ‘compelling reason’ to divide CamSur

NAGA CITY—Sen. Antonio Trillanes IV, a member of the Senate committee on local government and constitutional amendments, on Tuesday ditched the move to divide Camarines Sur into two provinces, saying it was unnecessary.

The Senate committee, headed by Sen. Ferdinand Marcos Jr., is now reviewing House Bill

No. 4820 that carves out a new province with 16 towns and one city from the existing 35-town, two-city Camarines Sur.

The new province will include the towns of Caramoan, Garchitorena, Lagonoy, Presentacion, San Jose, Siruma, Tinambac, Goa, Tigaon and Sangay of the fourth district and the towns of Baao, Balatan, Bato, Bula, Buhi, Nabua and Iriga City of the fifth district.

If approved by Congress and signed into law by President Aquino, a plebiscite should be called for residents of Camarines Sur to vote on the new province.

“I am opposing that move simply because there is no compelling reason for us to do so,” said Trillanes, who came here to grace graduation rites and hold a press conference.

He said the solution is to hold elections to change the province’s administrator if the argument for dividing the province was that it was too big to govern and its size contributed to poor governance.

Trillanes said while many believe that some P40 million will be added to each of the two provinces in terms of internal revenue allotment (IRA), he said, the other provinces will experience a decrease in IRA.

“We only divide a province like that of Kalinga-Apayao when two tribes cannot be unified. But in the case of Camarines Sur we see no compelling reason for us to divide it,” he said.

Trillanes added that “if we agree now that we will divide CamSur, what’s going to stop, let’s say, Cavite, Batangas, Laguna from dividing their provinces. In the end our nation will be divided into pieces.”

At a Senate hearing recently, officials of the Commission on Elections (Comelec) testified that the poll body has no budget to hold a plebiscite on the measure if it passes Congress and is signed by the President.

Deputy Speaker Arnulfo Fuentebella, however, insisted that the budget for holding a plebiscite is available based on previous testimonies by budget officials.

The Comelec, however, issued a certification after the Senate hearing that no budget is available for the plebiscite.