House leadership reshuffle not about 2028 polls, says solon

 

MANILA, Philippines — Majority Leader and Zamboanga City 2nd District Rep. Manuel Jose Dalipe on Wednesday dismissed claims that the leadership reshuffle in the House of Representatives is connected to the 2028 national elections, noting that they were merely trying to defend the legislative chamber.

Dalipe said that the removal of Pampanga 2nd District Rep. Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo as deputy speaker and Davao City 3rd District Rep. Isidro Ungab was merely due to their failure to sign a pivotal resolution — House Resolution (HR) No. 1414.

HR No. 1414 was discussed last Monday at the plenary by the House acting as a committee of the whole, in a bid to defend the chamber from attacks by former president Rodrigo Duterte and show  support for House Speaker Ferdinand Martin Romualdez.

“We are concentrated in trying to finish our task, we have accomplished a lot of the measures […] we are focused in trying to pass these legislations that will really help our country.  So we’re not thinking about 2028.  It so happened that a person issued a statement in an interview, which tries to malign the image, the character, the integrity of the House,” Dalipe said.

All of the deputy speakers signed the resolution and were co-authors of it, except for Arroyo and Ungab — which Dalipe said was seen as a way of disagreeing with the House’ stand.

“The resolution is no regular resolution, it’s a very important resolution that we have to pass.  The resolution was borne out of a statement.  Ano’ng sinabi no’ng statement — na bulok daw ‘yong House, it’s rotten (That the House is rotten).  So we have to issue that House resolution in defense of the institution,” Dalipe added.

“All party leaders, all those with party leadership positions have agreed, and we have decided that when we accept these positions, together with those positions are duties and responsibilities.  Together with those duties and responsibilities is to protect the House of Representatives, the integrity of the House.  So you (cannot) accept a leadership position and on the other hand you do not care about protecting the institution, which placed you as a party leader,” he pointed out.

“So the House, in a collective effort just came out with a statement.  Syempre binabakbakan naman kami, pangit naman ‘yon at ‘yong statement na inissue, hindi talaga maganda.  So it is just but a reaction to a statement done by a person in a TV interview, maligning, issuing bad statements against an institution.  This is not about 2028,” he added.

(Of course we are being attacked, that looks bad and we issued a statement because the accusations were really not good.)

Duterte, after the body decided to remove the confidential fund (CF) requests of the Office of the Vice President (OVP) and the Department of Education (DepEd) for 2024, launched tirades against the House in a Sonshine Media Network International — calling it the ‘most rotten government organization’.

The OVP, which requested a P500 million CF, and DepEd which asked for P150 million are both headed by Duterte’s daughter, Vice President Sara Duterte.

 Observers, including some members of the House like ACT Teachers party-list Rep. France Castro, believe that the recent movements in the House are connected to Romualdez and Vice President Duterte’s possible jostling for position before the 2028 polls.

Castro also claimed that further cracks within the Uniteam — the tandem of President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. and Vice President Duterte — will show up soon.

But Dalipe maintained that he has not observed any alignments among the lawmakers — whether for Duterte or Romualdez.

 “If the question is are there any alignments whether they would side with any of these two groups, I haven’t seen anything yet,” he said.