The principal author of the proposed P2,000 hike for Social Security System pensioners on Tuesday expressed hope that incoming President Rodrigo Duterte will issue an executive order that will practically reverse the veto outgoing President Aquino III imposed on the proposal.
Party-list Rep. Neri Colmenares said he was dismayed over the failure of the House leadership to override the veto of the President to reconsider his House Bill 5842. Congress adjourned sine die on Monday.
Colmenares, who ran for Senate but lost in the May 9 elections, said his group will also refile the bill in the next Congress with the hope that it will pass into law in a short time.
He said President Duterte’s support to the measure “will hasten its congressional approval.”
Last Monday, Colmenares said that the House “could have made history last night through a legislative action that will long be remembered by the Filipino people, but we chose the darkness of oblivion instead.”
But Majority Leader and Mandaluyong Rep. Neptali Gonzales II said the House could not allow a vote on his motion to override President Aquino’s veto on the ground that the Senate has adjourned.
“There is no rule that prohibits the House from tackling business just because the Senate has adjourned. The Senate can always reconvene any time, as it has done so in the past, before our term ends on June 30. The House leadership just does not want to put it to a vote for fear that our motion will get the necessary votes to override the veto of the president,” Colmenares added.
He said the Duterte administration’s all out support to the pension hike was a positive development.
“All is not lost, however, because President-elect Duterte supports the P2000 SSS pension increase. We hope he will immediately act on the increase once he takes office in July. The battle was not in vain because it has made pension increase a national agenda and gained the support of many. The chances of increase has become a possibility because of that battle by our senior citizens, which would not have been there had the bill not been filed,” said Colmenares who was the principal author of the bill.