At least a hundred congressmen will campaign against the senators who will not support the proposed shift to a federal form of government being pushed by the Duterte administration, a House official said Monday.
Leyte Rep. Vicente Veloso, chairman of the House of Representatives’ committee on constitutional amendments, said the senators would get zero support from the respective legislative districts of about a hundred congressmen should they say that federalism would not make things better for the Filipino people, especially the poor.
“We will campaign against these senators come the 2019 mid-term elections who will say that federalism will not change their lives for the better,” Veloso, a former Court of Appeals associate justice, told reporters.
Speaking in front of 1,400 Filipino workers upon his arrival in Israel, President Rodrigo Duterte asked them to “choose the best” leaders in the Senate as the filing of certificates of candidacy and the 2019 midterm elections drew nearer.
“You can pick whoever you want to be a congressman, but as for the senators, since you’re far from the country, choose the best,” said Duterte in his hour-long speech during his meeting with the Filipino community in Israel.
The President said he would not mention the names of the best people who would be running in the elections.
Former Philippine National Police chief and now Bureau of Corrections chief Ronald dela Rosa said Monday he will run for a Senate seat in 2019.
Dela Rosa made the statement in a chance interview after the flag-raising ceremony at the New Bilibid Prison after he was asked for an update on his plans for the coming polls.
“The President has announced it. The President told me to run, so I will run [for senator],” Dela Rosa said.
Veloso said about a hundred congressmen had come to such an agreement “in an informal exchange of views on the matter to vote on federalism.”
He said the House would work hard for federalism even if the Senate did not seem to be supportive of it, adding that the government had utilized funds to study the viability of the proposed federalism by creating a consultative committee.
“On the part of the House, we will continue our work with regard to the proposed federalism being pushed by the Duterte administration,” Veloso said.
Veloso’s statement came despite Speaker Gloria Macapagal Arroyo’s marching order to the House constitutional amendments committee to withhold the deliberations on the proposed shift to federalism and leave the matter to the future assembly or constituent assembly.
Arroyo wants a grand debate on Charter change for the shift to federalism once both chambers of Congress are able to sit in the assembly. With Nat Mariano