Senate President Vicente Sotto III said Tuesday he could be replaced anytime and it would be no problem with him as he downplayed any ouster plot against him.
There were earlier reports about a coup plot to remove the leadership in the Senate due to Sotto’s stand against critical issues, the latest involving the unilateral decision of President Rodrigo Duterte to cancel the Visiting Forces Agreement between the Philippines and the United States.
Crossing party lines, 12 senators on Monday adopted a resolution challenging Duterte’s abrogation of the VFA before the Supreme Court.
“I filed the resolution asking the Supreme Court to interpret for us, to finally interpret the Constitution on the issue of abrogation… We want clarity and I hope that once and for all the honorable SC could shed light on this purely question of law,” Sotto said.
With the vote, the resolution will now be included in the petition to be filed by former and incumbent senators “most probably today [Tuesday)],” Sotto said on whether or not Senate concurrence is required to terminate treaties.
Sotto, who belongs to the Nationalist People’s Coalition, which forged an alliance with the leading PDP-Laban, said he was ready to be replaced anytime.
He said the seven senators who abstained to adopt the resolution to question the Supreme Court on the role of the Senate in the abrogation of treaties was not a cause of concern for him.
“Why will I be concerned? I’m fine with that. I only serve at the pleasure of my colleagues. You can replace me anytime. I have no problem with that,” Sotto said.
“The important thing is, I will still do my job as a senator. And if I think it’s right, I will vote for it and if I think it’s not right, I will not. It’s that easy.”
Seven senators, all part of the majority bloc, refrained from voting after the VFA resolution was brought to the Senate floor.
The seven are Senators Ronald dela Rosa, Christopher Go, Imee Marcos, Aquilino Pimentel III, Ramon Revilla, Francis Tolentino and Cynthia Villar.
But with 12 senators, the resolution was adopted by the Senate.
Dela Rosa on Monday night cited the difficulty of getting a majority vote from the allies of the President.
He admitted feeling like a minority in the upper chamber after losing on some issues and measures during Senate plenary vote.
When asked if he wanted the senators in the majority bloc to vote against the resolution, Dela Rosq said it was “Wishful thinking lang.”
“I expect kung talagang… you go with us, but sinabi nga may kanya-kanya tayong pagiisip pero kung dun tayo sa political side of it, majority against minority, so majority palagi dapat mananalo,” he said.
“We were not able to get the majority votes. So meaning kami na ang minority ngayon dito sa Senado, ‘di na kami ang majority.”
While he was learning from his colleagues, Dela Rosa said, they could not dictate to him.
“I have to stand my ground,” he said.
Although he has not heard of any senator planning to leave the majority, Sotto doubted Dela Rosa’s group would even consider to form a new minority group in the chamber.
“Because if you are in the minority, the committees that will go to you are those the majority doesn’t want,” he said.
But Sotto said he had not heard of other senators who might have shared Dela Rosa’s sentiments.
He also disclosed that one to two senators who abstained from voting on the resolution Monday night came to his office saying they abstained simply out of friendship. However, he declined to name them.
He felt that some of those who abstained from voting knew that the adopted resolution was correct.
He said that was the reason they abstained and did not vote against [it]. “Because if you think the resolution is wrong, then you vote against it,” Sotto said.
While loyalty was a virtue, Lacson said, blind loyalty was simply just that-blind.”
When they cast their votes on any matter under deliberation, Lacson said, they should be dictated only by their conscience and what they honestly thought was good for the country and the institution where they belonged, and not because of blind loyalty to any person or party.
“Otherwise, we can no longer be the Senate of the people that we are supposed to be, but an expensive “rubber stamp” that our taxpayers have to sustain out of their hard-earned tax money,” he said.