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By Sammy Martin, Reporter
WITH the present House leadership under Speaker
Prospero Nograles there is a bridge of constant communication
between the majority and the minority in the chamber. This allows
the minority to scrutinize measures of national importance.
This is how House Minority Leader Ronaldo Zamora
describes his group’s relationship with Nograles and his key
people.
Whenever Nograles is not available, Zamora told
The Manila Times, his counterpart, Majority Floor Leader Art
Defensor or one of the deputy speakers get in touch with the
minority to ensure the smooth passage of bills and allow proper
consideration of the inputs from the minority—which includes
congressmen and congresswomen opposed to the Arroyo administration.
Recently, Zamora himself nominated Cebu Rep.
Pablo Garcia, a strong ally of President Gloria Arroyo, to be the
sixth deputy speaker of the House. The nomination was approved.
“We are getting a kind of respect from the new
leadership,” said Zamora. “They treat us in the minority as the
minority wants to be treated.”
Zamora said that in plenary session debates, the
majority always sees to it that the minority congressmen get equal
time to talk and discuss every issue.
“We have no problem on the procedural and
personal level. But we must admit that when we talk on the policy
level, obviously, there is a large difference between the majority
and the minority especially when Malacañang start to use their
magic wands,” he said.
He obviously meant by “magic wands” what has
been exposed as “bribes” or other forms of inducements for the
House to carry out the Arroyo administration’s bidding.
Zamora, who has been House Minority Leader
twice, said the 30 members of the minority always make sure all of
them speak with one voice on major issues. Among these are the
archipelagic baseline bill and Charter. This way the minority always
votes and debates as a solid bloc.
He vowed that the minority will “continue the
harmonious relationship with the majority but will remain as
fiscalizers and oppose measures they think will not do good. But we
will wholeheartedly support administration bills that we find to be
truly of great help to the Filipino people.”
But party-list representatives identified with
the minority and are referred to as “militants” have
reservations about the present House leadership.
They claim that with the impending merger of two
big political parties in the country, the Lakas-Christian Muslim
Democrats (Lakas-CMD) and Kabalikat ng Malayang Pilipino (Kampi),
both Arroyo administration parties, the injustice against them will
never be redressed.
These militant congressmen and women, as well as
other minority lawmakers the Palace particularly dislikes, are not
being given their Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF). Every
congressman and senator has a proper and legal PDAF allocation.
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