Congress after the Impeachment: Half-Empty, Half-Full

With the impeachment proceedings against President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo in Congress now over, public perception of the House of Representatives has been likened to a half-full, half-empty glass.

BY DABET CASTAÑEDA
Bulatlat

Neophytes and veterans at the House of Representatives (HoR) who voted “No” to Committee Report No. 1012, which sealed the death sentence to the impeachment case lodged against President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, agree that Congress is both half-empty and half-full.

With the reports that the 158 representatives who “murdered” the impeachment complaint received bribes and succumbed to pressures from the Palace, pro-impeachment congressmen believe these have worsened the public’s negative perception on the House as a government institution.

Many of the pro-impeachment congressmen, one of them confirmed, will be joining mass protests in the next few weeks to force the removal of Macapagal-Arroyo from the presidency for at least four constitutional violations. Among other crimes, she has been accused of stealing the presidency in the 2004 elections.

The 51 pro-impeachment representatives who resisted the perks and pressures by the president to withdraw the impeachment believe that there are still some who would stand up not just for what is right and just but more so for what their constituents expected them to be. In the second inter-faith gathering of various groups that support the ouster campaign against Macapagal-Arroyo in De La Salle Greenhills, San Juan City the 51 pro-impeachment congressmen were given tribute by former President Corazon Aquino and the Bukluran sa Katotohanan (solidarity for truth)-Youth. In a brief presentation, the legislators were called at the stage to each receive a certificate, a white rose and a cap with the words Bayani ng Katotohanan (a hero for the truth). Disappointing For Deputy Minority Leader Rodolfo “Ompong” Plaza (lone district, Agusan del Sur), a second-term solon who, in the middle of one of the House debates screamed “What kind of Congress is this?”,  the House could have used the impeachment proceedings as an opportunity to redeem itself.

FOR TRUTH: Former President Corazon Aquino joins pro-impeachment legislators and other anti-Arroyo forces in prayer at the inter-faith prayer gathering sponsored by the Bukluran para sa Katotohanan, Sept. 9 Photo by Aubrey Makilan

Plaza said, “But with the result there’s only one conclusion: all government institutions have already been bastardized and destroyed.” 

For someone who considers himself a “new” politician since he entered politics only in 2001, Plaza said it has been an “unfortunately disappointing experience.”

Theoretically, neophyte lady representative Darlene Antonino-Custodio (first district, South Cotabato and General Santos City) believes in the essence of congress being the voice of each Filipino. However, she said in a separate Bulatlat interview, it is regrettable that this representation has been compromised by many of their colleagues.

“Dapat maisip nila na hindi lamang sariling paninindigan ang ikinompromiso nila ngunit pati ang kapakanan ng kanilang kinakatawan” (They should realized that they compromised not just themselves but also the welfare of their constituents), she said.

Terribly painful

For another young House member, it was “terribly painful” that such a significant issue as the impeachment of the highest leader of the land was decided just by using numbers. “They wanted us to forget the case and neglect the pieces of evidences we wanted to present,” said Joel Villanueva (party-list, CIBAC).

Just hearing their colleagues explain their votes gave Villanueva, who shed tears after the committee decision was read on Sept. 6, “some sort of hopelessness.”

Villanueva also blamed the Commission on Elections (Comelec) for his one-and-a-half-term. His evangelical party won a seat in the House in the 2001 elections but was proclaimed only nine months after the 13^th Congress has convened because it was only then that the canvassing for party-list representations were done. He said it is the same thing now with other party-list groups because the final tally is not yet over.

Most critical

“I’ve seen other battles but I think this is the most critical one apart from the Estrada impeachment,” said third-term congressman Romeo Acosta (first district, Bukidnon).

He said the integrity of the House could sink deeper if reports of bribes would be proven. “There’s been lot of manipulation and maneuvering,” he said.

“Akusado ang presidente, gagawin nya lahat. They had to make sure na ang 79 ay hindi maaabot” (The president was being accused. They had to make sure the 79 will not be reached), Acosta said.

Acosta, who also participated in the impeachment case against Estrada in 2001, added that the pay offs during that time are not as large as today.

“Maybe because Estrada was over-confident he probably did not think he would be impeached. And now, GMA had learned that this early, all things should be done to keep the impeachment from reaching the Senate,” he said.

Pay offs

He cited as an example how the brother of Rep. Aurelio Umali (third district, Nueva Ecija) was promoted as Customs official in exchange for his “yes” vote to the Justice Committee report.

Rep. Reynaldo Uy (first district, Western Samar) on the other hand was reportedly persuaded by the president not to attend the crucial voting day in exchange for the removal of Maj. Gen. Jovito Palparan as commanding officer of the 8^th Infantry Division (ID) of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) in Eastern Visayas.

Uy was one of the first congressmen who signed the amended impeachment complaint based on gross human rights violations. Many of such cases, he said, were perpetrated by the military in his region under Palparan’s command. 

At the early stages of the impeachment proceedings, Rep. Catalino Figueroa (second district, Western Samar) also warned that he would support the impeachment case against the president if Palparan would not be redeployed to another area. A week before the voting day, Palparan was reassigned as commanding officer of the 7ID based in Fort Magsaysay, Nueva Ecija. The congressman did not sign the complaint and was a no-show on the voting day.

But while those who supported the president allegedly received good deals from Malacañang, some pro-impeachment members of the majority block stand to lose their positions.

“While the president is extending the hand for reconciliation, no less than the majority floor leader already made an announcement that there will be a reorganization in Congress and that all members or chairs who joined the impeachment will have to resign,” said Plaza.

Acosta said he knows he would be among those affected, being chair of the committee on ecology and environment. “But that’s the risk I took,” said Acosta. “The chairmanship is a small price to pay. At the end of the day what is a chairmanship for if you really would see that what is at stake is the (country’s) future?”

Jueteng money

In a separate interview, Boy Mayor, a self-confessed jueteng operator in the Bicol region who testified in the jueteng scandal hearing at the Senate, insinuated that it may have been jueteng money that made three congresmen from his region support the president.

Mayor said he personally delivered the jueteng protection money to the three representatives until he stopped manning the operations in December 2003. But the jueteng payoffs could still be part of the deals even at this time because the illegal numbers game had not stopped in the region regardless of government claims that it had stopped.

Reawakening

Veteran politician Rep. Arnulfo Fuentebella (third district, Camaries Sur) said the failed impeachment process should be a “reawakening” for the members of the House.

He believes all is not lost because there are 51 members of Congress who stood up to restore its credibility. Fuentebella, a member of the majority bloc, unexpectedly voted against Committee Report No. 1012.

Plaza, on the other hand, said that what the country needs now is a leader who is honest and who puts value in integrity.

It is for this reason that the pro-impeachment congressmen are joining protest actions and other activities that are geared toward the ouster of Macapagal-Arroyo.

“It’s hard to predict that the president will step down. Pero ang katotohanan ay hindi pwede pagtakpan” (the truth cannot be hidden), said Acosta.

But the real vindication, he said, is when people’s revolts will cease to be a necessity for change, he said as the crowd in front of La Salle Greenhills sang Bayan Ko, the signature song of the two people power uprisings in 1986 and 2001. Bulatlat

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