21 May 2010
'Speakership in the bag for Belmonte'
The speakership is in the bag for Quezon City Representative-elect Feliciano Belmonte Jr. if President Arroyo – an incoming congresswoman – is really not interested in the job, Mandaluyong City Rep. Neptali Gonzales II said yesterday.
“Tapos na ang laban (the fight is over) if she is not running,” Gonzales, incumbent House senior deputy majority leader who will most likely be the Liberal Party’s candidate for majority leader, said.
He predicted that many Arroyo allies in the ruling Lakas-Kampi-CMD would eventually decide to support Belmonte.
“The problem is very few might remain with Lakas,” he said in Filipino.
Belmonte, incumbent mayor of Quezon City, defected to the Liberal Party (LP) together with Gonzales and supported the presidential candidacy of Sen. Benigno Aquino III.
Belmonte himself expressed confidence in winning the speakership with votes not only from the LP and its allies but from Lakas as well.
He told dzMM’s Ted Failon that he has many friends in Lakas whom he could convince to support his bid for the fourth highest position in the land.
“At the proper time, I will have the numbers and more than the numbers to win,” he said.
Belmonte had served as Speaker in the 11th Congress.
In a separate interview on GMA-7’s “Unang Hirit,” Belmonte said his group would give its Lakas-Kampi rival a “good fight” even if Mrs. Arroyo were the ruling party’s candidate.
“We’ll give a good fight. History is actually on the side of LP,” Belmonte said.
He said in the past, elected congressmen allied themselves with the “winning side.”
“When I was elected congressman in 1992, the ruling party that time was also overwhelming – the majority was also over 100. Most of them were on the other side, on the winning side,” Belmonte said of the Lakas-NUCD party then.
“During the fight of Joseph Estrada and JDV (former House speaker Jose de Venecia) more than 100 lawmakers, including myself, were in the ruling party in Lakas. In no time at all, a huge group over 70 headed by our Cong. (now senator) Manny Villar moved over to the other side,” he said.
When asked if he has started to court votes from other political groups, he said, “I have to be frank and say yes.”
“A lot of government officials live in QC and so I connected with them and that’s probably one of the reasons why my name has been brought up as a possible contender for the speakership position,” he said when asked why he emerged as LP’s bet for speaker.
The group of Belmonte and Gonzales has already secured commitments from congressmen belonging to the Nationalist People’s Coalition and the Nacionalista Party for a majority alliance in the House.
LP campaign manager Florencio Abad said in a radio interview that more than 30 Lakas members and party-list representatives have expressed their intention to join LP and support Belmonte’s speakership bid.
An LP congressman told The STAR that their problem is not getting the majority in the House but forming a majority alliance in the Senate.
“I think the party should not enter into a coalition with Sen. Manuel Villar’s Nacionalista Party and allow Sen. Villar to retake the Senate presidency. Sen. Villar has not yet recovered from corruption and impropriety charges leveled against him by Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile and Sen. Jamby Madrigal during the election campaign,” he said.
He said he would prefer that his party mates in the Senate coalesce with the group of Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile, which includes senators Jinggoy Estrada and Gregorio Honasan.
By Jess Diaz
The Philippine Star
May 18, 2010
