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Friday, August 12, 2005
Editorial: Butchers in the House
It looks like the butchers who want to chop Cebu into pieces will get what they want in the House committee and even the House plenary.
After all the opposition raised by most of the towns and their elected
officials, business and civic organizations, church and parishioners, and the rest of the community, one would expect the proponents to abandon the plan of cutting up Cebu.
With their ambition to create political fiefdoms laid bare before the public, one would think they would cringe in shame and send their bills to archives.
They have not, these honorable gentlemen and lady: Reps. Antonio Yapha for Cebu West, Simeon Kintanar for Cebu South and Clavel Martinez for Cebu North.
And it is naive to think they will.
One needs only to remember that they are gasping for political breath, facing expulsion from the corridor of power.
What will they do without their congressional seats?
Tend to the sick, mend an ailing heart, or help the scouts with their cookies--these they can pursue without losing the position to broker power or peddle influence or, their best justification always, "serve the public."
The House committee will approve the three bills, separate or consolidated, report them to the floor and most likely the House plenary will pass the bills.
How many other bills had breezed through legislative mill on less "weighty consideration" and for less senior colleagues? (One is stupefied to learn that the bills will pass, not because of their merit but because they are authored by senior legislators. Aging in the House surely has benefits.)
Arguing before the House committee and the House plenary that the Sugbuak bills are what they are, selfish political vehicles, and would demolish historical, economic, and social ties of Cebu as one province would be useless.
The bills will pass because three senior members want them passed. The bills affect the personal welfare of these senior colleagues.
They won't oppose the bills, no matter what disaster it will bring to Cebu, because when they themselves file bills similar in intent to Sugbuak, their colleagues from Cebu won't stand in the way.
Professional courtesy is there in the House.
It can also be there in the Senate, unless Cebu senator Serge Osmeña will demand the same professional courtesy, but this time to block the bills that will dismember the province many Osmeñas have served and loved through the years.
(August 12, 2005 issue)
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