WHETHER it is at the House of Representatives or at the level of the local legislative body of the provinces, cities, and municipalities, our lawmakers were making the headlines this past week.
Recently, the recent Philippine Councilors League National Convention ended on a low after their election was marred with allegations of vote buying and problems with the voting system.
In a public post on his Facebook post, Davao City Councilor Danilo Dayanghirang, who was running for national chairman in the PCL, alleged that there is a vote buying incident is happening in the 2020 PCL national election.
The councilor accused the camp of Councilor Jesciel Richard Salceda of Legazpi City, Albay, for engaging in massive vote buying by depositing, through a law firm, a manager’s check amounting P7.3 million to the PCL’s bank account.
For his part, Salceda, also accused the camp of Dayanhirang for vote manipulation and cheating.
“The first round of testing of the election machines showed that votes cast for Salceda were counted for Dayanghirang. The following test showed that while only ten test votes were cast, the results showed 15 votes! And why were not receipts issued by the voting machines? So there will be no proof of the cheating? So there will be no basis for post-elections protest? The software provided by Converge IT Solutions was more primitive than the software used in Student Council elections! Blatant cheating!” Salceda said in Facebook post.
Dayanghirang refuted this claim stating that the problems with the election machines started when the camp of Salceda allegedly introduced “new features” to the voting system. He also said votes for him was counted for Salceda.
Meanwhile, at the House of Representatives, Davao City Representative Isidro Ungab was ousted as chairperson of the House Committee on Appropriations. This developed after rumors of a plot to oust House Speaker Alan Peter Cayetano and install Marinduque Representative Lord Allan Velasco ahead of the scheduled turnover under a term-sharing agreement.
ACT-CIS Party-list Representative Eric Yap was elected to replace Ungab.
In a Philippine News Agency report, Cayetano bared that Velasco has been allegedly offering chairmanships and funding allocations for congressmen.
“Umalis muna kayo sa committees n’yo, sa chairmanship n’yo, bumalik na lang kayo ‘pag Speaker na si Congressman Velasco,” Cayetano was quoted saying in the report.
(You should leave your committees, chairmanships, first, and just come back once Congressman Velasco becomes Speaker.)
In a statement, Hugpong ng Pagbabago (HNP) “strongly” condemned the removal of Ungab.
“For HNP, the ouster of Ungab was grossly unacceptable as it is disadvantageous to the Duterte administration’s reform agenda for the Filipino people and the country,” the group said in a statement.
It is sad to see the chaos among our lawmakers. Though it is not the first time we are seeing them wrestle for power, it is always sad to see that these things happen.
Events like this, without them saying much, the Filipino people can see what they are after. It is worrisome to see that they are more worried of their position in power than the welfare of the people.
While we also give the benefit of the doubt to those who have been accused or the accuser, we hope our leaders could focus more on serving the people who put them where they are right now.
We want to see them more serving the people of their community rather than fighting against one another. As elected public servants, the welfare of the community they are in should be first before their self-interests.