“The Senate should be independent.” This was the remark of Senator Alan Peter Cayetano after the upper chamber referred the discussion of the Maharlika Investment Fund bills to the panel of the administration’s ally. | DFernandezINQ
Cayetano argued that the controversial bills should be taken up by the Senate committee on government corporations and public enterprises, which he chairs.
Only the Senate minority bloc — composed of Senate Minority Leader Aquilino “Koko” Pimentel III and Senator Risa Hontiveros — has the same view as Cayetano. “If the MIF bill would have been primarily referred to the Government Corporations committee, I would have tried to find a consensus to be able to come up with the best possible legislation on the matter at hand,” Cayetano said in a letter which was put on record at the plenary session on Wednesday.
He explained that the measures “would reveal an intention to create — first and foremost — the Maharlika Investment Corporation , a State investment body proposed to be responsible for the overall governance and management of the MIF. Thus, the creation and investment of the MIF are contingent on the establishment of the MIC.”
Forming the MIC, Cayetano said, will involve queries affecting government corporations since funding and capitalization would be sourced from other government corporations.“I understand that any administration would prefer that a member of the administration bloc, not an independent, be Chairperson of the committee to which an administration-backed bill is referred to. But the Senate should be independent,” he said.
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