By Patrick Tulfo
ABORTED COUP AT THE SENATE
A brief coup took place on Thursday at the Senate, during which Sen. Loren Legarda briefly assumed the position of Senate President.
According to my source, the incident stemmed from the forthcoming report of the Blue-Ribbon Committee regarding alleged anomalies in flood control projects, in which three of their colleagues were implicated.
These three reportedly sought the help of their fellow senators, claiming they were being excessively targeted in upcoming report which may be released next week.
There are two versions of what happened on Thursday’s failed coup attempt. In the first version, members of the minority allegedly approached Sen. Legarda to offer the position in place of the current Senate President Tito Sotto III. In the other version it was Sen. Loren who supposedly approached the minority to seek their support in replacing the incumbent Senate President.
The second version of the story appears to carry more weight, especially since Malacanang it seems is putting a lot of pressure on Sen. Legarda’s son, Congressman Leandro Leviste, due to his revelations regarding the flood control mess. These revelations were based on what he referred to as the Cabral files, which were taken from the records held by the late DPWH Undersecretary Cathy Cabral.
The attempt to change the Senate leadership ultimately failed because several senators reportedly did not agree with one of the minority’s demands to reinstate their colleague Sen. Rodante Marcoleta, as chair of the powerful Blue-Ribbon Committee.
If these stories are true, then it only shows that Sen. Marcoleta is unpopular even among his peers.
Sen. Marcoleta’s performance in the Senate has earn him the monicker of being “EPAL” because of his tendency to contradict a lot of issues that holds national importance. One example is the renewed debate on the country’s territorial issue in the West Philippine Sea, where majority of senators threw their support behind Philippine Coast Guard spokesman Commodore Jay Tarriela on his latest tirades against China.
