MANILA, Philippines – Senators of the Liberal Party (LP) on Monday, March 20 called on Senate President Aquilino Pimentel III to give his attention to key issues rather than the moves to impeach Vice President Leni Robredo.

“We urge Senate President Koko Pimentel to focus on the numbers that matter: the thousands of unresolved murders, the rising prices of basic goods, and the 13-million-hectare undersea region rich in minerals and biodiversity of Benham Rise,” said the LP statement released by the office of party president, Senator Francis Pangilinan.

Pangilinan and fellow LP senators stressed that these are the figures that need focus and not the number of House members needed to push the impeachment complaint eyed by Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez.

Pimentel earlier made a remark that the impeacment case against Robredo will more likely proceed than Duterte’s because the President has strong support in the lower chamber. Duterte counts more than 200 allies in the supermajority coalition in the House.  

“Instead of the life and death issues that confront our people every day like putting food on the table and our children’s safety, security, and future, politics is dominating the national discourse,” the senators said.

“Let us, the country’s elected national leaders, all return the focus on what the people sent us to the Senate to do: to improve their and their children’s lives,” they added.

Embattled VP 

Robredo, LP’s highest elected official and chairperson, is facing threats of impeachment after Alvarez said he is mulling a possible complaint against her. 

Alvarez said the basis of the complaint is Robredo’s “betrayal of public trust” for recording a video for a United Nations meeting, where she criticized the violence caused by the drug war. He has also accused the Vice President of being behind the impeachment case against President Rodrigo Duterte. 

Robredo’s camp has since denied the accusation and said that they only stated facts in the video. They also tagged Alvarez’s threat as irresponsible and baseless. 

LP senators, in their statement, backed Robredo’s video message.

“Vice President Leni Robredo’s video message to a United Nations event is within her prerogative as an elective official and citizen of the country. The video message showed the world that the Philippines enjoys democracy where dissent is respected,” the statement said. – Rappler.com