You cannot blame VP Sara Duterte for skipping committee hearings at the House of Representatives. Not a few of them are conducted by partylist representatives who belong to legal fronts of the Communist Party of the Philippines and its armed combatants, the New People’s Army.

She fought them when she was mayor of Davao City. She grew up in an environment where the CPP/NPA reigned with impunity, and when she finally had the opportunity to confront the terrorist groups, she vanquished them. Davao City was the first place in the country to be declared insurgent-free by the Armed Forces of the Philippines, followed closely by the entire Davao Region.

The legal fronts of the CPP/NPA have no love lost for Mayor Sara Duterte as it is, she who launched the first offensive with the AFP NTF-ELCAC that led to the crippling of the terrorist organization.

Their detestation is demonstrated in their attempt to deprive her of confidential and intelligence funds.

Very vocal among them is ACT Representative France Castro, who was convicted by a court of transporting children of indigenous tribes in Davao del Norte in the middle of the night to an undisclosed place in another province.

She is out on bail and still attends congressional meetings and committee hearings. Castro is not alone. A leader of the dreaded Alex Boncayao Brigade is now a member of Congress.

While these characters still nurture their ideology, which has become irrelevant, you can still “appreciate” the stoicism and that includes their consuming hatred for VP Sara.

But what is more detestable are legislators who cannot hide their brazen agenda, including their profligate lifestyles and canine loyalty to their master who provides them their needs… and obviously an inchoate standard of luxury. They are sworn to “proceed with the plan” to demean VP Sara who, in what seems to be the first and the last confrontation in a committee hearing, took them all and made them look like a bunch of spoiled brats.

The hounding of the Vice President will not stop in the confines of the House of Romualdez. Some sniffing dogs have been released to track her, ready to create a story that would denigrate her.

A quick visit to former Vice President Leni Robredo was treated like it was a negative issue against VP Sara and the spin masters beat it to a pulp. It was the advent of the feast of Peñafrancia and several Marcos men came on the heels of Sara’s visit.

As I write this piece, former Education Undersecretary Gloria Mercado testified at the hearing of the House Committee on Good Government and Public Accountability on matters involving the budget utilization of the Department of Education (DepEd) under the Vice President.

She revealed that from February to September 2023 she received cash in envelopes amounting to P50,000 each month for a total of P450,000. She said the money came from Assistant Secretary Sunshine Fajarda.

I do not see any reason why the issuance of cash to an undersecretary is now a controversy. Vice President Duterte is now under obligation to explain to the committee how she spent it.

Meantime, the indefatigable Vice President continued with her preoccupations on how to distribute relief goods and other food items to victims of calamities. Unknown donors have filled to the rafters the satellite offices of the Vice President with sacks of rice.

She moves around at a dizzying pace seeing to it that donations are repacked and distributed to beneficiaries promptly.

The public knows she does not have the luxury of time to face the grand inquisitors, neither in committee hearings nor in the plenary at the House of Representatives.

On the other hand, she committed to attend the Senate plenary on the deliberations of the OVP’s budget proposal. She finds sanity in the upper chamber.

True to her style and acumen, she delivers an insult to the leadership of the House of Representatives without articulating it.

Such is the discipline and dedication of the former mayor who grew up in the most troubled times of Davao City and witnessed how the most challenging problems and opportunities were being addressed. She was honed to lead under any adverse circumstances.

Those are the qualities of a courageous and intelligent leader which many political incumbents with ambition to rise above their incompetence and depravity want to but simply cannot be.