Alan bows to Rody’s word

Everyone should not think that there will be a problem.

House Speaker Alan Peter Cayetano on Monday assured that he would heed President Rodrigo Duterte’s order to share the speakership in following the deal he had forged with Marinduque Rep. Lord Allan Velasco.

“There’s no problem because whatever the President says, that I will follow. So, everyone should not think that there will be a problem,” Cayetano said in a chance interview at the Senate.

“The President was just responding to the question ‘what will happen if that (agreement) will not push through,’” Cayetano said.

“But from the start, I have been very consistent.

The head of our coalition is the President, so the President will be followed,” he added.

Mr. Duterte was firm in saying that “there will be a problem” if Cayetano will not honor the 15-21 term-sharing agreement they made last July.

The deal meant Cayetano is to serve as House Speaker for the first 15 months of the last half of the President’s six-year term.

Velasco, meanwhile, will complete the last 21 months for his turn as House Speaker.

“I was there when we agreed– three of us. And I announced it after. He does not want to honor it. That’s his problem,” the President said referring to Cayetano.

“It is going to be a problem, so we will solve the problem when we are there. As of now, there (is no problem). It remains to be hypothetical,” Duterte added.

Cayetano explained anew that staying on his position beyond 15 months by claiming that House members were ecstatic about the performance of the House, particularly in passing the budget early and the high approval rating of the chamber.

He claimed that he pursued the position “not to give the President a problem but to solve the problem.”

The House leader further assured that the congressmen will follow Duterte’s order on the speakership as the majority of the House members are part of the “coalition.”

“I think most of the congressmen are members of the coalition. So that will not happen — that the President will not be followed by the members as far as choosing the speaker is concerned. That’s what I think,” he said.

Before the start of the 18th Congress, Cayetano, Velasco and current Majority Leader Martin Romualdez got into a tight speakership race.

As the three were considered as the closest allies of Mr. Duterte, the President and the speakership contenders came into a deal known as the “Magellan formula,” referring to the year of the Portuguese navigator’s arrival in the Philippines.