No need to elect new Senate president, senators say

Senator Francis Escudero has yet to be convinced of the success of automated polls. But at the same time, he finds it unnecessary to talk about electing a new Senate President, who could temporarily lead the country in case of election failure. “Pagkatapos ng election dun naman natin makikita yun. Me sufficient na panahon. Hindi tama para sa akin na ngayon gawin yan," Escudero, co-chairman of the Joint Congressional Oversight Committee on Automated Elections System, told reporters. (There’s still time. It can all be worked out after the elections. It’s not appropriate to do that now.) “E paano kung hindi (walang failure of elections), nagtanggal ka ng Senate President dahil sa isang contingency? Dahil sa isang pag-aakala? Hindi naman din tama yun. Dapat nandun na, papunta na bago gawin yun," he added. (If election failure doesn’t take place, then what now? You got booted out of the Senate presidency because of a contingency? That’s not right. ) However, Escudero — co-chair of the Joint Congressional Oversight Committee on Automated Elections (JCOC-AE) — said that the people should hope for the best but still prepare and plan for the worst. “I voted against it on the belief that we would be hard pressed at really fulfilling the mandate of full automation as we are seeing now but it's my hope that it would be successful," Escudero said. The Senate has sufficient time to elect a new Senate President if there will be a failure of elections. The chamber is scheduled to resume its session on May 31. Twelve senators will be serving until 2013 while the term of 12 others will expire on June 30. Some sectors raised the possibility of failure of elections due to the glitches in the preparations being conducted by the Comelec. With the supposed failure of elections comes the power vacuum scenario as the term of President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, Vice President Noli de Castro, Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile and House Speaker Prospero Nograles will all expire on June 30. Since the Senate is a continuing body, Senator Edgardo Angara called for the election of a new Senate president from among the 12 senators whose term will expire in 2013. Senator Rodolfo Biazon proposed the exclusion of Senators Manuel Villar Jr., Benigno Simeon Aquino III, and Loren Legarda from the choices because they are running for election in May. Among those included in the list, if ever, are Majority Leader Juan Miguel Zubiri, Joker Arroyo, Edgardo Angara, Escudero, Panfilo Lacson, Gregorio Honasan II, Francis Pangilinan, Alan Peter Cayetano, and detained Antonio Trillanes IV. For his part, Senate Minority Leader Aquilino Pimentel Jr. on Thursday expressed optimism that elections will proceed. “Failure of elections will not happen in the country," he said in a statement. “Our elections do not need a majority plus one vote to have a winner. If we have 50 million voters, the Constitution does not require the winning presidential candidate to get 25 million plus one votes. We follow the plurality rule. In other words, whoever gets the highest number of votes is the winner." Even though voting machines will fail in either of the country’s three largest islands, others will still function. Results based on these functioning machines “will be made the basis for proclaiming the winner. Those who did not believe in the results can go through the usual way of protesting," he said. The senator said it would be difficult to replace Enrile because of the difficulty of mustering a quorum while the senators and congressmen are busy with their election campaign. He, however, favors the removal of Enrile as Senate president because he is disgusted with his “authoritarian" manner of running the chamber, and not because of the feared failure of elections. “But that is not for me to decide," he said, explaining that Enrile can only be replaced through a Senate session, which it cannot call by itself. “The l4th Congress should be called to a special session by the President, but there is obviously no time for that because members of Congress are busy campaigning. So there will be no quorum," Pimentel said. “What will happen? In all likelihood, Enrile will stay on as Senate president until the elections are over. In which case, he will no longer be Senate president in the next Congress unless he is elected by the new Senate." Despite this, he denied that he has part in the reported plans to oust Enrile. “I want to emphasize that I have not talked with Sen. Angara or any other senator on this issue. So Sen. Enrile should not think that there is a plot to unseat him. There is no such thing. I just read Angara’s opinion in the newspapers. But I commented that the scenario of a failure of elections will not happen," Pimentel said. - RJAB Jr., GMANews.TV