Senator Joseph Victor “JV” Ejercito on Thursday criticized the way other lawmakers treated Budget Secretary Florencio Abad with kid gloves during the Senate finance committee hearing on the Disbursement Acceleration Program (DAP) controversy.
Ejercito told Manila Bulletin Online that the hearing is a game of numbers.
“There are only two of us in the minority and mostly from the majority. It is expected that members of the majority will be defending or will be nice to their ally, in this case Abad,” Ejercito said in a text message.
“I don’t want to attack my colleagues. But I can say that I really felt how it is to be in the minority in this hearing. Outnumbered, totally,” he added.
Meanwhile, Ejercito said the current administration must respect the decision of the Supreme Court (SC) rather than justifying technical malversation with its DAP arguments.
“They are challenging the SC. This is arrogance or overconfidence on the part of the administration,” Ejercito said.
Ejercito said the administration should face the consequences of their actions. He added that they could have passed an appropriation measure from Congress but they ignored the co-equal branch of government.
Ejercito said a declaration of good intentions is not enough.
“The road to hell is paved with good intentions. That’s the intent of passage of the law against technical malversation, to tell people like him that one cannot jungle funds, no matter how good the intention,” Ejercito said.
Frustrated, Ejercito left the hearing before it adjourned.
source: http://www.mb.com.ph/ejercito-abad-treated-with-kid-gloves-during-dap-hearing/
