Hontiveros is lone woman opposition bet to enter Senate

MANILA: The “last man” standing by making it to the winners’ circle as the only opposition candidate in the race for the 12 Senate seats at stake in the May 9 national elections is a woman.

She is reelectionist Senator Risa Hontiveros who, as of Wednesday, occupied the 11th place, based on partial and unofficial returns from the Commission on Elections (Comelec).

In that position, Hontiveros stood between two siblings – JV Ejercito at 10th place and brother Jinggoy Estrada at the 12th position.

The two are sons of former president Joseph Estrada, who succeeded in winning back their Senate seats.

Hontiveros, a member of the militant partylist “Akbayan” (For the Country) seemed assured of victory as of Wednesday morning by garnering a total of 15.2 million votes Hontiveros was the only opposition candidate who appeared to have made it back to the Senate in the ticket of Vice President Leni Robredo who stood a distant second to the presumptive president former senator Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos, the only son and namesake of the late Philippine dictator.

In this light, Hontiveros may thus find herself the lone oppositionist in the Senate – unless one also counts Senator Aquilino “Koko” Pimentel, who is considered an “outcast” If Marcos is proclaimed the winner in the presidential race.

But Hontiveros was unfazed even with this problem, confident that the Senate would continue to retain and preserve its traditional image as an “independent” institution.

“I will work to ensure that we will have colleagues at the Senate who will continue to fiscalise the executive (department) no mater how strong in the next six years,” Hontiveros told ABS-CBN News in a mix of Filipino and English.

While at the Senate, Hontiveros said she would pursue her long-standing advocacies, regardless of the political composition in the chamber.

These included, she said, women’s rights, gender equality, universal health care and ensuring peace at the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM).