The high cost of infighting
Barely a year after the May 2016 elections, the victorious side has been wracked by internal strife among contending factions. Take the case of the two winning representatives from Davao del Norte, Pantaleon D. Alvarez and Antonio R. Floirendo, Jr. It is common knowledge that the latter topped the list of President Rodrigo R. Duterte’s campaign donors and was instrumental in the former becoming House Speaker of the 17th Congress.
But a bitter catfight between their significant others has escalated into a take-no-prisoners war. According to the congressional grapevine, this started when Mr. Floirendo’s partner allegedly approached former president and now Pampanga Representative Gloria M. Arroyo to broach the idea of her taking over the speakership.
Ms. Arroyo supposedly rejected the offer and reported it instead to Mr. Alvarez, who later filed graft charges against Mr. Floirendo before the Ombudsman and called for an investigation into the joint venture agreement (JVA) between the Floirendo family’s Tagum Development Company, Inc. (Tadeco) and the Bureau of Corrections (Bucor). The JVA involves a Tadeco-operated banana plantation within the Bucor’s Davao Prison and Penal Farm (DPPF) in Panabo City, Davao del Norte.
Joining the fray is Department of Justice (DoJ) Secretary Vitaliano N. Aguirre II, who created a panel led by Chief State Counsel Ricardo V. Paras III to investigate the alleged irregularities. Curiously, the fact- finding report was signed by DoJ Undersecretary Raymund L. Mecate and not by Mr. Paras’ six-man panel.
During the Lower House hearings conducted by the committee on justice jointly with the committee on good government and public accountability, Mr. Aguirre admitted he was asked by Mr. Alvarez to nullify the JVA for being unconstitutional and contrary to law.
Similar pronouncements came from the Office of the Solicitor General (OSG) and the Commission on Audit (CoA), making it seem that these agencies were mouthing the same lines from a common script.
Tadeco President Alex Valoria debunked claims that his firm insinuated about the House leadership’s coercion of the DoJ, CoA, and OSG into declaring its JVA with Bucor illegal. “We base our arguments on the approvals of government authorities at the time the JVA was executed and the applicable laws. This is a consensual agreement which has stood the test of time,” he said. Now on its second 25-year term, the JVA will end in 2029. Mr. Aguirre disclosed at last week’s hearing that the JVA’s renewal in 2004 got approval from then Justice Secretary Simeon A. Datumanong, while another DoJ chief, Raul M. Gonzalez, approved a subsequent review and the resulting addendum to the agreement.
Lawmakers took turns questioning him on the validity of the agreement. However, Mr. Aguirre failed to address some of their concerns and requested for more time to study them, particularly the details of how the DoJ concluded that it was a lease and tenancy deal instead of a JVA.
Meanwhile, Mr. Valoria estimated that around 8,000 ex-inmates of DPPF have been absorbed by the banana industry, pointing to the success of the rehabilitation program as a main objective of the JVA.
He claimed Tadeco workers are the highest paid in the Philippine agricultural sector, and its labor- management practices are at par with the world’s best agribusiness companies, adding that “the JVA’s creation of 30,000 direct, indirect, and ancillary jobs translates to the secure livelihood and future of at least 181,000 Filipinos.”
For his part, Mr. Aguirre acknowledged that Tadeco paid hundreds of millions of pesos in taxes to the government and employed thousands of workers with a multiplier effect on their respective communities,
And all these would go down the drain just because of a protracted battle between legislators and their mistresses?