PNoy has killed the most measures of any president
MANILA — With half a year yet to the end of his six-year term, President Benigno Aquino III has already earned the dubious reputation of having killed the most number of bills since Congress was restored in 1987.
The number of measures passed by the 15th and 16th Congress that he has vetoed thus far stands at 80, earning the chief executive the moniker “Veneto” Aquino, a play on the Filipino translation of “vetoed,” which is “vi-neto.”
Way behind in second place is former President Fidel Ramos, who vetoed 51 bills between 1992 and 1998. Ironically, the president who exercised the veto power the least was the one who served the longest post-EDSA 1: Gloria MacapagalArroyo, who killed only four measures while finishing the term of her ousted predecessor, Joseph Estrada, from 2001-2004; and only two during her full six-year term from 2004-2010.
The numbers, of course, do not show the quality, or lack thereof, of the killed measures. But they do raise the following questions:
When does the president exercise veto powers? Which bills usually get the axe? Do the numbers say anything about how Congress works the legislative mill? How effective is the Presidential Legislative Liaison Office in acting as the bridge between the executive and the legislative branches of government?
While many of the bills Aquino killed may qualify as deserving of the veto, such as those converting local roads to national, quite a number were seen as vital legislation whose deaths stirred controversy, even anger.
These include the Magna Carta for the Poor and, the most recent and arguably most incendiary, the proposal to increase the Social Security System monthly pension by P2,000, which Bayan Muna party-list Representative Neri Colmenares, its main proponent, is working to override.
The chances of this happening appear slim so far. Colmenares needs the signatures of 193 of the House of Representatives’ members on his override resolution — he has 75 so far — and then a separate two-thirds vote of the Senate to override the veto.
While he has set his sights on gathering enough signatures by the time Congress convenes on May 23, after this year’s elections, the legislature will actually meet again until June 10 not to tackle bills but as the National Board of Canvassers to count the votes for president and vice president.
Of the 80 bills Aquino vetoed, 11, or 13 percent, were national bills; 68 bills, or 86 percent, were local measures; and one was a line veto.
National bills vetoed:
Fixed Term for Chief of Staff Early Years Act Establishing the Career Executive System Minimum Height for PNP, BFP and BJMP Magna Carta for the Poor Waling-Waling as National Flower Granting Additional Benefits to Centenarians Strengthening the Career Executive Service Internally Displaced Persons Benefits for Professional Athletes Increase in SSS Pension Of the 68 local bills vetoed, 57 were on road conversion. The 11 other bills had to do with the following: Baguio Charter, Mactan Airport, Bedi Citizenship, Surigao Agri, Western Visayas Medical Center, Davao State College, Occidental Mindoro Agri., Cebu Fishport, Camotes Island, Eversly Sanitarium, and Partido Board Regents.
Meanwhile, Aquino’s line veto on the sin tax law had to do with the provision mandating manufacturers and sellers of tobacco products to buy at least 15 percent of their raw materials from local sources.
While the country’s senior citizens may vilify Aquino for vetoing the SSS pension hike bill, an act that could incidentally prove costly to the administration in the May elections, Undersecretary Bernardino Sayo of the PLLO said the chief executive should be praised for rejecting 57 of the 93 road conversion bills passed by the 15th Congress.
Sayo said lawmakers propose the conversion of local roads to pass on to the national government the burden of providing funds for the development and maintenance of the thoroughfares.
In a number of cases, he said the chairpersons of the committees to which these bills are referred allow the measures to be approved despite questions or lack of study.
But what happens, according to Sayo, is that committee chairpersons would not dare turn down the bills of their colleagues.