This is in reaction to the news item titled “UNA blasts Pimentel for vote to oust Enrile, raps his ‘insensitive behavior’” (Inquirer, 1/22/13).
Sen. Koko Pimentel was not being insensitive in casting a “yes” vote for Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile’s motion declaring the position of the Senate President vacant. Shouldn’t the wish of a distinguished senior statesman who is 89 years old be granted?
People in the United Nationalist Alliance (UNA) like JV Bautista who are power-hungry may not think so. But to a young and dynamic leader like Pimentel, who wants to give change a chance in the Senate and to lighten the load of an aging colleague, be he the Senate President, that is just fitting. How many times had Enrile announced in public that if somebody wanted his position he was ready to yield?
Now that he had finally declared he was all set to leave the post and Pimentel was only too willing to support his decision, comes UNA going against the decision of the two who, Bautista said, had inked a unity partnership. So who’s insensitive?
If Bautista thinks Pimentel might not get UNA’s support for his candidacy this 2013 elections, he better banish the thought because, unknown to him, PDP-Laban Chair and Vice President Jejomar Binay is silently campaigning for the senator from Mindanao who is the president of PDP-Laban.
—BEN RANQUE,
chair, Political Party Institute,
PDP-Laban, Medina, Misamis Oriental,
benranque@yahoo.com