Minority resolution on EJKs sent to majority senators: Pangilinan

THE office of minority Senator Francis N. Pangilinan issued a statement on Friday, Sept. 29, emphasizing that a resolution by the Senate minority on extrajudicial killings (EJKs) had been sent to his colleagues in the majority, contrary to the assertion by some of them that they had not seen a copy of said Resolution No. 516.

Last Wednesday, a number of majority senators took to the Senate floor to call their colleagues’ attention to a blog post criticizing them as it cited the resolution in which they were not among the signatories.

The Senate majority that afternoon issued a more comprehensive resolution, No. 518, condemning EJKs and in which the minority senators this time were not among the signatories.

Mr. Pangilinan’s chief of staff, lawyer Herminio Bagro III, said in the statement, “As Senator Pangilinan wanted to gather more signatures, on Thursday, September 21, at 12 noon, we sent the copy through the publicly available and official email of Senators Richard Gordon, Gregorio Honasan, Cynthia Villar, Miguel Zubiri, and Majority Leader Vicente Sotto III.”

“This was done to inform them about the resolution and to show the number of signatures, and to ask them if they want to sponsor it,” the statement noted, adding:

“Senator Gordon acknowledged receipt of the email on the same day.”

“On Monday, September 25, we filed the resolution at 5:33 p.m. This was more than three (3) days since it was emailed to the above senators.”

“On Tuesday, September 26, it was read on the floor, stating the title of the resolution and the names of the 16 co-authors. It should be noted that no one manifested desire to be a co-author of the measure. Senate President Pimentel referred it to the committee of Senators Hontiveros and Lacson.”

“Clearly there was no attempt to keep or withhold the resolution from the seven senators. The Senate rules were followed.”