Dispatch from Crame No. 349:
Statement of Sen. Leila M. de Lima on Alvarez's and his group's bid to lead the Minority Bloc (26 July 2018)

7/26/18

The idea that Alvarez and the rest of the ousted House leadership should now lead the minority bloc in the House is nothing but preposterous. It reeks of opportunism up to the last moment of their fall from grace. The farcical practice that members of the same ruling party with the same allegiances to the President can simultaneously comprise both the majority and minority in the House must be put to an end.

It is time that the genuine opposition lead the minority in the House and be recognized as such, instead of the same people who are rivals with the majority only as to who sucks up the hardest to the President.

The party of the President is already the Majority in the House. This party is PDP-Laban. Its outsmarted and disgruntled faction in the House cannot now pretend to be the minority as it sulks in the sidelines of their internal power struggle. They must eat their humble pie and let the genuine opposition consisting of allied LP and independent anti-administration pary-list groups do the real work of fiscalizing in Congress.

This is how democracy works in the House, if indeed it is still allowed to so work under this government. It cannot be any other way. The alternative of accommodating the wishes of the disgruntled Alvarez faction, like throwing a candy to a crying baby, achieves nothing. It is in fact detrimental to public good and the ideals of an authentic, working democracy.