Senator Sergio R. Osmeña III

Biography

"Making lives better"

Tagged as the Senate’s “Maverick” for being fiercely independent, Senator Serge Osmeña, who is of Cebuano-Negrense-llonggo ancestry, takes pride that his family has had the honor to have contributed three generations of direct descendants to serve in the Philippine Senate. Both his grandfathers -- Sergio Osmeña Sr. and Esteban dela Rama -- and his father, Sergio Osmeña Jr., had been prominent lawmakers.

He has pursued the enactment into law of 183 bills, such as the Absentee Voting Law, Retail Trade Liberalization Act, Government Procurement Act, Securities Regulations Code, and the Regional Headquarters for Multi-National Companies Act, and of which he co-authored 55, including the Agriculture and Fisheries Modernization Act, the Clean Air Act, the Anti-Money Laundering Act and the Safeguards Measures Act.

He is currently the chairman of the Committee on Banks, Financial Institutions and Currencies and the Committee on Energy. He has likewise been elected chairman of the Joint Congressional Power Commission.

Among the bills that he seeks approval of during the 15th Congress are the Freedom of Information Act, the Fair Trade Act, the amendments to the Anti-Money Laundering law, the Insurance Code and the Bangko Sentral Charter.

In keeping with his family’s heritage, the senator has dedicated his legislative effort to bringing down the cost of doing business in the Philippines in order to encourage private enterprises to create more jobs for Filipinos. He has always emphasized the development of the countryside where the poorest of the poor live. Out of his total 3,251 infrastructure projects in all 79 provinces, 80% were constructed in the rural areas.

A firm believer that education is the great equalizer, Senator Osmeña has championed the fundamental need of all Filipino children to be properly trained to meet the challenges of life. He has funded a total of 935 school buildings all over the country.

The senator has likewise directed substantial budgetary support to government-owned medical institutions to fund the medical needs of indigent patients. To date, a total of 11,883 Filipinos have been the beneficiaries of Sen. Osmeña's medical assistance program at the Philippine General Hospital (PGH), National Kidney Institute (NKI), the Philippine Heart Center (PHC) the Lung Center of the Philippines, the East Avenue Medical Center, and the Baguio General Hospital.

Senator Osmeña has earned the reputation of being the Senate's fearless fiscalizer. His numerous exposes on graft and corruption, among others the anomalous SSS-EPCI bank sale, IMPSA-CBK, PIATCO, Tiwi-Makban, Marconi radar and Casecnan power contracts, have saved billions of pesos for the Filipino people.

Sen. Serge Osmeña is a farmer and businessman by training and was educated at Harvard, Georgetown, and the University of the Philippines. He is married to Bettina Mejia Lopez of Iloilo, Pampanga, and Leyte and has six children.

Birthday: December 13, 1943

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