'Whole' no more: SP probes back to committee level
Iloilo -- After all the hullabaloo, all matters presented before the Iloilo Sanggunian Panlalawigan (SP) for investigation in aid of legislation will be handled by standing committees as so established in its internal rules of procedure. This, notwithstanding earlier efforts to convene the SP as a "Committee of the Whole" and the elaborate process the group went to do away with the "usual" and push for a new chairman in lieu of the Vice Governor as Presiding Chair.
In an interview, Fifth District Board Member Domingo Oso, chairman of four SP committees and chosen chairman as well of the Committee of the Whole told The News Today, six matters pending investigation were already returned to respective SP committees for appropriate action.
For instance, the longtime request for Capitol intervention on the city's Perimeter Boundary Ordinance (PBO) will be referred back to the committee level instead of the previous decision of Vice Governor Roberto Armada for Committee of the Whole action. At the time the PBO was brought to the SP for investigation, the entire SP body saw no need to dislodge Armada from his chairmanship.
The move to vote a new Committee of the Whole chairman came after the probe sought on the P15 million Capitol power substation. First District Board Member Bernardo Silla in a privilege speech questioned the regularity of the entire deal pointing out to his colleagues the failure of said project as designed to operate and generate savings, stable power supply to the Capitol.
Further still, issues back to the committee level include job hires both in the Office of Vice Governor and Governor. Another was the pending administrative case of one Iloilo mayor where the SP sitting as quasi-judicial body has yet to make corresponding judgment as called for in the internal rules.
"It is best we refer it back to the committees," he explained. "It was my position that to convene as Committee of the Whole, the effort is superfluous, redundant because after all, the report will still be presented also to us."
Asked for specifics on the period alloted for each committee to handle the investigation on one subject matter, Oso said SP internal rules are not clear on the time frame.
"Even the absences of committee members or corresponding penalties are not addressed," he added.