House minority not a noisy bunch, Lagman tells Aquino

By BEN ROSARIO

January 7, 2011, 6:56pm

President Aquino answers questions during a press briefing after the Vin D’Honneur at the Rizal Hall in Malacañang on Friday, January 7, 2011. (Photo by RICHARD VIÑAS)

MANILA, Philippines – Congressmen from both the opposition and administration blocs resented the way President Benigno S. Aquino III treated them during the traditional vin d’honneur at Malacañang Friday.
House Minority Leader Edcel Lagman chided Aquino for taking the occasion in “making a crude partisan tirade” against the political opposition when the chief executive decried them as “a noisy minority trying to revive the bad practices of the past.”
Guests at the annual New Year event at the Palace complained that Aquino failed to play the role of a “good host” when he left rushing to another appointment. “Pati nga iyong mga ambassador nagulat sa nangyari. As usual, he was in a hurry to leave,” said a Liberal Party solon who requested anonymity.
He added: “It’s a good thing my wife prepared lunch for me. Noynoy did not prepare any.”
Lagman complained that Aquino aired his “derisive remark” against the minority as he led the toast welcoming the New Year in the presence of members of the diplomatic corps, Cabinet, Judiciary, Congress, bureaucracy and civil society.
“Secretary Ricky Carandang of the Presidential Communications Group admitted to me that he was among those who prepared the draft of the President’s brief message which specifically included the contemptuous statement against the minority,” said the opposition leader.
He added: “As Minority Leader, I enjoined the members of the minority in the House of Representatives to attend the Vin d’ Honneur as an expression of cooperation with the Aquino administration in the advent of the New Year.”
He took exception to Aquino’s tirade, saying that the “minority is articulate, not noisy.”
“It is responsible and deliberate, and does not bask in the past,” Lagman said.
”It is the President who repeatedly harps on the perceived sins of the past in a vain effort to project himself as a ‘different and model’ leader.”
According to Lagman the President is trying “to pick a fight this early in 2011.”
He stressed that the minority will not run away from a good fight, adding that if Aquino truly wants it, “he will get it.” (With a report from Rio Rose Ribaya)