Photo from Rep. Rodante Marcoleta’s Facebook page.
MANILA, Philippines — Sagip Rep. Rodante Marcoleta, a known ally of former President Rodrigo Duterte and his daughter, Vice President Sara Duterte, has been stripped of his membership in five committees in the House of Representatives.
Marcoleta lost his seat in the powerful committee on appointments and four other panels, just before the chamber approved next year’s draft P6.35-trillion national budget on final reading and adjourned for a break on Wednesday.
Deputy Majority Leader and Iloilo Rep. Janette Garin moved to nominate Quezon Rep. Virgilio Lacson as Marcoleta’s replacement in the committees on appointments, public accounts, energy, justice, and constitutional amendments.
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This came a week after Marcoleta was also stripped of his vice chairmanship in the committee on good government, which is currently looking into how public funds had been spent by the Office of the Vice President and Department of Education, the latter when it was also headed by Sara Duterte.
No official reason was given during Wednesday’s plenary about Marcoleta’s replacement
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Obvious ‘witchhunt’
Sought for comment, Marcoleta said his removal may be due his recent actions that were “interpreted as being supportive to the Vice President.”
The veteran lawmaker was one of the few who stood up for Duterte after the appropriations committee broke what he called a ‘’tradition’’ by not immediately approving OPV’s P2.03-billion budget for 2025, on allegations that its P125-million confidential funds in 2022 and 2023 were misused.
Marcoleta also questioned why the panel “prematurely raised’’ a Commission on Audit (COA) disallowance notice covering a bulk of those funds when the OVP, ‘’as a matter of procedure,’’ could still explain how the money was used.
“That they deviated from this norm is out-of-the-box and highly suspicious– obviously bordering on political witchhunt,” he then told the Inquirer.