Sara asked NPC to support PDP-Laban’s Velasco for Speaker, says NPC exec

Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte has asked the Nationalist People’s Coalition (NPC) to support the speakership bid of Marinduque Representative Lord Allan Velasco, an NPC stalwart told GMA News Online on Tuesday.

NPC Secretary General Aurelio “Dong” Mendoza made the disclosure on the same day that PDP-Laban president Senator Aquilino “Koko” Pimentel named  Pampanga Representative Dong Gonzales as one of PDP-Laban’s bets for speaker alongside Velasco and former Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez of Davao del Norte.

“Mayor Sara reached out to NPC to help support Congressman Lord Velasco’s bid for Speakership but we will still discuss it with the leadership and NPC and its members,” Mendoza said.

Mendoza said the party was likely to go for Velasco since the latter was a party-mate of President Rodrigo Duterte.

“Majority of the members are considering Congressman Lord Velasco for Speaker. Baka ‘dun na ang punta,” Mendoza said.

“Congressman Velasco is a member of the ruling party and the party of the President. As such, we believe that the legislative agenda of the President and his administration would be achieved with the support of the majority of the members of congress under his leadership,” he added.

According to Mendoza, there are 38 NPC members who won seats in the House of Representatives for the upcoming 18th Congress during the May 2019 polls.

NPC is a currently a member of the PDP-Laban led majority coalition in the Lower House.

Regional party Hugpong ng Pagbabago chair Sara Duterte, on the other hand, also inked a coalition with NPC for the May 2019 polls.

Aside from Velasco, Leyte representative-elect Martin Romualdez of Lakas-CMD and Taguig representative-elect Alan Cayetano of Nacionalista Party have both expressed their plan to contest the speakership.

Sara has earlier said that she would support anybody running for Speaker as long as such candidate was supportive of her father.

During the campaign, she called both Romualdez and Velasco as the “next Speaker of the House.” She has expressed support for Cayetano’s speakership bid.

Sara has been viewed as instrumental in the ouster of then Speaker Alvarez in July 2018, the same day of President Duterte’s third State of the Nation Address (SONA).

Alvarez was ousted five months after Sara, through a post on Instagram, lashed out at the House leader for supposedly being arrogant and bragging that he—as Speaker—could unseat Duterte.

Alvarez was replaced by former President and Pampanga Representative Gloria Arroyo. —NB, GMA News