DAVAO CITY—President Duterte took a swipe at the party-list system in the country, saying it is being “abused” by wealthy and influential people.
This developed as Congress released a summary of the Statement of Asset, Liabilities and Net Worth of its representatives, which showed that one of two billionaires in the Lower House emerged from the party-list group, and another one in the top 10 richest of them also represented another party-list group.
“The rich people fund the party-list. They are named after laborers, but their nominees are the millionaires,” the President said.
He added “many of these party-list members are involved in corruption.”
Duterte made the comment during the oathtaking of newly elected officials in Cagayan de Oro City at the Xavier Sports and Country Club Convention Hall on Wednesday.
It was also during his speech where he also expressed his dismay over the “continuous ownership of vast tracts of land by wealthy landowners despite the implementation of the government’s land reform program,” a Malacañang report said.
The report added the President named “some powerful landed elites” in the country who he accused of circumventing the agrarian law “to continue taking hold of huge agricultural lands, depriving poor farmers of lands to till.”
He vowed to aggressively carry out the land reform law and go after powerful landowners.
“Just like in Bacolod, the sugarcane [fields]. In Central Luzon, it’s the Cojuangcos, the Monteverdes, Benedictos,” Duterte said in his speech. “I told them that if they are not going to do it, I will go there personally. There is nothing that we can do about it because that is the law.”
He said the “big landowners, despite having big parcels of land, cannot find satisfaction, that even after the implementation of land reform program, they remain billionaires.”
The President also criticized the communist organizations for carrying out their own version of land reform.
“The New People’s Army formed an association and forced people to join. The NPAs then chose the people who will possess the land and not the original tenants,” he said.
“That is why they were killing each other there. That was their drama. It was just for show. Those idiots. They can’t fool me. I’ve been in and out of the mountains for so long,” Duterte said.
“To make the communist rebels irrelevant, the government must seriously implement the land reform program,” he added.
“I told the Cabinet you want to make the NPAs irrelevant? Give away all the lands. That was what the NPAs promised, land for the landless. They act as if they know better than you,” he said.
Also present in the oathtaking were Senator-elect Christopher Lawrence “Bong” Go, Cagayan de Oro Second District Rep. Rolando Adlao Uy, Mayor Oscar Seriña Moreno, Vice Mayor Raineir Joaquin Velez Uy and Second District Councilor Joyleen Mercedes Labis Balaba.