Senator Panfilo Lacson told ANC after Juan Ponce-Enrile was sworn in as senate president after Manny Villar resigned, that “Nothing is spontaneous here in the Senate. These things are planned.”
To recall, Villar, who was re-elected as senator in 2007 under the Genuine Opposition ticket, was installed as senate president last July with a vote of 15-7 by what was described as a “mongrel” majority that included all of Malacañang allies. Given that kind of support base, Villar has been doing a delicate balancing act between Malacañang’s interest and the public’s expectation for the Senate to do a fiscalizing role to the Arroyo administration’s brazen violations of the Constitution.
Although initiated by four opposition senators – Lacson, Loren Legarda, Mar Roxas and Jamby Madrigal, Villar’s ouster last Monday was made possible when the very same people who were his allies just more than a year ago abandoned him.