San Carlos Bishop Gerardo Alminaza on Tuesday, May 26, appealed to the country’s senators to restore dignity, sobriety, and integrity in public service, calling recent developments in the Senate “deeply troubling and disappointing”.
Alminaza slammed a recent two-hour Senate debate over a video presented by Senator Imee Marcos, stating that the issue could have been resolved in 10 minutes.
He told DIGICAST NEGROS the time should have been devoted to urgent national concerns directly affecting ordinary citizens.
“What we are witnessing is not simply a waste of time,” Alminaza said, “It is a denial of meaningful public service to poor Filipinos who expect the Senate to address the nation’s most urgent problems with sincerity, competence, and moral responsibility”.
The bishop highlighted the plight of ordinary Filipinos—including farmers, workers, transport groups, fisherfolk, the urban poor, and the youth—who continue to suffer from poverty, hunger, unemployment, rising prices, and uncertainty about the future.
He stressed that these sectors deserve serious legislative discussions on critical issues such as wages, food prices, corruption, education, health care, and the country’s worsening social crisis.
Warning that public confidence in democratic institutions is weakened when debates center on political spectacle, personal attacks, or partisan maneuvering, Alminaza reminded lawmakers that the Senate is a public institution entrusted with the people’s trust, not merely a political arena.
“It is painful that, at a time when many Filipinos are struggling to survive, some members of the Senate appear more concerned with protecting and advancing political interests than confronting the daily realities faced by the poor,” Alminaza said.
The prelate urged the Senate to place the common good above political ambition and to utilize its time, power, and resources for the welfare of the nation, particularly the poor and marginalized.*
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