Senate Minority Leader Ralph G. Recto expects President Duterte, after a five-hour Palace meeting of the National Security Council attended by lawmakers on Wednesday, will next convene the Legislative-Executive Development Advisory Council (Ledac) to “discuss policy” issues.
“Judging by how he [Duterte] appreciated the views shared by the attendees [at the NSC meeting] on Wednesday, we can expect more groups to be convened as his sounding boards,” Recto said.
The senator noted that the Ledac, created to facilitate passage of urgently needed legislative measures endorsed by the Palace, among others, was “mothballed in the past six years” of the Aquino administration. “He [Duterte] can revive this as a productive forum to discuss policy,” Recto added.
In a separate interview, Senate President Aquilino L. Pimentel III described the NSC meeting presided by Mr. Duterte as “very successful, very productive and very long,” noting that the meeting started at 3 p.m. and ended at around 8 p.m.
Pimentel, however, begged off from disclosing details of the marathon discussion in deference to a request from the President.
“I will just give you the topics because before we left the President said kung puwede huwag nang ilabas sa room ’yung pinagusapan,” the senator told reporters. He said the topics discussed included the “West Philippine Sea issue, the road map to peace in Mindanao, the communist insurgency and the war against drugs.”
Pimentel gave no other details beyond saying the atmosphere of the meeting was “serious but the President has his way of lightening the atmosphere.”
Asked if there were specific directives for Congress to pass Palace-backed legislation arising from their NSC meeting with the President, Pimentel said the other senators who were present at the meeting, including Senate Majority Leader Vicente C. Sotto, Sens. Juan Edgardo M. Angara, Franklin M. Drilon, Gregorio B. Honasan, Panfilo Lacson and Recto, will be meeting soon to determine what specific legislative measures are needed.
“We will have to discuss kung ano ’yung napulot namin doon which needs legislative interventions,” he said. “Sa ngayon, I cannot say kung ano doon.”
In a separate statement, Recto observed that Mr. Duterte, in inviting former Presidents Joseph Estrada, Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, Fidel Ramos and Aquino to the NSC meeting, along with minority lawmakers, is proving “that he is a practitioner of “inclusive politics.”
“I can sense that he likes to crowdsource ideas,” Recto said. “I have been asked to describe his style of running high-level meetings. He can be focused one moment and funny the next. It is both educational and entertaining. This guy’s thought process is good. He knows when to summarize points and where to shepherd the discussion.”
Recto recalled that in a bid to break the monotony of long meetings, Mr. Dutere displayed “this comedian’s gift of timing on when to crack jokes. He gave great inputs, and with his humor, in-house entertainment as well.”