Ilocos Norte 1st District Representative and presidential son Sandro Marcos defended his bill creating the Maharlika Investment Fund citing that previous administrations also filed the same bill.
Sandro said that similar sovereign wealth fund (SWF) bills had been filed during the administration of former presidents Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III and Rodrigo Duterte.
Sandro said that Finance Secretary Ben Diokno and former Senator Bam Aquino also push for the same measure.
“Well, this isn’t a new idea if you think about it. Sec. Diokno already said they were looking at it during the time of Duterte. If I’m not mistaken, former senator Bam Aquino filed a bill in 2016 trying to do the same thing; my guess is it was not passed because the administration of former president PNoy was about to end at that time. I believe Senator JV also filed a bill; it’s not a new idea,” he said.
“Yes, it became apparent that the President was in support of creating a sovereign wealth fund, but it didn’t — the idea did not come from him per se because this is something that has been in the works or something that has been pushed by not even this administration but administrations past, before,” he added.
Sandro said that they got lucky since the bill breezed swiftly in the lower house.
“It just so happens na naswertehan kami na kakasimula lang ng administrasyon, so we have six years to hopefully be able to craft a piece of legislation that would see out and go beyond the President’s term,” he noted.
Sandro also denies railroading the bill.
“How has it been railroaded? You know how many bills were filed in a week and approved on the committee level or on first and second readings this week? I’ll tell you; it’s more than the sovereign wealth fund,” he said.
