Senate defers AIIB membership approval

It would be up to a new set of senators under the next administration to ratify the country’s membership in the China-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), which President Benigno Aquino III green-lighted late last year.

The executive branch is not in a rush to secure Senate ratification of the country’s membership in the new multilateral lender, even as funding is readily available for the required contribution to AIIB’s capitalization, officials told the Inquirer.

“There’s no more time. We’re ending sessions on Feb. 3. We cannot ratify it by the end of this Congress,” Senate President Franklin M. Drilon told the Inquirer on the sidelines of the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas’ annual reception for the banking community Tuesday night.

Due to the upcoming elections, Congress will be on recess from Feb. 4 until May 22, after which sessions will resume on May 23 until the sine die adjournment by June 10. Filipinos will vote for a new president, vice president, 12 new senators and various local officials.

Separately asked if the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) is eyeing to get the Senate’s nod within the current 16th Congress, Undersecretary Laura Q. del Rosario pointed out that the deadline for ratification is in December 2016. “We have enough time,” she said.

The DFA will lead the representation with the Senate to secure its ratification of the AIIB membership. Drilon said they have yet to hear anything about the AIIB from the DFA.

Even as Congress resumed this week, Del Rosario said they have yet to start discussions with senators. “We have no time yet, so far. We have lots of bilateral meetings scheduled that we need to complete by May,” she said in a text message last week.

National Treasurer Roberto B. Tan, who represented the Philippines at the AIIB’s opening ceremony in Beijing over the weekend, told reporters that the country remains on observer status pending Senate ratification of its membership.