Vice presidential aspirant Senate President Vicente III on Friday, Jan. 4 said he is qualified for the vice presidential post but that depends on the electorate.

The Senate chief said he is qualified for the second most powerful post of the country as he does not need a learning curve being in public service in the past 30 years.

Sotto said he knows the country’s problems and their solutions.

On the issue of China’s refusal to honor a United Nations arbitral ruling that rejected its ‘’historic’’ claim over most parts of the South China Sea, Sotto said he has filed a proposed Maritime Zone Act of the Philippines that defines the country’s territorial limits.

He said he has transmitted a copy of his bill to members of his Nationalist People’s Coalition (NPC) at the House of Representatives who might want to file a complementary bill.

With the uninterrupted incursions by China into the country’s Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ), Sotto explained that the country has ‘’no other recourse but to negotiate with our neighbors.’’

Sotto said the Philippines has to insist on what is its territory as China insists on its nine-dash-line over the South China Sea.

To counter this, Sotto stated that the country has to depend on 72-year-old Philippine-US Mutual Defense Treaty (MDT).

On the issue of agriculture, the NPC is studying a silver bullet solution to the country’s dependence on imports of agriculture produce as there is a pressing need to fund the agriculture sector, he said.

Sotto proposed that the government buy 50 percent of the nationwide farmers’ output as a solution, ‘’not motherhood statements.’'

At present, government only buys two percent of the farmers’ produce which is like a subsidy and farmers are stuck with their present low economic status. Middlemen are raking in, he added.

‘’Buy at the farm gate prices,’’ he added.

Sotto said the Partido Reforma of his presidential candidate, Senator Panfilo M. Lacson, is doing this in Davao del Norte where farmers are now seen driving Hilux vehicles.

To create an economic boom in the agriculture sector, government should thus use P250 billion out of the P328 billion unused portion of the national budget, he added.

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