Senator Risa Hontiveros on Tuesday, January 24 said she is pleased to know that President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. has reservations on the new “re-engineered” version of the proposed Maharlika Investment Fund (MIF).

Marcos, in a recent interview, has expressed his doubts on the idea of a re-engineered MIF where House proponents shifted the source of funding from government financial institutions to government owned and controlled corporations (GOCCs).

“Pleasantly surprised ako na sinabi ni presidente na oo nga this is not workable, or we don't accept that yet, which was precisely my point,” Hontiveros said in an interview on ANC Headstart.

Hontiveros reiterated her belief the Marcos administration should have deferred presenting the MIF during the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos, Switzerland.

“It was still a very rough draft apparently from their end, work in progress...It was really premature,” she said.

“There was nothing yet to present. They jumped the gun on this. I'm afraid it made the president look amateur,” she lamented.

Many senators, she said, were actually surprised over the administration’s move to present the bill in Davos when “we hadn’t even begun to deliberate on it.”

On Monday, January 23, Sen. Mark Villar filed the Senate’s version of the MIF bill.

Hontiveros, however, reiterated that the Philippines do not need a sovereign wealth fund.

“Senate had its turn to express our minds about it, publicly, and then parang rehearsal ang ginawa nila doon (they made rehearsal of sorts) of something that was still in very, very rough form. So very ill-advised),” she said.