PANGASINAN Rep. Jose de Venecia will no longer have to contend with long line of congressmen waiting for the quarterly release of their pork barrel allocations once he is replaced as Speaker by Davao City Rep. Prospero Nograles.

And his critics are getting a rush.

"Di ba tamang tama? Year of the rat ngayon, so dagang bukid na siya," Nueva Ecija Rep. Edno Joson, an independent, said in jest.

The tedious process of getting their congressional allocations and allowances was among the long list of complaints of congressmen belonging to the "reform bloc."

If he is ousted, the Pangasinan congressman and his staff will have to say goodbye to the many perks that his office has been enjoying in the past 15 years, especially discretion over disbursements of House funds which Kampi president Luis Villafuerte, the leader of the reform bloc, said should be audited and be made public.

Like Joson, Cibac party-list Rep. Joel Villanueva is also reveling on the idea of seeing the Speaker reduced to being an ordinary congressman.

The deputy minority leader joked they could even ask De Venecia to question the quorum whenever the majority bloc tries to cook up something fishy in the plenary.

Palawan Rep. Kahlil Abraham Mitra of Pangasinan said the long list of issues against the Speaker is hounding him now.

"De Venecia’s past is catching up with him," he said in a press statement, noting that most of these issue involved alleged "kickbacks" from projects such as the NorthRail, the PEA-Amari deal and the canceled national broadband network deal with China in which his son Joey, owner of Amsterdam Holdings Inc. (AHI), was involved.

Mitra also brought up the more than a hundred million-dollar alleged behest loan during the Marcos regime of De Venecia’s old company Landoil Resources. Sources said the loan could have already reached more than $500 million because of interest and dollar exchange rates.

De Venecia’s camp has said the Supreme Court had already cleared him of any liability on the deal. The loan granted by Philippine Export Guaranty (Philguarantee) in the 1970s was to finance construction and other projects to be undertaken by Landoil in Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and other Middle East countries and in Libya.

But Landoil failed to collect its receivables which reached $169 million, prompting Philguarantee to assume the payment of the unserviced foreign loan obligations.

Mitra said De Venecia’s involvement in these issues is the reason he "is way off line to call for a moral revolution and shepherd the House of Representatives into moral recovery."

"Mr. De Venecia is missing the point," said Mitra, son of the late Speaker Ramon Mitra. "For most of the House members, De Venecia is not the leader who can usher Congress to effect change and move the House forward."

Mitra also blamed De Venecia’s leadership for the bad image of the House as an institution.

"Precisely, it’s ironic and an insult to the House and the public for De Venecia to call for moral revolution as he lacks the moral ascendancy to lead one," he said.

Valenzuela Rep. Rex Gatchalian of the Nationalist Peoples Coalition said his group, which is composed of at least 20 neophyte congressmen, also favors a leadership change "in the hope that this would bring us a more dynamic Congress befitting our youthful ideals."

Presidential son Rep. Diosdado "Dato" Arroyo of Camarines Sur was among those who attended Gatchalian’s birthday party last week where the neophytes signed a manifesto withdrawing support from De Venecia. – Wendell Vigilia