No one compares to you, Cong. Tet

Bataenos are mourning the passing away of the province’s foremost political patriarch Representative Enrique T. Garcia, Jr. of the second congressional district of Bataan, Monday night (June 13) at 75.

The incumbent congressman of the Second District of Bataan (2013-2016), the same post he held in 1987-1992, 1995-1998, 1998-2001 and 2001-2004, he was also the 26th and 28th governor of the province (1992-1994, 2004-2007, 2007-2010 and 2010-2013).

Enrique “Tet” Tuason Garcia was born in Balanga on September 13, l940 to parents Enrique Garcia Sr. and Emiliana Tuason. He graduated salutatorian at the Arellano Memorial (Bataan) High School in Balanga, Class of 1957 and finished his Bachelor of Arts degree in Economics at the De La Salle University in 1963. He continued his studies and completed a Bachelor’s degree in Commerce, major in Accounting.

In 1965, Garcia was employed as Senior Auditor of Esso Philippines and was promoted as Assistant Marketing Economic Manager in 1968. Three years later, he was made the Marketing Economist and Resident Manager of Esso Philippines. In 1974, however, he resigned from Esso Philippines and put up the VicGar Trading where he was the president. Six years later, he joined the Bureau of Internal Revenue as Executive Assistant. In 1983, he founded the Garcia, Lava and Associates, an accounting firm based in Manila.

In 1987, he ran and won as congressman of the Second District of Bataan, with the support of then OIC-Governor Leonardo Roman. But he broke ties with Roman when the latter supported the proposed relocation of a petrochemical plant to Batangas even after it had been approved by the national government to be established in Bataan.

Garcia returned to Congress in 1995 after defeating erstwhile Congressman Dominador Venegas of Orion. During his term, he fought against the monopoly/cartel of the Big Three oil companies in the Oil Deregulation case. He was re-elected in 1998 and 2001. During the period, he crusaded for the establishment of an OilEx and the scrapping of the Value Added Tax (VAT).

In mid-2000, he, together with son Balanga Mayor Albert Garcia, initiated the conversion of Balanga into a component city. The capital town of Bataan came to be known as the City of Balanga starting on December 30, 2000,

Congressman Tet Garcias had been credited for the nationalization of the former Bataan Provincial Hospital and the establishment of the Bataan Polytechnic State College. He was working on the conversion of the said college into a university when his third term expired. His son, newly-elected Congressman Abet Garcia, completed the said project.

In 2004, Tet Garcia ran and won as governor of Bataan. Free college education, fiscal management and environmental protection were just three of the major concerns of his administration. He is also regarded with utmost gratitude by his constituents as the Father of Iskolar ng Bataan. Today, thousands of poor but deserving students are benefitting from this scholarship program. He was reelected two more times, in 2007 and 2010.

After his nine-year stint at the Bataan Capitol, he won anew term as congressman against former Governor Ding Roman during the May 13, 2013 congressional elections.

Aside from being the province’s most respected political kingpin he is also known as “Bataan’s Father of Petrochem”.

During his first term in the Philippine Congress, from 1987 to 1992, he became widely known for vigorously and successfully fighting to keep the petrochemical industry in the Province of Bataan.

Undoubtedly one of the outstanding lawmakers in the country, Cong. Tet valiantly fought against the attempt of the late President Corazon S. Aquino to transfer the petrochem project to Batangas.

Arguing that the transfer of the petrochemical plant to Batangas was unfair to Bataan and to the Philippines as a whole, he fought against the plant’s transfer all the way to the Supreme Court in a landmark case.

On August 24, 1990, to emphasize his belief in the truth and importance of what he was fighting for, Garcia took an emphatic leave of absence from the House of Representatives and vowed to resign if the petrochemical plant’s transfer was not stopped.

Garcia filed a petition beforehand asking the Supreme Court to stop the transfer of the Petrochemical plant to Batangas. On November 9, 1990, the Supreme Court of the Philippines issued its final decision on Garcia’s petition, G.R. No. 92024 and ruled that the Philippines’ Board of Investments had indeed erred in approving the transfer of Luzon Petrochemical Corporation from Bataan to Batangas, and that the Board of Investments also erred in approving the change in feedstock from naptha only to “naphtha and/or liquefied petroleum gas”.

The Court ordered that the original certificate of registration of Bataan Petrochemical Plant, stating that it operates in Limay, Bataan, be maintained.

The Court further agreed with Garcia that the intended transfer of the Petrochemical Plant from Bataan to Batangas was disadvantageous to the national government and to the province of Bataan on several grounds.

Garcia victoriously returned to the House of Representatives after the Supreme Court issued its decision, and triumphantly proclaimed that the Supreme Court ruling vindicated his monumental “fight for justice

In winning the case, Bataan earned a minimum of P 200 million per year in additional real property taxes  for at least in 10 years equivalent to P 2  billion which Rep. Garcia used to start  Bataan’s first extensive college scholarship program that benefited 12,000 scholars yearly.

Tet Garcia and the former Victoria Sandejas had five children: Anna, Angela (current Dinalupihan mayor), Albert (current Bataan governor), Jose Enrique (current Balanga City mayor and incoming Representative, 2nd district of Bataan ) and Francisco (incoming City Mayor of Balanga).

You may have left us, Cong. Tet but your legacy has immortalized you in the heart of every Bataeño. No one compares to you.

With reports from Raffy Viray and Mhike Cigaral and excerpts from Danilo Nisay’s Who’s Who in Bataan