By Omar Fernando

DAVAO CITY—Top leaders in the province of Lanao del Norte met with former President Rodrigo Roa Duterte to express their heartfelt gratitude for “making the dream of the people of the province come into reality” through the completion of the Panguil Bay Bridge.

Governor Imelda “Angging” Quibranza-Dimaporo and her husband Abdullah “Bobby” Dimakuta Dimaporo, the former second district representative of Lanao del Norte, led the delegation during the recent visit.

There is something in the 1987 Constitution that does not like Speakers of the House to become president, so much so that all three who aspired for the highest post in the land failed miserably.

The first to fall was Speaker Ramon Mitra Jr. of the second district of Palawan, who presided over the 8th Congress from June 23, 1987, to June 30, 1992. Mitra defeated then-Defense Secretary Fidel Ramos during the Laban ng Demokratikong Pilipino (LDP) party convention in 1991, which merely set the stage for the one that mattered most.