Valenzuela congressman dies in car crash

A veteran lawmaker representing Valenzuela City’s second district was killed yesterday in Nueva Ecija shortly after he suffered a heart attack while driving back to Manila and collided head-on collision to a passenger bus.

Sixty-nine-year-old Antonio Serapio was on the highway in Barangay Sta. Rita, Cabiao town when a heart attack struck, causing him to veer into an oncoming Sierra Madre Trans provincial passenger bus.

Ronnie Santiago, a driver of the same bus company, said Serapio’s four-door sedan was a "total wreck."

Serapio was rushed to the Nueva Ecija Doctors Hospital but later died in the intensive care unit. Doctors later found that Serapio had a heart attack.

Serapio – a lawyer by profession – has a house in Barangay San Carlos in Cabiao. Reports said he visited his family there.

Sources in the House of Representatives said Serapio served for three terms during the time of the late Speaker Ramon Mitra. He was also a former regional trial court judge in his hometown Valenzuela before he joined Congress.

Serapio, a member of the Nationalist People’s Coalition of tycoon Eduardo "Danding" Cojuangco Jr., was supposed to complete his first term in the 13th Congress, which will expire on June 30.

The administration congressman was supposed to attend yesterday’s special session at the House. Speaker Jose de Venecia announced Serapio’s death at past five in the afternoon, more than an hour after the chamber had convened its session.

"Let us have a few minutes of silent prayer for our fallen colleague. This is a moment of sadness for us, where our colleague, Antonio Serapio, met a fatal vehicular accident and has just passed away," he said. "He served Valenzuela and this nation well."

De Venecia suspended the session for a few minutes to say a prayer. He then instructed House secretary general Roberto Nazareno to inform House members of the scheduled necrological service.