THE entry of Davao City Mayor Rodrigo Duterte into the 2016 presidential race is no doubt a game changer. It could affect the chances of administration candidate Mar Roxas and survey frontrunner Grace Poe Llamanzares.
Analysts and political observers agree on two things: First, that the Mindanao and Visayan votes that could otherwise go for Mar Roxas will now be split between him and Duterte. Still, as far as dislodging Mar Roxas from his ranking as third place in poll surveys, this is a matter of speculation. Despite the Davao mayor’s tough stance against crime and corruption, trafficking of illegal drugs and other syndicated crimes, there are also those who are afraid where he can lead the country to.
Duterte’s dislike for Mrs. Llamanzares could also affect the latter’s popularity. He can go on campaigning against “an American President” in the wake of at least five disqualification cases filed against Poe as senator and for President.
Nonetheless, it’s now a five-way race for the presidency in 2016 between Poe, Vice President Jejomar Binay, Roxas, Senator Miriam Santiago and Duterte.
Mrs. Llamanzares may now be the most popular presidentiable candidate, according to poll surveys, but we have seen in past presidential elections that popularity is not all there is to it in winning elections. And we cannot discount the grassroots machineries and all the resources of the administration.
Miriam has the misfortune of being weighed down by cancer and chronic fatigue syndrome. These prevent her from conducting a real nationwide campaign. That is why I am wondering: what prompted her to run for the most backbreaking campaign of any election?
Duterte also has baggage to carry; he is identified with the Davao Death Squad responsible for many extra-judicial killings in Davao.
Whatever the outcome, the entry of Duterte into the presidential race makes the 2016 polls more interesting.
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Budget Secretary Florencio “Butch” Abad has promised us that there will be an audit of the P10 billion or so expenses of the government for the recent Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Summit held in Manila.
I hope it will be an honest accounting. This is the people’s money. This is no joke.
Almost immediately, the loss of productive hours cannot be quantified right away. Imagine, there was almost a week of lockdown of schools, public offices and private companies in Metro Manila.
The lockdown and ensuing traffic gridlock must have caused the country billions of pesos. Recall how people walked to their destinations and waited for hours for a ride.
The bilateral agreements entered into by the President are all speculative.
As for the pluses—well at least the Philippines was on the map again for its hosting of the summit.
I still cannot grasp the logic of holding the Apec meetings in Metro Manila considering the multi-faceted hassles of everyday life here. The summit could have been done in Subic as it was in 1996.
Santa Banana, if anything, what the Apec summit showed is the utter incompetence and ineptitude of the Aquino administration. Mr. Aquino would not hesitate to do anything just to show off.
But did he really believe he could hide the fact that the streets of Metro Manila are home to street dwellers? Did he think the Apec delegates had not heard of the awful traffic situation here? BS Aquino III only succeeded in fooling himself.
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The four senators—Loren Legarda, Pia Cayetano, Cynthia Villar and Bam Aquino—who voted as members of the Senate Electoral Tribunal against the disqualification of Senator Grace Poe as a duly-elected senator can now go down in history as having disowned the very Constitution they have vowed to protect when they took their oath.
I am particularly disappointed at Pia Cayetano, a lawyer, who should know her law that Mrs. Llamanzares failed to prove before the SET that she is natural-born. Pia knew, as the other pro-Poe senators also knew, that international or customary laws cannot prevail against the Constitution.
Pia voted anyway for Poe for sentimental and personal reasons. But not as a lawyer. Her late father, Senator Rene Cayetano, must now be turning in his grave. Rene was my good friend and I know he would have voted to defend the Constitution.
I am also disappointed at my friend Loren Legarda, who should have been more circumspect and independent-minded instead of going with the majority. As for Tito Sotto, oh, well, what can you expect from him since we knew all along how he would vote to protect one of his kind in the entertainment industry?
As for Bam Aquino, what can you expect from a puerile mind? Cynthia Villar, for her part, has always said that she would vote for what the people want. In other words, damn the Constitution so long as the people are given what they want.
So do these senators still expect to be called lawmakers? In my book, the five have lost all their moral ascendancy in trying to go after wrongdoing in government. They have committed the worse crime of disowning the Constitution.
In declaring that Poe is not natural-born, Supreme Court Associate Justices Antonio Carpio, Arturo Brion and Teresita Leonardo de Castro are unanimous in their dissenting opinions that “there is no Philippine law that automatically confers Philippine citizenship to a foundling at birth. Even if there were, some would only result in the foundling being a naturalized Filipino citizen, not a natural-born Filipino citizen.”