Manila mayoral candidates Amado Bagatsing and Alfredo Lim are both calling the attention of the Commission on Elections, the Commission on Audit and the Department of Interior and Local Government to the massive spending spree incumbent Mayor Joseph “Erap” Estrada is engaged in during the campaign period.
According to them, Estrada is practically “flooding the city with huge amount of cash after close and trusted political allies and poll surveys his group conducted showed him trailing Bagatsing and Lim in voters’ preference.
“Erap is heading to a sorry loss comes the May 9 local polls. He is even losing the support of the masses, the classes C, D, and E of the populace. His [Erap’s] only answer or solution to this impending defeat “is to flood, literally, the city with plenty of money. Will this suffice? Will this work?” Councilor Bernie Ang, a close confidant and trusted friend of Estrada, confided to The Standard recently.
Another Estrada ally, former councilor Felix Espiritu, allegedly sought the assistance of Bagatsing to have his son running for councilor, Bobby, and Estrada’s official running mate, Honey Lacuna, “be adopted by the LAB-Kabaka team [Bagatsing and vice mayoral hopeful Councilor Ali Atienza tandem], hoping, perhaps, for a victory.
Still another Erap’s co-group, three-term Councilor Cristy Isip, opted to be an independent and to support Lim’s mayoralty bid instead.
On top of this, a contractor-sympathizer of Estrada, who requested anonymity because of the “delicate and serious” issue involved, disclosed that a recent survey ordered by the mayor—after he gave and handed cash to barangay officials, senior citizens, teachers and students, vendors and stallholders, job order and casual workers, and policemen and firemen but not to any regular city hall employee—showed a dismal result.
Bagatsing topped the survey with 48 percent, followed by Estrada at 23 percent, and Lim, 22 percent, a source said.
The people must be vigilant and the voters should be wise and not to be swayed and influenced by “money politics,” even as Bagatsing and Lim told the Comelec, CoA and DILG “to caution and warn Estrada not to overspend,” “or else they will be compelled to file charges against him.”