|
It
appears that GO’s greatest enemy is within its own
party.
Latest
news reports show that now it’s Villar playing dirty
tricks against fellow GO candidate Trillanes, which
include the filing by a Dutchman and his Filipina wife
of a petition to deny Trillanes’s plea for bail.
Meanwhile, TU congressional candidates are sure to
dominate Congress since GO has no candidate in some 61
congressional districts. Neither does GO have any
candidate in 267 cities and municipalities with a
reported combined number of registered voters of some
5.6 million,
These
threats of “massive protests” if and when GO loses
despite their showing in the surveys is merely to
condition people’s minds that GO will only lose if
cheated. But if we apply math to the probabilities of
the election results it is clear that there is no way
that GO can avoid losing simply because they lack the
organization and the representation nationwide.
n n n
Big
names in the opposition continue to jump ship and over
to Team Unity as the campaign goes into its crucial
final days.
Mayor
Ruthie Guingona, wife of opposition leader Teofisto
Guingona, was reported to have joined TU with the full
approval of the former justice secretary. Celso Lobregat,
a member of the powerful Lobregat political clan in
Zamboanga City, is now with the administration party and
is strongly working for TU candidates in this part of
Mindanao.
n n n
It
appears that Loren Legarda has accused teachers, who sat
as members of the board of election inspectors, of
cheating and pointed at the overworked tutors as the
main cause why she lost in the 2004 vice presidential
elections. She also accused the teachers of dishonesty
and fraud for allegedly conniving with Vice President
Noli de Castro.
Being an
election official is always a risky business and I am
sure that teachers will be very careful of Loren Legarda
after this.
n n n
There
are reliable reports from the provinces that GO
operatives are adding the names of some GO candidates to
the sample ballots of TU making it appear that TU had
endorsed them. This is a warning to the public to be
wary of the manipulations of GO. TU is focusing on its
12-0 campaign and unlike GO, they remain united and
growing stronger.
n n n
Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez was fuming when she
insisted that the Ombudsman’s order of suspension
against Binay did not consider the timing of the
elections nor was it encouraged by the Palace.
“It’s
about the law!”
Binay is
accused of graft when he allegedly inserted 8,000 fake
employees in the Makati City payroll. Cases against
Binay include grave misconduct, conduct prejudicial to
the best interest of the service and dishonesty. The guy
broke the law and he should answer for it.
n n n
An
oppositionist declared that this local election is a
referendum on the presidency.
Each
election is a referendum of some kind and the President
is not immune to the highs and lows of public acceptance
as dictated primarily by economic and social scales. GMA
inherited the nagging problems from past administrations
but despite the pressures, she focused on resolving each
problem, manfully taking the brunt of her critics’ ire
fanned by the media’s negative reports, because of her
strong belief that as a nation’s leader she must answer
for the exercise of her authority.
Despite
the relentless efforts to discredit her and topple her
from the presidency, she brought the country to
international stature and was lauded globally as a true
leader. The country’s very strong showing in the
economic front that catapulted the peso as one of the
strongest currency in Asia and brought down our BOP
deficits to manageable levels, pre-paying our
obligations and stockpiling our reserves to
unprecedented levels, are accomplishments nobody can
ignore.
No other
president has accomplished so much under so much
pressure and still be as statesmanlike and determined to
follow the people’s will, the same people who gave her
their overwhelming trust and confidence as the best
president at the worst of times.
n n n
As we go
to the polls on Monday, let us remember that we are
going to vote for politicians who will lead us into the
future. In that we choose our destiny and our fate. Let
us vote with our conscience, wisely and with confidence;
let us vote not for vengeance but for unity and
progress; not with hatred and anger but with hope and
belief in the true state of our nation. Our nation is
progressing rapidly. Let us cast our vote that this will
continue. |
