Senate race: Battle lines drawn

MANILA, Philippines - The race for 12 Senate seats kicked off yesterday with President Aquino pitching for the administration slate in Manila while Vice President Jejomar Binay led the United Nationalist Alliance (UNA) in Cebu City.

Aquino personally launched the proclamation rally of “Team PNoy” at Plaza Miranda in Quiapo with the color yellow made prominent by political leaders.

Aquino introduced his 12 handpicked candidates that he said “would bring us to the righteous path.”

He rallied support for the 12 candidates as he spoke of the various anomalies of the previous administration.

“If I may ask you, will you still allow anomalies in the past administration to continue?” Aquino asked the thousands who attended the rally that started at 4 p.m.

Sen. Franklin Drilon, Team PNoy campaign manager, stressed the need of the administration to secure a majority of Senate seats in the midterm elections and ensure that its programs for the last three years would run smoothly and bear fruit.

Drilon said every effort will be made to secure a 12-0 sweep of the elections, with Aquino playing a major role to achieve this.

Drilon said the President will join at least seven of the campaign sorties initially covering the provinces of Laguna, Cavite, Cebu, Iloilo, and Pampanga and the cities of Dumaguete and Cagayan de Oro.

“He has a real investment (in Team PNoy),” Drilon said.

Describing the current Senate as unmanageable, Drilon said the focus of Team PNoy is to follow on the “matuwid na daan” (righteous path) of the President. He said UNA’s path in this elections is still unknown.

On the other hand, UNA secretary-general and Navotas Rep. Tobias Tiangco said the proclamation rally in Cebu “focused on a positive theme and will move away from political mudslinging.”

Tiangco said the Cebu rally highlighted the collective message of how UNA’s senatorial candidates ticket will “make life better for Filipinos.”

When asked why they chose Cebu to kick off the UNA campaign, Binay simply said they are not that choosy or “elitist.”

Binay said Cebu is important to UNA even if he personally lost votes in the province during the 2010 elections when he ran for vice president.

“The elections are over. I lost here (in Cebu) but I did not hold a grudge. I am always here. That is the mark of UNA. We are always for unity,” Binay said.

UNA’s nine senatorial candidates heard Mass at the Sto. Niño Cathedral officiated by Cebu Archbishop Jose Palma before the start of the rally.

After the Mass, Binay, with UNA stalwarts former President Joseph Estrada and Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile, led the candidates in a motorcade through Metro Cebu, Mandaue and Lapu-Lapu.

The three common candidates of both political coalitions – Senators Francis Escudero and Loren Legarda and former Movie and Television Review and Classification Board (MTRCB) chair Grace Poe-Llamanzares – attended the rally in Plaza Miranda.

Llamanzares sent her son Bryan and cousin actress Sheryl Cruz to represent her at the UNA rally in Cebu.

Llamanzares told reporters that she had made it clear to Binay that she could not physically appear at the rallies of both parties.

Escudero earlier preferred attending the LP rally in Manila since it was “nearer.”

Among the officials and personalities present in the rally at Plaza Miranda were Speaker Feliciano Belmonte Jr., Transportation Secretary Joseph Abaya, former senator Aquilino Pimentel Jr., Albay Gov. Joey Salceda, Budget Secretary Florencio Abad, Justice Secretary Leila de Lima, Senators Manuel Villar Jr., Teofisto Guingona III, Quezon City Mayor Herbert Bautista, Richard Gomez and his wife Rep. Lucy Torres, Aga and Charlene Muhlach, and Dingdong Avanzado.

Avanzado and Noel Cabangon performed live while Gomez, Torres and the Muhlachs endorsed Team PNoy.

Two hats

As far as Malacañang is concerned, President Aquino can wear two hats – run the country and be the campaign manager of the Liberal Party – now that the campaign period has officially started.

“This (campaign) is part of governance. He believes that these are the people who will be able to push forward his reform agenda, and we’ve worked around the schedule,” presidential spokesman Edwin Lacierda said yesterday.

“The President will be governing regardless of where he is, regardless of whether he is in Naga, or in Mindanao, or in Davos or in Malaysia or in Cambodia for another ASEAN meeting, he will still be governing,” he said.

According to Lacierda, Aquino himself is “mindful of his responsibilities as the President and this (campaign) is part and parcel of pushing forward his agenda, his reform agenda.”

Aquino said earlier that he will be working as Chief Executive in the morning and probably join the campaign sorties of his handpicked senatorial candidates in the afternoon, if he will have the time, and will be choosing places where he could attend.

“He’s going to campaign for his people, for Team PNoy, and again, this is part of the decision of the President to campaign strongly in order to push forward his reform agenda,” Lacierda said.

Regardless of what Aquino will do, “there will always be criticisms.”

“The President is always taking criticisms in stride, but what he will do is what he believes is proper, what is good for the national interest. We have worked out the schedule already. So you can be guaranteed that the President, while he will be doing some campaigning, it is just part of his schedule,” he said.

Lacierda said it would not be everyday that the President would lead the campaign.

There are reports that Aquino will join the campaign sortie of LP-led senatorial candidates in Laguna on Thursday.

“We have the political landscape of the entire country and the President and LP coalition have decided on some areas that he would like to visit. As to details we will announce it at the proper time,” Lacierda said. –Delon Porcalla, Jose Rodel Clapano, Paolo Romero