Henry Uy of Parian

 I first met Henry Uy in the school where my youngest daughter and his granddaughter were classmates. We would hang around near one of the school's gates at noontime to bring lunch for the girls, so it sort of became inevitable that we would strike up a conversation.

 It was in this manner that I got to know the kind of person that Henry Uy is. From our conversations I learned that Henry is a loving and devoted family man, who continues to work even at past 60 years because he finds idleness debilitating.

 He works with his hands, being a car airconditioning expert and an automotive mechanic, skills that he continues to practice through jobs he takes at an unnamed shop on the ground floor of his house in barangay Parian.

Yet Henry Uy is never too busy for his granddaughter, for whom he would drop everything. He never misses to bring her to school in the morning and fetch her in the afternoon in an old but perfectly conditioned 1970s white Toyota Crown.

But it is during noon where I often find time to talk to Henry Uy as he comes to bring lunch for his granddaughter. At noon he comes in a battered old, but again perfectly conditioned, red motor scooter. And that is rain or shine, and all for the love of a granddaughter.

Aside from his professional calling and personal devotion to his family, Henry Uy also dabbles in community work, serving the barangay of Parian in various capacities. He would have been a perfect shoo-in for an elective barangay position, perhaps even just as a councilman.

But the incumbent line-up did not include Henry Uy. He was rejected ostensibly because of his age, and more likely because he does not have the money to contribute to the team campaign. Feeling slighted, Henry Uy decided to run for barangay Parian councilman on his own.

One of our "lunchtime friends" in school, lawyer Achilles Canete, himself a former politician, having once served as mayor of Liloan, and doting guardian to a granddaughter like Henry Uy, tried to encourage Henry about his "seniority."

Attorney Canete told Henry Uy that age is not a factor in politics because politics is not a running race. It is about service, and the honesty and dedication to fulfill one's service commitments.

This was a great morale booster coming from a man like Attorney Canete, who served as Liloan mayor with honesty and dedication and left it with his reputation intact, and his record unsullied.

I hope that Henry Uy can take heart from Attorney Canete and not waver in his decision to run for the post of barangay Parian councilman despite his lack of resources and organization and the efforts of his rivals to keep "the old man" out for no other reason than his age.

What I can probably say for Henry Uy regarding his political plans is that he probably can serve the barangay of Parian so much better than those whose only claim to capability is their youth.

Attorney Canete is right. Public service is not a running race where youth would matter over honesty and dedication. Besides, with age comes experience. And Henry Uy has a lot of that tucked in his belt, having, as I said, already served Parian in a variety of ways.

I believe the residents of Parian deserve more. For it would be a great loss and a sorry mistake if they trade the sincerity, dedication and experience that Henry Uy can bring to the table in favor of something as untested and unqualified as plain and simple youth.