Capitol race, referendum on Noynoy

The Liberal Party is under tremendous pressure, and largely because of its own doing, to officially capture the Cebu provincial capitol by way of a clear electoral win in the May 2013 elections.

Having removed Gwen Garcia, the main obstacle to this goal, by means that many people to this day continue to believe was more political than legal, the Liberal Party must now prove it can win and win cleanly by vote what it won fuzzily by something else.

But there’s the rub. The Liberal Party standard-bearer in Cebu province, Junjun Davide, is perceived to lack the strength to win on his own. His strong finish in his first attempt to capture the Capitol in 2010 was not on account of his own steam.

The real wind beneath his wings at the time was Noynoy. It was a time when Noynoy was still an ascendant commodity. Everybody it seemed wanted to play a part in what was thought at the time to be history unfolding.

But now the winds of change have shifted. And while Noynoy continues to ride high on the ratings, these ratings have consistently declined and have never recovered. There is no reason to believe they still will, going into the last half of his term.

Any perceptible loss of strength on the part of Noynoy will bear heavily on the Liberal Party campaign in Cebu province, especially where the fate of its Davide is concerned, since he never had any winning strength of his own to begin with, at least outside Cebu City.

The same cannot be said of his runningmate, Agnes Magpale, who inadvertently reaped all the benefits from the subterfuge that saw the removal of the Liberal Party’s main stumbling block to the Capitol. Magpale is now actually where Davide longs to be.

But that is only temporary because their respective candidacies can no longer be switched and it will still have to be a Davide-Magpale tandem eventually. Had it been the other way around and with Magpale now ensconced at the Capitol firmly, the pressure to win would have been lesser.

This time the Liberals will need to move heaven and earth to ensure that a Davide-Magpale ticket makes it through. But even if it did, it is not something Cebuanos will smack their lips over. A weak candidate winning still makes for a weak leadership.

In the end, it will be as if Magpale will be running the show, in which case the Cebuanos will not get what they bargained for. And the potential to be worse is there, as Magpale, while stronger than Davide, is not exactly as strong as befits the dynamic needs of the Cebuanos.

The fear then is that, with both Cebuano leaders weak, or not as strong as needed, it will be the party overlords in Manila who will be calling the shots in Cebu. And with Mar Roxas desperate in his own bid to take Malacañang, he clearly would want a say in vote-rich Cebu.

On the other hand, the other scenario of only Magpale winning and thus having to serve under the administration of another Garcia, Pablo John, will mean that Capitol will get even more interesting in the years to come.

Pablo John is definitely a stronger candidate than Davide. But he will not really be up against Davide. He will be up against the entire Liberal Party machinery. He will be up against the president.

It is thus not so much about PJ or Davide running for governor than it is about Noynoy validating his 2010 Cebu win and ensuring Roxas does too in 2016. For the first time in Cebu’s history, the outcome of the Capitol race will be decided by a referendum on the president.