Of political dynasties & puppets of leaders

For our special presentation on our talk show on Straight from the Sky, our guests will give you the guidelines prepared by the Laity on “What the Catholic Laity must do for the coming 2013 elections.” Indeed, the 2013 mid-term elections is crucial for us Filipinos in the sense that that the 1987 Constitution that allowed only a single 6-year term for the Office of the President meant the President has no accountability for his term. Pundits would say that 6 years is too long for a lousy president and too short for a good president so while we are not having a presidential election in 2013, this is the only time we can show our gratitude or our displeasure to the Aquino Presidency.

We  have with us tonight two staunchly conservative Catholics, Tita Aurora Yap of the Task Force for Life and Family (TFFL) and Grace Galang of the Catholic Charismatic Renewal. These two women want to share with you their own stories and why they have remained in the church founded by our Lord Jesus Christ. Above all, they follow and obey the magisterium of the Catholic Church not because they have been ordered to obey by the Bishops… but rather because of their love for our Lord Jesus Christ and fellow man.

So watch this very interesting show tonight on what we Catholics must do in the coming May 2013 elections, especially in light of the Aquino Regime’s program to disrupt or destroy the family unit… through the passage of the Reproductive Health (RH) Law that has angered many conservative Catholics. So in a way… listening to these ladies should open your eyes on what we should be doing in this coming May elections…which means going out to the polling centers to vote. But more important than voting is for Catholics to exhort their friends to vote for the right candidates. So see this show on SkyCable’s channel 61 tonight at 8:00PM with replays on MyTV on channel 30 M-W-F.

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The final series of the Ramon Aboitiz Foundation, Inc. (RAFI) Candidates Fora will be on today at the University of the Philippines Cultural Center in Lahug and will feature Gubernatorial candidate Pablo John Garcia of One Cebu and Mayor Michael Rama of Team Rama. With no one from the BO-PK appearing in today’s session, it would be much like last Thursday’s purely Liberal Party (LP) presentation.

I gathered that Rep. Tomas Osmeña apparently refuses to go on a debate with the incumbent Mayor because I reckon he is afraid to make slip ups that could bring his mayoralty bid down. This race is quite crucial in the sense that both Mayor Rama and Rep. Tomas Osmeña are neck-to-neck as of the last survey that was recently released. This means both Mayor Rama and Tommy Osmeña must convince the undecided that are considered “swing” votes. So it is crucial that these people get to know the real issues and today is the perfect time to show to the Cebu City residents who should be mayor.

We’ve written numerous articles about Rep. Tomas Osmeña, but he never honored us with a reply. We know that he’s been going back and forth to Houston, Texas because of his cancer but at this point, we would like to know the status of his health. Otherwise, as we’ve already written in this corner, you people out there ought to make sure that you choose properly your vice mayoralty candidate because you might just be voting for the real mayor of Cebu City when you vote for the vice mayor.

Meanwhile, during the Mega Cebu Candidates Forum last Thursday, I bluntly asked acting Gov. Agnes Magpale “Why didn’t she opt to run for governor instead of settling for the post of vice governor as she is acting governor now and is the most experienced candidate in the Province of Cebu… with all due respect to gubernatorial candidate Jun Davide?”

Without batting an eyelash, acting Gov. Magpale told the audience that it was not for her to make that decision… but rather it was a party decision that she should run for vice governor. This statement was reiterated by LP gubernatorial candidate Jun Jun Davide—that this was a party decision.

Since I was already done with my Friday column, I wrote this piece in my column in the Philippine Star last Saturday. So allow me to cut and paste that portion of my PhilStar article wherein I wrote, “I dare both acting Gov. Magpale and LP gubernatorial candidate Jun Jun Davide to tell us when and where did this LP party caucus happen…how many votes did Jun Davide get over acting Gov. Magpale?” Nope, they never reacted to that column.

The reason of course is clear… that if there were such an LP party caucus, it would have been splashed all over the local newspapers. So let’s cut the bull__it and ask these two LP candidates to stop lying to us Cebuanos and admit that Rep. Tomas Osmeña made the decision that Jun Jun Davide should run for governor and Acting Gov. Magpale had no choice in that decision. In this election, political dynasties are on the hot seat but what could be worse than electing a political dynasty is electing a puppet of that dynasty! What Cebu needs is a real leader…not a puppet of a leader.

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