Tenuous

The presidential race is in unfamiliar flux.

Last Tuesday, the Comelec’s Second Division ruled leading contender Grace Poe disqualified from seeking the nation’s highest post. The ruling is on the petition for disqualification filed by lawyer Star Elamparo. Voting 3-0, the panel requires only one more vote to gain majority in the en banc.

Three other petitions for Poe’s disqualification will be heard over the next few days. The petitions are heard separately by the poll body’s divisions. Collectively, these petitions touch on the matter of Poe’s standing as a natural born citizen as well the sufficiency of her residency to meet the very high, and very clear, standards set by our laws.

Mathematically, at least, the odds seem to be stacked against Poe. Even as they are, her camp tries very hard to put on a brave front. Her spokesmen, it seems, take an extra cup of strong coffee every morning in order to sound gung-ho during media interviews.

In private, however, some of her supporters appear shell-shocked. They behave like small ships caught in a tempest, seeking safe sanctuary elsewhere. They sense a candidacy turned tenuous.

Whatever the final outcome of the appeals process, the first ruling by the Second Division throws a very cold towel on the enthusiasm of Poe’s supporters. It will force campaign contributors to hold back a bit and await developments on these cases. That could break the momentum of her run.

Meanwhile, the other strong contender, Rodrigo Duterte, is not yet in the clear. The poll body has yet to rule on his certificate of candidacy.

The Davao City mayor played on the ledge, fiddling while the deadline for the filing of candidacy passed. Now he is trying to get back in the game through the side door, by substituting for someone who had withdrawn his own candidacy to avoid being declared a nuisance.

No one seems to know when the Comelec will rule on the Duterte substitution. Until that happens, his candidacy is tentative.

Tentativeness, however, does not diminish Duterte’s enthusiasm nor that of his supporters. He does not appear to have a clear campaign plan, but he cares little for such trifling details. He keeps repeating he can give up his candidacy anytime and simply retire from politics – a thought that surely keeps his closest allies.

Duterte’s greatest asset is his mouth. It is also his biggest liability.

His mouth emits vulgarity that is sometimes entertaining, sometimes disconcerting. This week, he ruffled the prim and proper feathers of Catholic leaders when he cussed even at the Pope.

Having talked about his romantic liaisons and the claim he was sexually abused by a priest, we all await with bated breath what the man will say next. Without intending to, he has become our own version of Donald Trump. Both men could implode on the way to elections.

Then, again, they might not. In which case, the rules of the game might have to be rewritten.

Politically motivated

The Ombudsman seems bent on reinforcing perceptions her actions are politically motivated.

A couple of months ago, she filed a case against former officials of the Land Bank based on a deal that was contemplated but not consummated. The LBP officials are led by former finance secretary Gary Teves, now treasurer of UNA party.

Then she brought the former general manager of the MRT to court for a contract he did not sign. Former DOTC secretary Mar Roxas negotiated the questioned maintenance contract and his successor Jun Abaya signed it. The suit includes neither of the Aquino Cabinet members.

This week, the Ombudsman pulled out a complaint languishing in her office’s archives for over a decade and filed a case against the former officials of the GSIS led by Winston Garcia.  The case involved the use of e-card services offered by Union Bank, terminating the old system of issuing LBP checks for beneficiaries and sending these out by snail mail.

The shift to the e-card, says the Ombudsman, deprived the LBP of earnings from maintaining the old inefficient system. The LBP, however, did not even have the technology to shift to e-card and therefore never participated in the bids for the project.

Each year, the GSIS processes five million pension and claims payments and 12 million in salary loans. The process long cried out for modernization to better serve beneficiaries, the real owners of the social security fund.

Garcia claims the shift from paper checks to electronic cards produced such efficiency in the GSIS’ millions of transactions with its beneficiaries the institution saved hundreds of millions through the last decade. P200 million is saved in transaction costs annually and, because maintaining balance is lower, the GSIS saved P6 billion over the period. When the current leadership of the GSIS rebid the project, Union Bank again proved superior to the other alternatives.

When the GSIS embarked on this project, only three banks – UBP, BPI and DBP – expressed interest in participating. Union Bank was selected for many reasons. It offered a seamless system for disbursing loans and claims. It required only half the maintaining balance offered by DBP and BPI. The UBP e-card had more expansive uses, being a debit and not just an ATM card. The card is usable abroad, using the Plus and Visa networks.

In addition, the UBP e-card does not require GSIS members to maintain a deposit balance. UBP is not only an approved government depository bank, it is also partially owned by the SSS.

The only reason Winston Garcia could imagine for this case being filed now is that he is the opposition candidate for governor of vote-rich Cebu.