Romualdez using Binay template, but will prove to be useless

I AM referring to the investigations of alleged corruption against Vice President Jejomar Binay undertaken for 17 months from August 2014 to January 2016 — just three months before the May 2016 elections — by the Senate blue ribbon committee.

The investigations were obviously ordered by President Benigno Aquino III in order to stop what in 2014 was Binay’s huge lead, based on polls, to become the next president in the May 2016 elections. Indeed, in June 2014, Binay had 41 percent support, according to a Pulse Asia poll. Sen. Mar Roxas, the administration and the Yellows’ candidate, was far behind, with just 6 percent of voters likely to pick him. Sen. Grace Poe had 15 percent, Miriam Defensor Santiago had 10 percent, and Ferdinand Marcos Jr. had 5 percent.

Very likely because of the blue ribbon’s corruption hearings, which were even televised and almost always given prominence by the Yellow papers, The Philippine Daily Inquirer and the Philippine Star, voter preference for Binay gradually went down to 21 percent in September 2014. However, the blue ribbon’s investigation did not benefit the administration candidate Roxas but the independent Poe, whose 30 percent preference by voters surpassed Binay’s 22 percent.

It was the unexpected newcomer, Davao Mayor Rodrigo Duterte — who quickly established rapport with the masses — who siphoned off the votes of the Filipinos who lost confidence in Binay. By April 2016, Duterte led with 33 percent, followed by Poe at 22 percent and Binay at 18 percent.

In the 2016 elections the next month, Duterte got 39 percent of the votes cast, Roxas with 23 percent and Poe with 22 percent. The Senate investigations led in August 2017 to the filing of charges against Binay for multiple counts of graft and falsification charges. The case is still pending in the courts.

Sara

House Speaker Romualdez obviously ordered, convinced, or gave millions of reasons to the quad committee and Committee on Good Government and Public Accountability to investigate Sara, the shoo-in for the 2028 presidential elections, following what the Aquino administration did in the case of Binay. The congressmen were even seen to consult their notes, which obviously had been prepared by Romualdez’s operatives.

There are, however, crucial differences between the Romualdez and Aquino black propaganda campaigns, and therefore, their outcome would be quite different.

First, as I discussed in a previous column, it takes a huge effort and a long period of time to topple from his or her pedestal a figure with charisma or who has become a folk hero. While Sara’s charisma draws mostly from her father, she herself has had a good measure of it.

US President-elect Trump was convicted of 34 counts of fraud in connection with his attempt to prevent adult film star Stormy Daniels from telling the public about their one-night stand. Only a conviction of murder would be as bad as that in terms of public image. Still, though, Trump won the recent elections handily.

Propaganda

Through the Christmas holiday period, and if Sara intensifies her own propaganda campaign, most people will have forgotten the charges of malversation of her confidential funds. People would take as a hyperbole typical of Davaoeños her claim of having contracted “somebody” to kill President Marcos et al. if they get her killed. Anyway, that kind of contract is only for the movies, lapped up by Western media, which see us as a Wild West country. What kind of assassin would be so stupid as to risk his life to kill a hard target when the contractor is already 6 feet underground? Probably in a drunken spree, a close friend of Duterte told her that she would avenge her if Marcos killed her.

Second, Aquino’s investigation of Binay’s alleged corruption was undertaken by the Senate blue ribbon committee, consisting of respected senators, who, of course, could be considered as Binay’s peers since they were voted into office on a national scale and got votes in the range of the vice president’s.

In Sara’s case, she is being investigated by a gang of political pygmies who were voted into office by less than 1 percent of the 32 million she got. People also find it so despicable that a former member of the Left’s death squad and a former or current communist cadre are the disrespectful inquisitors of the Republic’s vice president. Even their big boss, Romualdez, got only 181,000 votes, and only because his aunt was the incomparable Imelda.

Third, Romualdez’s operation to politically assassinate Sara is being undertaken much too early ahead of the 2028 presidential elections, giving her time to recoup her losses. By contrast, Aquino III’s operation lasted until a month before the 2016 election. Unless, of course, Romualdez has become so worried that his cousin, from whom he draws all power, would croak sooner, a concern that is not too farfetched since Marcos has been living with a single kidney for 40 years after he donated one of his kidneys to his father in 1983.

Fourth, Romualdez’s operation against Sara may have a different goal, in contrast to that against Binay. Romualdez is likely planning to set Sara up for impeachment on the basis of the alleged malversation of funds when she was education secretary.

Romualdez is seriously deluded if this is his goal. He needs 13 senators to find her guilty, and I’m sure five won’t do that — Sens. Bato Dela Rosa, Robinhood Padilla, Imee Marcos, Bong Go and Francis Tolentino. Most of the other senators just don’t like Romualdez and don’t want to be identified with him; they won’t risk voting against Sara, who would, after all, still have a lot of supporters. Come to think of it, I’m betting that in an impeachment trial, 23 senators would acquit her or abstain, with only one finding her guilty — Risa Hontiveros.

Romualdez and Marcos should objectively take stock of the situation. By February next year, or the start of the campaign period for the May 2025 senatorial and party-list elections, this persecution of Sara will be all but forgotten, with those in the House who participated actively in persecuting her panicking to be re-elected and demanding for more campaign funds from their benefactor. They are wasting their time and resources — my estimate is the hearings have cost at least P200 million, excluding the “underground” expenses.

Romualdez should instead direct his House to spend their time coming up with laws to make sure our flood control projects are undertaken without corruption, a long-term program to ensure rice self-sufficiency is undertaken, and measures passed to solve the drug problem — which is worsening — and how Metro Manila traffic can be solved. You know, the kinds of laws the House, according to the Constitution, should be busy studying and enacting.

If you’re not convinced yet, just check out what happened to the Alice Guo investigations that lasted four months. Two Philippine Daily Inquirer columnists and a Philippine Star editor had claimed they got them riveted to the TV for days and marveled at it. Yesterday, no other senator attended Risa Hontiveros’ hearing on that issue. It will take decades, as in the case of Sen. Win Gatchalian’s father, William, for the court to decide if she is a Filipino or not.

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Romualdez using Binay template, but will prove to be useless
Source: Breaking News PH