Malaya
THERE is only one issue that the opposition United Nationalist Alliance keeps bringing up against the administration that it feels will be its main foe in the 2016 elections when the Vice President will go for the presidency against the man that Jejomar Binay beat in the last election, Interior Secretary Mar Roxas. The UNA says the government is not playing fair, citing the cases filed against the Vice President and his wife Elenita, both of whom have been mayors of Makati City.
Binay was appointed mayor by the late President Corazon Aquino after the dictator was deposed. Binay was then a human rights lawyer mostly handling cases of persons that ran afoul of martial law regulations.
There were cases filed against Jojo and Elenita Binay for alleged corruption.
In the case of Elenita, the wife, who is also a doctor, the case, already dismissed, has been revived by the Office of the Special Prosecutor which is under the Office of the Ombudsman, led by a former Supreme Court Justice Conchita Carpio-Morales. The Office of the Ombudsman is a constitutional body that is not under the Executive Arm of the government and is independent of every one.
Says the President’s spokesperson Abigail Valte: “The Office of the Special Prosecutor is under the Office of the Ombudsman which is an independent and separate entity from the Executive. It baffles me why they are putting the blame on us, accusing us of selective prosecution, when the Executive does not have a hand in running the affairs of the Office of the Ombudsman, much less the Office of the Special Prosecutor.”
Mrs. Binay, a medical doctor, has been leveled four graft charges from the alleged overpricing of hospital beds at Ospital ng Makati when she was the city mayor for one term, while her husband had to rest after having served three terms as Mayor.
On the issue of politicos that abused their pork barrel, called Priority Development Assistance Funds until the Supreme Court finally ruled that the use of these funds by our legislators (congressmen and senators) for their selected projects was illegal, the UNA complains that while three Senators, two of whom are UNA stalwarts, are being investigated on the use of their PDAFs, none of the President’s party mates have been called to task on how they used their PDAFs.
Of course, the investigation of how politicos used their pork barrels is not something that the President worries about. There are independent agencies that investigate were these funds went and check on how they were spent.
Blaming the President as the head of his political party on who is being investigated presumes too much and does not seem like a valid issue in the elections in 2016. I would worry more on the other parties who will be fielding candidates in 2016 rather than trying to create issues that will not fly.
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In the meantime, Binay himself hints that he is leaving the Partido Demokratiko ng Pilipinas (PDP-LABAN) to form a new party under which he will run in 2016. It is expected that Mayor Joseph Estrada of Manila will coalesce his Partido ng Masang Pilipino (PMP) with the new Binay party which is expected to be launched on June 12, 2014.
PDP-LABAN president Senator Koko Pimentel says that he has been expecting this development. His party will continue recruiting members and will bring in new members to strengthen the party at the grassroots.
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That could mean that the President’s party, the Liberal Party and the Nacionalista Party of former Senator Manny Villar could continue their 2013 partnership in the 2016 elections. The partnership won nine of the 12 senatorial slots in 2013 and would still have a chance even with the much ballyhooed Binay candidacy. For now, Villar is saying that it is still too early to plan for 2012 but with Binay announcing that he will be forming his new party in June, the political season for 2016 may actually be starting in four months.
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The Rotary Club of Pasig together with the Rotary Club of Mutya ng Pasig and the Rotary Club of San Diego Paradise Valley had a joint medical mission at the Pamantasan ng Lungsod ng Pasig last Saturday where more than 1,400 residents of the City of Pasig were treated and given medicines brought in by the volunteers from San Diego Paradise Valley and local medical staff. Surgeries were performed on boils and other minor surgeries and circumcisions.
There were pediatricians, surgeons and nurses in attendance.
This is the second year that the medical mission from San Diego Paradise Valley has come to Pasig before proceeding to the Visayas and North Luzon where they will also hold medical missions. A sisterhood agreement between the Rotary Club of Pasig and the Rotary Club of San Diego Paradise Valley in the works which will assure that the Rotarians from San Diego will continue to come to Pasig on a medical mission year after year.
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