WE really cannot help but pity those candidates running as independents or claiming to be with a particular party but who are actually not included in the official line-up. Yes, that is what is happening in Davao City where there are those aspirants for the City Council who run as independent candidates or mostly doing the best they could to get affiliated in the administration party but failed for some reasons or another.
For example former councilor Nilo “Small” Abellera who was once a proud in the official ticket of thes Hugpong ng Pagbabago (HNP) of Mayor and now Vice Presidential candidate Sara Duterte, and of the Hugpong sa Tawong Lungsod, the (HTL), the main body of HNP, is now campaigning on his lonesome in the barangays of the First District. Then we have Lyndon Banzon, a somewhat perennial candidate having small meetings in areas like the relocation site in Ma-a and some other blighted communities in the city proper.
Small Abellera was, during the initial formation of the HNP-HTL line-up, assured of inclusion along with then filer Leah Librado. But suddenly Nilo got booted out in favor of other candidates. However, it would seem that the “die is cast” as far as “Small” is concerned. So, there is no more turning back for the former first district councilor in his seeking for a new term.
Banzon on the other hand, may have tried his best to get into the circle of the “chosen ones” of the administration party gods. Nonetheless, his efforts were probably enough, or that his total personality may not be up to the standards required by the Party to be considered as acceptable for its official candidates. So like “Small” Abellera, Banzon is on his own with perhaps a little help from some loyal friends who see the sincerity of his intention to serve the people of the first district.
Good on the part of Ms. Leah Librado. After she was “disengaged” from the initial HNP-HTL official line-up like Abellera she immediately decided to withdraw her candidacy. Now her problem is only limited to making her final choices for Mayor, Vice Mayor and the councilors. And for sure she knew them very well, their ins and outs. So making her final decision who to vote will not be difficult for her.
But how true is the report that Librado’s departure from the HNP-HTL official line-up was caused by her failure to hold the horses of her former Chief-of-Staff from squaring with one of the administration party gods? True or not it really does not matter now. The political battle is nor on its third hot week and the hurt is now getting even deeper.
In the third district we learned that at least two reelection seekers are still having some possible nightmares despite the assumption that they are sure winners. One is again, reported to have committed acts that made the gods uncomfortable. The other is believed to be hampered in the campaign efforts because of some unexpected family problems.
On the whole those aspirants for councilors who are expressly carried in the official ticket of the administration in all of Davao City’s three districts may have better sleep in the remaining nights of this election season.
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Some senators are proposing a Senate probe to draw to the surface why the alleged P203 billion pesos inheritance tax on the late Ferdinand Marcos Sr.’s supposed estate has remained uncollected. It is apparent though that those who are making so much noise about the issue are those who are after the neck of front-running Presidential candidate Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr.
We believe the investigation will only be focused on the officials of the government agency tasked to compute and collect the tax – the Bureau of Internal Revenue and the men and women who once headed it. And since the determination of the original amount of tax was done as far back as 1997 then the Senate probe must have to work back to some four past administrations with different Department of Finance and BIR chiefs.
Our hunch though is that the failure to collect the tax or the payment by the executor of the estate to pay what is computed as due the government is the vagueness of some, if not all, of the basis of the determination of the supposed Marcos properties, the computation of the taxes due, and the context with which the finality of the Supreme Court ruling was arrived at.
Wasn’t it that the administrations of Cory Aquino, President Fidel Ramos, and that of the recently demised former President Benigno Aquino III the most opportune time to have the collection done? What made these administrations fail miserably on that supposed priority mission? The three administrations have all the power and influence during those times but they did not. If at all, it is only the lack of clarity as to the legal basis of the action they would have taken that hindered them from doing even the radical approach in collection.
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