\Of all national politicians eyeing a major berth in 2016, Senate Majority Floor Leader Allan Peter Cayetano would come out as the most visible in Cebu City nowadays.
Last month, he visited fire victims in Barangay Lorega and distributed cash and medical assistance. Recently he gave a check to the Cebu City United Vendors Association by way of affirming the vendors’ co-op micro lending services. Before he graced the 17th General Assembly of the Cebu News Workers Multi-Purpose Cooperative last April 26, the senator addressed another group in an uptown hotel.
The youngish solon suffers from asthma but his hectic schedule especially now that Congress is in recess belies his physical affliction. His FB page is like a collection of pictorials culled from speaking engagements made before high school graduates, beauty pageants, conventions, seminars, sports events, aid distribution sorties and courtesy calls to his office by celebrities like boxing great, Manny Pacquiao. If anybody out there still doubts his commitment to run for president, the pictures in the social networking site will provide some answer.
There is another dimension to Sen. Cayetano’s busy calendar because gracing social and civic events isn’t all that simple. The senator said as much when he revealed during last week’s NewsCoop assembly that he had to ask the help of Cebu City Mayor Michael “Mike” Rama to pave the way for his engagements in Cebu.
This is interesting because national politicians don’t really need the nod of local leaders if, for example, a senator intends to distribute relief goods to calamity victims. But since local politicians have direct power over barangay leaders and influence on national agencies and private organizations, a national politician who is on the good side of a local leader is assured there would be an organized assembly that will hear his speech and accept the material aid.
The program actually enables the official to interact with key officers of national agencies, urban poor groups and grassroots leaders and engage them in substantial discussions on what to do with the problem brought by the calamity.
The template of Sen. Allan Peter Cayetano bears the bottoms-up approach towards development and the engagement defuses the tension caused by poverty in many marginal communities. That alone is service and if he keeps his promise of bringing state resources and aid from private partners to realize noteworthy projects, why should a local leader prevent his visit to Cebu City’s inner communities?
That is precisely the point Cebu City Mayor Michael Rama made when asked to comment on reports that there is more than meets the eye in the friendly relations between him and Cayetano.
Mike has denied the rumor but can a highly probable scenario be taken lightly?
Cebu City is vote-rich. Its total population of more than 866,000 according to the 2010 census is like a magnet to politicians. The voting population of Cebu province is pegged at more than 2.5 million, the biggest voting population among all provinces in the country.
I’m not saying the cat is out of the bag, but one thing is sure. The Cayetano-Rama buzz will not die down right away. I think Sen. Cayetano’s gray matter went on overdrive when he addressed what I think was the surprise question of the day.
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The senator from Taguig was well-prepared when quizzed about published reports that his name appears on the supposed list of pork barrel scammers along with two Cabinet secretaries and 9 other legislators apart from Senators Juan Ponce Enrile, Jinggoy Estrada and Bong Revilla.
Cayetano urged Justice Secretary Leila de Lima to release Janet Lim Napoles’ tell-all affidavit so he can meet the accusation head-on. By referring to the Daily Tribune report which published the list allegedly furnished by former illegal drugs whistle-blower Sandra Cam, I guess Sen. Cayetano was saying the report came from a polluted source.
The rest of the questions during the conference had been more or less anticipated by the good senator, but there was another item that I think he didn’t expect would crop up. It is about the conflicts now rocking the cooperative sector. I only managed to mention the quarrel between the electric cooperatives and the National Electrification Administration but even then, our
interaction was nothing substantive. For lack of space I will refer readers to two previous columns I wrote on the subject (Quo Vadis, Electric Co-ops?)
The bigger issue, one, which I wasn’t able to raise because he was in a hurry to leave for Manila is the move by Congress to amend the Charter of the Cooperative Development Authority. The amendment to the Cooperative Act of 2008 is viewed by many as being manipulated by vested interests in order to weaken the cooperative sector. It is no coincidence that the NEA Reform Act, which diminished the authority of CDA over the power cooperatives had been passed and now Congress is targeting the regulatory body through an amendment that would further weaken the sector.
Sen. Cayetano introduced himself during the NewsCoop general assembly as a member of a successful co-op based in Taguig City. As a fellow co-operator, I challenge him to show his wares as genuine legislator and advocate of cooperatives by looking into the opposition of power co-ops against the NEA Reform Act. CDA national executives, regional directors, officials and ordinary employees have likewise signed a position paper demanding that Congress reconsider its moves to amend the Cooperative Act of 2008.