The decider

Something really odd is happening in Philippine politics.

Less than three months from now, candidates for national positions will be filing their certificates of candidacy.

But other than Vice President Jejomar Binay, who is gearing for a presidential run, nobody has categorically announced yet his desire to run for a national post.

The weirdest thing of all is that the administration Liberal Party has yet to firm up a national slate. Normally, politicians practically fall all over themselves to be with the party in power.

Getting a slot is decided by a party caucus wherein stalwarts engage in a free-for-all contest to determine the fittest.

As we can see, this is not happening in the LP because of the mind-set that Interior and Local Government Secretary Manuel “Mar” Roxas II, after giving way to President Benigno S. Aquino III in the 2010 presidential race, is the default candidate for the highest position of the land.

The thing is, there appears no “universal clamor” from partisans and coalition partners for Roxas to bear the flag mainly because he is unpopular with voters.

This is indicated by survey results where he is nailed in number 3 or 4 in the rankings.

Senator Grace Poe is on top of the heap followed by Vice President Binay.

More than five years as a member of the Aquino Cabinet, Roxas should have already cemented his status as next-in-line with all the executive department’s resources at his command — in the DILG and PNP and before that as DOTC Secretary but he remains a cellar-dweller in the surveys.

Will his grade improve if he goes around in the company of Senator Poe?

This seems to be the rationale behind President Aquino’s request for Poe to be seen in public with Roxas, hoping that her good vibes with the public would rub off on the DILG executive, clearly a last recourse to boost his popularity ratings.

The idea suggests that Sen. Grace Poe would be able to mollify the feelings of people in Metro Manila who are mad at how they are being made to suffer daily when they ride the decrepit Metro Manila Transit.

This is a widespread protest among the working class in the National Capital Region and because the government is missing in their daily grievance, I’m not sure if Roxas will gain pogi points just by basking in the presence of Sen. Poe.

In the provinces, the situation is even worse.  I recently met a colleague from the cooperative sector, Mr. Allan Bartolo who runs a community radio station in Bugasong, Antique.

The station has been besieged by complaints from victims of super typhoon Yolanda who, more than one year and six months after the devastation, have not been able to receive the Emergency Shelter Assistance (ESA) promised them by the Dept. of Social Welfare Services.

The victims went through the process of proper documentation but the P30,000-ESA per beneficiary was just good on paper.

Some 3,000 of them whose houses were totally damaged were made to wait and wait, same thing with more than 800 people whose houses were partially damaged and were authorized to receive P10,000 each.

A one-day delay can cost lives such that a week or a month’s delay in the delivery of financial assistance to calamity victims would be systematic criminal neglect and here we’re talking of a year-and-a-half delay in a region that is supposedly close to Roxas’ home province, Capiz.

To make matters worse for the people of Bugasong is that their local officials did nothing to help them, according to Mr. Bartolo.

Beleaguered by complaints day and night, Bartolo organized his townmates to air their grievances in a mass protest at the public plaza two months ago.

The angry crowd vented their emotions, which were broadcast by the community radio station.

This pressured the regional DSWS in Iloilo to process and finally release the financial assistance last June.

I understand the Deputy Ombudsman for the Visayas is looking into this case which is not isolated because after Mr. Bartolo posted this in the social media, Mr. Alexis Yu, another co-operative leader based in Basey, Western Samar came forward to air similar complaints.

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In 2010, the LP cobbled a coalition with other parties that propelled P-Noy’s election. The Nationalist People’s Coalition, Lakas NUCD and the Nacionalista Party together with some party-list organizations are clearly biding their time for LP events to take their course before making any decision.

I think the coalition could hold if it’s a Grace-Chiz team-up but if it’s a Mar-Grace, the partners would each go his own way, either support the administration ticket or cross over to the opposition with Binay.

The probability then that President Aquino will pick Senator Grace Poe as the LP candidate for president is very likely and the sorties that she, together with Mar and Chiz, will conduct in the coming days could be the decider in the selection of her running mate.

The whole point of the exercise is really to pin down the most winnable candidate for president but even a Grace-Mar equation can still be tricky.