Modus vivendi

NO BATTLE royale. No clash of titans. No war of attrition.

Not even a tempest in a teapot – that which was anticipated, indeed prognosticated, by just about every local political observer worth his rocking armchair has ingloriously come to.  

Naught, absolutely nada.   

So, Vice Gov. Dennis G. Pineda and 4^th District Rep. Juan Pablo P. Bondoc will not face off for the governorship of Pampanga. Not this 2019, at least.

On the contrary, as Sun-Star Pampanga gloriously bannered: Rimpy, Delta forge alliance.

“The right thing to do.” So was Bondoc quoted in the SSP scoop, ascending to the plane of statesmanship, thus: “I do not see anything wrong in being humble. I am bowing my head to Governor (Dennis) Pineda because I know that he can be the key in providing progress for my beloved cabalen in the fourth district of Pampanga which has been my family’s mission for decades now. And instead of becoming a hindrance, I wanted to be an instrument in providing that progress.”

Some sense of self-sacrifice there. The subordination of personal ambition to the greater interest, to the higher good, of the people. Can anything be more sublime than this?

Pineda could not be any more gracious, and grateful: “We have known the Bondocs for true public service for the Kapampangans. In fact, we can say that we owe to them the growth and development of the fourth district over the years and that is the sole reason we came to this moment.”
Neither bargains nor deals, political or otherwise, Pineda said effected this mutuality but the shared goal of “honest public service to the Kapampangan.”

Beyond the political, the Pineda family, their scion said, are inclined to build “genuine and lasting” friendship with the Bondocs.

All’s well that ally well, then: to Delta the governorship, to Rimpy the fourth district.

Clear enough. But how well will this “alliance” play at the political downstream?

In the fourth district, it is well known how Bondoc birthed, nurtured, and grew board members, mayors, vice mayors, councilors, down to barangay chairmen.

Contemporaneously, the Pinedas prepped and propped up their own loyal confederates in the local government units.

There had never been any instance when the Bondocs and Pinedas went into direct rivalries, true. But in many an election past, the contests for board members, mayors and their slates were no more than proxy wars, with the real opposing forces that were these political families disengaged from the actual combat.

Now, will this so-called “alliance” lead to the fielding of common bets, euphemized as “unity candidates,” with equity of the incumbent as basic premium for selection?          

But how will this play in municipalities with graduating incumbents, like San Simon, Macabebe, and San Luis? Or in Bacolor and Porac, though out of the Bondocs’ fourth district domain?

Or, the Bondocs be given carte blanche in their district, in exchange for their exclusion in the rest of Pampanga?

Or, will the “alliance” walk the path of least resistance that is libre zona? That is, open season, a free-for-all comers, with their patrons totally hands off the battles?

Whichever, this Bondoc-Pineda or Pineda-Bondoc bruited “alliance,” all but oral and aural absent any duly signed supporting document, appears to be least an alliance and most a modus vivendi, in its elemental meaning of “an arrangement or agreement allowing conflicting parties to coexist peacefully, either indefinitely or until a final settlement is reached.”

This is no disparagement, though, of the efforts of Minalin Mayor Edgar Flores credited to have brokered the “momentous event” marking “the continuous development for the Kapampangan province to be spearheaded by the gentlemen-leaders.”
If anything, the 2019 elections in Pampanga will be differently interesting.