Our good shepherd

 

“IF WE really pray together, (we would discern that) one cannot monopolize truth. Truth begins in the heart, the sanctuary of our conscience.”

Thus spoke the Most Reverend Paciano B. Aniceto, archbishop of San Fernando, at the thanksgiving Mass in celebration of his 71st birthday on Sunday.

He could well be speaking of that sector of society that has arrogated unto itself all possession of truth. But, no, the archbishop’s sermon encompasses all the faithful, their individual politics undistinguished.

In the presence of Her Excellency, President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, the Reverend Governor Eddie T. Panlilio, Congressman Dong Gonzales, City of San Fernando Mayor Oscar Rodriguez, and a host of other politicians and local leaders who were allowed through the stringent security measures imposed by the Presidential Security Guard at the Mother of Good Counsel Seminary, Apu Ceto shone as the shepherd truly worthy of his flock.

To Apu Ceto, there never are black sheep. He has faith in the goodness inherent in anyone, even among those who have gone astray. I should know, I was once Apu Ceto’s most prodigal child, converted by his faith in his God and his belief in me, notwithstanding my frailties.

“We need to purify and change. If we follow that process, we will have a peaceful and just society with integrity. You should watch and pray that you don’t fall into temptation.”

“Our country is at a crossroad. We are a divided people, eternally quarreling, bickering. Some media contribute to this. We are falling into the pit.” Apu Ceto warns.

But instead of taking his flock to the streets of protests to foment greater divisions, Apu Ceto, pointed them to the way that he has always embraced:

“We are asking the Lord to permeate every stratum of society. Families and leaders should work so there is a holistic approach in the search for a real, authentic, common good, for the progress and development of our people.”

Ora et labora. Pray and work. Christian life at its most essential.

“Let us pray together, discern together so that we could know the will of God for the Filipino people.”

Apu Ceto laid down anew, the very ground upon which sprang the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines pastoral statement on truth. That which, Apu Ceto lamented, made the shepherds “unpopular.”

He cautioned those that found cause for impatience, if not disbelief, in the pastoral statement: “The Church is a sign of contradiction but it comes from a position of strength because the center of evangelization is Jesus.”

Oh, how conveniently have we Christians forgotten the very paradox of our faith: of spiritual strength in human weakness, of the triumph in the Cross, of being born in dying.

“We have to give the precise mission of the Church, we do not respond to external pushes only. Intrinsic in its nature and mission, the Church must define society, not society defining us.”

Apu Ceto has spoken. And eloquently. Now, were the more loquacious – and mediaphilic – of our churchmen as discerning as him…

(Zona Libre, March 2008. Reprinted on the occasion of the Archbishop Emeritus of San Fernando Most Rev. Paciano B. Aniceto’s 85th birthday, March 9, 2022) 

 

 

Tragedy and farce

 EDSA UNO gifted the world with “people power.” The phrase was readily accredited to Cardinal Sin after he went on air to call on the nation “to use your power as a people” initially to “save” the embattled mutineers led by Enrile and Ramos from sure annihilation by the Marcos forces.

I do not mean to pull the rug from under the now dearly lamented Sin. Neither do I claim the gift of prescience or prophecy, but in the April 8-14, 1984 issue of The Voice – two months short of two years before EDSA Uno – the phrase already appeared in my Ingkung Milio column, thus titled:

People Power and the Filipino 

IN THE annals of political struggles, war included, people power has long claimed its rightful place as the major determining factor in the outcome.

This power received its utmost glorification in the social philosophies of Marx as embodied in his Communist Manifesto and put to empirical application in the Soviet and Chinese revolutions and countless other uprisings in those moulds, as well as in the failed Allende experiment in Chile.

That great Asian, Mao Tse-tung, summed up the potency of people power in various quotations in his Little Red Book, most prominent of which was: “The people are the ocean, we are the fish that swim in that ocean.” There too was his stratagem of marshalling the people from the countryside toward the encirclement of the cities.

With all these leftward tendencies of people power harnessing, populism has come to be identified with the communist prescription of wresting power from the ruling circle.

In its essence however, any move, be it parliamentary or revolutionary, has to mobilize people power to reach its successful or liberating end.

While we have seen people power in the collective anguish and indignation over Ninoy Aquino’s assassination, we have yet to see it in terms of concrete moves directed at our socioeconomic and political liberation.

Our history as a people is so replete with the kisses of Judas that they have become part and parcel of the Filipino psyche.

The betrayal of the Katipunan, Vicos to Diego Silang, the Macabebe scouts in Tirad Pass and Palanan (a still-debatable issue), the Makapili during the Japanese Occupation, not to mention the American boys and unconscionable cronies, are glaring examples of the quislings who have always sold their country and their people in exchange for personal gains.

More glaring even are the current events related to the coming Batasan polls.

The Opposition is united only in name – the first word in its acronym UNIDO. Beyond that, there is not even the finest thread that holds them together.

True, they all have an aversion to Marcos. Truer yet, they all draw “strength and inspiration” from the martyred Ninoy Aquino. Truest though, there is no clear-cut, selfless and nationalistic ideological basis for all their actions.

Rather, it is a case of everyone to his own selfish motive and ambition.

Invoking guidance from the sacrifice of Ninoy, they aspire – conspire may be the apt word – to move the people to exercise their potency for change. Not for the people’s own welfare, in the ultimate analysis, but for the advancement of their personal political ambitions.

It is Robespierre and his manipulation of the French masses in the 1790s all over again. Nearer home, it is the Tejeros debacle restaged in a not-totally dissimilar setting.

The fault however does not solely lie in these opportunists. Much of the blame is traceable to the people themselves.

The people, in all naivete and perhaps due to their fatalism bred by colonizers, foreign and home-grown, have been so accustomed to their hapless state that they could not see a power greater than the gun or the peso, even the devalued one. Bonifacio’s walis tingting has yet to form from the countless coconut ribs lying for the picking.

For a mere pittance, even those who wailed the most at Aquino’s wake and funeral found themselves like sheep herded to provide an audience to some ruler’s folly.

We will see more of these idiocies until May 14. To impress the greater mass of voters, politicians would pay for every shout of “Mabuhay!” and for every wearer of a vote T-shirt, for every trumped-up attestation of love for a candidate.

People power? In many a Third World country, this is the new order of things. In the Philippines, it is seen more in the powerlessness of the people to rise, stomp their feet, and state that enough is enough.

Ah, yes, despite all these, there is people power in this nation of cowards, to quote Mansfield. To us, that power is the people’s strength in crying out in pain for years, and their power to bear all sorts of insults and injustice. And their powerful refusal too to transform anguish into a fiery zeal for their own liberation.

Ninoy, you may have been wrong. It seems the Filipino is not worth dying for. AND THEN came EDSA Uno.

A vindication of Ninoy, his widow in yellow triumphant. Shining moment of the Filipino before the admiring world. Brief shining moment like the mythical Camelot, it turned out. Within 10 years, the Marcoses were back, their northern bailiwick as strong as ever.

A short 15 years after, EDSA Dos came. No, not against the dictator’s remnants, but one petty excuse for a president.

Another Aquino, the BS III in an interregnum of sorts, sampling Pampanga’s Glory-Been in his self-caricature of Mr. Clean.

In another 15 years from EDSA’s second coming, the nation descended to Duterte’s despotism.

2022. But one generation removed from the original EDSA, comes the son and namesake of the dictator at the cusp of claiming his birthright to the presidency.

Never again. Never forget. Not ever in the Filipino, alas.

Marx paraphrased: History repeating itself in the tragedy that was Marcos and the farce that is Marcos Junior.

Santayana impacted: Unlearning of the lessons of history, we are a people dumbed, we are a nation damned.

Rabelais dead-on: “Draw the curtains, the farce is played.”

Game over.

(Punto! Feb. 22, 2022)

The Capampangan

THERE IS much ado about the Capampangan.

More than a tribe, the old Capampangan prides himself as a separate race. Perhaps in bitter rebellion against the diminution of his once vast kingdom that was said to have stretched from the mouth of the Pasig in Tondo to the upper reaches of the Chico River in Cagayan Valley.

Mayhaps, in a vicious reaction to the consequent waning of the primacy of his lingua franca which is now limited to just the province and the southern half of Tarlac, plus a single town in each of Pampanga’s contiguous provinces of Bataan, Bulacan, and Nueva Ecija.

He may not be the distinct species that he likes to make of himself, but the Capampanga unarguably stands out when ranged against his Filipino fellows. You will know the Capampangan, easily.

Food is his passion. A gourmand is the Capampangan as he turns snails and frogs, dogs and field mice, pythons and cobras, locusts and mole crickets into exotic dishes rivaling ambrosia itself. And no meal for him without the attendant condiments of patis, toyo, and aslam.

And who could love the pungent buro more, other than the Capampangan?

How the Capampangan loves to party! Just about every occasion is a cause for celebration. A Capampangan fiesta is unrivalled in the excesses of bacchanalia. The fattened calf or pig, even good old Bantay, get served on the Capampangan table. Beer goes by the truckful. No money is no excuse to feast. E ca macapagtawó? Ala cang marine tau. Nananu ya itang mag-five-six qng cantu? Feast for the day, all the year to the usurer.

Fashion is an everyday statement. In colleges and universities, the ubiquitous Capampangan student is the one dressed to the nines but with barely a dime. Just about everywhere he is togged as though ever-ready to a party.

Dance is a religion. Even before the fad of disco and ballroom dancing, the Capampangan has had – dating to the turn of the century, the 19th to the 20th pa – Circulo Fernandino in the capital town, Bachelor’s Club, later Thomasian in Sto. Tomas, Old Legs in Bacolor, Batubalani in Guagua, Maharajah in Macabebe, Now and Then in Minalin, and a host of other annual formal dances where the local crème de la crème shine in their best fineries.

Porma is his way of life. When a Kapampangan earns – even barely enough – the first thing he buys is a car, never a house. Why? Ninanu ca, malyari meng apidala-dalang pamorma ing bale?

Now you know the reason behind the labeling of the Capampangan as mayabang. Part of this also is his “sugar mentality” raised, no doubt, in the province’s once fertile sugarlands. More than a sweet tooth and a diabetic constitution, the Capampangan possesses a saccharine tongue.

Just you listen when he woos the object of his affection. Or eavesdrop to his whispers to the subject of his seduction. And wonder no more why the Capampangan is a lahing sibuburian, if not a lahing pipicutan.

The Capampangan’s mastery with words is manifested too in the number of cabalens in literature and in the media. Just about every newspaper in Manila has a Capampangan for an editor, columnist, deskman, or reporter.

Of course, there are the laughables about the Capampangan.

When the deadly H-fever epidemic was wreaking havoc in Metro Manila and elsewhere, it was joked about that Pampanga would be spared. Why? The Capampangan has no H in his language, silly.

Which brings to mind that tongue-twister that landed me a grade of 70 in high-school Pilipino after I read it thus: Hako hay naiipan ng anging hamian hat hako’y napa-alak-ak, a-a-a-a-a.

Having not the letter H in the language is nothing to be ashamed of though. This is part of the Kapampangan’s Spanish heritage. Remember in lengua Español, the letter H is silent. O, nanu pang asabi mu?

Positivizing the negative is a Kapampangan attribute. Finding opportunity in adversity is imbued in the Kapampangan character. Yes, there was more than sloganeering or rhetorics in the late Governor Bren Z. Guiao’s E co magmalun, mibangun ya ing Pampanga immediately after the eruption of Mount Pinatubo. It was a call to the resiliency innate in the Capampangan. Proven in time by the leaps and bounds the province has taken rising, then soaring from Pinatubo’s ashes of devastation and despair…

Luid ya ing Capampangan.

(First published in The Voice, Dec. 6-12, 1998 – all of 23 years ago. Uploaded on the occasion of the 450th anniversary of the foundation of the Province of Pampanga, Dec. 11, 2021) 

 

'Dugong aso' deconstructed

ALDO NING KAPAMPANGAN. Celebrating the 450th founding anniversary of the Province of Pampanga started with a Holy Mass concelebrated by San Fernando Archbishop Florentino Lavarias and Archbishop Emeritus Paciano B. Aniceto and half a dozen priests at the Capitiol grounds on Monday.

This was immediately followed by the lighting of the Capitol’s Christmas displays. All other events traditionally included in the annual celebrations, foremostly the Mutya ning Kapampangan pageant and the Most Outstanding Kapampangan Awards, have been cancelled for the second straight year owing to the pandemic.

The pause, the quiet accorded the festivities, gives a good time to really reflect on the Kapampangan soul.

Rather than go to the breast-thumping “Kapampangan Ku, Pagmaragul Ku” conceit and think hard of what I can really be proud of as a Kapampangan, I chose to look at that singular disparagement of the Kapampangan in the eyes of all the other “nations” of the archipelago – from the Ilocano to the Bicolano, the Waray and the Ilonggo, the Cebuano, the Maranaw, etcetera.

Aye, the Kapampangan dog-tagged – it can’t be any more literal – as dugong aso.

Quick trip through my yellowed archives brought back this piece written and rewritten some years back –

…DOGS ARE clichéd as man’ts best friend, yet they tend to get the choicest cuts in the worst insults. “Gone to the dogs,” for instance.

Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago riled the usually cat-cool Sen. Panfilo Lacson (not my relative) not so much for calling him “Pinky” as for branding him as Sen. Juan Ponce Enrile’s “attack dog.” Warranting a reply in kind from the former top cop. A case of “dog-eat-dog” there?

“Tuta ng Kano (America’s puppy).” So, the militant Left derided Ferdinand E. Marcos, Cory Aquino, Fidel Ramos, and all those who followed them to Malacañang down to Cory’s son BS.

Even the venerable Carlos P. Romulo, who served eight Philippine presidents – from Quezon to Marcos – and who himself sat as president – of the Fourth Session of the United Nations General Assembly in 1949-1950, was not spared of a similar epithet. No idle urban legend but a revealed truth to student activists of the First Quarter Storm was Chou En-Lai’s dismissal of Romulo as “America’s running dog” at the Bandung Conference of Asian and African nations in 1955 that helped crystallized the Non-Aligned Movement.

At the time of Cory too, I remember the Malacañang Press Corps raising a howl over a presidential factotum’s obvert reference to them as mongrels when he directed his staff to “feed the kennel” whenever his office issued press releases.

For too long a time, a collective insult, indeed, a curse, to the whole Kapampangan race is the branding “dugong aso.”

In 1981, the political leadership of Pampanga – from Gov. Estelito P. Mendoza, Vice Gov. Cicero J. Punzalan, down to the mayors led by the “Big 5” of San Fernando’s Armando Biliwang, Arayat’s Benigno Espino, Magalang’s Daniel Lacson, Sta. Ana’s Magno Maniago, and Sta. Rita’s Frank Ocampo, along with Angeles City’s Francisco G. Nepomuceno, raged and ranted rabidly at then Olongapo City Mayor Richard J. Gordon for citing the Kapampangans as dugong aso in the context of regionalism’s ill-effects to nationalism in his nomination speech for Ferdinand E. Marcos in the KBL party convention at the Manila Hotel.

Actual physical threats were even thrown Gordon’s way in addition to some persona non grata resolutions. (Gordon’s topping Pampanga in the senatorial contest of May 2013, is some vindication of the forgiving-and-forgetting nature of this race.)

Lapid

Even as dugong aso stuck to the Kapampangan, the insult accruing thereat has largely dissipated. This is owed to an extent to then Gov. Lito Lapid, as we wrote here some time ago:

“Ikinagagalit nating mga Kapampangan ang pagtawag sa atin ng ‘dugong aso.’ Subali’t ito ay ipinagmamalaki’t ikinararangal ko. Sa katapatan, wala nang mauuna pa sa aso: sa kanya iniiwan ng amo ang tahanan nito, pati na magkaminsan ang pagtatanggol sa kanyang pamilya. Subukin mong saktan ang amo, at tiyak, dadambain ka ng kanyang aso. Ang katapatang ito ang iniaalay ko sa inyo.” (We Kapampangans get slighted when told the blood of dogs runs in our veins. But I find pride and honor in this. When it comes to loyalty, none beats the dog: to it man leaves the protection of his home, at times even the defense of his family. Try to hit a man and his dog will surely attack you. This is the kind of loyalty I off er you.)

Before a beaming President Ramos at the Mawaque Resettlement Project site in 1997, Lapid pledged his loyalty in gratitude for the new lease on human decency, on human life itself that El Tabaco bestowed upon those the Mount Pinatubo eruptions devastated, displaced, and dispossessed.

Thence, the Bida embraced FVR’s Lakas- NUCD with a fidelity his wife could only wish he committed to his marital vows with as much devotion, if not intensity.

Lapid there made a rarity: loyalty being an uncommon commodity in politics. So, what is it that makes politicians and adulterers one and the same as a dysfunctional radio? Low fidelity on a high frequency, dummy…

There too was Lapid giving a novel and noble meaning to the derogatory dugong aso impacted in the Kapampangan psyche, extolling it as the virtue of katapatan, of dogged loyalty to an elder, to a superior, to a friend. No mean feat for the uncolleged Lapid.

But for the title “Of dogs and men,” there is very little I remember of a column I wrote in The Voice in the late ‘70s. It would have made a most relevant read in the subject I am discussing here. The ending of that column though is something I cannot possibly just easily forget, having consigned it as much to the mind as to the heart and put out at every opportunity that calls for it, like now.

A lesson in loyalty – of dogs, as well as of men – perfectly captured in that blurb of an award-winning Lino Brocka movie: “Sa bawa’t latay, kahit aso’y nag-iiba. Sa unang latay, siya’y magtatanda; Sa ikalawa, siya’y mag-iisip; Sa ikatlo, siya’y magtataka; Sa ika-apat, humanda ka!” (At every lash, even a dog changes. At the first, it would learn. At the second, it would think. At the third, it would wonder. At the fourth, brace yourself!)

Caveat canis. Beware of the dog. Yes, there is more to what the Latins of old put up at their gates than its literal meaning.

Tantingco

GOOD-BYE, Dugong Aso.

Thus, the erudite Robby Tantingco, head of the Center for Kapampangan Studies at the Holy Angele University, slugged his Facebook post three years ago.

He wrote: “Have you noticed? There is hardly any Filipino anymore who calls Kapampangans ‘dugong aso’. We have successfully asserted ourselves and changed the conversation to the other narratives of the multi-layered story of our amazing people. So, once and for all, and to put the last nail on the coffin of this subject matter, let us stop blaming the Macabebe Scouts alone…for the capture of Aguinaldo in Palanan in 1901…”

And, with their corresponding mug shots and briefs of their dastardly deed, Robby laid the blame on Spanish Capt. Lazaro Segovia, Ilocano Cecilio Seguismundo, and Tagalog Maj. Hilario Talplacido as having betrayed Aguinaldo.

Lamented Robby: “And yet it was the foot soldiers, the Macabebes, who bore the brunt of the nation’s anger which resulted in the unfair racial profiling of all Kapampangans as ‘traydor’ and ‘dugong aso.’”

Rightly, and reasonably, Robby: “How could the Macabebes, who never served in Aguinaldo’s army and therefore could not have betrayed him, be branded as traitors, and not these three defectors? They were merely doing their job as hired soldiers of the American military, and were actually exacting vengeance on a man they hated with all their heart and soul (for killing Andres Bonifacio whose roots were in Macabebe, and for ordering the burning of the Macabebe church).”

I commented: From another perspective, the Macabebe scouts should even be hailed as heroes. Aguinaldo’s messiahnic delusions deprived the revolution of its father, Bonifacio and its only real military brains, Luna.

While over a score liked what I said, the overwhelming majority of reactions were more of relief and gladness at Robby’s reasoned contextualization of a historical event in expunging from the Kapampangan race the canard of a canine bloodline.

Luid ya ing Kapampangan!

 (Punto, Dec. 8, 2021)

Anak ng Ama: Sino ba talaga?

 
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 ANAK NG Ama. Mula sa Pampanga. Alay sa Masa.

Ito ang bansag sa sarili ng kandidato sa pagka-gobernador na si Danilo “Boy” Baylon, naging punongbayan ng Candaba sa isang termino, nakilala sa mga manok na ipinamamahagi hindi lamang sa kanyang bayan kundi sa buong lalawigan. 

Higit na kumintal sa kaisipan ng balana ang kanyang iwing pagka-makadiyos, sa kanyang mabuting pangangaral katuwang ang kanyang maybahay na si Apo Aniway na kandidato naman sa pagka-punong bayan ng Candaba.

 

Dios. Dignidad, Disiplina. Ana nga ng kaniyang bansag na kawikaan. At ayon na rin sa kanya, “atas ng Paginoon” ang kaniyang pagtakbo sa pagkagubernador.

“Ang wika ng Ama, sa araw daw na mag-file kami ng COC ng aking asawa, panalo na raw ang maraming taong naghihirap sa buong Pampanga, maging sila man ay nasa kabilang panig pa!” aniya sa kanyang Facebook page.

“Kaya anuman ang aming maranasang paghadlang, hirap, paninira at pananakot... ang lahat ng ito ay hinahandog namin sa mga tao at higit sa lahat...Sa Dios!!!,” dagdag pa ni Baylon. 

At ito na nga ang nangyari: Inihagkis sa kanya, “Bulaang propeta,” sigaw na kumalat hanggang mamaos sa social media. Pinag-iingat ang mga manghahalal na Kapampangan na huwag maging hangal at maniwala na lamang sa mga “nagsisilapit sa inyo na may damit tupa, datapuwa’t sa loob ay mga lobong maninila.” Mula Mateo 7:15-16, mismo.

Lalo pa ngang tumimo sa kaisipan ng balana ang babala laban sa mga mababangis na lobong nagdadamit tupa sa mga naging pangyayari sa Amerika kung saan inihabla ang isa pang nagpahayag ng sarili na “hinirang na anak ng Diyos” – si Pastor Apollo Quiboloy, tagapagtatag at pinuno ng Kingdom of Jesus Christ, the Name Above Every name at mismong espirituwal na tagapayo ni Pangulong Rodrigo Duterte – sa patong-patong na mga kaso ng “sex trafficking of children, sex trafficking by force, fraud and coercion, marriage fraud, money laundering, cash smuggling and visa fraud.”

Lubha mang napakalayo ni Baylon kay Quiboloy, sa isip ng marami ay hindi pa rin ito ganap na maihiwalay sa kapahayagang “bulaan,” bunga na rin ng kanilang eksklusibong kapatiran bilang mga bugtong na “Anak ng Ama/Diyos.”

Hindi. Hindi ko sinasabi, lalo’t hindi naniniwalang bulaan si Baylon. Ang pagsama sa kanya ni dating Gubernador Reberendo Ed Panlilio, ang talunan sa pagka-gobernador na dating alkalde ng Bacolor Jomar Hizon, dating alkalde ng Masantol Peter Flores, dati at muling bumabalik sa pagka-mayor ng Floridablanca Eddie Guerrero, at higit sa lahat dating Candaba Mayor Kuyang Jerry Pelayo ay sapat na para sa akin na hindi maitatatwang katibayan na hindi palsipikadong mangangaral si Baylon.    

Ang maikling sanaysay na ito ay hindi pakikisali sa madaliang paghusga sa kapwa. Ayon na nga sa Mateo 7:1-2 – “Huwag kayong hahatol upang hindi kayo hatulan.

 Ito ay sapagkat sa hatol na inyong ihahatol ay hahatulan kayo. Sa sukat na inyong ipinanukat ay isusukat sa inyo.”

Ang alalahanin ko lamang ay ang pagbansag ni Baylon sa sarili bilang “Anak ng Ama” at ang pinagkakahulugan nitong siya ay “sugo” ng Panginoon sa pagtakbo niya sa pagkagubernador – upang akuin mula sa kadiliman (?) ang lalawigan Kapampangan.  

Tiyak naman na aral si Baylon sa Banal na Aklat gaya ng mga ipinahihiwatig sa nakita kong bidyo ng kanyang pangangaral. Ang hindi ko matanto ay ito: Nabasa kaya niya sa kanyang sipi ng Bibliya kung sino ang tuwirang tinukoy – sa mismong pangalan nito – na “Anak ng Ama”?  

Basa:

At noo'y sila'y may isang bilanggong pusakal na tinatawag na Barabbas. Mateo 27:16

At mayroong isa na kung tawagin ay Barabbas, na nakapiit kasama ng nangaghimagsik, mga taong nagsipatay ng mga tao sa panghihimagsik. Markos 15:7

Datapuwa't silang lahat ay nagsisigawang paminsan, na nangagsabi, ‘Alisin mo ang taong ito, at pawalan mo sa amin si Barabbas.’ Lukas 23:18

Sila nga'y nagsigawang muli, na nangagsasabi: ‘Huwag ang taong ito, kundi si Barabbas.’ Si Barabbas nga'y isang tulisan. Juan 18:40

Datapuwa't inyong pinakatanggihan ang Banal at ang Matuwid na Ito, at inyong hiningi na ipagkaloob sa inyo ang isang mamamatay-tao. Gawa ng mga Apostoles 3:14

Ang ipinagpalit ng mga Hudyo kay Kristo -- si Barabbas, mula salitang Aramaic na Bar Abba na ang tuwirang salin sa Ingles ay “Son of the Father” at sa Tagalog nama’y “Anak ng Ama.” 

Ang akin lamang katanungan: Magmimistulang mga Hudyo ba ang mga Kapampangan sa araw ng halalan at pipillin ang nagtanyag sa kaniyang sarili bilang si Barabbas?

Maghunus-dili naman tayo.

(Mga larawan mula sa Facebook)

Campaign notes

IT IS still a looongg way to the official campaign period but already incumbents, wannabes, has-beens, and never-bes are just about everywhere and anywhere inflicting themselves upon the hapless electorate.

Time anew to take out of the old baul this piece of 2006 vintage with some updated refurbishing.

You have no money? Dream on running, even winning. It won’t cost you a thing. But never wake from that dream and live the nightmare of political realities here.

Even as a candidate, you have already been claimed by the voters to be their personal one-way ATM: no deposit required but ready to dispense cash anytime of the day or night for their power and water bills, cost of hospitalization, expenses for weddings, baptisms and funerals, birthday parties and fiestas, tuition for their kids, even milk for their infants. And yes, loads for their mobiles.

I remember the dearly lamented undefeated mayor of Apalit Tirso Lacanilao who, in one campaign sortie, was asked by a constituent for money to pay for the hospital bills of his wife.

Tirso was already fishing out P500 bills from his wallet when he happened to ask what caused the wife’s hospitalization.

“Menganac ya pu,” came the reply.

“Putanaydamo,” raged Tirso. “Anyang magpacanyaman cang gagawan me ing anac mu e mu na cu man cayabe. Oba’t ngeni cacu mu papabayad ing cayang pamanganac?” Classic Tirso.

You have money? Use it wisely.

Find some free lessons in this costly experience of a board member who ambitioned for a House seat in the 2004 polls.

Well beyond a year to the elections, BM was already crowing that P30,000 was doled out daily to his needy constituents even before the cock crowed in the morning. Into the campaign period, BM upped the ante to P50,000 per day. Still, he ended up in the kangkungan against one whose win earned him the title “Con-doctor.”

His 2004 experience unlearned, BM did the same route in 2007, upping his daily doles to P70,000, only to be picked out of the pansitan against one Cong Dong.

A dilemma: Identified as a generous giver in elections past, BM stands to lose a lot of the ground he covered in 2004 and 2007 if he tightens even just a bit his publicly-perceived-as-enormous campaign chest. Dati kang nagbibigay ng tig-500,  bigla kang magbibigay ng tig-100, magiging masama ka pa sa iyong binigyan. 

The flash of wealth is more a liability than an asset. Still remember Don Pepito Mercado? Throwing money like there’s no tomorrow, the Don soared in the people’s imagination as a mighty, invincible eagle in 1994 only to be reduced to a pitiful pipit in the 1995 gubernatorial polls. Principally because he just stopped being outlandishly generous at the time it counted most – in the middle of the campaign period.

Being official candidate of a party, even of the party in power is no sure-fire guarantee to victory.

In 1992, Marino “Boking” Morales did the unprecedented: He was the official candidate of the two dominant parties at war for the presidency. President Cory Aquino and candidate Fidel V. Ramos of Lakas-NUCD graced Boking’s proclamation rally. At Boking’s miting de avance, it was candidate Ramon V. Mitra that anointed him as the main man in Mabalacat of the LDP.

Dr. Catalino Domingo of the NPC drubbed Boking mightily. Thereafter, Boking though has done more unprecedented things. Like sitting as mayor beyond double the term limit, ultimately unseated only in 2017 – ruling all of 22 years. His attempt for a comeback in 2019, albeit for the vice-mayoralty, ended in a drubbing by his own kin.

In some twist of irony, Boking’s favorite whipping boy Anthony Dee’s no-retreat-no-surrender mantra may have rubbed off on him as Boking tries a comeback anew – for them mayorship in 2022. This time facing a more formidable opponent other than his nemesis, incumbent Mayor Cris Garbo, in his own former factotum Deng Pangilinan.

Barangay chairmen are prized – and highly-priced – acquisitions in elections. But like the party, they are no foolproof certainty to winning.

In 2004, Andrea Dizon-Domingo thrice paraded before the members of media 28 of the 33 barangay chairmen of the City of San Fernando as her committed campaigners.

She ended third placer to eventual winner Oscar S. Rodriguez who had no barangay chairman other than Do Santos of San Agustin in his corner.

Channeling Madame Didi, Dolores village chief Vilma Caluag was accompanied by a number of the 24 barangay chairmen purportedly already in her deep pockets when she filed her COC for San Fernando mayor in 2019. Lightning struck twice with women contesting the mayorship of the capital city.

At her filing for the city mayorship anew last October, Madame Vi was accompanied only by her family.

From organization, let’s shift to tactics.

The early bird does not always get the worm. Sometimes, because of his over-eagerness – read: gagad – he gets to be shot first.

Think Pampanga First District in 1998 here. The first pretender to the throne being vacated by Cong Tarzan Lazatin was businessman Beko Panlilio. Ah, how the barangay captains swarmed around him from late 1996, only to lose them to “Cong Rey” Guiao, whose own campaign sputtered when Atty. Ed Pamintuan left the Angeles City hall for the district. Of course, it was EdPam’s vice, Blueboy Nepomuceno who went on to win.

The early bird gets to be fed first to the hungry mob. Heed the Kapampangan adage here: Tauling kabit, manu. Last comes first.

Opinion polls are another matter to take real care of. Believe in published surveys at your own peril. There I go again.

In 2007, an alleged survey allegedly commissioned by the provincial government alleged that then-3rd District Rep. Rey Aquino in his comeback bid for the San Fernando mayorship led the incumbent Mayor Oscar Rodriguez 60-40.

So, what’s new here? Oca never won in any published survey since he entered politics at that point. Conversely, he had won all but one – 1992 – electoral contests he joined: 1987, 1995, 1998, 2001congressional races, and the 2004 mayorship.

And in 2007, Oca drubbed Rey to the tune of over 16,000-vote margin. Same margin of error placed in that alleged survey most certainly.

It was only in 2016 that the surveys proved correct – the incumbent Cong Oca losing to the man he beat in the same contest in 2013, his inaanak Dong Gonzales.

Like Oca, another one who never won in any survey but won all elections he entered is Cris Garbo of Mabalacat – as councilor twice, board member three times and vice mayor once. And board member again in 2007, 2010 and 2013.

So, Garbo lost – to Boking Morales as projected by the surveys in 2016. So, who’s been the mayor of Mabalacat since 2017 to date?

Surveys are meant to serve as campaign guideposts. Their efficacy for propaganda purposes – to gain some bandwagon effect – have long been lost because of surfeit and the incredibility of results.

Have you read of any published local survey citing its margin of error? If you have, did they tell you how they arrived at it?

End of lesson for now. Keep on running, dream on winning.

 

Punto @14

 

FOURTEEN YEARS. That we have come to this point – where a number of contemporaries in the local print media failed to reach even but a third of the way – is more than enough cause for celebration. Especially more so given, most grievously, the still ongoing Covid-19 pandemic.

Indeed, at the onset of the Q protocols in the first quarter of 2020, Punto! nearly came to what its haters – yes, we have them too --  so ardently wished it would be: Puntod! 

Forced by the circumstances as we were to stop altogether our twice weekly  print issue, reduce our office staff to the barest essential, limit our online coverage.

It is to the credit of our correspondents – the human infrastructure without which Punto! could not stand, much less excel; to their total commitment to the journalism profession fostering that unwavering sense of sacrifice that we have survived: All the salaries/allowances/fees from the GM, the office staff, the editor, columnists, correspondents, down to the last contributor were slashed by a whopping 50 percent.

It was hard, it was painful, but it was the only way we could keep Punto! afloat, as it did, indeed.  

We owe it too to our advertisers, corporate and in government, for keeping their accounts as much as their trust in us, the economic crunch they too suffer, notwithstanding.

It is that trust – shared by our thousands of readers and followers – painstakingly built in the past 14 years with fairness in our news, fearlessness in our opinions, strict adherence to facts, in the service of the malayang Pilipino that we shall ever endeavor to keep unshaken in the coming years.

Guided as we are by what Joseph Pulitzer long ago articulated which at Punto! has come to be the very article of faith of a truly free and unfettered press:

…[F]ight for progress and reform,

never tolerate injustice or corruption,

always fight demagogues of all parties,

never belong to any party,

always oppose privileged classes and public plunderers,

never lack sympathy with the poor,

always remain devoted to the public welfare,

never be satisfied with merely printing news,

always be drastically independent,

never be afraid to attack wrong,

whether by predatory plutocracy or predatory poverty.

Pointed, yes. As only Punto! can.

 (Editorial, Oct. 27, 2021)