LAKAS PRESIDENT. Sen. Ramon “Bong” Revilla Jr. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO
It’s back to square one for the Lakas Christian Muslim Democrats (Lakas-CMD) party.
The Lakas-CMD, which catapulted its founder, Fidel V. Ramos, to the presidency in 1992, is undergoing a major overhaul aimed at regaining its old glory and making it a force to reckon with in the 2013 midterm elections. It also dropped Kampi, the political party founded by former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.
“We will be looking back, going back to our roots. We will take care of those who have remained loyal to the party and fully support their candidacies in 2013. I myself plan to go to the provinces just to personally campaign for them,” said Lakas president Sen. Ramon “Bong” Revilla.
To date, Revilla counts 13 to 14 governors, more than 30 congressmen and a lot of mayors who remain with Lakas.
As part of its makeover, the Lakas-CMD is re-installing Ramos as the party’s guiding light and weaning itself away from its principal, former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, who is under hospital detention.
Stalwarts of the Lakas-CMD met on Friday in a five-star hotel in Manila to map out the party’s strategies in preparation for next year’s elections.
The party that played a dominant role in the country’s politics for 18 years from 1992 to 2010 took a major beating with the defeat of its standard-bearer Gilbert Teodoro in the last presidential election.
Revilla said Friday’s national council meeting was intended as the first step toward reinvigorating the party that went through several name alterations, alliances and coalitions before membership dwindled at the latter half of 2010.
Revilla told the Inquirer that the overhaul expects Ramos to take a more active role in the party.
“Lakas-CMD would experience more of FVR (Ramos’ initials). He instructed me as party president to take care of the party and he assured that he would be behind me,” Revilla said in a phone interview.
House Minority Leader Danilo Suarez is leading a group of senior Lakas-CMD members tasked to woo back Ramos. These include Revilla and Occidental Mindoro Rep. Amelita Villarosa.
But Ramos did not attend the Lakas meeting on Friday.
House Speaker Feliciano Belmonte Jr., a former Lakas member who switched to the Liberal Party just weeks before the 2010 elections, said Lakas should reorganize itself under a new leadership with the help of Ramos.
Belmonte said Lakas had continued to be a potent party with its members entrenched in Congress and local government.