Catching the giant’s gaze

The Liberal Party to which President Benigno Aquino III belongs entered Thursday into a political alliance with the Bakud party of the Durano clan in Cebu City’s 5th district.

The coalition gave birth to the LP’s Cebu gubernatorial ticket 2013 that consists of former Cebu City councilor Hilario Davide III for governor and incumbent Vice Gov. Agnes Magpale for reelection.

While this development gives the LP a substantial raison d’être in Cebu, the party that in realpolitik wields great clout in the way countryside progress unfolds need not wait for the campaign period to give this province its share of blessings.

There was some sense in Rep. Tomas Osmeña’s earlier gripe about the lack of big development projects for Cebuanos during the better part of President Aquino’s first three years in office.

Eminent Cebuano economist Fernando Fajardo has noted the poor representation of the interests of Cebuanos and people elsewhere in Central Visayas for that matter in the national government.

The promise of the construction of a new terminal to expand the Mactan Cebu International Airport and implementation of a Bus Rapid Transit system in Metro Cebu became viable quite tellingly just this election year.

Cebuanos have shown that infrastructure projects like the building of flyovers is not what they want. The national government cannot impose these projects on the people; cannot presume to know what is better for those who have a more comprehensive view of realities on the ground.

Rep. Pablo John Garcia of Cebu’s 3rd district impliedly said that with the backing of the administration party, Davide and Magpale are now like the Philistine giant Goliath.

We leave Garcia to make what he can of his reading of a wry twist into the last name, a near-homonym to that of Israel’s King David, of his rival to be.

Now when elections are still a good year away, Davide and Magpale, proverbially perched on the shoulders of the giant that the national government truly is, can already represent the interests of the Cebuanos to Malacañang.

As members of the party in power they have the moral obligation to exert what influence they can so that Malacañang will help Cebu make good progress in addressing the issues that accompany its continuing urban sprawl from poor drainage to an ecology on the brink of collapse.

Even before midterm of the P-Noy years, the two local leaders can ensure that Cebu becomes more than a rich vote basket in the eyes of giants.