Admin wants its candidates to campaign under one banner

POLITICS IS ADDITION. President Aquino welcomes to the Liberal Party new allies from Cebu. In photo are (from left) DILG Chief Jessie Robredo, Rep. Lorenzo Tañada III, Transportation Secretary Manuel Roxas II, Cavite Rep. Joseph Emilio Abaya, Cebu Rep. Ramon Durano, Danao City Vice Mayor Ramon Durano III, former Tourism Secretary Joseph Ace Durano, Sen. Franklin Drilon, Customs Chief Rozzano Rufino Biazon and Budget Secretary Florencio Abad. MALACAÑANG FILE PHOTO

MANILA, Philippines—So, will it be the Liberal Party  or the United Nationalist Alliance?

The administration has drawn the line and wants its senatorial candidates also running under the rival UNA ticket to decide under whose banner they would actually campaign in the 2013 midterm elections.

The message apparently goes to Senators Francis Escudero and Loren Legarda, and Grace Poe Llamanzares, who were drafted on the ticket formed by President Benigno Aquino’s LP and that of Vice President Jejomar Binay’s UNA.

“The condition is a candidate carried by both groups cannot stand physically with the UNA,” former Senator Ramon Magsaysay Jr., who will be part of the administration ticket, told the Inquirer, echoing the position of the ruling party.

House Majority Leader Neptali Gonzales II, a senior LP member, said: “Anybody who’s going to be on the slate, while we cannot prevent them from being adopted (by the opposing ticket), should not campaign with the other side.”

Gonzales said it would “not look good” for candidates to campaign under both standards.  He said doing so would suggest that a “common” candidate was endorsing his fellow aspirants on one ticket, while junking those on the other.

Told about the LP policy, former President Joseph Estrada said UNA was now open to allowing some of its candidates to likewise campaign with the other senatorial ticket.

“That’s ok,” said Estrada, a senior UNA official who was once very adamant against sharing its candidates with LP.

In previous interviews, he said he had been assured by Legarda, a frontrunner in the Senate race like Escudero, that she would never “climb” the LP stage during the campaign even if she was included on the administration’s lineup.

Like Escudero, Legarda has been careful with her pronouncements on whether to run under LP or UNA or both. Legarda belongs to the Nationalist People’s Coalition, which has a “partnership” agreement with the LP.

The LP has similar agreements with the Nacionalista Party and the National Unity Party, which is composed mostly of former allies of ex-President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.

Escudero is a former NPC member who bolted the party in 2010 when he failed to get the support of party patriarch, businessman Eduardo “Danding” Cojuangco, for his presidential run. He ended up endorsing Mr. Aquino and Binay.

As of Saturday, Magsaysay said, the administration ticket was still a candidate short. Estrada said the UNA slate still had room for two more.

Aside from the three “common” candidates and Magsaysay, the LP slate will include former Sen. Jamby Madrigal, Rep. Juan Edgardo Angara Jr., Paolo “Bam” Aquino IV, and Risa Hontiveros.

The ticket also includes three NP members in Senators Alan Peter Cayetano and Antonio Trillanes IV, and Rep. Cynthia Villar.

Magsaysay said the LP lineup would be formally announced at the Club Filipino in San Juan on Monday.

The UNA lineup will include former Senators Ernesto Maceda and Richard Gordon, Sen. Gregorio Honasan, Representatives Jose Victor Ejercito, Jack Enrile and Milagros Magsaysay, and the President’s aunt, Margarita “Tingting” Cojuangco.

Estrada said Jose “Jose” De Venecia Jr. was reconsidering joining the Senate race where he previously lost in 2010. De Venecia exposed the allegedly anomalous National Broadband Network deal after his company failed to secure the contract during the Arroyo administration.