JV Ejercito gets boost from big brother

MANILA, Philippines—Senate President Pro Tempore Jose “Jinggoy” Estrada is expected to join the United Nationalist Alliance (UNA) campaign sorties and personally endorse the candidacy of his half-brother, San Juan Rep. Joseph Victor Ejercito, after they have purportedly settled their differences.

That’s according to their father, ousted President Joseph Estrada, who said he had patched things up between his sons in a heart-to-heart talk last year.

“Wala na yun. Tampuhan lang ng magkapatid yun (That was nothing. That was just sibling rivalry),” the older Estrada told the Inquirer in an interview at his Polk Street residence in San Juan.

Estrada said Jinggoy would campaign for JV onstage and offstage in UNA sorties. He said he and his sons would be present during the long Mindanao leg of the UNA campaign that will kick off Sunday in Bukidnon.

To show that all’s well between his two sons, he noted the presence of JV during Jinggoy’s 50th birthday celebration last Feb. 16.

Last November, the conflict came to a boil when Jinggoy denounced JV for purportedly touching on their “sibling rivalry” in a provincial press conference.

JV promptly apologized to his big brother Jinggoy, but their father opted to sit down with them one Sunday.

That’s when the 75-year-old Estrada warned his sons in Filipino, “OK, continue with your squabbling so I’ll die earlier.” Both sons kept quiet, he recalled.