Pangasinan village execs didn’t snub Aquino – board member

LINGAYEN, Pangasinan—Did Pangasinan barangay (village)  captains snub President Benigno Aquino III when he visited the province last week to campaign for Team PNoy senatorial candidates?

They did not, said Board Member Amadeo Espino, Liga ng mga Barangay provincial federation president.

“It just so happened that we were in Clark [Freeport in Pampanga] at that time for our annual provincial congress,” Espino said by telephone on Monday.

Except for some barangay captains from Dagupan City, the absence of village chiefs from different towns was noticeable during the President’s visit to the cities of Dagupan and Alaminos on March 15.

“We have long scheduled our convention and we were given clearance by the DILG (Department of the Interior and Local Government) regional office on Jan. 25 to hold the activity,” said Espino, brother of reelectionist Gov. Amado Espino Jr.

He said it would have been impossible for them to reschedule the convention because the venue had long been reserved and the invitations to participants and guests had been distributed early.

Vice Gov. Jose Ferdinand Calimlim, who was among the guests in the convention, said he and Governor Espino would have wanted to personally welcome President Aquino to the province on Friday.

“Actually, we also prepared for his arrival. We wanted to welcome the President ourselves but this is now a time for politics and an activity of the Liberal Party (LP), that’s why we gave them due respect,” Calimlim said.

Espino and Calimlim are running for reelection under the Nationalist People’s Coalition (NPC), the dominant political party in the province, against the LP tandem of Alaminos City Mayor Hernani Braganza and former Philippine National Police chief Arturo Lomibao.

Calimlim said 1,297 of 1,364 barangay captains in the province cities attended the congress, which was held from March 14 to 16.

“We just welcomed [Aquino] through simple tarpaulin streamers,” he said.

Calimlim said the provincial government remains “101-percent” supportive of President Aquino and all his prodevelopment agendas for the country.

In Alaminos City on Friday, Aquino formally introduced Braganza as the LP candidate for governor against Espino.

Although Espino had been implicated by government officials this year in various scandals, including gambling and the murder of a town mayor, Aquino had made no direct reference to the governor in the Dagupan and Alaminos sorties.

The President said: “You have been witness to a leadership of deceit, filled with anomalies at the expense of the province and you have the chance to change the system… You have the chance to share with the province the development happening in Alaminos through Braganza.”

He added: “You can do this without seeking out gambling or luck or through illegal activities.”

In Dagupan, Sen. Franklin Drilon, Team PNoy campaign manager, declined to comment on reports that Pangasinan is now an “electoral free zone.”

The reports also acknowledged that the province, which has 1.62 million voters spread in six districts, is an NPC bailiwick.

In an electoral free zone, candidates of coalition member-political parties fighting against each other in local elections are given equal treatment, all of them being official candidates.

Commission on Elections records show that the NPC has 43 mayoral candidates, with 28 of them running for reelection, while the LP has only 29 mayoral candidates with three reelectionists. Gabriel Cardinoza and Yolanda Sotelo, Inquirer Northern Luzon