Tracing Poe’s bloodline to Guimaras

JUNIE Rodriguez and Teresa Rodriquez-Victoriano believe Sen. Grace Poe is a daughter of their elder sister Victoria. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO

LATELY, Junie Rodriguez is answering phone calls and replying to text messages more often than before.

“Sometimes it rings when I’m in the middle of my work and I have to ask the caller to call later,” he told the Inquirer. “My co-employees tease me about calls from the media, including television networks in Manila.”

Rodriguez, a casual employee of the municipal government of Buenavista on the island-province of Guimaras and assigned to the public slaughterhouse, and other members of his family, have been suddenly thrust into public scrutiny after they came out, claiming that Sen. Grace Poe is most likely a blood relative.

Reporters have visited their houses in Sitio Mantangingi in Barangay East Valencia, a farming village that is a 30-minute ride from the wharf.

Rodriguez, 54, is the eighth of 12 siblings whose eldest, Victoria, is believed to be the biological mother of Poe, who is among the front-runners in the presidential derby in the May 2016 elections. “We believe that (Poe) is our niece and we grow up being told so by our elders,” he said.

Victoria, in her 50s, died in 1996 due to heatstroke in Sultan Kudarat province in Mindanao.

Determining the identities of Poe’s biological parents has become more urgent after the Commission on Elections (Comelec) ruled to disqualify her as a candidate for the country’s highest government position for failing to meet citizenship and residency requirements.

Poe is expected to bring her case to the Supreme Court.

The senator was reportedly abandoned and later found in the baptismal font of Jaro Cathedral in Iloilo City in 1968. She was later adopted by show biz celebrity couple, the late Fernando Poe Jr. and Susan Roces.

The Militars had earlier been believed to be Poe’s biological family, but DNA tests conducted on them turned out negative.

Rodriguez’s younger sister, Teresa Rodriquez-Victoriano, said the family had a “gut feeling” that Poe was the baby given up for adoption by her sister.

The two siblings said the baby was brought by Corazon Javellana, a neighbor, who then handed her over when she was “just a week or a few weeks old” to landowner Tessie Ledesma Valencia in Iloilo City’s Jaro district. Valencia later gave the child to Fernando Poe Jr. and his actress-wife.

Javellana had told their mother, Jovita Gabayoyo-Rodriguez, not to worry about the baby because she was already in good hands, Rodriguez said. “She said she (the baby) was already living in a nice house with an affluent family. At one time, she told our mother, the baby was with Susan Roces.”

Rodriguez said the family understood why their niece was offered for adoption. The baby was born outside of wedlock and there was no father to provide for her, he said.

Victoria has four daughters, all by different fathers, he said. The eldest, Aida, died of an illness and the second is believed to be Poe, 47. The others are Mayin, 40, and Magdalena, 38.

Mayin had the closest resemblance to Poe based on the shape of their face and forehead, the Rodriguez siblings said.

Victoria earned the ire of their father, Dalmacio, because she bore children outside of wedlock. She gave birth in the house of an aunt—her father’s sister—in the neighboring village of Avila.

Rodriguez said economic difficulties could have also prompted his parents to agree to give up the baby. “We were 12 siblings and we were poor,” he said.

To feed the family, he said, rice was served in a large basin during meal time. “You had to make sure to be at the dining table at 6 p.m. for dinner or you would have nothing left to eat,” he said with a chuckle.

Relatives and neighbors have been pushing the Rodriguezes to come out, especially that previous claims on the identity of Poe’s biological parents have been disproved.

“We could have come out when she became senator, but we did not want to pull her down from where she is now because we are poor and she is better-off … . But no one has been proven to be her true family,” Victoriano, 51, said.

Neighbors and other villagers are also hoping that Poe will turn out to be the Rodriguezes’ niece.

“Of course, we are not totally certain. That’s why the DNA testing is important. We will be bothered by our conscience if she loses the cases against her and we did not try,” Rodriguez said.

A younger sister who is based in Iloilo, Lorena Rodriguez-de Chavez, and Poe’s supposed half-sisters, Mayin and Magdalena, have subjected themselves to DNA testing.

The family has refuted insinuations that they came out for money.

Jesus Nograles Rodriguez Jr., a retired labor judge in Bacolod City in neighboring Negros Occidental province, has offered P300,000 for “solid and credible” information that could point to Poe’s real parents. He said he and his golf buddies would raise the amount.

But the siblings said the reward is immaterial. They pointed out that Lorena met with Poe on Dec. 10 in Iloilo City before the offer was even announced.

“If the DNA results turn out positive, then that proves that she is really part of our family. But if not, then that’s it. We did our part,” Rodriguez said.

He, however, admitted that aside from Victoria’s baby, Javellana also brought another baby to Iloilo for adoption. He could not recall who the parents of the other baby were because he was just a young boy then.

“It’s possible that the other baby could also be (Poe). So if it turns out that we are not related to the senator, maybe the family of the other baby is,” he said.