Aquino can’t change ‘clamor’ for Binay return in Makati–VP camp

The camp of Vice President Jejomar Binay on Saturday said the President’s recent tirades could not change a clamor for a return of Binay to Makati City’s seat of power, claiming the city experienced “deterioration” under the leadership of Liberal Party’s Kid Peña.

“The President unfortunately derided the services and benefits introduced by the Vice President, but apparently he was not informed that his local allies in Makati are running on a platform of continuing these same services and programs,” Binay’s spokesperson Joey Salgado said in a statement.

“Yet in the few months that the President’s allies have run Makati, the people have experienced a rapid deterioration in the delivery of services, the return of fixers at City Hall, and local gangsterism at the barangay level. The clamor is for the return of the Binay brand of service. And not even the President’s unfortunate remarks will change that,” the United Nationalist Alliance communications director added.

Binay’s daughter Rep. Abigail is running for Makati mayor after her brother, Jejomar Erwin “Junjun” Jr., was dismissed from office and perpetually disqualified from public service by the Ombudsman after being found liable over the construction of the supposedly overpriced Makati City Hall Building II and Makati Science High School Building.

In his most scathing remarks yet against Binay, President Benigno Aquino III on Friday said the Vice President was no longer the selfless person he knew as he brought up corruption allegations against the former mayor in a tightly packed Makati Coliseum.

READ: Aquino: He’s no longer the Jejomar Binay I knew

“Your former mayor here called me incompetent and callous. But my question to him is, how has someone who is incompetent and callous turned a former ‘sick man of Asia’ into ‘Asia’s rising tiger?’ Can an incompetent person lead the modernization of the Armed Forces, the police and even the fire bureau? Is it callousness and incompetence if one is able to bring health services to the poorest 40 percent of our population and bring the conditional cash transfer program to almost 4.6 million households?” Aquino said before residents of Makati, a Binay bailiwick for the past three decades.

Salgado said it was the Vice President who materialized the vision of Aquino’s mother, former President Corazon Aquino, of a propoor government in Makati when he was still mayor. It was the late democracy icon who appointed Binay as officer in charge of the city post-Edsa revolt.

“Vice President Jojo Binay’s faith in democracy rights remains as strong as ever. His commitment to human rights and uplifting the lives of the poor emanates from the spirit of Edsa 1986.  President Cory’s vision of a government that cares for the poor became a reality in Makati under Jojo Binay’s leadership,” Salgado said.

“Had the President spoken directly to the people of Makati rather than the small group of local sycophants and opportunists who joined him on stage, he would have known about the real Makati,” he added.

Salgado boasted that Binay was able to “rebuild” Makati and its economy and extends its services “previously accessible only to the rich” even when the city was buried in debt when he took over in February 1986.

“The Vice President’s social programs have contributed to a drastic reduction in poverty. From a poverty incidence of 3.74 percent in 2000, Makati under a Binay leadership succeeded in lowering the rate of poverty to 0.5 percent by 2012, or 2,000 individuals out of a resident population of 650,000. These are official government statistics,” he said. RC