THERE was a time when political idealism clashed with political expediency. The board member aspirants were told to stick to their avowed principles to do away with money politics – ayaw dawata ang kwarta sa mga kandidato ug ayaw pamalit sa boto.
And they did, I mean, the 2 of them did, the third one opted for political expediency.
To the 3rd one, winning is everything, as in, we can debate about good political principles and better governance only when we win. If we lose, then what’s the point of the debate?
So when a party-list dangled a huge sum of money so that it will be included in the special operations of the 3 BM-wannabes, the 2 BMs refused while the 3rd one joyfully accepted the monetary offer.
To make the story short, the 3rd one won while the 2 BMs miserably lost.
Ang resulta – giaway nila og maayo, in fact, hangtod karon, nagbungol pa sila. But who can blame the 3rd one, victory was desired, and achieved. And that’s all that matters.
* * *
The bigger irony – the one who told them to stick to their principles – and not accept money from candidates and buy votes – was in fact, a wolf in sheep’s clothing.
It turned out that the supposedly incorruptible mentor of the 2 BMs accepted the bigger portion of the dangled money from the party-list, just like the 3rd BM who won.
But the biggest irony of it all – instead of spending the huge sum from the party-list for his special ops, as what the 3rd BM did, and won, the supposedly incorruptible mentor kept the money “for future use.”
A mayoral candidate wept unashamedly when I handed him the special ops fund for my father in law 2 nights before election time and said he was promised huge sum of money by the supposedly incorruptible mentor only to find out that it was just a promise, never to be fulfilled.
Sus, gabola-bola lang ang baba sa hinampak nga mohatag siya nako para kampanya pero ang labas, botbot ra man diay tong iyaha, the mayoral candidate told me.
As expected, the mayoral candidate lost, including the whole municipal slate.
* * *
That was before.
This time around, the same incident is happening. Some of the players are the same while the rest are new ones.
The same plot – party-list budget – is repeated just like before.
From what I learned, 2 BM-wannabes are displaying their sharpened political talons as they battle for “true” representation of a particular party-list group. They need to harness their best skill – and talent- because what is at stake here could mean victory or defeat in the upcoming polls – a huge budget that they can use for their special ops.
One of the two is a veteran of this particular political game while the other one is spreading the gospel of clean governance and a big No to corruption.
The second one must be a fast learner because he automatically imbibed the bola of the party-list group and conveniently divorced himself from his crusade against corruption. If he gets the money from the party-list group, what will he do with the money – kept it for himself or buy votes?
To answer my own question, since he accepted the huge sum from the party-list, he would now be assessing his chances of winning. If he thinks there is big chance of winning, then he would use the money to buy votes. But if he thinks he has no chance of winning even with the money from the party-list, then the practical choice would be to keep the money and recoup his losses.
Anyway, I am in no position to judge the BM-wannabes because of the unwritten rule nga diskarte-diskarte lang kuno aron modaog.
Matod pa, unsaon man kuno nang pabut-an but-an churvah kong mapildi ka sa piniliay?
* * *
A BM-wannabe is in trouble.
A sitting mayor has developed a severe case of allergies against the BM-wannabe. In fact, a mere mention of the name of the BM-wannabe is enough to trigger volcanic spasm on the part of the mayor.
Anybody on stage who mentions the name of the BM-wannabe knows that his talking time will be cut off immediately because all candidates are forewarned to exclude the name of the BM-wannabe. And that rule is absolute.
Despite attempts to patch-up their differences, everything is futile because the sitting mayor is convinced that the BM-wannabe is working for the candidacy of a candidate from the other political fence.
The other BM-wannabes of the same group are also saying that the mayor’s observation is accurate. So aron way samok, naka-decide na lang sila nga pasagdan na lang nila ang ilang kauban sa iyang diskarte.
