May 14 Brgy Election, Vote Buying Inevitable

 By Mortz C. Ortigoza

Without the Senate’s counterpart bill for the postponement of the village poll, the barangay and SK (Youth) election in May 14 this year is inevitable.
"Tapos na ang Senado, tapos na ang Kongreso. Wala na kami, e (inaudible). Tapos na iyong barangay election," Senator Cynthia Villar told me when I asked her last Friday about the absence of the counterpart bill from the Upper House and Congress already in recess and will be back into business a day before the poll.

Everybody will be happy as of April this year. Ingratiation and vote buying by the candidates for the village chiefs, the council members, and even the parents of the SK or Sangguniang Kabataan will be ubiquitous in every nook and cranny of the country.

A first class town mayor told me that he will interfere by funding the candidacy of his village chiefs despite the monies given by his rivals to those barangay kapitans.

“I’ll face them tit for tat. I’ll bid out the highest price they can offer versus my chosen candidate,” he told me.

The mayor is so rich that every presidential and gubernatorial bets he wanted to win became victorious in his town because aside from the wherewithals distributed by these candidates, he chipped in with them his own personal monies he raked from his humongous businesses.

There was a time that his mayoralty candidate defeated a rival funded by the governor and a congressman.

“Pera and accomplishments lang ang labanan sa politika,” he crowed to us media men.

“How much and how many waves (about the number of times a P300, P500, or P1000 can be used to buy votes) will be distributed to every enraptured voter in your village?” I posed.

He said it depends upon the barangays.
He cited that the election in the Poblacion will go to millions of pesos. In other villages some candidate could just spend P200, 000.

Another hizzoner ( means His Honor the Mayor, to the plumbers and tricycle drivers who read this colum) told me the high stake thrust is not the village polls but the presidency of the Liga ng mga Barangay (League of Barangays) where winner becomes ex officio or council member of the town or city's legislature just like the president of the entire SKs) especially if the opposition are almost the same in number with the pro mayor solons in the Sanguniang Bayan.

He cited that it will be in this campaign and poll where the mayor shelled out tens of thousands of pesos and even “kidnapped” the  Kapitans and bring them as far as Manila or Baguio City to wine, dine, and give them whore to spend their time while waiting for the  D-Day (read: erection, er, election).

“Their mobile phones are even confiscated to avoid them being pirated by another kapitan who aspires for the Liga top’s position and could lure them with a higher amount to vote for him,” another source in another town told me before.

On my experiences covering this election, usually the candidates who were backed up by the mayor usually wins the Liga polls.

“Si mayor kasi ang kalaban mo diyan. Ano ang mapapala mo madami siyang pera saka pagiinitan ka sa projects pag sinuway mo ang gusto niya,” another kapitan told me.

Hard Headed but Shrewd Kapitan 

Only one gung ho village chief in a city did not believe in this axiom. He challenged the bet of the mayor.

“Iyong mga kasama kong mga kapitan pera lang ang katapat niyan,” he bragged to me the vulnerability of the village chiefs when I asked him he could not collide with the mayor.

He shelled out P50,000 per kapitan but asked them to sign a blank bond paper where he told them that the paper was an assurance that they each received the sum.

That paper was filled up later by words that turned out to be a, HesusMariaHusef, Contract of Loans.
"The salamabit was a shrewd politico!" I cried then when a fellow columnist told me what happened.

After he lost the poll, he chided his callus faced fellow Kapitans who did not only take his monies but voted to the candidate of the mayor.

“He even sued us for collection of sum of money. Loan pala iyong binigay niya hindi vote buying,” another dimwitted kapitan, just like many of his contemporary that proliferate in the country, lamented to me.

Some of his fellow Kapitans did return the P50,000 others still face a court case of an unpaid loan.

Ganoon ka kapal ang mga mukha ng mga kapitan, pera-pera lang sana pero they deceived the vote buying bet for the League of Barangays’ poll.

That’s estafa or swindling even the transaction was illegal.

 (You can read my selected columns at mortzortigoza.blogspot.com and articles at Pangasinan News Aro. You can send comments too at totomortz@yahoo.com)