How a Filipino politician buys votes

P40M spent for a P70K monthly job in 3 years

By Mortz C. Ortigoza

“Elective post is for the rich only,” I told a mayoralty bet as he and his employees scan the names of their voters on the list and count the corresponding P1,000 each of them after they evaluated the authenticity that the names are their supporters.

“The other day, there were six thousand voters here to get their P1000,” he told me at his house that was teeming with voters four days before the May 9 election.

“Grabe, that’s P6 million already!” I quipped.

“But we change our system because policemen were hot on our trail. Our leaders instead come here and get the monies for distribution in the different villages. Everybody knows I give P1,000. My opponent buys votes for P300 to P500”.

Both he and the opponent are successful businessmen.

“I want to beat him; I want to see how deep his financial chest is. Today, I will be going to the bank to withdraw P20 million,” he told me.

My friend cited that the P1000 he gave was not all from his pocket.

“Half of that is from my patron. He used to give P400 counterpart to the P400 that I give to a voter. But I told him my opponent buys vote for P500 each thus he acquiesced to the P500.'

He told me his patron provides only for the 40% of the 60,000 voters.

“60,000 voters bawasan mo ng 20% or 12,000 dahil hinde naman lahat buboto. It would become 48,000 bawasan mo ng 50% that would be 24,000."

24 thousand voters multiplied by P1,000 each equal 24 million pesos, he explained to me like when I was in Grade 6 learning addition, division, and multiplication.

He said he did not follow the 50% rule or 24 thousand voters. He still added other 20% or 12 thousand voters to make sure he got more voters and more chances to win.

“Personal money ko na iyong P1,000 sa 12 thousand voters. That’s another P12 million”.

Son of a gun, why these people spent P40 million for a job that gives only a P100 thousand monthly pay – for a first class town - for three years? I posed to myself.

(NOTE: My seasoned mayoralty bet - a nine-year mayor - friend (the politico I mentioned above) still lost the poll. His underestimated his opponent whom he thought was deficit of a campaign fund. The opponent – a kin - bought votes at P1,500 at each voter. Nangutang at nagsanla ng ari-arian ang kamag-anak na rival)

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

Duterte, Cayetano on coup, assassination

Amid the rumors that presidential front runner Rodrigo Duterte hid billions of pesos on his BPI accounts, President Benigno Aquino III to undermine the May 9 presidential election in favor of Administration backed  Liberal Party's presidential aspirant Mar Roxas, vice presidential candidate Antonio Trillanes threat that groups in the military will grab power to prevent the communist friendly Duterte to assume the presidency, and speculation in the social media that the Armed Forces of the Philippines and the U.S Central Intelligence Agency collude, just like in Chile and South Vietnam, to assassinate the presidential front runner,  here is an excerpt of my interviews with Duterte and his vice presidential bet, my friend, Senator Alan Peter Cayetano about their take on these rumors just after the third presidential debate held in Dagupan City.

Davao City Mayor Rodrigo Duterte and Senator Alan
 Peter Cayetano. PHOTO CREDIT: JoeAm.Com

MORTZ ORTIGOZA (ME): There were rumblings among the military that they would not allow a Duterte Administration to assume power on July 1. Several observers said that the Armed Forces of the Philippines and the CIA would collude to topple down a President Duterte because he is identified with the communist and would be a threat to the military alignment in the region versus Mainland China. What’s your take?

SEN. CAYETANO: Unang una Diyos lang ang may alam kung sino talaga ang magiging president. Pangalawa hinde dapat makialam ang mga foreign countries because we have our national interest. We love our alliances with other countries but they should allow Filipinos that Filipinos chose their president.

At sa military and police hinde sila allowed iyong partisan politics. Ramdam namin, so may mga nagsasabi kay mayor na dahan-dahan sa pagsasalita dahil sa mga kaalyado natin. Pero sabi niya dapat independent ang Filipino sa ating foreign policy dapat Filipino mag isa at panindigan niya.

Duterte undaunted by assassination buzz from AFP, CIA

Questions importance of EDCA to Ph

By Mortz C. Ortigoza

DAGUPAN CITY – “If it’s destiny to be assassinated hanggang diyan na lang ako (then my life stops there),” declared by presidential front runner Rodrigo Duterte when asked if he was not anxious that the military and the Central Intelligence Agency might kill him because he is friendly with the communists and a threat to the U.S military interest in Asia.

Philippines Presidential Frontrunner Rodrigo Duterte
Photo Credit: Pinoy Insider

Lately, media reported that Francis Bundoc Besin called Bong Go, the chief aide of Duterte, that two assassins have been hired for ten million pesos to liquidate the presidential aspirant from powerful sniper rifles provided by principals in the police.

“If God wants me to be president I will be there,” he stressed to this paper after the third leg of the presidential debate held here last Sunday.

In the April 18-20 Social Weather Station’s polls, the Davao City mayor led by six points to 33 percent his nearest presidential opponent Senator Grace Poe who received only 24 percent from the voters.

The survey’s time frame included his gaffe about his humor why he was not included first in the queue to rape the Australian missionary 36-year-old Jacqueline Hamil who was gang raped by hostage takers in 1989.

Envoy hits Guv's "ape-faced ole’ man" call

Crows on machismo, jinx, women at rally

By Mortz C. Ortigoza

LINGAYEN – A veteran politician whose stints in public office started in the late 1950s assailed in a grand rally the Pangasinan governor after the latter called him a wretched ape faced handicapped old man.

Manila Economic and Cultural Office (MECO) Chairman Amadito Perez, Jr., told the sea of supporters of Nationalist People’s Coalition’s gubernatorial aspirant Mark O. Cojuangco and vice gubernatorial bet Mark Roy Macanlalay, in a grand rally here, that he got the ire of exiting Governor Amado T. Espino, Jr. and his gubernatorial candidate son and namesake after he mocked the plan of the older Espino to beautify the Fifth District where the governor runs against Cojuangco’s wife Kimi for Congress.

The lady Cojuangco is the incumbent solon there.

“Nag punta doon iyong mag –ama sabi nila iyang pa pilay-pilay na hukluban na matanda na iyan nakiki-alam pa sa pulitika na kamukhang tsonggo, sabi nila. Sabi ko totoo iyan, nagbabaston ako dahil hukluban na pero tanungin ninyo ho ang mga kapitbahay namin dahil ganyan na mahina ang tuhod ko kung nakita nila ang misis ko na nakabalot ng tuwalya sa ulo sa umaga, “ay may ginawa iyong mag-asawa!”” the Octogenarian Perez, a former mayor and congressman, bragged his sexual potency to the masses who relished it with a guffaw.

In the birthday bash of Cojuangco in October 12, 2014 at a university in Urdaneta City that the envoy hosted, Perez bragged to guests that he got four strong feet.

“May baston na ako ngayon. Sabi ko sa mga kaibigan ko na ang ikatatlong paa ko ay gawa sa bakal. Ang hindi alam ng iba na meron pa akong ika-apat na paa na pinagawa ko na rin sa bakal”.

Perez cited the jinx of former Alaminos Mayor Hernani Braganza who tremendously lost with the older Espino in the 2013 governorship race. In that poll. the latter romped up 699,573 votes while the former got 237,109 votes.

“Alam ninyo kung bakit ganoon lang kalayo ang diperensiya ni Governor Espino at ni Braganza ng halalan ng nakaraan? Dahil amay kwandad Pangasinan walay ibubulsa ton tilay, walay ibubulsa ton banyas. Amom data nga malas naguyod mo idyay malas nga ibulbulsam nga banyas ket sisigurado nga naabak ka (Why that huge difference in the voting tabulation between Espino and Braganza? Because as what the Pangasinenses say Braganza kept a lizard in his pants’ pocket thus a misfortune because he carried a lizard that caused his loss),” he said in a mixed Pangasinan and Ilocano’s dialects.

Perez declared how incorruptible Cojuangco was. He said when they were both a congressman, a jueteng (illegal number game) financier came to Cojuangco and asked for his protection for half-a-million peso a month.

“Dahil si Congressman Mark Cojuangco ay hindi anak ng jueteng. Oo totoo iyan dahil ilang beses na may kilala ako na nagpapalaro na binibigyan ng kalahating milyon buwan-buwan si Congressman Cojuangco. Natatandaan ko pa iyan tinangihan niya. Pinagalitan niya pa iyong tao,” Perez said as the people gave Cojuangco a rousing applause for his integrity.

Video Analysis: Pacquiao - Bradley 3: Manny wins with 2 KDs

By Mortz C. Ortigoza

The Pacquiao-Bradley rubber match last Sunday was exciting as the two, in a chess match, exchanged hard flurries of blows. It became more exciting after Manny gave a powerful left hook on the right face of the plunging Bradley that caused his knock down at the seventh round after his gloves touched the canvas. 

ABS-CBN interviews me on my post analysis of Manny Pacquiao's win 

against Tim Bradley on their rubber match or 3rd Fight.

Any parts of the body except the sole of the shoes that touches the floor would be deducted by points. Those are the perennial rule in boxing.

In the ninth round fight fans, especially the screaming bakya crowd in the Philippines, jumped hysterically from their seats and cheered Pacquiao after he hit with his left power punch the American that caused him to somersault at the canvass.

ABS-CBN TV interviews me after Manny Pacquiao won with 

two knocked downs against Timothy Bradley.

"Manny so powerful this time he could knock down opponents again,” my errand boy Procopio shouted.

“Manny so powerful this time, his political stocks at Social Weather Station and Pulse Asia would shoot up from Number 8 to the stratosphere. Delikado si (senatorial bets) Tito Sotto and Franklin Drilon lalo na nag aantay na kay Manny Pacquiao ang maingay at mahabang motorcade sa Manila,” I silently told myself, too.

  As what host Bill O’Reilly would pose at his guest at Fox News TV: “What say you, (senatorial aspirant) Walden Bello?

Compute na lang natin kung ilan ang kina-in ng media hype sa allowable by the Commission on Election na radio and television propaganda hours the Filipino Superman had accumulated.

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

U.S, others display fire powers at Clark

By Mortz C. Ortigoza

After I read at the Pinoy Aviators' Community Page Group at Face Book the aircraft static display at Clark of the American, Australian, and Filipino troops who used them at the military exercise dubbed as Balikatan 2016, I told myself to go again there just like last year.

A-10 Thunderbolt

AIR POWER DISPLAY. Philippines civilians and military officials milled last April 9 around the various combat aircraft of the United States, Philippines, and Australia at the static display at Clark Air Base in Pampanga. The combat planes and surface to surface rockets HIMARS (High Mobility Artillery Rocket System) were used in the March 18 to April 22 Balikatan (military exercise) 2016. The U.S brought A-10 "Thunderbolt" attack aircraft, HH-60 "Pave Hawk" Combat Utility Helicopters, C-130 "Hercules" Medium lift/transport aircraft, Boeing E-3 Sentry AWACS, B-52 "Stratofortress" strategic bomber, C-17 "Globemaster" Heavy lift/ transport aircraft, RQ-4 "Global Hawk" unmanned surveillance aircraft, Joint Terminal Attack Controller (JTAC), PJ flying boat, P-3 Poseidon, Bell Boeing V-22 OspreyOsprey, others. The Philippines had their C295 Martime Patrol Aircraft, C-130 "Hercules" medium lift/transport aircraft, PZL W-3 "Sokol" CUH/Rescue Helicopter, UH1H Combat Utility Helicopter OV-10C/M "Broncos" FAC/attack aircraft, MG520 "Defenders" Scout/light attack helicopters, FA-50PH "Fighting Eagle" light fighter/combat aircraft, B412 Combat Utility Helicopters, others, while Australia brought there its P-3C "Orion" anti-submarine/maritime patrol aircraft.

The display was on April 9 (Saturday) 2016 at Haribon Hangar of the former American ran Clark Air Base in Pampanga – an almost three hours drive from my home in Dagupan City.

“Be there at least before 8 am because the free show was for a half day only,” the announcement at Aviators' said.

I arrived at the hangar at almost 9 am where the April's summer sun started to “blister” my skin, joined one of the two rows queue composed of excited civilians and military men mostly officers from different parts of Luzon and probably Visayas and Mindanao.

There were even Filipino family members in tow by their U.S Air Force and U.S Marine relatives who joined the queue.

We were required by the local air force to write our name and our address on a bond paper before we were allowed for our ingress at the gate of the 6012th Operation Squadron Base and into the hangar where bevy of combat planes from the Vietnam War era like the Super Huey to the modern era P-8 Poseidon .

Some of the planes and rocket battery displayed there were from the U.S Marines.

Sikorsky Pave Hawk

When I stepped on the hangar I saw people of various persuasions like the group of noisy Aeta (mountain people) children milling curiously on the different air assets.

Sikorsky Pave Hawk

“Gusto ninyo rin ba mag piloto ( Do you want to become a pilot)," I asked two tiny curly haired and wide eyed black skinned Aetas who looked like Vice President Jojo Binay, with a worn-out clothes of course, as they clambered just like what they do in the trees to a huge Sikorsky MH-60G/HH-60G Pave Hawk of the U.S Air Force.

“Oo, gusto namin maging piloto!” shouted by the duo whose province mate who made raves and waves globally is Allan Pineda Lindo alias Apple Dee Ap of the Black Hawk Down, er, Black Eyed Pea hip -hop group.

TV 5's host with wide eyed Aeta kids

“Was this the same chopper used by the (U.S) SEAL Team 6 in inserting themselves near a military academy at Abbottabad, Pakistan in May 10, 2011 to kill Osama bin Laden?” I posed to one of the pilots who was in a group of the crew of the American made combat chopper.

“Hey Jim, was this the same chopper used by SEAL Team 6?!” the pilot shouted at a sergeant who was amused watching the antics of those Aetas jumping in and out of the chopper.

“I ain’t know, sir!” the sarge shouted back.

The Sikorsky CH-53E Super Stallion is the largest and heaviest helicopter in the United States military.

Even though the Yanks there ain’t know the choppers used in extracting the SEAL Team 6 and the cadaver of ole’ man Osama, I found later that what was used in Pakistan were the stealth Boeing/Sikorsky RAH-66 Comanches or a modified UH-60 Sikorsky Black Hawk.

P-8 Poseidon, P-3 Orion, and E-3 AWACS

Near the Sikorsky was the guarded Boeing made P-8 Poseidon that was used by the U.S to make fly- by at the Mainland Chinese held islets supposedly owned by the Philippines and Vietnam in the South China Sea.
"Hmmm, it got limited windows," I told myself as I scanned behind my Ray Ban sunglasses the right side of the white jet.

P-8 Poseidon

The P-8 conducts anti-submarine warfare (ASW), anti-surface warfare (ASUW), and shipping interdiction, along with electronic signals intelligence (ELINT) role.

P-3 Orion

I went to the nearby Boeing E-3 Sentry, commonly known as an airborne early warning and control (AEW&C) and asked the crew there the difference of the converted Boeing 707, first manufactured and saw service in 1962, in intelligence gathering and the Poseidon.

 E-3 AWACS

“I ain’t know about the difference of the Poseidon. What we know is the features of the AWACs,” a male captain crew told me.

A-10 Thunderbolt

ME: Hi, you’re a Marine pilot and a Captain. You fly this ugly monster’s Warthog?
CAPTAIN: Yes Sir!
ME: You’re probably a graduate of the United State Naval Academy in Annapolis?
CAPTAIN: Yes sir, an USNA alumnus.

Crew of  A-10 Warthog with Filipino spectators

 ME: Have you seen war in Afghanistan and Iraq?

CAPTAIN: Naah, we are assigned in South Korea.

Then we discussed about a 1998 West Point graduate Captain Nate Self whose platoon was ambushed by the Al Queda’s supported Afghan rebels (click full story here) in Takur Ghar, Afghanistan when their CH-47 Chinook helicopter was hit for several times by rocket propelled grenades from the enemies below.

A-10 Thunderbolt

“Your rescue mission was impressive, you used a lot of air assets like F-16 and F-15 and even a C-130 with all those blazing Gatling guns before the Chinooks (helicopter with two huge horizontal rotors) pull out your besieged men and geez in a nighttime to avoid being shot at by the rebels,” I told the all ears Captain.

AWACS and C-17 Globemaster III

I met this pretty Air Force captain who guided high school students composed mainly of Aetas who probably lived near Clark,.

C-17 Globemaster III

ME: You speak fluent Tagalog.

CAPTAIN: I was born in Pangasinan.

ME: Oh, I’m from Pangasinan, too. Are you an alumna of the USAFA (United States Air Force Academy) at the Rocky Mountain?

CPT: No, I was a graduate of a university in California then I joined the Air Force and was assigned as intelligence officer of the AWACS.

ME: What’s the difference between the AWACS and Poseidon?

CPT: Oh sorry, I’m not privy with the Poseidon, only of AWACS.

AP-3C Orion

Analysis of Pacquiao-Bradley 3: Fight too close

By Mortz C. Ortigoza

After raking the hard earned seed monies (we Flips, er, Filipinos called it “capital”) of those Igorot vegetable and Pangasinan bangus or milkfish  wholesale traders when I bet for Floyd Mayweather the tuition fees of my children against their wagers for Manny Pacquiao, I should be turning 180- degree and predicts Pacquiao, the pet peeve of senatorial candidate Walden Bello, to pounce and trounce out American Tim Bradley in their rubber match this Sunday (Saturday in the U.S) especially after I saw the absence of a random drug testing for the duo.

PHOTO CREDIT. INQUIRER.NET

“This sonnafabich (Pacquiao) would become a whirling dervish without the drug testing on this fight,” I told my errand boy Procopio Matulis after I Google if the duo subjected them anew to The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) just like what they agreed on their 2014 
rematch.

CLICK HERE MY RADIO INTERVIEW ON PACQUIAO-BRADLEY 3

Then last night as I prepared myself to bed, I saw at You Tube the training of Bradley and his new trainer, the verbal showboat former trainer - turned boxing commentator Teddy Atlas that changed my prognosis that this fight could either go to Manny or Timothy.

New Trainer’s Innovation to Bradley

As you know folks, in the first 2012 controversial fight of the aging Filipino Superman but Senatorial Shoo-in (God Save Us!) versus Bradley, he should had won it because of his hand speed, and in the 2014 rematch, he nearly lose against the bobbling and weaving attack styles of the American in the first six rounds until Bradley had calf injury.

It happened after Tim outbalanced himself due to his propensity to throw a looping right power punches to Manny.

That injury snapped out from him his foot work that used to elude Pacquiao in hitting him.

In the fourth round of that clash, he even hit Pacqauio’s left face with a powerful right uppercut that lifted by a foot, son of a gun, the feet of Manny from the canvass.