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Friday, February 13, 2004
Editorial: Not just a nuisance
What happened to presidential candidate Eddie Gil in Cagayan de Oro City shows he’s more than a nuisance and should not have been in the race at all. He displays a mean streak that’s anything but presidential.
Gil was threatened with arrest after he refused to pay his and his staff’s hotel bills for P35,000 and issued a check that bounced. A report said Gil is wallowing in debt and it’s still a day or two into the campaign..
Comelec weeded out those who cannot wage a national campaign but Gil survived the screening. Apparently, the Comelec erred in its assessment of the candidate.
It would not have taken much sleuthing for the poll body to realize that Gil fails the yardstick. An additional standard Comelec could have used is the aspirant’s chance to get votes.
Gil ran in the last presidential election and the few votes he got should have told Comelec the man cannot ever come close to competing in a national race. The early surveys for this election say he gets less than one percent.
Why are fringe candidates ever allowed? They only clutter the poll forms with tally zeros and prolong the count further.
The Cagayan de Oro incident highlights the need to be more thorough in removing nuisance candidates.
More than a defection
The somersault of Cebu City Councilor Vicente Kintanar Jr. to BO-PK from Kusug is routinely seen as loss for one party and gain for the other. Or the triumph of opportunism for the defector and the wound of betrayal on the group abandoned.
It’s more than that though.
It exposes once again a flaw in the much-criticized party system of the country.
Kintanar was chosen by Kusug to fill a vacancy left by a Kusug councilor who resigned. The procedure, in which a Kusug representative replaces the seat formerly occupied by a Kusug councilor, assures that the decision of voters in the last election is not violated.
Changing parties before the term is completed frustrates that will. Kintanar not only betrayed Kusug but also the voters who provided the seat he took over.
(February 13, 2004 issue)
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