Sunday, February 18, 2007
Hands off on Sugbuak?
TWO administration candidates for the Senate are leaving the proposal to create three new provinces in Cebu up to the Cebuanos.
Former opposition senator Tessie Agquino-Oreta, who is running under the administration’s Team Unity, was non-committal when asked whether she is for or against the division of Cebu into four provinces.
One condition Gov. Gwendolyn Garcia has set for her One Cebu party to support administration senatorial candidates is for them to sign a covenant, where they will pledge to fight “Sugbuak,” a term the Capitol coined for three bills seeking to split Cebu.
The bills, which the House of Representatives shelved before adjourning last week, can be filed anew in the 14th Congress. One proponent, Rep. Clavel Martinez of the fourth district, is fielding her son Celestino III to take over her seat in the House of Representatives.
“It’s up to the Cebuanos,” Oreta said in a press conference yesterday, adding that she couldn’t give a categorical answer because she does not know the Cebuanos’ “pulse” on the issue.
Sen. Joker Arroyo, who is running for reelection, shares Oreta’s view.
“It is improvidence for us if we are to sign the covenant that involves a very essential issue that only Cebuanos understand,” Arroyo said.
He said he does not believe Governor Garcia will oblige him and the other senatorial candidates of the administration to sign a commitment to block the Sugbuak bills if these reach the Senate.
“It is even presumptuous and purely meddling on the issue that we do not know, if it is made a condition by the governor in exchange for Cebu’s vote,” Arroyo also said.
But he promised that he will oppose the bills if these go to the Senate.
He suggested to the legislators who want to divide Cebu to look back to Cebu’s history during the colonial period when Cebu was the only province classified as one senatorial district.
“At that time, other provinces were clustered by two or three to become a senatorial district. But Cebu stood stronger after Manila and if you dismember Cebu today, you are making Cebu weak,” he said.
Oreta and Arroyo were in Cebu yesterday for Team Unity’s launching at the New Cebu Coliseum.
“Who are we to decide for you?” Oreta quipped.
Although she did not give a clear answer when asked if she will sign the covenant, she said she favors strong local governance.
Cebu officials earlier declared that they will not endorse all Team Unity candidates.
On the Charter change issue, Oreta said that although she does not favor a unicameral form of government, she is open to introducing amendments to the Constitution.
She said she decided to run under Team Unity’s banner because she is tired of the opposition’s “politics of anger.”
“They didn’t contradict my views on education,” she said of President Arroyo’s administration. She said that the administration is with her in her effort to make pre-school education free for all Filipino children.
The former senator also asked for forgiveness for her actuations during former president Joseph Estrada’s impeachment trial.
She was caught on camera dancing with glee, when the Senate voted in January 2001 against opening an envelope that allegedly contained evidence of billions of pesos in a bank account Estrada held under an assumed name.
Oreta said the matter is already a “closed book.” (KNT/With AIV)
For Bisaya stories from Cebu. Click here. (February 18, 2007 issue)
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