Friday, September 12, 2008 Chiongkee takes oath as Comval Lakas-CMD chair
COMPOSTELA Valley Governor Arturo "Chiongkee" Uy formally took his oath as provincial chair of the ruling Lakas-CMD party before Lakas national officials in Metro Manila Tuesday.
The oath taking formalizes Uy's emergence as the administration party's top party man in Compostela Valley.
House Speaker Prospero Nograles, Lakas president, said Uy's ascension to the Lakas-CMD top provincial post is an acknowledgement of the governor's successful efforts in forging unity among ComVal political leaders.
Nograles administered the oath on Uy who, earlier in July, was elected as party chair during a Lakas-CMD general assembly in Nabunturan.
The oath taking was held at the House of Representatives and was attended by 41 governors, 93 congressmen and 700 city and municipal mayors.
Uy has stamped the mark on his province as administration country during a July Lakas-CMD general assembly attended by all members of the Provincial Board and all of the province's 11 municipal mayors, and nearly all the barangay captains, in a political development that practically declared the opposition an "extinct specie".
"We have reached total political unity that could further push the province towards full development and lasting peace," said Uy as he noted that Monkayo Mayor Manuel Brillantes Jr., the lone oppositionist in the ranks of the mayors, also attended the Lakas assembly.
Attending the July gathering -- in response to the call of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo and Speaker Nograles on provincial party leaders to unify the party -- were former Congressman and Lakas-CMD provincial chair Prospero Amatong, who nominated Uy as his successor, Representative Manuel "Way Kurat" Zamora, Representative Rommel Amatong, Vice Governor Ramil Gentugaya, and Davao del Norte Governor Rodolfo del Rosario, Lakas-CMD regional chair.
The Lakas-CMD national directorate has acknowledged Uy for being the first province governor to call a general assembly in a bid to strengthen the party for the coming 2010 polls. The Nabunturan assembly in July came barely a month after President Arroyo and Nograles launched the first mass oath taking and assembly under the merged Lakas-Kampi Party.
Uy said he would set mass oath taking of the party in his province in October. (BOT)
