Seares: In this ring: Caindec vs. Tomas
VICTOR Emmanuel Caindec, regional director of Land Transportation Office (LTO), and Cebu City Mayor Tomas Osmeña each must know what his job is and keep himself there.
Yet they’ve been entangled during the week in a heated verbal exchange of accusations and insults about each other’s work, often straying to things that they did not originally quarrel about.
Tomas complained about the LTO backlog in issuing licenses, which was hurting numerous motorists. Caindec shot back with the disclosure that 156 of 240 City-owned vehicles were not registered and would face the risk of being impounded. City Hall sought particulars as it rejected the charge.
But the running word war has spilled over to other issues, including Tomas’s alleged inability to solve problems besides traffic management, such as coping with floods and garbage.
Ultimately, they came to the absurd question whether Caindec should run City Hall and Mayor Tomas should lead the LTO.
Megaphone
The mayor can say it was his right to speak for motorists, most of whom are city voters, who were “penalized” for LTO’s failure to print enough licenses. Caindec can say it was his duty to enforce the law on registration of vehicles, including those owned by the City Government.
What set off the fireworks was apparently the megaphone used in the conversation: the two public officials hurled information and calumny through their Facebook accounts. Nothing else these days can be more public than when truth or lie is digitally repeated several times.
If you were...
If you were the mayor, known for alleged bullying and demanding what he wants, would you not bristle when the LTO official accused you of collecting political pogi points? Would you not snarl when LTO Chief Caindec implied your ignorance in solving the monstrous traffic mess in Mambaling, where an underpass is being constructed, and added the threat: “I’ll show you how to do it. Unya resign (ha).” And would you not go ballistic that after you accepted the challenge, Caindec, realizing the risk of his bet, called it off?
And if you were the LTO regional director, would you not fume over the suspicion that the mayor could be exploiting the restiveness of disgruntled motorists for political gain? Would you not resent that the mayor, among the LGU heads, was making the only public noise about LTO’s admitted failures?
Politics as factor
Caindec who raised the question of political motive could not shed that off his own person.
Appointed as chief of Citom (now CTTO) last Dec. 15, 2014, Caindec had mayor Mike Rama, Tomas’s archrival, for a boss. When he resigned six weeks later, Caindec chose to stay as private sector rep in the traffic agency. And Mike crowed, “(Victor) will always be part of Team Rama because he’s a bright boy.”
Bright boy he must be because Caindec believed he could solve the Mambaling crisis. But when he attached the condition that Tomas must quit if he, Caindec, could end the Mambaling crisis, politics inevitably tainted his proposal.
The BOPK camp promptly highlighted the political color, alleging that Caindec got the LTO post through an anti-Tomas national official and was doing his benefactor’s bidding.
Talking back
Critics of the mayor think it’s good for the city to have someone courageous enough to stand up to Tomas. Since when has anyone in recent history heard a national agency official publicly talk back to the mayor the way Caindec does?
Caindec uses plain and at times colorful language (e.g. “orgasmic”). He directly goes to the point, avoiding the maze-like linguistic tour his former boss used to take. And Caindec knows the law, at least enough to tell him that he cannot function as mayor and Tomas cannot function as LTO chief.
Caindec has to be elected to City Hall and Tomas appointed to the LTO. Which will not happen. If each thinks he can help the other solve the ills that afflict the community, an unsolicited advice may be sent by private means, not the public wall of the internet, and with some civility, not laced with toxic prose.