PEOPLE talk about...
* EIGHT 'TERMED OUT" SENATORS AND SEVERAL HOUSE MEMBERS whose election a lawsuit before the Supreme Court wants to declare unconstitutional.
The petition, filed by a group of lawyers and other private individuals, alleges that under the Constitution, a senator cannot serve for more than two terms of six years each or a total of 12 years and a congressman or congresswoman has a term limit of nine years for three consecutive terms of three years each.
The "termed out senators" named in the petition are Senate President Vicente Sotto III and senators Franklin Drilon, Panfilo Lacson, Francis Pangilinan, Lito Lapid, Ramon Revilla Jr., Pia Cayetano and Aquilio Pimentel III.
No anger, she says
Mary Ann de los Santos, Tomas Osmeña's running mate, didn't strip her councilor's office of everything. She left two items: a glass partition and a bathroom mirror.
De los Santos lost the election along with Tomas but she said she wasn't venting anger on her office at Cebu City Hall. Like mayor Tomas and outgoing councilors besides her, she took away only what she personally owned and used in her office. She made the claim Saturday (July 6) in an interview with Bobby Nalzaro on dySS radio. She showed an inventory list to Nalzaro but it was not yet independently checked if the glass partition and the mirror were indeed still there. The published photos didn't clearly show that.
What may distinguish her act from Tomas is that she didn't include the removal of tiles, ceiling, fittings, electrical wiring and the like. And she didn't say she was refused a request for a sum of money from the mayor and the City Council for equipment and renovation of her office. She said she took away her desk and six desks for her staff, which, she told Bobby, were all made of quality hard wood.
Experience in losing
Mary Ann must have accepted the May 2019 election results with less rage than the BOPK standard bearer did. And she is also a veteran politician: 15 years as barangay leader (council member in 1994 and barangay captain in 1997), a city councilor in 2013 (sole Team Rama survivor in Cebu City north) and 2016.
And she suffered losses too, big ones: for city mayor in 2007 and congresswoman of Cebu City north in 2010. So her defeat to Mike Rama this year (by 26,678 votes) was not a new experience.
Top highlights in her career include:
* That August 17, 2015 privileged speech before the City Council when she announced she was defecting from Team Rama to BOPK, whose leader Tomas she had engaged in bitter and fierce verbal battles. In the "massacre" speech, Mary Ann complained she was "murdered" and "brutalized" by a person "you know" but didn't name. She didn't need to; she referred to the Team Rama head, Mike.
* Allegations of wrongdoing over scraps of metal and other materials from the 2014 demolition of the old Cebu City hospital building, charges against which, she said, she was not defended by her party mates.
* And now this: the stripping of her office before her exit from City Hall, but there's no definite talk yet about charges against her.
'Nuisance' bet Paulino
Last February, in its first week or so, a Comelec division disqualified, on petition of Tomas Osmeña, one Paulino Osmeña for being a nuisance candidate. Last May 2, Comelec en banc affirmed Paul's disqualification.
Yet since Paulino's or Paul's name was already in the ballot, so he was included in unofficial tallies, such as ABS-CBN's Halalan 2019. He drew only 2,735 votes.
Had Edgar Labella's majority been razor-thin (Edgar's margin over Tomas: 18, 925 votes), would Paulino's votes have helped under the Supreme Court's Benhur Salimbangon doctrine?
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