Wanted: a new JDV legacy

By Ermin Garcia Jr.

Finally outflanked and out-maneuvered. And surprisingly, for someone politically astute, Speaker Joe de V did not see that coming. 

            Don’t look now but the plot to double-cross the Speaker in GMA-vintage fashion is beginning to surface. Note how Executive Sec. Ed Ermita made no bones about Malacanang being open to a constitutional convention as the other avenue to amend the charter, even as other outspoken alter egos of Mrs. Arroyo like Gabby Claudio and Romy Makalintal started to douse cold water on the planned Con-ASS.

            The objective for the new GMA plot is – without the Con-ASS in place, all bets are off.  Our Joe de V will not be prime minister.

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PANGASINAN EXPRESS DERAILED. The Speaker should have seen that coming but he was too trusting to believe that GMA shared his vision. He was warned by his friends in the opposition but he waved them off, firm in his belief that GMA and he were inseparable and effectively fused in their dreams for the country. What a fatal misread of his situation and his principal.

            It’s a matter of time now before GMA deals the final blow.  Expect her to announce that she wants her allies in Congress to shift the arena to the Con-con, and the prepared script will no longer call for JdV to lead the rally in the House. It will be Prospero Pichay, but who else?

            This time, it will no longer be a JDV-led “Pangasinan Express” train but a Pichay “GMA Charter Express” train with the catholic bishops and senators seated on the lead coach for the Con-con.

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THE NEW END-GAME. But what’s the end-game for a GMA-led Con-con, you ask. How can a Con-con expected to be composed of “independent” delegates to be voted upon by districts and cities? Will the delegates deliver for GMA? But, of course! That’s where DILG Sec. Ronnie Puno and Budget Sec. Rolando Andaya enter the picture.

            Mr. Puno will blackmail and tighten its strangle-hold on the local executives with threats of suspension to ensure the votes for anointed candidates to the Con-con while Mr. Andaya will make sure that the disappointed congressmen will toe the line and forget their allegiances to Mr. JdV via the releases of their pork barrel.

            Then as one might expect, the CBCP, Brother Mike, The One Voice, and other opposition leaders will sing the chorus in the background for the holding of the Con-con.

            Gee, you have to credit Mrs. Arroyo for all that devious plotting. That’s why she remains glued to her presidential seat to the consternation of the splintered opposition… and her latest targeted victim is the Speaker.

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A NEW LEGACY. Speaker JdV may have been blinded by an ambition to become prime minister, to have a crack at history in a bid to leave a legacy of being the best leader the country ever had, but one cannot deny his sincere motivation to serve the country well. Both his political allies and foes concede that. I believe that as well.

            But his supposed skills at negotiations and reaching “win-win” compromises have become his own weakness. GMA has evidently seen this and used his own ambition to use and mislead him.

            But all is not lost for him and his dream legacy. He and his loyal allies can still wrest the initiative from GMA-Pichay-Puno conspiracy and launch his a true Con-con, this time with only one agenda – to have a truly responsive charter that will serve the people’s interests, and not one particular politician, including himself.

            How I’d love to see and hear the Speaker commit himself to that vision of serving only the people’s interests and no personal agenda for himself, and enough of GMA.

            Let his legacy be that of the man from Pangasinan who sacrificed all, turned his back on GMA’s vested political interests and won to right the wrong in the country.

(For past columns, click http://sundaypunch.prepys.com/archives/category/opinion/punchline/)

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