Espino camp hits my column’s Celeste vs. Espino

By MORTZ C. ORTIGOZA

Power-that-be in the pilgrim town Manaoag, Pangasinan told me that Vice Mayor Lito Arenas has moist eye for the mayoralty of the town in the 2016 polls.

He said Arenas’ vice mayoralty tandem would be Former Mayor Nap Sales.

“Big time private contractor si Lito. Si Nap cash strapped na and could not regain his old post as it would cost him an arm and leg to run for the mayorship”.

My source told me Mayor Kim Amador is a formidable force to reckon with.

“His sister, an Undersecretary at the Department of Budget & Management, has been generous in giving projects in Manaoag”.

He told me that Amador’s vice mayoralty tandem will be my friend Councilor Doods Rosario- former ally of mayoralty wannabe, my amiable pal too, Dr. Ming Rosario – a former board member.

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Former Mangaldan Mayor Berex Abalos told me he will run for a seat at the Sangguniang Panlalawigan (provincial board).

“Maganda iyan, bakit kayong mga taga Mangaldan pinakamalaking bayan sa 4th (Congressional) District outside Dagupan City) wala kayong representation sa Sangguniang Panlalawigan? “ I posed.

He said he would be supported by his business patron Former Congressman Mark Cojuangco, a gubernatorial hopefull.

“Maganda iyan pag BM (board member) na si Berex, siguradong makakakuha na kami ng kontrata thru you from Governor Cojuangco,” a contractor teased

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One of the men of Pangasinan Governor Amado T. Espino called me recently  belying my column he saw at the internet: “Rep. Celeste vs. Gov. Espino 2016 Congress”.

“The governor is angry, you have been instigating that he and Congressman (Jesus “Boying”) Celeste to quarrel,” he said on the phone.

I told him that what I wrote came from one of their lawyers Attorney John Bigay who called me on the phone.

“He is not our lawyer!”

“But he was there at the injunction trial of (then Police Provincial Director Senior Supt.) Marlou Chan when the governor questioned the legality of Chan’s appointment as permanent director of the province despite Section 51 of Republic Act 6975 (Department of Department of the Interior & Local Government Act) where the governor appoints one of the three nominees submitted by the police regional director.”

I said lawyer Bigay’s presence at the Regional Trial Court in Lingayen, Pangasinan with the provincial government officials made an impression to us media men that he was one of the counsels of the governor.

“He is not our lawyer,” he reiterated.

I told him that I did not write to make intrigue on that column. I even posed in my article a qualification on the prognosis of Bigay that Espino versus Celeste could only happen if the former chooses to reside from Bugallon, Pangasinan to any towns or a city in the district this May 8 or one year to the May 9, 2016 poll as mandated by law for one to qualify to run in an elective public post.

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I asked the other day Former Congressman Mark Cojuangco at the Star Plaza Hotel in Dagupan City about him appropriating half-a-million pesos from his pork barrel funds when he was a solon and giving it to the fiesta celebration of his town Sison.

“That was what the lapdogs in the media of Espino tried to paint you,” I told him.

“That’s a big B.S. That was not true. I and my wife used our personal funds to donate to fiesta not only in our town but to the other towns,” he said.

He cited the EC Jammers Orchestra as one of the freebies he and Rep. Kimi Cojuangco (5th District, Pangasinan) contributed to the fiestas not only in Sison but in other towns and cities in Pangasinan.

He said the Commission on Audit (COA) would not allow him to allocate a part of his priority development assistance fund (PDAF) or pork to fund a fiesta.

“Probably they referred to the programs we funded from the PDAF in the barangays,” he explained.

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Word – War among the media allies of Cojuangco and Espino  becomes more exciting after the Cojuangco group commissioned veteran, battle and intrigue scarred Renato “Atong” Remogat to run roughshod in the radio with Espino’s hacks that pounced on the personal lives of the media men of Cojuangco.

“Kung gusto nila ng personalan umpisahan natin sa kanilang kamag-anak at sa kanila,” he told friends.

Atong would unleash his fire and brimstone versus those media men of the Espinos at Sonshine Radio and Ambassador Antonio Cabangon –Chua DWIC-FM starting this May.

(You can read my selected columns at http://mortzortigoza.blogspot.com and articles at Pangasinan News Aro. You can send comments too at totomortz@yahoo.com)