Cash strapped mayoralty bet a congressional material now

By Mortz C. Ortigoza

DAGUPAN CITY – A mayor who ran then on a shoe string budget for a municipal office in Pangasinan and a recipient of hundreds of millions of pesos of infrastructure projects is being groomed to run for a congressional office.

OATH – Mayors in the 44 towns and four cities’ Pangasinan are sworn in on this photo to their new party PDP-Laban by Party Provincial President and Pangasinan 5^th District Representative Amado T. Espino, Jr. (Extreme Left)  (Photo Credit: Philippine Information Agency).

The mayor, who asked to hide his name, said that when he ran for the mayorship in 2013 he had only P4  million campaign budget while his opponent who was the incumbert mayor had P10 million to P15 million campaign chest.

He cited that a former congressional candidate who had beef to grind against the mayor loaned a house and lot to help shore up his (the bet) campaign because the ally could not stomach the corruption and incompetency of the mayor and his family.

“Pati mga sisters ko abroad nag ambag ambag para makatulong sa kampanya ko”.

He said the then reelective mayor bought vote for P500 per voter while he could only afford to buy vote at P100 per electorate.

“But I still won in a landslide in that poll. I won in all the villages except one where I lost almost two dozens of votes,” he stressed.
He cited that even voters milled around him whenever he went to a stump in their villages.
They told him not to worry about the sums given by the mayor because they would not vote for him.

After the poll he had still two million pesos left that he bought a sports utility vehicle he would be using as a public official.

“Mabuti ng bumili ng sasakyan bago mag umpisang umupo para iwas intriga na binulbulsa ko ang pera ng bayan”.

He cited that he is on his last term but he was being egged by the powers that be to run for a seat in the House of Representatives.

 “My contracting business is bullish now because a congressman friend gave me P100 million projects while the other solon gave me P60 million projects. Another politician gave him almost P30 milion road project".

The Commission on Elections (Comelec) announced that the filing of the certificates of candidacy for the May 13, 2019 middle term elections will start in October 1 to 5, 2018.