Ex-Cong Celeste to Challenge Sual Mayor Calugay’s Post

FOR THE 2022 ELECTION

BY MORTZ C. ORTIGOZA

Former Pangasinan First District Congressman Jesus “Boying” Celeste will soon announce to the public his intention to duke out, geez this early, with Philippines second richest town’s Sual first term mayor Liseldo ”Dong” Calugay for the May 2022 National and Local Elections, a source who is closed to the ex-solon texted me.

”Paki bullhorn mo na brother si ex-Congressman Jesus "Boying" Celeste. He is out to challenge Mayor Calugay of Sual para maumpisahan na ang Sual”

My mole, as what the spooks say, was the same man who gave me the scoop in October 1, 2018 that former Pangasinan Governor and Congressman Amado T. Espino, Jr. trusted ally’s Board Member and then congressional wannabe Raul Sison deserted him to challenge the former son Jumel in the acrimonious 2019 congressional race in the Second District of the province.

Here’s what I wrote:

2022 POLL'S DUKE OUT: From left: Former Nine-Year Pangasinan First District Congressman Jesus "Boying" Celeste and Philippines second richest town's Sual, Pangasinan Mayor Liseldo "Dong" Calugay.

“A major blow struck the camp of a marquee political family in the huge Pangasinan province when a hardcore ally jumped ship to a rival (gubernatorial bet Arthur Celeste) because he was not anointed and felt betrayed to run for a congressional seat. Exiting Board Member Raul Sison, the point man of Governor Amado “Pogi” I. Espino, III in the Second District, abandoned him and his congressman father with the same namesake after feeling being cheated for his congressional ambition in the second district of the province”.

At the caption of that then breaking news I penned and posted on my Political Blog: Sison, in that covert Manila meeting, joined the camp of Alaminos City Mayor Arthur Celeste for the latter‘s gubernatorial run in the May 2019 election. Others in photo there were Presidential Adviser for Northern Luzon and  Cagayan Special Economic Zone (CEZA) Administrator and Secretary Raul Lambino (dubbed as the King Maker of Pangasinan), former Pangasinan Governor Victor Agbayani, Binmaley former councilor Arnulfo “Anong” Alipio, and another ex-loyalist of the Espinos retired police colonel Paterno Orduna .

Alipio and Sison (whose family said died of pulmonary disease and a heart attack) have been in the news after they were sued by the cops as one of the 12 perpetrators of the September 11, 2019 ambushed of former governor Espino where ten men armed with powerful assault automatic rifles fired with military precision the convoy of two vehicles of the just defeated solon in his Fifth District reelection when he and his body guard were traversing Barangay Magtaking, San Carlos City, Pangasinan. Result of that treachery and overkill: Espino’s police escort Staff Sgt. Richard Esguerra and his driver Agapito Cuizon died.

Raul, whom I described as the King Gimmicks then, tried all his best to snare the votes of the district against the young Espino and his financial juggernaut by doing various corny antics like by climbing a tree like a chimpanze ang goofing around with a microphone on his hand.

It did not sit well with the older Espino who gave his opprobrium that running for Congress was a serious profession unlike what he saw in the classless Sison – his former man Friday whom he said could not even speak and finish a sentence in correct English during his stint as Board Member in the August Chamber.

‘Umaakyat siya sa puno ng kahoy na parang unggoy na may dala dala pang roll-on,” he said in a press conference he called to rebut the attacks of his political opponents led by gubernatorial candidate Celeste.

Here’s the other half of the Short Message Service (SMS) colloquially called texts by my source who lived in the western part of the mammoth almost four million populated province of Princess Urduja (did the warrior lady has a first name? Or her first name was really Princess just like Actress Princess Punzalan the ex-wife of Willie Revillame).

“Ex Mayor and Congressman Art Celeste is going back in 2022 (election) for his most loved position than the mayoralty and the gubernatorial post -- the congressional where he spent nine years as a lawmaker”.

The vice mayoralty tandem of Boying Celeste, a three-term mayor and three term solon -- what a feat, will be former Sual three term – mayor John Rodney Arcinue.

Calugay defeated John in the May 2019 election by a lead votes of 1,667 among the 22,535 registered voters who went to the polling precincts.

According to Halalan Results of ABS-CBN television network, Calugay (PDP-LBN) outsmarted Arcinue (NP) with 12, 101 and 10, 434, respectively.

John’s father my coffee mate ex-mayor Roberto “Bing” Arcinue was knocked out by his former vice mayor and pet peeve hahaha Dioneil Caburao (PDP-LB) with 12, 788 votes while Kuya Bing settled with 9, 003 votes.

Hinde umubra iyong sako-sako natin Kuya Bing, mas maraming sako ang kalaban bumaha hahaha!

Just like in Dagupan City where thousands of pesos changed hands between the bag men of the deep pocketed mayoralty bets, who are chains of malls’ owners, that Sual poll was one of the most expensive vote-buying marred elections in Pangasinan.

The Celestes smarted that Sual, second richest town in the Philippines according to the Commission on Audit, was snatched by their bitter enemies former Congressman Espino and his son and namesake the incumbent governor of Pangasinan.

Calugay, just like Raul Sison, is known as the factotum of the former governor.

According to the news article I wrote in November 15, 2019 titled: Sual Gears Up to become Richest Town in PH, I penned (sus, this yokel sometimes felt the groove to write on a ball pen and a piece of scratch paper) a report released by the COA that the municipality of Sual maintained its position as the second richest municipality in the country with assets amounting to P2.037 billion.

Only Sual - among Pangasinan’s 44 municipalities – made it to COA’s top ten richest towns, besting such other first class towns as the capital town of Lingayen, Bayambang, Mangaldan, Malasiqui, Binmaley, and Calasiao. The tiny coastal town located at the First Congressional District or Celeste Country earned more or less P200 million a year from the business taxes from the Team Sual Corporation (TSC) and the San Miguel Corporation (SMC) that procured and sold in the market the electricity generated by the TSC.

And I was not yet talkin' about the local government unit's share from her local taxes and the tens of millions of pesos' Internal Revenue Allotment from the Imperial Manila Government.

Now you know how sensationalized to write a political article about this once tiny sleepy town (who got an absentee mayor with an illustrious surname, agpaypayso Vice Mayor Alex Rigonan the best pal of broadcaster Ruel Camba and Ike Palinar?) where political titans of Pangasinan clash head on of their proxy wars to gain or deprive each other families of political territory either contiguous,  compact, or adjacentas what the statute on congressional apportionment would say in the Constitution – the subject I taught in college for ten years.

The forthcoming duke out of Boying and Calugay and the Espinos is seen by political experts as continuation of the political maneuvering and hegemony of the Celestes and the Espinos to control the District.

It is seen as, just like the expensive John versus Dong tiff for the mayoralty's diadem in 2019, as another Battle Royal where dough will flood to the hands of the vulnerable highest bidding voters (pera-pera lang just like in Dagupan hahaha) of the mountainous coastal town.

In that 2019 poll, the Espinos clawed its presence by taking over Sual, Mabini, Dasol, and Agno towns where their loyalists like Calugay and Mayors Ariel de Guzman, Noel Nacar (who used to support the Celestes in 2016 Election), and Gualberto Sison won against the Celestes mayoralty candidates.

For several elections, the nine towns and one city used to be dominated by Celestes’ mayoralty allies after the family through former mayor Art (a former resident of the vote - rich Bolinao town) ousted the Braganzas, another bitter but fading political enemies, in Alaminos City.

But in that last year’s election, the younger brother of Celeste, former Bolinao Mayor Arnold, a U.S repatriate beat by 7, 448 lead votes Espino congressional bet Tim Orbos, the younger sibling of the former solon of the District.

That lead votes were part the 195, 020 voters that went to the polling places in Western Pangasinan.

Here's Media Man Mon Untalan, a kibitzer of the District's politics:" Naglipat na ng gamit sa nabiling house ng mga Celeste (si ex-Congressman Boying) sa may kurbada bago paahon sa zigzag doon sa kalsada ng Sual. Nandoon ang congressional district's office ni Cong. Noli who by the way will run as mayor in Agno na nawala sa kanila. To date patuloy ang clever campaign nila led by Kapitan Tomagoy of Barangay Caoayan, Sual. He is batang Arcinue".

Mon said that the second 1,000-megawatt (MW) coal-fired power plant of Korea Electric Power Corporation will try again its bid to build shop at the coastal town.

"That's what made Sual very attractive to politicians," Mon added.

According to broadcaster Harold Barcelona, after Boying told the village chiefs of Sual his intention to run for the top executive post there, 12 out of 19 Kapitans pledged immediately their loyalty to him.

I have to confirm this yet when I interview the former solon since I doubted some of the reports of Harold, a Facebook and SMS or Text illiterate hahaha, whenever he dropped by the house and “wolfed” some Davao Fruits the missus buy in the Southern Island and sell in the rambunctious province of Pangasinan.

***

After I “absconded” from Mindanao after my almost four months being lock down there due to the phantom pandemic Corona Virus Disease -19, prolific radio commentators Ruel Camba and Atong Remogat dropped by at my house in Dagupan City and told me on that middle of July meeting over a bottle of Johnny Walker and succulent Davao Durian pulps as finger food that Calugay was roving around the municipalities of the District and was seen generously giving financial assistance to the mayors there.

“Because he intends to run for Congress and his wife will run for mayor versus Boying Celeste,” the duo told this Op-Ed Writer who was hungry to know the nitty-gritty of the political events in the towns of the gargantuan province after he was enmeshed in Mindanao politics. Sus, he was even baptized by a Duterte Cabinet Secretary at his residence at the foot of the majestic, er, tallest and great Mt. Apo in Kidapawan City as a Muslim Chieftain with a name: Datu Musuko Pagdimakak*yo hahahaha!

I forgot to ask the two how much Calugay gave to those Mayors.

***

What I know the De Venecias led by Fourth District Representative Toff de Venecia gave lately Seven to Ten Thousand Pesos financial aids to barangay officials in Manaoag and San Jacinto Towns after Secretary Lambino was seen, as a whirling dervish, giving fifty mono block chairs and allegedly Seventy Thousand Pesos to each of the many Kapitans of the 140 villages’ district.

That’s a lot of monies son of a gun that could change the loyalty of those Kupitan, er, Kapitan – for - Sale in the Central Pangasinan’s District.

These information came from the trolls or dummy accounts like Dina Magpitpit, Liann De Vera Bauzon, and countless others who do the bidding for their patrons and launch their vitriol to those political leaders I saw with regularity on my news feed in Facebook. 

Anyway, the brouhaha and the tearing of each other’s prestige and honor by these media friends have been a treat and amusement to the many hahaha who know them!

READ MY BLOG/COLUMN:

Why Reporters Hide Their News Source

(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)