Either Cojuangco or Guico for the Gov’ship

By Mortz C. Ortigoza

A national official with Salary Grade 31 ((₱295,191 monthly) who supports the Guico-Lambino-Celeste Political Group called me on the phone yesterday afternoon. We have a lengthy tête-à-tête on the brewing political saber rattling of some marquee politikos like billionaire Mark Cojuangco registering as voter in Lingayen, Pangasinan that I posted on my blog his photo (sitting beside his Man or Woman Friday with a long surname – was she Thai?- Dang Nakalimutankoangsurname) scribbling on the Voter’s Registration Sheet of the Commission on Election in the coastal capital town.

“There was no truth that there was a pact between our group and the Espino Group,” he referred to my April 14, 2021 blog’s Boring Governorship and Cong’l Races.

MARQUEE PLAYERS that inflamed the political cauldron this early of Pangasinan after Billionaire Mark Cojuangco (left photo) registered as voter last April 19 in Capital Town Lingayen. Right photo from top to bottom: Pangasinan Fifth District Representative Ramon “Mon-Mon” Guico, III and Pangasinan Governor Amado ‘Pogi”Espino, III. 

Excerpt of my Op-Ed there: 

"Here’s Deep Throat -2: 

“Ayon sa source ko, nag usap usap na raw mga Guico, Cojuangco, at Espino. Hindi na raw kakalabanin si Pogi sa governorship and in exchange, the Guico will keep the congressional seat and mayorship plus the xxxxxxxx”.

Quid pro quo, eh?”

Let's hear again National Official on the other end of the phone line:

“We sent signals to them that in case former Congressman Amado T. Espino, Jr will not challenge Mon-Mon (incumbent Pangasinan Fifth District Rep. Ramon Guico, III) in the district he will not run against Governor Pogi (Amado Espino, III – son of the older Espino),’ he explained on the other end of the phone line where Ma-An Guico locks horns with Amado Jr. while hubby Mon-Mon tussles with Pogi E. in the provincial “encomienda”.

“The group has wherewithal for a provincial campaign against the Espino,” the voice cracked on the other end of the phone line of course in the vernacular.

How about former Congressman Mark Cojuangco registering as voter in Lingayen, some personalities in the coastal town were jittery despite former Sual Mayor John Arcinue being floated to challenge Mayor Pol Bataoil – many see Mark’s presence there is more than his moist eye for the congressional seat occupied presently by Second District Rep. Jumel Espino? I inquired.

He agreed it was a sort of a gambit. The group will pressure Mayor Bataoil to run against Jumel – as the Real Deal unlike the marginalized former Congressman Victor Agbayani – while Cojuangco could pivot too – damn just like Barrack Obama’s pivot to Asia to parry the Chinks - for the governorship versus Pogi.

The pressure sounds like the following: Mayor you run against Jumel otherwise you face the wrath of the mammoth financial campaign chest of the Arcinues and the Cojuangcos. Or the former General runs against Jumel and Cojuangco helps buttress his campaign trove against the Espinos?

The scenarios look bizarre for me but that's how my source sees them.

If that happens Mon-Mon mans the ramparts in the one city eight towns’ Fifth District against the enemy and where he can watch too the fruition of the tens of thousands of people job generating juggernaut’s Japanese owned  Sumitomo International Wiring Systems he interceded to invest in the special economic zone he help created there.

“When his father died (Business tycoon Danding Cojuangco of San Miguel Corporation) Mark inherited billions of pesos,” the national official said on the phone.

Political Science 101 – my favorite subject I taught in college - dictates that a governorship candidate in the 44 towns three cities (yes 3 not 4 because Dagupan City dimwit is an independent City) Pangasinan to have an effective husting needs one billion pesos that could whet the appetite and win the ingratiation game of the more or less two million voters – mostly vulnerable members of the great unwashed.

This aside from the old score he has to settle to former Rep. Amado Jr. defeating in the Fifth District Mark’s missus then sitting Congresswoman Kimi Cojuangco and Governor Pogi decking him out in the 2016 governorship race.

Despite this Writer hearing straight from the horses mouth, those narrations and phenomena we see are for me were still parts of the fluid electoral situation until the Fat Lady sings her jazz rendition in the October 1to 8, 2021 filling of the Certificate of Candidacy (CoC) in the Comelec. There we can confirm these positioning, posturing, parleys, saber rattlings, and whatchamacallit we are seeing today and we suspect to ensue in the near future.

READ MY OTHER BLOG/COLUMN:

Die Inefficient Pinoy Producers Die

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