By Dominique Gabriel G. Bañaga

Amid an ongoing signature campaign, launched by former Negros Occidental Provincial Board Member Patrick Lacson, urging Negros Occidental third district Rep. Alfredo Benitez to run for governor in the 2019 elections, Vice Governor Eugenio Jose Lacson called the push “premature.”

The incumbent provincial official said the plan may create the impression of a power struggle within local political coalition Love Negros, of which the vice governor and Benitez are both affiliated.

“I have been telling [the] media that the congressman and I have been talking,” the vice governor explained. “[He] could have shared his sentiments directly [with] Rep. Benitez.”

Lacson added, the mayors of the Negros Occidental third congressional district have sat down with Benitez and they could have resolved it internally.

“Only when Love Negros has chosen its candidate for governor in 2019, then we go public,” he affirmed.

The congressman, who is said to have a reserved slot among the PDP-Laban senatorial slate, is in his last term.

In addition, Benitez has also endorsed his younger brother, Francisco Benitez, to replace him in Congress./DGB, WDJ