Easter Sunday saw a doctor, nurse, priest, and two retirees – a hotelier and a salesman – gather at a shopping mall over coffee.
The priest started the ball rolling by saying, “I always laugh aloud when I see television ads where old senatorial candidates say their ‘vows of promises’ in attracting voters to their side – they seem to be bringing heaven down to purgatory and straight to hell.” The nurse agreed, adding, “They really know how to squeeze the minds of voters who are also being fooled by promises – imagine, telling us of their healthcare bill and those senior citizen discounts, all which are all there already.”
“When re-electionist senatorial candidates talk of their platform, it is as if they will really do it for the Filipinos,” said the doctor. “Most of them really forget – if not, all of them.”
“How can we believe them when they are there for those monetary privileges and business interests?” asked the retired hotelier. “The only problem is the Filipinos WANT to get fooled, always, with a five hundred pesos bill in exchange for three years of no people-service at all,” the retired salesman added. “The winners need to get back their investment in their campaign money first more than anything else.”
“That is true,” the priest agreed. “Their first priority is the return of their political investment.”
“Who is there for true service?” he added. “If they could not have a return of their political spending then his mind will not be in serving truly the people.”
The points raised were reminiscent of a WatchMe column from January that asked, “When will the Comelec penalize rule violators?,” where a priest posed the question, “How will they recover the cost of winning – or losing – an election except from money deals when they sit in power, right?” The point of the statement was also similar to another WatchMe column, entitled “How many would run for office if financial benefits were scrapped?,” where a lawyer was quoted as saying, “Why are politician candidates spending millions to win an election… How could they recover the millions spent after winning?”
The doctor chimed in: “Reality tells one that those in power, and who wants to remain in power, will always raise funds by the hundreds of millions to ensure re-election. That is the real scenario in politics – who wants to serve losing money?”
“Of course, there are many monetary gains in politics,” the priest replied. “Even politicians take care of some in the religious sect.”
He made note of one senatorial candidate who claimed they would raise salaries and lower the prices on various goods.
“This candidate has been a senator for decades, a cabinet secretary of the past administration, and even lost a presidential bid; and now he says he has more things to do?” the priest noted. “Why did he not do it before? What was he doing when he was in great power?”
“They have much to do,” said the nurse. “Yet, they were busy empowering themselves with their greed for money – maybe.”
“Can we please have new faces in our new list of senatorial candidates?” asked the retired salesman. “There are twelve old f*****s already as incumbents who run the Senate show; let’s have a new breed, please.”
***
This column greets Roel Venus, Dodong Bascon, Elsie Gonzaga, Rex Constantino, Doc Herm Javellana, Millie Gonzaga, Charles Lim, Ritchie Macabane, Jun Cordova, Michelle Wong, Stephen Sy, and Rosbe Briones./WDJ