E·N·Q·U·I·R·Y
DEMAREE J.B. RAVAL
DEMAREE J.B. RAVAL
Angara-Legarda in 2010?
Sunday, 09 16, 2007
"No way,” Sen. Ed Angara says of the yarn being spread by his detractors about his political plans in 2010. Angara claims this is no more than some spinmaster’s effort to revive that oft-repeated tall tale about his alleged liaison with Sen. Loren Legarda, and put Legarda, who is topping all surveys leading to 2010, in a bad light and thereby pull her down in the rankings. As a veteran Navy counterpropagandist says: “Loose lips sink ships.”
I happen to know Angara and Legarda quite well, and I can comfortably speak about the courses they have plotted for their respective political ships, as it were. Although a warship skippered by an Angara-Legarda tandem in 2010 would blow out of the water the speculated Lacson-Escudero or Villar-Estrada (J) or Roxas-Cayetano (P) or Gordon-Teodoro team-ups, this scenario is simply star-crossed.
Angara knows from where all those negative allegations are coming from, and he has an answer to each one.
That he abandoned Fernando Poe, Jr. and Legarda in 2004? Somebody is lying through his teeth, Angara says. The records of the infamous “Noted” proceedings that led to that stolen dawn proclamation will show it was Angara who shepherded the opposition’s strenuous albeit unsuccessful arguments. It was he who authored the “The True (Minority) Report,” which detailed the fraud in the elections, and this electoral chicanery was validated by the damning “Hello Garci” tapes. It was Angara who subsidized the team of lawyers who valiantly put themselves in the path of that express train of fraudsters. It was Angara who brought the protest of FPJ and Legarda to the Presidential Electoral Tribunal.
That Angara is a “dear” friend of Legarda? That is another fabrication that Angara says can only come from a demented and evil mind. If the quotation marks on “dear” were to speak, they would clearly say, “What are we doing here to debase that word?” Angara and Legarda are friends: This is the truth, and nothing could be farther than - or closer to - that. After all, Legarda learned and earned her political spurs from Angara, and she is grateful for that tutelage. And lest anyone misinterpret that closeness between the two, let it be known that Angara has mentored a great many starting pols who are now sufficiently and effectively making marks of their own. Those he had mentored - except one, and my partner Rolex Suplico, knows who he is - have that similar trait of gratitude and are not ashamed to show it. Angara has been linked to many women before, but the link has proved to be mere gossamers of fanciful imagination out of the warped mind of a dedicated detractor. That’s why Angara’s family remains strong and closely-knit as ever.
That he has been co-opted by Malacañang? Admittedly, there is a half-truth to that — if we are talking about legislating for the good of the country and doing away with the bitter opposition versus administration intramurals that needlessly tax the people’s patience. Angara’s cooperative stance with Malacañang should not be interpreted as his being co-opted by his erstwhile adversaries. He has always steered away from the high and low extremes of issues, and opted to trod the middle ground in finding a solution to the ills of the nation. The Ramos administration comes to mind: Angara, then leader of the majority opposition, opted to shepherd all the bills, whether administration-sponsored or otherwise, that have become laws which are now reaping economic benefits for the nation. “Adversarial” is not descriptive of Angara; “statesmanlike” would be more like it.
That he has political plans in 2010 or by the end of his term as senator in 2013? For an answer, Angara would rather bring you with him to his farms in Nasugbu and Baler, which are gems of tracts of land that can easily qualify as agri-tourism sites. In his apolitical moments, Angara gets in touch with himself in the quiet solitude of his farms. And there is where he will be when his term ends in 2013. I can believe him. Not that he has become bone-tired, but that he would like to pause to smell once more the flowers in far-off Aurora, where he grew up. He has contributed more than enough for the nation. The fruits of his legislative skills are everywhere: in education, health, agriculture, banking, electoral reforms, anti-corruption, senior-citizens’ welfare... Thus his last term of six years is what his son, Rep. Sonny Angara of Aurora, calls bonus na lamang para sa bansa.
So in 2010, Angara will still be in the Senate, to retire to his farm in 2013.
On the other, Legarda is obviously measuring well her moves. The tempo is dictated by her determined effort to make a go at the presidency in 2010. She is not hiding it, and she is not distracted at all by anything. She continues with her role as legislator, unmindful of the distracting and destructive buzz about her that her detractors could concoct. Her trust rating among the Filipino voters is going through the roof, following her amazing performance in the senatorial polls as topnotcher for the second time around. The infrastructure of her campaign is slowly being put in place. Whatever she has learned from the 2004 campaign and thereafter, when the opposition under Angara stood by her and that of Fernando Poe, Jr., will surely benefit her.
So, there. Whoever is the demented and evil mind foisting the Angara-Legarda red herring is definitely in for a big disappointment. Sorry, wise guy, but there are no takers.
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