“If New York (the United States), Sydney (Australia) and Moscow (Russia) have their own grand celebration, this is our version,” Binay said.

“This is also our way to share love and to lead Filipinos in welcoming 2009 with hope and optimism.”

In neighboring Bonifacio Global City, streaks of red, yellow and green lit up the sky above The Fort where the Taguig city government threw a New Year countdown and street party for around 5,000 people, highlighted by a spectacular 15-minute fireworks presentation by the award-winning La Mancha pyrotechnics group.

At the SM Mall of Asia in Pasay City, executives and celebrities of the GMA 7 television network sponsored a grand party, to the delight of their fans and supporters.

Rained out

Some 10,000 people, under the watchful eye of 120 policemen, showed up at the Makati street party held at the corner of Ayala and Makati Avenues despite the intermittent showers.

“If not for the drizzle, more people could have come and celebrated with us,” Binay said.

The annual New Year countdown party in Makati also served as a fundraising event for the ABS-CBN Foundation’s “Sagip Kapamilya” to help indigent families.

To keep the crowd entertained, rock bands like Sandwich, Blue Ketchup, the Bloomfields and Brownman Revival performed their hit songs and revved up the crowd.

Dancing lights

Shortly before the stroke of midnight, Binay went up the makeshift stage and led the official countdown to 2009 as a splendid 10-minute fireworks display sponsored by the city government lit up the skies.

As the clock struck midnight at The Fort, organizers let loose a spectacle of light that seemed to dance to the rhythm of the music playing in the background.

As fireworks exploded in crimson and light green hues, yellow sparks formed a line of small rocket bursts, to cheers and applause from the crowd that packed the corner of 5th Avenue and 26th Street.

Lights from thousands of clicking cameras flashed incessantly as people tried to get a snapshot of the display. Others raised their beer bottles to greet the New Year, while some hugged the person next to them.

The display was excerpted from the La Mancha presentation that won third place in a fireworks competition in Hanover, Germany. La Mancha was one of the organizers of the World Pyrolympics held in the Philippines in 2005 and 2006.

“From the feedback that I heard, people loved last night’s fireworks display because it shot up really high,” said Senior Supt. Camilo Cascolan.

People started to trickle in at around 9 p.m., said Cascolan, who kept watch with a contingent of the Taguig police. After the party ended around 1 a.m., the police chief said he noticed more people arriving and the parking lots filling up with more cars.

P1-M prize money

Of those who attended the Makati event, Roque Ferfas almost went home the champion. But Ferfas narrowly missed taking home the much-coveted P1 million grand prize of the night’s raffle draw.

Ferfas only got to identify 14 Makati City logos, just two short to win the top prize, from the boxes that were flashed on the giant screen onstage, according to Fel Lim, one of the event organizers.

Lovelyn Fortaliza and Princess Saja also had the chance to pocket the P1-million prize, being among the 15 lucky partygoers who were selected by raffle draw to play the game.

Fortaliza and Saja only successfully identified eight and three Makati logos, respectively.

The three each took home P20,000 in cash, plus either a digital camera, Apple iPod and Sony Playstation Portable game console.

Participants needed only to donate any amount to the foundation to get one raffle stub.

“Although nobody won the P1 million, it was a successful night for the foundation,” Lim said.

INQUIRER.net

Gordon, who was ranked fifth in the 2004 senatorial elections, can seek re-election in 2010. But he has been aspiring to become president since 1992 yet.

“I think among those who have declared (to run for president), I can see that I am the most ready (to manage the country) but I am not a candidate yet,” Gordon said in a press conference.

He said he knows the job of a president.

“If I need to be president tomorrow or today, I already know what to do right away,” Gordon said.

He said he has been handling many executives positions in the past, including 13 years as Olongapo City mayor, chairman of the Subic Bay Metropolitan Authority (SBMA) and as secretary of the Department of Tourism (DOT).

“We envisioned Subic Bay, we created the free port, we took over the free port and nothing was stolen. Today, SBMA has 87,000 jobs,” Gordon said.

He said that when he was Tourism secretary, the DOT was able to increase tourists with his “Wow Philippines” program.

“In the Senate, I think everybody knows that I put up the automated election law. It’s already implemented. I sponsored the tourism bill, which should have been approved last year,” Gordon said.

Experience

According to Gordon, he has been the governor of the Philippine National Red Cross for the last 26 years, and has helped thousands of less fortunate people through the years not because he is in politics but because he wanted to help.

He has served as chairman of the Pacific-Asia Tourism Association (PATA), governor of the International Red Cross, and chairman of the East Asia Pacific of the World Tourism Organization.

“I think I’m ready (to become president of the Philippines) except that I don’t want to say that I am running right now because I am not ready to announce that,” Gordon said.

He said he is not a traditional politician and he will pale in comparison to those who already declared candidate for president with “their horrendous money which is even questionable where they got it.”

“So, the point is, I will make it a point to announce it in a proper time,” Gordon said.

On the billboards in Metro Manila showing his face and that of Cebu Gov. Gwendolyn Garcia, he said it does not mean a Gordon-Garcia or Garcia-Gordon tandem in 2010.

“We are just putting up a Cebuano-Filipino in Metro Manila. You must know that I was the one who installed the statue of Lapu-Lapu at Bagumbayan (Luneta),” Gordon said.

Gordon said that with the billboard, Garcia represents the Cebuanos in Metro Manila.

Meanwhile, Gordon said a deserving candidate for president does not have to be super rich to become president, but that the person must have dignity, capability and honesty to lead the country.

Gordon said that although he has money, he will not spend that for a presidential election. He said that if Filipino voters are already mature, they will even contribute
money for the president they are going to vote just what happened to Barack Obama in the US.

Sunstar

Short of this, however, Estrada may be forced to seek the presidency for himself in 2010, but said he will wait until the last quarter of the year to make that decision to run.

Estrada is believed to have, at the very least, a solid political base of about 30 percent that, in a race with four or five presidential contenders, would easily make him win the presidency hands down.

In a telephone interview with the Tribune yesterday, Estrada, who is vacationing in Baguio City, said that he is not actively seeking the presidency and really wants to see the political opposition uniting behind one single presidential bet.

He said that part of his New Year’s resolution is to concentrate on his efforts to unite the opposition into supporting only one candidate in 2010.

“That’s really what I want to see: A single standard bearer representing the political opposition. That’s the only way we can’t be cheated by this administration. It already happened in 2004 when the opposition split up. It would have been impossible to cheat Ronnie (Fernando Poe, Jr.) had he been the single opposition bet. As it was, he was cheated and by the millions in votes.”

He stressed that the very same thing will be repeated if the political opposition fails to unite behind a single presidential bet, which is the reason he is prepared, if all efforts at unity would not bear fruit, to make a run for the top seat.

There are at least six presidential aspirants within the opposition forces, namely Senators Manuel Villar, Manuel “Mar” Roxas, of the Nacionalista and Liberal Parties respectively, Senators Francis “Chiz” Escudero and Loren Legarda, from the Nationalist People’s Coalition and Sen. Panfilo “Ping” Lacson” along with Makati Mayor Jejomar Binay.

Reports however, had it that Villar, as well as Vice President Noli de Castro, is being eyed by the administration parties, Lakas and Kampi as their standard bearer, in a bid to unite the two administration parties, since a merger appears to be an impossibility.

Congressional sources, however told the Tribune that there may just be a team up of Villar and De Castro, with the Vice President seeking the same seat in 2010 under the administration banner.

De Castro belongs to the “Wednesday Club” which has as its members Villar, Senators Joker Arroyo, Francis Pangilinan and National Economic Development Authority (Neda) chief Ralph Recto.

The Wednesday Club was formed in 2001 when all four of them, all congressmen, ran as adminis-tration senatorial bets and won, while De Castro, a radio-TV anchor, ran and under the banner of the opposition as senator. The four adopted him as their club member.

The anti-Estrada forces, as well as Malacañang, are said to fear Estrada’s run for the presidency in 2010, with them insisting that he is disqualified from seeking the presidency again as the Constitution bans one who has already served as president.

But others argue that the constitutional ban refers only to incumbent presidents seeking reelection.

The case of the former president, however, is unique in the sense that he served in the high seat for only to a little more than two and a half years, having been ousted from power through a power grab by then Vice President Gloria Arroyo, who not only served the rest of his term, but also sought the vote for the presidency in 2004.

The argument raised on this issue is that the vice president who had succeeded Estrada served for well over three and a half years and as sitting president, could still seek the presidency in 2004, while a deposed president, who served less than three years, cannot possibly be barred from running for the presidency, especially since he is not seeking a reelection, but another term of office after his ouster.

If Estrada makes a run for the presidency, the issue is certain to go to the Supreme Court for resolution.

The Daily Tribune <<< Without Fear or Favor >>>

In a television interview two nights ago, Nograles said he was no longer focused on pursuing the merger of the two pro-administration parties.

Nograles said his current concern is to persuade Lakas and Kampi to support common national and local candidates in the general elections in May 2010.

He hinted that failure on the part of the two parties to support common tickets could mean defeat for many administration candidates.

Lakas was founded by former President Fidel Ramos, while President Arroyo is   Kampi’s founder. However, both parties consider Mrs. Arroyo as their principal leader.

The two groups are still in search of a presidential candidate for 2010.

Before Congress adjourned session for the holidays last month, Nograles told reporters that the Lakas-Kampi merger was still on track despite his feud with Kampi president Rep. Luis Villafuerte of Camarines Sur on Charter change (Cha-cha).

He said he was talking to Interior Secretary Ronaldo Puno, who chairs Kampi, and not to Villafuerte, on the merger plan.

Last Dec. 9, while Nograles was out of the country, Villafuerte delivered a privilege speech criticizing his House boss for “putting the cart before the horse” by filing Resolution 737 even before congressmen could resolve what Cha-cha mode to use.

In Resolution 737, the Speaker proposes to amend certain economic provisions of the Constitution to allow foreign ownership of land.

Villafuerte, who drafted a resolution that seeks to convene Congress as a constituent assembly (con-ass) to propose Charter amendments, would have wanted the House to first decide what Cha-cha mode to use – whether it is his proposed con-ass or any other means.

Nograles’ proposed amendments, however, would go through another route – via the usual process of legislation – and not through Villafuerte’s con-ass.

The Nograles route will involve Senate participation, while the Kampi president’s con-ass will bypass senators.

In the 2007 elections, Lakas and Kampi supported separate local candidates, though most party leaders carried a common senatorial slate – President Arroyo’s Team Unity ticket.

The Genuine Opposition clobbered Team Unity. Only three of Mrs. Arroyo’s senatorial candidates – Edgardo Angara, Joker Arroyo and Juan Miguel Zubiri – made it to the Senate.

Some of the defeated candidates blamed the Lakas-Kampi infighting for their defeat, while others said they were collateral damage of the President’s unpopularity.

The Philippine Star

Tagbilaran Bishop Leonardo Medroso said the scheduled plenary session will give bishops a chance to come with a consensus on crucial issues, including next year’s elections.

“There’s a strong possibility we will talk about the coming 2010 elections and the country’s environment,” Medroso said in an interview on Church-run Radio Veritas, excerpts of which were posted on the CBCP website.

He said the plenary session will include “consensus building” where bishops will try to arrive at a united stand while respecting divergent views of individual colleagues.

The CBCP regularly meets in plenary twice a year, in January and July. – GMANews.TV

GMANews.TV

President was asked what she intended to do once her term legally expires in an interview by members of local media in Baguio City, to which the President emphatically replied: “I don’t want to talk about 2010. Politics is not in the foremost of my mind. Lets talk economics and not politics.”

Instead the President wanted to talk about her so-called Resiliency Plan for the global financial crisis, which she said she already presented to businessmen in a briefing last October as a contingency plan for the crisis.

Part of this is a massive infrastructure program which includes among others the construction of the Halsema Highway in Benguet, which she said she expects to be done before the end of 2009, and the newly-inaugurated Ambuklao Dam Bypass Road.

Weather the storms
“Peace, progress, and prosperity” are the main wishes of President Arroyo for the Philippines in 2009, in her New Year’s message to the country Wednesday.

“For 2009, first and foremost, I wish for peace, progress and prosperity for the people of the nation,” she said in her message Wednesday.

“The year 2008 was tumultuous for the world due to the global economic recession that, thankfully, has not become a crisis in the Philippines. So I pray for greater peace and stability. I hope that we can all work together as a global community to weather these storms,” the President said.

“Here at home, I hope that the efforts we are making to eliminate poverty and to improve the lives of our people will continue to bear fruit and that these efforts will pave the way to the creation of a more prosperous Philippines. Happy New Year!” she added.

The President shared this optimism with local Baguio residents who trooped to the Mansion House grounds for a gift giving event, where she gave them bags of rice, and cans of milk and other foods and to personally wish them a happy new year.

Aside from meeting and receiving gifts from the President herself, the residents from the city’s 128 barangays will have the added opportunity of getting inside the presidential Mansion that is celebrating its 100th year of existence this year.

Mrs. Arroyo and the rest of the First Family are in Baguio for their New Year vacation in Baguio City. They were joined by local officials.

Earlier Tuesday, the President led the unveiling of the twin centennial markers of the “Mansion House” at the main gate of the presidential summer residence here. The said house, the official residence of the President in the city, is celebrating its 100th year. With reports from RG Cruz, ABS-CBN News

ABS-CBN News Online Beta

Estrada said he could tell whether he can still unite the opposition by that time. If his efforts fail, he said would run for president.

“I’m still uniting the opposition… Part of my New Year’s resolution is to double my time to unite the opposition into supporting only one candidate in 2010,” Estrada said.

Estrada said a fragmented opposition would be easily cheated in 2010 like what had happened to his friend, the late movie actor Fernando Poe, Jr. (FPJ), who ran but lost to President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo due to alleged massive cheating in the 2004 presidential elections.

He said he was elated with the statement made by ousted Speaker Jose de Venecia, Jr. that he could still run in 2010 because “the Constitutional prohibition against any re-election for the president does not apply to former presidents.”

“I’m thankful. I thanked House Speaker De Venecia,” Estrada said.

Estrada had said that he would run in 2010 if the opposition fails to unite and support a single presidential candidate.

De Venecia said the constitutional prohibition against any re-election for the president only applies to an “incumbent president.”

He said the intention of the Constitutional Commission in including the prohibition in the 1987 Constitution is to prevent an incumbent from using the powers and resources of his office for his re-election. – GMANews.TV

GMANews.TV

Noting a Comelec report that 24 million or half of the 48 million Filipino voters are already covered by the biometric listing, he said the poll body should persuade the rest of the voting population to register under the new system through intensified information and education campaign.

“The biometric process would eliminate the possibility of one and the same person being registered in many precincts and, therefore, allowed to votes so many times,” the senator from Mindanao said.
Pimentel decried that the biometric registration of voters remains an unfinished task considering that it was started in 2004 at a cost of P1 billion.

The opposition lawmaker said that the use of flying voters remains a serious problem in the country’s electoral system, which should not be underestimated or ignored by poll authorities. He said it is through this foul tactic that many an unscrupulous and corrupt politician has cheated his way to victory and kept himself in power through the connivance of dishonest election officials.

“It is very important that we get the cleansing process of the voters going and finished. The Comelec has started to do that sometime in the past and I really hope that they will be able to accomplish the objective of providing every precinct with a clean list of voters so that we can start correctly on the right foot from the very process of getting to the polls and casting their votes,” Pimentel said.
He also lauded the Comelec for its plan to require its field officials all over the country to conduct house-to-house counter-checking of voters.
Theoretically, he said the house-to-house verification appears to be a sound approach to ferret out flying voters.  But he said he is not too sure whether the Comelec has enough personnel to do that.

Pimentel said it may be more practical for election authorities to undertake random counter-checking of households, starting with those where there is an unusually huge number of registered voters.
He said the Comelec should act fast on complaints or reports of the existence if flying voters in certain areas.

ABS-CBN News Online Beta

Critics of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo on Wednesday vowed no respite for her in the new year and in the homestretch of her nine-year term. She has been in Malacañang since 2001.

“There is nothing Ms Arroyo will be able to do in the last few months of her reign of terror that will improve what people think of her,” said Leah Navarro, co-convener of the civil society group Black and White Movement.

Despite four failed attempts to impeach Ms Arroyo, Navarro said her group would continue to “seek redress in that direction” if only to make her accountable for unresolved allegations such as the “Hello Garci” controversy.

Navarro said her group would also continue to block administration efforts to keep Ms Arroyo in office beyond 2009, a lingering suspicion considering moves in the House of Representatives to amend the Constitution.

The move of Malacañang allies to spearhead Charter change can force the fragmented political opposition to forge a unified front against constitutional amendments to ensure that the presidential election in 2010 will take place.

The elusive unity within the opposition was pointed out by Sen. Alan Peter Cayetano and Senate Minority Leader Aquilino Pimentel Jr. in separate interviews before the country ushered in New Year’s Day.

Cayetano said that Charter change remained the biggest issue confronting critics of Ms Arroyo in 2009.

Common platform

This will provide a common platform for the warring members of the Senate to unite against a “common enemy,” he said.

The opposition has several presidential aspirants but Cayetano said “the big hindrance—what is stopping these major realignments from becoming manifest—is the possibility of Cha-cha, and the possibility of the President staying on in whatever capacity after 2010.”

He said those in the administration had already made “commitments” to their presidential candidates, mostly in the opposition, “subject to the fact that it won’t be a question of choosing between President Arroyo and the next candidate.”

“In short, any political commitment hinges on there being elections in 2010,” he said.
So far, only Sen. Manuel Villar has declared that he would run for president, while Senators Loren Legarda, Mar Roxas, Francis Escudero, Panfilo Lacson and Richard Gordon are keeping coy about their presidential ambitions.

While there will be individual announcements and party recruitment, there is no realignment taking place “until the certainty of the 2010 elections.”

The prospect of no elections is scary for both the opposition and the citizenry, he said, adding that the first quarter of the year would be “crucial” because of Charter change.

The House initially decided to go it alone—proceed with Charter amendments without the Senate—but later declared a ceasefire during the holidays following a large rally spearheaded by the Catholic Church and the opposition in Makati City.

Joint voting

The Senate has been adamant that any Charter change resolution should be decided by both chambers, voting separately, while the much larger House wants a joint voting. The House will start floor debates on Charter change resolution when Congress resumes session on Jan. 19.

Quoting the “Art of War,” Pimentel said: “Under the Sun Tzu principle of the enemy of your enemy is your friend, they might engage in a unified effort to stave off a brazenly unconstitutional act.”

By “they,” he was alluding to presidential aspirants in the Senate.

INQUIRER.net, Philippine News for Filipinos

Estrada was convicted in September of 2007 for plunder after a six year trial which pitted career government prosecutors against a “Dream Team” of the best lawyers Estrada could hire. After extracting an oral promise from Estrada that he would never run for public office again, President Arroyo naively pardoned him one month before he was to begin serving a life sentence in Bilibid prison.

But of course, a public promise is not worth the paper it isn’t written on and Estrada was off campaigning for the 2010 presidency as soon as he was on his feet. The only barrier standing in his quest for the presidency was the effect his conviction would have on public opinion.

This barrier may have evaporated this Christmas when People Power icon Cory Aquino, speaking after Estrada’s turn at former Speaker Jose de Venecia’s book launching, said: “I am one of those who plead guilty for the 2001 [People Power uprising]. Lahat naman tayo nagkakamali. Patawarin mo na lang ako. [We all make mistakes. Please forgive me.] ”

Estrada saw Cory’s apology as a “vindication” if not a blessing and as the “best Christmas gift” he had received. So what if he plundered billions to take care of himself and his cabal of mistresses? We all make mistakes. St. Cory said so.

Cory’s apology to Erap was the banner headline of the Philippine newspapers and the Fil-Am media as well. The fallout for this apology was immediate. In its December 26 editorial, the Philippine Daily Inquirer described Cory’s apology as “a betrayal of the highest aspirations of the democracy she helped restore in 1986, and which she remains the famous icon of.”

Cory’s spokesperson, Deedee Siytangco, sought to contain the damage to Cory’s reputation by clarifying that the remark was just said in jest. “But”, Sytangco added, “she’s not taking it back.” Hello?

Cory was not taking it back because she had made the same point before. In October 2005, after publicly calling on President Arroyo to resign because of election fraud, she said she regretted joining the people power protest against Estrada. “I thought GMA would be a better alternative to Estrada.”

As the Inquirer editorial pointed out: “Well, so did we and millions of other Filipinos. But Edsa II was never about Arroyo. She was the main beneficiary because she had been elected to the vice presidency in 1998; in other words, she was the constitutional successor. But it was never about her.”

“Cory does have something to deeply regret, but that is not Edsa II,” Inquirer columnist Conrado de Quiros wrote, “Edsa II was righteous, Edsa II was resplendent, Edsa II had the moral backing of a people—which made it a true expression of People Power. The last having been made possible by the morality play or political telenovela that unfolded before their eyes, which was the impeachment trial. What Cory has to regret, and regret deeply mournfully, is not the People Power of January 2001 but the elections of May 2004.”

Erap’s apologists were quick to defend Cory’s apology. “Her politics is something she cannot detach from her Christian morality”, wrote one. But Christian morality teaches forgiveness after contrition and penitence and Erap has neither been contrite nor penitent about any of the crim es he committed and was convicted for.

When Cory was elected president in 1986, I was ecstatic. I have been an active member of the Ninoy Aquino Movement (NAM) since its founding and I currently serve as its president. I even chaired the Presidential Banquet Committee in August of 1986 that hosted a gala banquet at the Moscone Center in San Francisco for Pres. Aquino which drew more than 4,500 guests.

My disillusionment with Cory began when we (NAM) sent the top FilAm leader of the farmworkers movement, Philip Vera-Cruz, to the Philippines to meet her in Malacanang in 1986. Philip had not been back in the Philippines since he left for the United States in 1928 and it was a big thrill for him to meet Cory.

When they met, Philip expressed his concern to Cory about the problem of toxic pesticides which are banned in the US but which are in widespread use in the Philippines endangering Filipino farmworkers. Cory listened, or at least appeared to, Philip later related to us, but took no notes and asked no questions. She was just humoring an old man, he sighed. After he was done, Cory shook his hand and appeared to him to be telling her aide “next” (referring to the next visitor waiting to see her). In one ear, out the other.

I also join the complaint of one who sent this email after reading about Cory’s apology: “At the start of her administration, most of those who fought against Marcos and (for the cause of EDSA 1 that catapulted her to the presidency) were among those her administration victimized through her surrogates who rewarded the Marcos loyalists in our government department with high positions and those who fought against Marcos were eased out. What kind of judgment is that?”

As William Esposo, one of her erstwhile supporters, asked in the title of his Philippine Star column, “Oh Cory, how could you?”

Blame Cory if Erap wins in 2010 – INQUIRER.net, Philippine News for Filipinos