MANILA
Vice President Jojo Binay’s worries are piling up. There are too many fires to put out and he doesn’t have enough, or the right, firefighters.
The Senate investigation into alleged massive moneymaking during Binay’s turn as mayor in Makati City and now his son Junjun’s continues with new exposes at every new hearing.
The Ombudsman is after him. And the Senate subcommittee of the Blue Ribbon Committee has a partial report recommending that both Binay senior and junior be charged with plunder.
Earlier, one of Mr.Binay’s spokesmen put his foot in his mouth by advising Sen. Grace Poe to stay away from Liberal Party people because they, according to the spokesperson, cheated Grace’s father, Fernando Poe Jr., when he ran for president in 2004. (The Liberal Party wants Grace Poe on their ticket for the 2016 presidential election).
Two weeks ago, Binay also ran into an embarrassing episode where two potential vice presidential candidates turned him down.
Is the Binay camp disintegrating? At the very least, things are starting to get mishandled.
The continuing Senate hearings seem to have an inexhaustible supply of exposes that bare alleged financial wrongdoing in Makati City by the Binays. As I’ve written before, the accusations are simply too many to not have the ring of believability.
For how can Mr. Binay’s attackers make up all the stories they have told the Senate? It’s just not humanly possible to come up with that amount of details that sound true.
And if formal plunder charges are filed against the Binays, that would mean detention for the Binay pere et fils because plunder is non-bailable.
If we go by the Binays’ history of defiance of sitting authorities, it would indicate that they will not go quietly to jail but instead resist arrest. If that happens, it would open up a dangerous phase in the continuing saga of the Binays.
Senator Poe retorted to the Binay spokesman who advised her to stay clear of Liberal Party officials that it’s Binay who has allied himself with someone who had directly made life hard for FPJ in 2004. How more direct can she be?
And then, to top off a week gone bad, Veep Jojo got a very cold shoulder from two possible veep candidates that he sounded out: Poe and Mayor Rody Duterte of Davao City.
First, that’s embarrassing. The second-highest official of the land is refused by two junior officials.
Second, and more critically, it would now make it hard for Binay to persuade someone to run with him. Why? Because the next people he will sound out now know that they weren’t his first choice as running mate. How would they feel knowing that they’re not only second-choice but third-choice? How will their egos be able to swallow that?
Some of the people around Veep Jojo have been with him for years. Because of that these people know him and they know how to react to issues on his behalf.
But the relatively new people making noise for Binay have often proven to be liabilities for him. A case in point is the one who proffered advice to Grace Poe about being wary of Liberal Party officials. Poe’s response, that it’s Binay who’s aligning himself with a former FPJ tormentor (referring to former President Gloria Arroyo who allegedly cheated FPJ in 2004) went straight to the heart of the issue.
And, more recently, Binay’s noisemakers questioned Grace Poe’s citizenship (she had dual American and Filipino citizenship before but has already renounced the US citizenship) and her alleged lack of residency requirement to run for higher office in 2016. Later, the Binay camp backtracked and disowned their own spokesman who raised the said questions. The Binay camp is mishandling things big time.
Beleaguered as he is, Binay needs mouthpieces who will help him rather than hurt him. His noisemakers haven’t done him many favors. Instead, they’ve been a negative presence in his entourage because of their brusque and off-putting style.
Binay puts on a brave and nonchalant facade in the face of the deepening controversies swirling around him. Over the years he’s proudly repeated the mantra that he doesn’t give up even in the face of extreme odds. He’s not the type who surrenders easily.
The coming weeks will tell us how long he can go on challenging the odds.
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