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Tuesday, March 20, 2007

Of local elections and other nonsense

For the past one month, we are bombarded by TV , radio and print ads of local and national candidates. In Lucena City and Quezon Province, the mood is like a big fiesta whenever a candidate arrives in a barangay. Who cares about platform? Who cares about graft and corruption? Who cares if a candidate is a jueteng lord or an ex-convict?. What is important to the poor people of Lucena is that they can have free lunch and a chance to rub shoulders with the mighty. To receive money from them later after a campaign is a given. This is a sad reality in my city of Lucena. Nobody from the local candidates talk about the following:
1. The rampant illegal gambling that destroys the fabric of the family.
2. The existence of government sponsored short-term lottery which pervades the
culture of gambling.
3. The bastardization of Perez Park wherein the pea-brained politicians replaced
the monuments with disneyland castles. It is not a sunken garden anymore.
Maybe the old Perez is grumbling in heaven!.
4. The lack of long-term plan to generate employment.
5. The lack of long-term plan to improve infrastructure.
6. The lack of long-term plan to improve the quality of education.
The local candidates are running to PROTECT THEIR OWN INTEREST. They are promising a lot of hot air but without substance. They will give to the people what they will get from the people. Cry my Lucena! Can you blame me for not voting this coming May?.

ALC