The bitchy, temperamental outburst of Presidential crony Tommy Alcantara caused negative ripples in the business community. As a result, many business leaders said they were totally turned off in supporting GMA. According to our ear-spies, Tommy’s uncontrollable flare-ups shooed away many of GMA’s potential supporters in the business community. They said they can take the occasional outbursts of GMA but definitely not from her indispensable arrogant clones or is it "clowns"? Former Finance Secretary Lito Camacho’s departure from the Cabinet, according to our ear-spies, was apparently caused by intrigues coming from the same people surrounding the president. FVR is said to be furious about the way some of GMA’s close associates are acting. This is the reason they say why he supposedly encouraged his daughter Christy Ramos-Jalasco to join Raul Roco as part of his senatorial slate. It appears GMA’s people are subscribing to a new kind of political strategy – politics by subtraction.
A day before Finance Secretary Lito Camacho’s resignation was the talk of the town, it was overheard by our ear-spies that Palace feelers called on NEDA Director General Romy Neri and asked if he would be interested in taking over the Finance Department’s helm. Being in the United States for some time, he was quite removed from recent developments in the country. According to our ear-spies, it was unknown to the Palace that Neri’s friends got him a few hours after Camacho resigned to dissuade him from even considering the offer. For whatever reason his friends jumped the gun, it was not disclosed. Neri allegedly agreed with his friends and politely declined the offer of the Palace on the grounds that he would be more effective as NEDA chief.
| Contributions To The Presidential Campaign |
According to our ear-spies, it was overheard that a Presidential relative is going around Makati offices personally talking to Japanese public works contractors supposedly asking for contributions to the presidential campaign. Our ear-spies heard that a lot of the Japanese contractors are pestered and piqued with this Presidential relative but cannot do anything about it because of the relative’s seemingly "untouchable" position. The supposed harassment has gotten so bad that these businessmen have decided to approach the Japanese Embassy in Manila for help. But it appears the hands of embassy officials are all tied. The only thing that the Japanese contractors’ could do is to play "hide-n-seek" with the Presidential relative (or return to Tokyo when he comes a-calling).