Kapatiran: It will take a miracle for us to win

The Kapatiran political party yesterday admitted it needs nothing short of a miracle to win in the election.

"We have to admit that we need a miracle in order to win in the election," Martin Bautista, one of the three senatorial candidates of the party, said during a press conference yesterday.

Bautista was here campaigning with fellow candidate Adrian Sison yesterday. Their third senatorial candidate, Jess Paredes, former executive director of the Visiting Forces Agreement Commission, failed to attend the party''s sortie in Cebu because he was campaigning in Dumaguete City.

Bautista and Sison had their provincial sortie in the province and Cebu City yesterday despite being little known to many Cebuanos.

However, Bautista said that despite the looming defeat their fight against rampant corruption, worsening hunger, poverty and inequality in the country will continue.

Sison said that Kapatiran will help clean up politics, especially the politics of money.

"Our political party was founded on the ideology of the common good," he added.

Based on recent major pre-election surveys, the three senatorial bets merely got 3.6 percent of the votes.

Sison also called on the Commission on Elections to withdraw all gun ban exemptions.

"The recent election related incident involving Sta. Fe mayoralty candidate Roger Illustrisimo who was shot in front of Comelec office shows that no one is safe even within government premises and that is a great insult to the institution," Sison said.

Kapatiran secretary general Nandy Pacheco said that to be a candidate, you must lay your life on the line and those who are afraid to die are not fit to serve.

Kapatiran was formed by a group of Christian professionals and became an accredited political party in May 8, 2004. It aims to set a new trend in Philippine politics by centering its platform of government on faith and morals. - Gerome M. Dalipe IV with Mary Gold C. Sagarino and Cristina V. Roso, UP Masscom interns