Matrona power!

One of these days I might just make public a sort of manifesto, with writers and possibly artists of all fiber expressing support for the Noynoy-Mar ticket. That’s because I’ve come to the awareness that most friends in the arts and culture community I happen to carouse with appear to share my conviction and strong hope that no one should be our next Prez but Benigno Aquino III.

Oh, never mind the arguments for now. It’s just been a collective gut feel, I think, that has united many of us. And whether they mind it or not, I’m going to start letting on exactly who these “yellow friends” are, especially since I presume that everyone should have the courage of his convictions.     

Make that her convictions. Lady friends seem to outnumber my kabaro, heh-heh. Just a couple of weekends ago, for instance, at a joint birthday party for my fellow Pisceans Erlinda Panlilio, author and editor, and Karina Bolasco, writer and publisher, it happily turned out to be yellow affair.

I walked in as the first male (make that single) to be appropriately welcomed by a single malt bottle. When the smoke of my instant gratification had cleared — at the sight and feel of an Island single malt, specifically a gorgeous liter of Isle of Jura, Superstition edition — I took in the rest of the venue’s contents and found myself being ogled by six attractive ladies. Who all certainly looked like they were of considerable substance.

Well, maybe it was my pair of eye-catching bright yellow “Crocs” — make that “Kloks” as they were made in China and sold for so cheap you wouldn’t believe in Santa Claus. Forthwith, premier fiction writer Susan Lara sallied forth and declared to her fellow matrons (nothing wrong with that term, right?) that she also had a pair of the self-same yellow Kloks with brightly painted flowers in wild colors, and that the source had been yours truly.

Maybe everyone else now hoped to be a similar recipient of my dutiful sense of largesse when it came to lady friends and cheap footwear, but what happened was that everyone crowded around me on the sofa to show off their own patriotic stuff — which I didn’t have. Yellow ballers. Yellow pins. Yellow pendants. Yellow car stickers. All declaring their allegiance to the Yellow Army.

With that company — fellow Philippine STAR columnist Barbara Gonzalez, chick lit writer Carla Pacis, NBDB director Andrea Pasion-Flores among them — I felt like a Spartan ready to dine in hell. Oops. Wait, that’ll probably need an extensive academic footnote, so just delete that and rewind. Thank Zeus the dapper poet Jimmy Abad soon joined us. And I know he too is for Aquino, yehey!

But wait, I’m not saying that everyone among those lovely ladies are voting Noy-Mar come May. Maybe I shouldn’t have identified them all here, thus this caveat. But in walked Jing Pantoja Hidalgo and her gallant hubby Tony Hidalgo, and at that moment I felt sure our yellow ranks were further strengthened.

And when National Artist Rio Almario came in, why, he appeared to exude a golden yellow aura such as only National Artists can be endowed with. Of course we’ll leave it up to him, a man of such stately stature, to profess his political allegiance in due time. I have high hopes however that he’ll be more of a match than any of us against dear Frankie Jose, his fellow National Artist and my fellow STAR columnist, who recently declared his support for Gibo.

Now, I wouldn’t mind having Gibo Teodoro for Prez. I believe I was one of the first ever journalists to interview him, and tout his steak-grilling skills right here in this paper, thanks to our common buddy Atty. Mike Toledo, now his spokesman, and Gen. Tutti Ebuen, my Bedan schoolmate of 50 years back and Gibo’s mentor behind flight controls. But wait, that’s another story, which could well lead to political arguments, which we’ll have none of for the nonce, at least not in this piece lauding Matrona Power!

Suffice it to say that Erlinda’s cook was garbed in a nice, enviable apron that night, so that everyone just had to take a pic of her before she chopped up the delectable lechon. Erlinda let on (since we’re fellow yellow textmates and e-mail forwarders) that she had a dozen or so of such yellow aprons distributed among market vendors.

Now that’s better, I said approvingly. Earlier I had questioned the impact of having volunteers undertake leafleting sorties in Makati, since “NCR is ours; it’s in balance Luzon where you girls have to cover more ground, especially among the so-called D-E, despite what SWS’ Mahar Mangahas said, incredibly enough, that we were losing out to the moneyed one in the A-B-C bracket.” 

Dunno, but it seems to be that Makati Business Club members and their wives, cooks and mayordomas have made up their minds, at least against that moneyed one, especially since they know all about banking practices. And wherever I look in traffic, politically committed cars only have that yellow ribbon sticker in their windshields, except one rather crudely made one for Gibo I spotted last week. No, it couldn’t have been Manong Frankie’s car.

The gist of it is that fellow writers, a lot of artists I’ve spoken with, and fabulous music makers like Cookie Chua and fellow STAR columnist Jim Paredes have affirmed that we’re on the same correct side of the political fence. 

Whenever I open my e-mailbox, I find a tsunami of support (and some blackprop against the rival) mostly sent by power ladies who lunch with their laptops, apparently, such as writer-editor and coffee-book creator Marily Orosa, a dear friend.

And there it was the other day: why, old friend Loida Nicolas Lewis, as substantial as a lady can get, out there in the Philippines’ lead colony that is the US, has been barnstorming from East to West Coast for the common cause. In fund-raising affairs in New York and LA, she’s been joined by yet another formidable madame, my old crush Vicky Garchitorena. In fact some expat Bedans led by Delfin Amorsolo and Bobby Muldong will, by the time this comes out, have broken bread with Vicky and handed donations as handsome as they are.

Last Saturday, Loida hosted a benefit lunch at her Fifth Avenue digs (a new one, recently featured in Architectural Digest, and not where she and sis Mely famously treated me to a tinapa breakfast some years back, under the gaze of a Picasso). In her behalf, the US Pinoys for Noynoy-Mar host committee issued invitations, for a minimum of a $100 donation. Why, my old Mendiola buddy Nito Abad barely partook of his lunch plate, owing to dietary concerns, and yet added a digit to that minimum cover.

Loida’s and Vicky’s efforts spearhead the campaign among registered Pinoy voters in the US to vote for the LP ticket, as well as to mobilize US Pinoys, whether registered voters or not, to contact their relatives, friends, and acquaintances all over the Philippines to do the same. They intend to establish chapters throughout the US, in every city and state, and thus raise at least $2 million for the Noynoy-Mar campaign by getting 100,000 US Pinoys to each contribute at least $25.

Declared Loida on March 1 at the dual celebration of EDSA People Power Revolution’s 24th Anniversary held in New York’s Upper Westside: “Whether you are registered to vote or not, you can always call your family and friends in the Philippines and donate to the campaign. We cannot stand idly by.”

She also called for vigilance to minimize fraud and tampering of election results by the computerized voting process, which could lead to a failure of elections. Then she urged everyone to invoke Divine Intervention in the fight between good and evil. Hmm, she must be reading a popular columnist whom I occasionally share whisky with at Conspiracy Bar & Resto on Visayas Avenue. 

In an earlier event on Feb. 26, it was Vicky Garchitorena, considered a pillar of Philippine NGO activism, who gave an update on the elections. The common message was that they worked hard to support Noynoy and Mar, including the whole Liberal Party ticket, “out of deep compassion for the Filipino and because they believed in the value of democracy through fair, honest and peaceful elections.”

On March 10, the Concerned Filipino-Americans, USA, led by Loida who’s also the national chair emeritus of the National Federation of Filipino American Associations (NaFFAA), sent a letter to State Secretary Hillasry Rodham Clinton, requesting for a Philippine Presidential Election Observers Group. 

In micro detail were listed numerous “sumbongs” and fears having to do with the current power shortage, the automated election system, a politicized military establishment in the Philippines, especially the PMA Class of 1978 which “adopted President Arroyo as a member,” the same lady’s intent to run for Congress and “seek the post of Speaker of the House,” NAMFREL’s disenfranchisement by the Comelec, etc.

Since Loida had been Hillary’s close supporter, it is highly likely that indeed, Sec. Clinton will convince President Obama “to send an observer team similar to that headed by Sen. Richard Lugar in the1986 Philippine Snap Presidential Elections.”

How exciting. And all because of Woman Power!

But that observer team can only act as a deterrent, a Big Bro panel of eyes and tut-tut fingers. What has been most heartening is the spate of other developments that have entered our ken.

For instance, a cousin of mine, only a decade younger and thus a matrona, supervises a large hospital in Jeddah, where she reports that the mostly Pinoy nurses have been clamoring for those yellow ballers and other items.

And then Kris Aquino has joined her bro in Mindanao sorties. That clinches it. The value of being a young matrona is that she often figures to have a husband and a son. Now, between the PBA’s recent double-MVP James Yap and showbiz’s latest phenom delight Baby James, what other star power draw can come close?

Dolphy, Sarah Geronimo and Manny Pacquiao? Give me a break. Methinks we won’t dine in hell come May and June.

Viva Matrona Power!