Powerhouse Palayan team-up looms in 2016

PALAYAN CITY, Philippines – A powerhouse tandem involving Mayor Adrianne Mae Cuevas and Vice Mayor Florante Mercado looms in 2016 after the latter affirmed his support to the Cuevas administration.

The two politicians, who belong to rival parties, said they are open to a team-up.

Cuevas is a party mate of Gov. Aurelio Umali in the Liberal Party and its local party, Unang Sigaw Partido ng Pagbabago, while Mercado ran for vice mayor under the Nationalist People’s Coalition and the local party Bagong Lakas ng Nueva Ecija of the Josons.

Both had landslide wins in the May 2013 polls. Cuevas defeated former three-term congressman Pacifico Fajardo by 4,500 votes, while Mercado clobbered Cuevas’ running mate, former three-term mayor Romeo Capinpin, by 2,900 votes.

Mercado assured Cuevas that he would continue to support her administration and her programs, and would not seek the Palayan mayorship for as long as she is the local chief executive.

Earlier, Mercado dismissed as mere speculations reports that his father, former Makati City vice mayor Nestor Mercado, was considering to run for mayor to challenge Cuevas’ re-election bid.  

“It’s not impossible if he wants to be with me,” Cuevas said on whether Mercado could be her running mate in 2016.

For his part, Mercado replied in Flipino: “It’s feasible.”

Mercado said he would never fight Cuevas nor oppose her programs because he has never seen anything wrong in what she is doing.

“I also believe that he trusts what I do,” Cuevas said, adding that she and Mercado appear to have chemistry. “We are working together very well,” she said.