Futile

For the life of me, I could not understand why Fernando Poe Jr. and Panfilo Lacson inflict these so-called "unity talks" on themselves.

It seems that each time they try to meet, blood is drawn. This is a ritual of self-laceration, a pointless ceremony of masochism.

When they did manage to meet, after much painful effort, both parties gave contradictory versions of what transpired. When the meetings fall through, such as the one scheduled for last Tuesday, they blame each other. Their respective pages trade barbs.

Poe and Lacson are candidates for the presidency. Setting aside the survey numbers, they are supposed to be equals in democratic principle. Equal aspirants for an awesome post in which much power – and more important, much responsibility – is reposed.

At some point, they should stop behaving like adolescents carried away by flimsy sentimentalities and start behaving like honorable statesmen. They should each stand before the public and say that this nonsense about "unity talks" is done and over.

That way, there would less speculative distraction from the substantive issues in this electoral season.

Why this exercise in futility was pursued well into the campaign period is baffling. I could understand talks before candidacies were filed such as the Poe-Lacson meeting last year where they agreed to engage in an honorable selection process.

As we know now, nothing came out of that agreement. Instead, the LDP split bitterly, with one side supporting Poe’s bid and the other Lacson’s.

There were rumors circulating of one or two other meetings between the two candidates. One particularly nasty rumor had it that Lacson would soon withdraw from the race after his campaign expenses have been reimbursed. Lacson recently revealed that someone from the Poe camp had indeed tried to bribe him to withdraw. He has since advised Poe to restrain his men from making such demeaning offers.

Of the two sides, Poe’s handlers seem to be more inclined towards keeping these meetings covert. In fact, one reason they gave for canceling the last scheduled meeting was the fact that Lacson announced the event to the media and, understandably, drew intense media attention.

In the run-up to that last scheduled meeting, Poe drumbeaters were raising expectation that Lacson would withdraw to favor their candidate who was running neck-to-neck with the incumbent in the recent surveys. Former president Joseph Estrada himself proposed that Lacson give way since Poe was ahead of him in the surveys.

In response, Lacson very publicly proposed that the movie actor slide down to become his vice-presidential candidate. This was, says the senator, an unbeatable tandem.

Compared to Poe, there is no question Lacson is better equipped for the job they aspire for as rival candidates.

When the meeting fell through, Poe’s handlers blamed Lacson for putting impossible preconditions. They maintained that given Poe’s survey ratings, there is no way their candidate will back out. Now they are saying that if the opposition loses to President Arroyo, the blame should be pinned on Lacson.

If neither was ready to yield to the other’s candidacy, then why the frantic effort to get "unity talks" underway?

The Poe camp has been very secretive about what is driving the effort to get the two rival candidates to sit together and talk. Lacson has made it known that the last scheduled meeting was arranged by a "businessman" who seems to be an acquaintance of both candidates. But he has refused to name that broker.

All the secretiveness has intrigued the public. The talks may be futile, but the identities of the brokers should be of public interest.

There appears to be very powerful interests intervening in this electoral contest. They are powerful enough to actually force two presidential candidates to agree to meet even on an impossible agenda.

Neither Poe nor Lacson seem to be particularly eager to cut valuable time from their respective campaigns to sit down and chat. Notwithstanding, they both agreed to the meeting – even as that fell through eventually.

On this matter, the public is left in the dark.

I suppose these two candidates have an obligation to be transparent to the public and reassure all fears that may be inspired by the suspicious secretiveness surrounding these scheduled meetings. If two potential presidents may be ordered by some invisible powerbroker to sit down and work out an arrangement between them, then that powerbroker may very well command the presidency if any of them perchance wins in May.

Unless that powerbroker is properly identified, the adverse speculation cannot be held back.

Today, there is endless theorizing about who is behind arrangements for this futile meeting between the two candidates. Some suspect a major electoral financier. Others suspect a sect capable of delivering command votes to either candidate.

Whoever that powerbroker might be, he surely has clout. He must have some immense capacity to entice two presidential candidates to do things they would not otherwise do.

There is little love lost between Poe and Lacson. But this powerbroker actually manages to force them to cancel appointments and agree to sit together.

Whoever he might be, he seems to be pretty anxious to get either Poe or Lacson elected. Both candidates appeal to similar constituencies with identifiable parameters: people who benefited from prior dispensations, people who need political access to make money, people who are disadvantaged by the reforms being pursued by the present dispensation.

Those are general parameters. They do not allow us to specifically identify who the powerbroker might be. We can only speculate – and do so on very little evidence.

We will be spared from our worst speculation if the two parties, in the name of transparency, declare who the real architects of these "unity talks" are.

I doubt if either Poe or Lacson would come forward and name the powerbroker. That can only be because doing so will be politically costly.

And so we are left only with our worst suspects.