Wrong assumptions
Few days ago, all Cebu newspapers reported a warm human inter personal development. They used the word “reconciliation” to highlight the event that involved highly strung political personalities. His Honor, Congressman Eduardo R. Gullas, of the first district of the province of Cebu, reconciled with the Hon. Tomas R. Osmeña, representative of the Cebu City South district.
Cong. Gullas, who was called a “land grabber” by Rep. Osmeña, years ago, found occasion in his heart to forgive the latter as a fruit of some kind of accommodation. As variously reported by news media, the veteran lawmaker expressed, in a forum, disappointment with being unable to source full funding to a massive infrastructure project in his political turf. The Cebu City legislator, the reports continued, offered to the “land grabber” unsolicited help of some Four Hundred Million pesos which fund was supposed to be under his stewardship for Cebu City undertakings. That assistance was so enormous in its amount that it bridged the gap and buried the animosity between the two political giants.
As I opened this article, what we witnessed was a great human relation. Amity being positive, is always the better side of arrogance. The gesture of Hon. Osmeña, taken on its face value, blurred a part of his perceived haughtiness. Has he mellowed and thus become a better person is a question which only time can really answer although in my attempt to understand the happy event, I had to consider few factors.
It looked to me that the Gullas-Osmeña reconciliation was founded on wrong assumptions. First, the Cebu City congressman must have assumed that his offer would be turned down. In his mind, that was a distinct possibility. Knowing that his gesture was rather unprecedented, he expected a polite rebuff. After all, they were not the best of friends. Up to that point in time, he ruffled the feelings of the veteran lawmaker with libelous words that have no place among members of the legislature.
Yet, the former Cebu City mayor was not totally unprepared for any twists. His kind of personality is known to anticipate the unexpected and to formulate other plans for unlikely events. I like to think that he must have figured out what to do in case, against his assumption, the legislator from Cebu province, took the offer.
Second. Cong. Osmeña must have also assumed that in the event Rep. Gullas accepted the “offer”, he could use such a Gullas acceptance as a leverage for future political endeavors. It did not take him a long time to hint on this thought. A follow up news story mentioned about his thanking the first district for the avalanche of votes given to his favorite candidate for governor in 2010. I therefore see that the city’s south district representative assumed that he could call upon his peer from the province to allow him to blabber about this fund contribution for the infrastructure done in the first district. That would be the city lawmaker’s bragging point. Should he not be allowed by Cong. Gullas, to show that swagger, Rep. Osmeña assumed that he had the correct reason to call the former BS for ingratitude.
Third. The legislator from the city’s south district knows that the biggest barangay in Cebu City is called Barangay Visayanian. Contained in his computer bank are names of persons from every sitio in all barangays in the city, who passed thru the portals of the University of the Visayas. The bond among Visayanians is markedly distinguishable. Their feeling of oneness can be seen in practically all undertakings. The former Cebu City mayor must have assumed that the P400 million would be so huge an amount enough to buy these commanding Visayanian votes.
Despite the plausibility of these assumptions, the Cebu City South District congressman, is in for the surprise of his life. But, he has nobody to blame because, in trifling with the interests of the voters of the Cebu City South District and in misapplying public funds intended for the district somewhere else, his assumptions are intrinsically wrong.
***
- Latest
- Trending
