Why we can't host another ASEAN Summit
I read this PR news from Rep. Gerald Anthony "Sam Sam" Gullas, Jr. who noted that there will be another Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Summit in the Year 2017 and he says that "Manila and Cebu are the only places in the country that managed to host an ASEAN summit in the past." While I do not dispute this fact, but with the Cebu International Convention Center which was originally made for the 12th ASEAN Summit in November 2006 still out of commission in the two years after the Oct.15th earthquake, then I don't think Cebu is ready for any summit at all!
Rep. Sam Sam also did not factor in that Iloilo City has a brand new convention center and for sure they would move heaven and earth to have the 30th ASEAN Summit held in Iloilo City. Yes I have to say it loud and clear that thanks to Cebu Governor Hilario "Jun Jun" Davide III for his "Noynoying" in the past two years, he couldn't even fix the CICC.
Come now, two years after the Bohol-Cebu earthquake, many churches in Bohol have now been fixed. That's because they just built a new church where the old one used to stand. But for restorations like the belfry of the San Agustin Church, quite understandably, this is taking a bit longer. But for the CICC, this building wasn't a total wreck at all and please don't give me any legal excuses why they couldn't fix the damn thing!
Gov. Davide has been in the governor's seat for two years already and yet he couldn't spare the time to find ways to restore the CICC to its former self? If you ask me, the poor parish priests of the many churches that collapsed in Bohol fared much better than our governor. Don't forget these parish priests don't have the money or even insurance money to fix their fallen churches. Yet two years after that devastating earthquake a lot of these churches are now back in the service of the Lord.
In my book, if Gov. Davide can't start fixing the CICC during his term, he has no business asking Cebuanos to reelect him in the 2016 Presidential elections because by not fixing the CICC, I don't think we should even be bidding to have the 30th ASEAN Summit held here.
I know that Rep. Sam Sam Gullas is supportive of the Liberal Party even if they do not belong to that party… and consequently they have to support the re-election bid of Jun Jun Davide. So the challenge for Rep. Sam Sam Gullas is for him to visit Governor Davide and demand from him to have the CICC fixed and if he won't do that…there's no point in helping a governor who cannot even help restore what Cebu used to have.
Speaking of the Liberal Party, I had lunch with a former and bitter Liberal Party member in the person of Efrain Pelaez, Jr. who just happened to be having lunch so close to my office. Since I already had my lunch break, I went there to listen to the sob story of Jun Pelaez who apparently made a last ditch effort to keep himself within the LP but to no avail… even if he attended the LP's "Gathering of Friends" at the Cebu Coliseum last August 24th when Pres. PNoy Aquino was in town to lambast his critics then lie to us Cebuanos that he plunked in P23 billion for Cebu in the last five years.
Well by now, everyone knows that after a meticulous count by Cebu news reporters, we all ended up a little over P2.2 billion in rehabilitation projects in the last five years under the Aquino Regime. So what does this make of Pres. PNoy? Even their much boasted widening of the Mactan Circumferential road, while it is on record that this money was spent… we cannot see this road widening anywhere. So the next logical question is…what happened to that money for the widening of the road?
In his last few days as an LP member, Jun Pelaez even went to Judy Roxas, the mother of LP Standard bearer Manuel "Mar" Roxas…but to no avail. The LP has decided to have Lapu-Lapu Mayor Paz Radaza as the LP mayoralty bet for Lapu-Lapu City. A final telephone call to Mar Roxas was never answered. The die has been cast… Jun Pelaez was out of the Kulambo!
But the fate of Jun Pelaez as an ousted LP member has yet to bear fruit. I asked him what party does he and his friend Rene Espina Jr. is now with and he told me that they are now with the Nationalist People's Coalition. Alas for Mar Roxas, Gov. Davide is probably the weakest LP leader in the entire country! By their choosing Mayor Paz Radaza who has since been suspended… it was a great LP mistake and for sure, Jun Pelaez would greatly benefit from the suspension of Mayor Radaza. As for the LP's choosing Mayor Radaza, what good would this do when Lapu-Lapu City just like us in Cebu City cannot even vote for the governor? So in my book, this LP move was bad for the candidacy of Mar Roxas.
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