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poll opened October 19, 2015

drama king chiz escudero in non-event press conference announces he won’t run for president. ho-hum.

we have decided to give chiz escudero the title drama king after today’s press conference at the historic club filipino to announce a non-announcement and a non-event – he is no longer running for president.

he was in his usual elegant and eloquent tagalog and in one part of the speech he said he was thinking about whether he should have just released a press release rather than hold a press conference to announce the withdrawal of his presidential pursuit.

we agree, he should have just done that and spare the media and us the time of having to drive all the way to greenhills only to hear his ho-hum announcement. right after his announcement, it was rumored that everyone was given double espressos and 2 bottled of red bull to prevent people in attendance from falling asleep.

we are really tired of the drama that chiz escudero makes us go through. in this last one we fail to see the point nor the wisdom of staging such an event when he had nothing to say.

he also did not announce what his plans are for 2010. all he said was he was no longer going to pursue the presidency. he did say why he was not doing so but we were so angry and frustrated and yes an overload of drama that we chose not to listen anymore.

what is even more frustrating was he did not tell us what he will do in 2010. it looks like this drama king chiz escudero will be staging another dramatic event on another time.

Escudero no longer running for president 
By Maila Ager
INQUIRER.net
First Posted 08:09:00 11/24/2009

MANILA, Philippines – (UPDATE) Senator Francis “Chiz” Escudero announced on Tuesday that he would no longer be running for president in the May 2010 elections.

“Nagpasya ako na hindi tatakbo bilang pangulo sa darating halalan… [I have decided not to run for president in the coming elections],” said Escudero at the Club Filipino in Greenhills, San Juan.

“I always say that it’s the presidency but not at all cost,” Escudero said in his speech.

It has been almost a month since Escudero announced his decision to leave the Nationalist People’s Coalition (NPC), his political party for so many years. The NPC was founded by businessman Eduardo “Danding” Cojuangco.

Tuesday’s event was attended by his supporters like the Magdalo group, the Youth for Chiz, the young executives for Chiz, among others.

quo vadis Chiz Escudero? the country needs the debate that escudero will bring, replace erap estrada as standard bearer!

we are not celebrating here, with the announcement that loren legarda will join manny villar at the NP. we are mourning the disappearance of chiz escudero from the top political landscape of the presidency and the vice presidency.

legarda joining the NP means chiz escudero is on his own – without a polticial party, he left the NPC in a huff; without a VP tandem, he didn’t even tell legarda about his decision to bolt the NPC and we suspect with a thinning political base.

we mourn his departure or is it implosion from the political landscape as we think he is a good man. we make fun of his elegant tagalog but beyond the elegant words are very good principles and very good ideas. we would have preferred that he does not disappear from the presidential and vice-presidential landscape to battle it out with the others. we think, the country will be serve better in this election if escudero was part of the debate. we do not know if he will win, he probably won’t but we think the debate that will ensure when he is there to do it will do the country well.

we hope that escudero will find a way to come back. in fact we have a proposal for a course of action for escudero. we had proposed this previously in this blog and we will say it again :

escudero should replace erap estrada as standard bearer of erap’s political party! give erap some important job in an escudero government, but get there on top.

this country needs the debate that escudero will bring to the election, we hope escudero will relent.

drama queen senator loren legarda to announce 2010 plans within the week! oh, oh – here we go again!

my nose gave a fantastic twitch when i read this news article — loren legarda will announce her vice-presidential plan within the week. i thought it was just deja-vu!

we have heard this from loren legarda before. in fact a few times. so here we are again in the same place we used to be before with her. being the drama queen, we should expect some of it this week.

also very interesting is that chiz escudero, her ex-partner also announced he will announce his plans within the week, well by november 15. i had to do a double take when i read legarda’s piece. i thought, even in the roller coaster ride of announcements, these two people go at it together. coincidence? planned?

we don’t have the answer to that. i guess we all have to wait for senator legarda, then senator escudero. we have been doing that a few times already for both of them, one more won’t hurt. please, just one last time!

Legarda to bare 2010 alliance within the week 
By Charlie Señase
Inquirer Mindanao
First Posted 09:59:00 11/10/2009

COTABATO CITY, Philippines — Senator Loren Legarda on Tuesday said she would announce within this week whether to run for vice president with presidential aspirant Gilbert Teodoro Jr. under the Lakas-Kampi coalition or with Senator Manuel Villar of the Nacionalista Party.

“Whether orange (campaign color of Villar) or green (color of Teodoro), I will have to formally announce it within this week,” she said during a brief talk before officials of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao here.

chiz escudero to announce plans for 2010 on november 15, 2009. here we go again!

this is not a joke – we have another date to wait for as far as chiz escudero’s plans for 2010 are concerned. no, it’s not his birthday this time, done that, been there, it’s november 15, a press conference. no, it’s not the last one when he announced he is bolting NPC, it’s about his p;ans for 2010. promise, that is what will be announced. well, that is according to him, again!

will there be drama again this time? here is our suggestions – let’s not count on it. let’s not allow escudero to take us on a roller coaster ride, again!

As I See It
A President without any strings attached

 By Neal Cruz
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 23:41:00 11/08/2009

I had a long talk with Sen. Chiz Escudero at a Quezon City restaurant last week, during which Chiz revealed why he left his party, the Nationalist People’s Coalition (NPC), which was about to anoint him as its presidential standard-bearer, and other perplexing things most of which were, however, off the record.

Is he still running for President?

Chiz said he will make his decision, and announce it at a press conference, on November 15.

http://opinion.inquirer.net/inquireropinion/columns/view/20091108-235086/A-President-without-any-strings-attached

the tough questions chiz escudero supporters should ask chiz: “iniwan mo ba kami sa kawayan”? escudero’s political suicide

we here this often now – “walang iwanan”. in an office we used to work before, the line we used was the complete thought – “iniwan sa kawayan!”. that expression uses the idea of the way pinoys  cook lechon where the pig is skewered through and through, with a long “kawayan” then left to slow cook on a bed of burning hot coal. the poor pig tied on both front and back hinds with a long bamboo passing through its body can do nothing but roast against the burning coal.

“iniwan mo ba kami sa kawayan?” is a question chiz escudero’s supporters must ask of chiz, not to mention something that chiz must explain to them.

as of this writing, we really do not know why chiz bolted his political party, NPC. many words have been said, most of it in eloquent tagalog from chiz but we really don’t know until now why he did what he did.

a double whammy, a second kawayan, to follow it through. is that till now escudero’s supporters do not know yet what are the actual plans of escudero. escudero has not declared anything yet.

if we interpret escudero’s elegant tagalog into plain and understandable tagalog, chiz quit the NPC based on principle, or specifically a difference in principles on governance. he kept mentioning the importance of being independent and without shackles for effective good governance.

the other reason mentioned is about money. chiz denies this but it has been mentioned by many. chiz says he lives a simple life and money has not been key for him. he forgets that what we meant was money not for his lifestyle but money for the presidential campaign. some say cojuancgo who set up NPC was willing to bankroll only a few hundred millions but what was needed was a few billion pesos.

in today’s newspaper, the son of cojuangco said the reason for the split was there was no agreement on some of escudero’s “radical positions on matters” (  http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/inquirerheadlines/nation/view/20091101-233358/Escuderos-radical-positions-caused-split-with-NPCDanding-son).

it is a coin toss on what are the real reasons for now. we will need to wait for more elegant tagalog from chiz to know them.

in the meantime, these are the tough questions escudero’s supporters must ask chiz:

• “iniwan mo ba kami sa kawayan?”
• there is an english version – “were you just jerking us off?”. chiz made had this drama about holding off his official announcement on his presidential run till his 40th birthday. he had asked all his supporters, not to mention the rest of the filipino people to wait for that birthday of his. there were other postponements after that, each one he did not say he will quit the NPC but just to wait for certain dates for the announcement.
• question — all of the above, the reasons we mentioned for bolting NPC, were they not thought off all this time? questions on principles, approach and funding are pretty basic questions. these are questions are asked at the very top of the list that any presidential makes when planning to run for president. they are so basic that i thought they should be on top of the agenda.
• why were these not discussed years, months ago or any time  before his 40th birthday? or anytime BEFORE he was posturing on running for president.
• when was the last time escudero talked to danding cojuangco? these topics were not discussed?
• wasn’t escudero talking to the chair or president of NPC about these matters early on?

we are very surprised that topics of this sort has come up at this time when it is very close to the registration time for candidates.

while escudero did not officially announce it,  he was truly posturing that he will for president. he organized, the party organized people and groups. he went into public speaking engagements, he set up websites, he gave interviews – he was on the limelight. all that he did can only be interpreted by his supporters that he was going yo run for president and we assume that many supporters joined him because he was running for president.

what was all that then, only to announce a little over a month from candidate registration time that he is quiting the NPC. not only that, he has not declared what he intends to do.

so, hindi lang iniwan sa kawayan, ngayon bitin sa bubungan ang mga supporters ni escudero.

if escudero decides to do something in 2010, we wonder if his supporters will continue to support him?

the irony in PDI’s page 1 – the gentle giant chiz escudero’s presidential bid and a gentle giant of the sea both dead in the water

we think there is great irony, poetic even, in today’s page one of PDI (philippine daily inquirer).

headline, above says “Chiz junks NPC, Danding” talking about yesterday’s “shocking” announcement of him leaving the political party that has put him as senator, that we think effectively has put his presidential bid as dead in the water. 

we had previously written on chiz escudero with our own headlines:  will chiz escudero be orphaned? is his presidential bid dead in the water? (click to read) and more recently –  questions on chiz escudero answered. he is orphaned, leaves his political party NPC. is his presidential run dead in the water? (click to read)

just above the PDI headline is a very imposing picture of what PDI describes as a “gentle giant”, the whale shark found dead at manila bay. this gentle giant of course died in the water and was just washed away to the shores of manila.

we thought the news headline and our view that chiz escudero’s presidential bid as being dead in the water gives us the irony of a huge picture of a dead gentle giant. chiz escudero is the only presidentiable who we think has very gentle ways, most specially in the eloquence of his tagalog. he speaks in monotone and the cadence of his speech is a very gently wave of good tagalog. (contrast him to the fiery mar roxas of “putaang ina” fame!) escudero also has very much giant ideas on good governance and on what is right and what is wrong. these are the exactly the things we admire about him.

the headline in words  of a gentle presidentiable giant below the picture of a dead gentle giant from the sea – both dead in the water, one the sea creature, the other the presidential bid.

 

the 2 hail mary pass options for chiz escudero

we like chiz escudero. we particularly like to hear him speak. he is the most eloquent of all the presidentiables specially in pilipino. you just have to bear and grin the monotone delivery and statue like poker face. but once you get past that this man makes a lot of sense. he also has his principles and priorities in the right place.

we are saddened that the NPC has abandoned chiz or that chiz abandoned the NPC. we think, as we have previously asked in this blog, chiz escudero’s run for the president is dead in the water with the most recent developments.

dead as it may be, we like to give him two options for a hail mary pass. one is a miracle, the other redemption.

first the miracle. this hail mary pass involves replacing erap estrada as the standard bearer of estrada’s political party and machinery. the miracle involved here is that erap needs to be convinced that he should withdraw his candidacy in favor of escudero.

lets face it erap’s run for the presidency has a very high legal barrier to cross. it will not come easy for erap. it’s a great thing if he gets it, but what if erap fails? should erap allow himself the possibility of the humiliation of a legal defeat on his presidential run?

agreeing to step down in favor of escudero gives erap the statesman status, the wise elder and the guru for escudero. he can be kingmaker, a role that he will enjoy the same way as marlon brando enjoyed it at The Godfather.

the way it stands now, it looks like it will take a miracle, erap sounds very determined and committed to his quest. but with escuderos gift for tagalog words, he just might be able to convince erap to give him the miracle.

now, the redemption. this one is simpler and this one is very smart. he will be taking 1 step backward to be able to take 2 steps forwards after 6 years.

escudero can redeem himself by running for VP under villar. surely escudero is a much better choice than drama queen loren legarda for villar.

this hail mary pass is very similar to our proposal for perlas and villannueva. we had proposed in this blog for perlas and villanueva to abandon their presidential bids and run for senators instead.

we had proposed that as to us it is obvious both men will not be voted president at the moment. if they lose the presidency, the country loses two bright. idealistic and principled men. they have a much better chance of winning as senators than as president. getting themselves into the senate will enable the country to make use of their talents and skills. the same thing applies for escudero. 

we hope escudero will think hard about our twin proposals for his hail mary pass.

questions on chiz escudero answered. he is orphaned, leaves his political party NPC. is his presidential run dead in the water?

the press meeting that is presently on going at club filipino is just about to end with now the question and answer portion.

we had  2  questions in our october 25 post in this blog  (click to read) —  will chiz escudero be orphaned? is his presidential bid dead in the water?.

the first question has been answered – he is now orphaned. on the second question, yes we think escudero’s run for the presidency is dead in the water.

the gist of it is that chiz escudero announced he is leaving the NPC, the political party that he is with since he start in politics and is now an independent.

he said this in very eloquent prose, talked about what is wrong or right about governance  but inspite all of that,  we are not sure if he is running for president or not. he has not said one way or the other if he will run for president or not. the only thing that is sure is that he has left the NPC. we need to wait some more. again!

without a political party for the machinery and without funds, not even eloquence in speaking in tagalog will solve those. without those, any political campaign is dead in the water.

this whole episode also i think in some ways marks escudero’s reputation. escudero has taken us on a wild ride on his presidential candidacy with an unpleasant after taste. this is particularly difficult for his supporters, most specially those in the internet world. among all the presidentiabbles escudero has used the internet most intensively and it is very much well oiled.  after all these months, twits, facebook, chat and email it has come to this. it must be tough to take for many of  his internet supporters.

this also opens up  a few more questions –

• what will happen to loren legarda? she announced she is a VP candidate but no announcement under what party and with whom as her presidential partner
• legarda may just go with villar who has announced he already has a VP
• will NPC have a presidential candidate? or will it coalesce with others?
• does this open up the possibility of escudero running for VP?
• what about a miracle — erap is disqualified or he withdraws and chiz takes over as presidential candidate?

chiz escudero to annnounce 2010 political plans august 27, without drama queen loren legarda

escudero, based on this news article is scheduled to announce hos 2010 political plans tomorrow at 10 am. finally!

we hope he will announce he is running for president. with the way escudero has been acting, we really can’t tell for sure. he first made a big deal about his birthday, then ondoy as the reason for not doing it then.

we do not have inside information, but based on the news article below, it looks like the postponement in the announcement was caused by two things – uncertainty on what his party the NPC, founder by danding cojuangco, will do and drama queen loren legarda’s wishy-washy indecision on what to do with her own plans.

after reading this article, we think we were pretty close to the truth of the possibility of escudero being orphaned – not having a political party. now, it looks like he might not have a VP partner too.

this article now talks of other VP partners other than legarda . its a strange list – jejomar binay, grace po and ace durano. with that kind of a list, we think he has no one.

we will know by tomorrow. we wish chiz escudero well.

ps: with the way things are and the drama between drama queen legarda and escudero, it looks like the villar-legarda tandem is the thing that will happen.

Escudero to announce candidacy even without Legarda 
By Philip Tubeza
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 20:51:00 10/27/2009

MANILA, Philippines—After several delays, Sen. Francis Escudero is to finally announce his intention to run for President under the Nationalist People’s Coalition on Wednesday but his would-be running-mate and party colleague, Sen. Loren Legarda, was “not expected” to attend, members of his campaign team said.

The campaign team sent out a media advisory Tuesday saying that Escudero will make a “very important political announcement” at 10 a.m. Wednesday at Club Filipino in San Juan instead of a previously scheduled 6 p.m. event at the Bahay ng Alumni at the University of the Philippines in Diliman, Quezon City.

will chiz escudero be orphaned? is his presidential bid dead in the water?

aside from being irritated no end to drama queen loren legarda being wishy-washy on her 2010 plans and her telenovela dramatics on running for higher office, the other part that has caught us is this — will chiz escudero end up being orphaned and without a political party when he runs for president? or is he?

for the longest time, we knew escudero will run for president. he had not said it directly but for many months, decades even, escudero acted and spoke like a presidential candidate. escudero was into it very early just like mar roxas was.

when asked for a direct confirmation if he will run for president, he always answered he needed to wait for his 40th birthday. for drama, something that he has inherited from loren legarda, he has said he will make important announcements on his birthday when he turns 40. the legal age for a filipino citizen to run for president is 40. days before his birthday, he had scheduled a press conference on his birthday. his birthday came and went and no announcement.

the excuse he gave for not making an announcement was that politics should not be the topic in deference to the suffering and rehabilitation many filipinos were going through because of ondoy and peping. that is also something he inherited from loren legarda.

loren legarda has made several announcements – first, she will run  for “higher office”, then just a few days ago, for vice president. she did that without any mention of escudero, he was also not there when she made the announcement.

now we have this news that danding cojuangco, the founder of NPC, the political party that escudero and legarda belong to, is not inclined to support the candidacy of escudero.

we are bothered by the increasingly hyper coverage on legarda’s candidacy for VP and the decreasingly absence of real news on escudero. we find it strange that the VP seem to be getting more press and news than the Pres. it does not help that legarda seem to be surrounded by vultures with practically all the presidentiables courting her to be their VP, well that is according to the drama queen loren legarda.

well ok, there is drama here but we think it is on what escudero will do or better yet what the NPC will do to escudero.

someone needs to write this up into a telenovela!

loren legarda declares she is a vice-presidentiable, with teodoro or escudero?

loren legarda is once again in good dramatic form. she announced, actually she said she was kinda “forced” to announce that she is running for vice-president. she made it appear she was not intending to announce it, it was just that a reporter asked her the question and she answered.

the thing is she did not say who she will be running with. when she said that, i started to bite my nails. it was such a dramatic moment that no other cliff hanger on tv can beat her moment. after this announcement, i was reduced to tears.

Legarda formally declares bid for vice presidency in 2010
By Maila Ager
INQUIRER.net
First Posted 19:37:00 10/23/2009

MANILA, Philippines–Senator Loren Legarda on Friday formally declared her intention to run for vice president in the 2010 elections.

Legarda made the announcement during a press conference at the Rizal Park at the launch of her outreach program dubbed “Lingkod Loren.’’.

Her announcement came just hours after Local Government Secretary Ronaldo Puno withdrew his vice presidential bid under the administration’s Lakas-Kampi Christian Muslim Democrats tickets.

Legarda did not say who her presidential candidate would be. But even before Puno’s withdrawal, some administration members were already pushing for Legarda to be the running mate of Defense Secretary Gilbert Teodoro.

The senator repeatedly said, however, that she would stay with the opposition.

Legarda is a member of the Nationalist People’s Coalition, which is expected to endorse the presidential bid of Senator Francis “Chiz” Escudero.

http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/breakingnews/nation/view/20091023-231888/Legarda-formally-declares-bid-for-vice-presidency-in-2010