DUTERTE SUPPORTERS DEFY
LOCAL POLITICAL WARLORDS
By Manny Piñol
This is the story of a province and its people who stood up against the dictates of their local political leaders and went all out to vote for their preferred presidential candidate.
North Cotabato, the province where I was born and raised, was a problematic area for the presidential campaign of Rody Duterte.
The Governor, the three Congressmen and most of the Mayors belonged to the administration Liberal Party.
In fact, three of my siblings who were running for local political positions officially belonged to the LP while the two others ran under PDP Laban. (All of them though campaigned openly and hard for Duterte.)
I realized this problem early on. This was the reason why I gave my approval to the political group of the Duterte campaign to reach out to the political family which holds sway in North Cotabato.
You see, when I was convincing Duterte to consider the Presidency I made a promise to him that I will not run for a political position so I could focus on his campaign.
I hoped that this move would also convince my political opponents in the province that I was no longer a threat to them and it would pave the way for a political reunification.
In fact, towards the last few weeks of the campaign, I made a pitch in the radio programs aired locally, which I was handling, asking local political leaders to set aside political differences and get behind the candidacy of a Mindanaoan, Duterte.
I had to handle a radio program which was aired twice a week since January over seven local radio stations to campaign for Duterte to support the local PDP Laban team which did not have the finances and the machinery to wage a province-wide campaign.
I said a Duterte Presidency would be beneficial to the province. Besides, Duterte has always been there to help the people of North Cotabato in the past, including coming to the succor of victims of bombings in the province who were brought to the Southern Philippines Medical Centre in Davao City.
I also made personal efforts to reach out to the other political family controlling North Cotabato through common friends assuring them that I have no plans anymore to go back to politics in the province.
My appeal fell on deaf ears.
In the town of Carmen, where the other political family holds sway and virtually controls the lives of people, voters were intimidated and instructed to vote for anybody but not Duterte.
This tactic worked in the past but on Monday, the people of North Cotabato defied their local political leaders and voted for the candidate of their choice.
The result was a resounding rejection of traditional politics.
Yesterday, when I came home to the province of my birth, I felt so very proud of my people.
In spite of the pressures exerted on them, administration candidate Manuel Roxas III only managed to get 67,971, Grace Poe 34,955, Jejomar Binay 21,991 and Miriam Defensor Santiago 2,334.
And Duterte?
He got a whopping 395,370 votes!
The 395,370 votes are more than just a number for me.
This number represents people in my province who have reached a higher level of political maturity who who were willing to defy their local political leaders and vote for who they believe should be their next President.
It would be preposterous for me to claim credit alone for what happened in North Cotabato in the last Presidential elections.
So many volunteer groups worked hard, including a group of doctors who formed a team to campaign for Duterte.
The local PDP Laban group sacrificed a lot to campaign even without resources.
But most of all, the people themselves pressured their local political leaders.
T-shirts given out by local political candidates were rejected if these did not carry the name of Duterte.
The Muslim tribes of North Cotabato were among the most die-hard Duterte supporters because of the fact that he has a quarter Bangsamoro blood.
They also consider the Duterte Presidency as historic because he will be the first President who carries Moro and IP lineage
Many of the local political leaders capitulated to the wishes of their people. Aside from a few mayors, including in the town of Arakan, who openly campaigned for Duterte, a congresswoman switched sides and went for Duterte at the last minute.
Many others, except the political family based in the town of Carmen, simply abandoned the campaign for Roxas.
In the end, the people of North Cotabato triumphed.
Of the over 500,000 who voted, 395,370 showed me that there is hope in my province.
I am sad, however that in two other provinces in Mindanao - Zamboanga del Norte and Agusan del Sur - people's right to vote is still trampled upon by the local political warlords.
This would end soon with the Duterte Presidency. What happened in North Cotabato could happen in these provinces soon.
Change is coming.
(Image shows the results of the presidential elections in North Cotabato; a color coded Philippine map shows how the country voted - yellow went Roxas, orange went Binay, light blue went Poe while blue went for Duterte. John Pagaduan)
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