The Liberal Party standard bearer yesterday swore in as members Quezon City Mayor Feliciano Belmonte, daughter Joy Belmonte-Alimurong and Vice Mayor Herbert Bautista while presidential aspirant Bayani Fernando kept off the administration party’s national convention led by chairman President Gloria Arroyo.Senator Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III and his vice-presidential tandem Senator Manuel Roxas II welcome the defection, noting that the addition of the hierarchy of the country’s richest locality was a boon to party.
“We can benefit from the experience and steadiness of Mayor Belmonte. This [move to LP] will really boost the presidential bid of Noynoy,” Roxas said.
Senator Francis Pangilinan said the transfer was a gauge of what was happening elsewhere, with more officials from other political parties are joining the LP bandwagon.
Belmonte, former senior vice president for external affairs of administration party Lakas-Kampi-CMD, has completed his third term as Quezon City mayor and is running as representative of the city’s 4th District in the 2010 elections.
He has endorsed Bautista as his candidate to succeed him with daughter Joy for vice mayor.
Fernando has hinted at a possible defection but indicated no particular party.
“I am studying the option. I don’t consider myself a party member,” he told Standard Today, without a word about his absence at the Philippine International Convention Center in Pasay City.
His disappointment is well-known after he was junked as standard bearer over the choice of Defense Secretary Gilbert Teodoro Jr.
Meanwhile, matinee idol Dingdong Dantes has formed Advocates of Youth and Students for Noynoy Aquino or Ayos Na.
In a press briefing at Romulo Café in Quezon City yesterday afternoon, he said the voice of the young would be crucial.
“Pinoy Gen Next, the biggest block of Filipino youth voters, supports Senator Noynoy Aquino, a symbol of hope and change for our country,” he said.
Dantes, 29, said Gen Next or Generation Next consisted of Filipinos born between the late ’70s and the late ’90s.
Political spin doctors have targeted the youth to duplicate the success of the youth-powered Obama presidential campaign in the United States last year.
He was joined by Bernadette Herrera Dy, founder of Bagong Henerasyon and Ayos Na national convenor; Mujiv Hataman, of Anak Mindanao; Laguna youth leader Ruth Acero, daughter of last-termer Siniloan, Laguna Mayor Gilmore Acero, and Toki Baes, Parañaque City SK councilor.
Other youth provincial leaders vowed to group together at the launching of Ayos Na on Sunday, Nov. 22, at the Risen Garden near the Quezon City Hall.
Ayos Na secretary general Elmer Argaño reckoned 6,000 youth volunteers would be showing up at the Ayos Na launch.
“It is Dingdong’s pledge to the Aquino family to organize at least 500,000 youth campaigners that will support Senator Noynoy Aquino in his bid come 2010,” he told Standard Today. Roy Pelovello, Rio N. Araja and Gigi Muñoz David
Source: http://www.manilastandardtoday.com/insideMetro.htm?f=/2009/november/20/metro2.isx&d=/2009/november/20
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