Binay braces for bigger smear drive after ratings dip

MANILA, Philippines – Detractors of Vice President Jejomar Binay are expected to “redouble” their attacks now that they have succeeded in causing a slight dip in his popularity ratings in the recent Pulse Asia survey, his spokesman said yesterday.

“We expect his political detractors to continue their campaign of lies against the Vice President,” Joey Salgado, head of Binay’s media affairs office, said.

Binay, chairman of the Housing and Urban Development Coordinating Council (HUDCC) and presidential adviser on overseas Filipino workers’ (OFW) concerns, said the attacks against him would not distract him from his responsibilities.

A recent Pulse Asia survey conducted from Sept. 8 to Sept. 15 showed 31 percent of Filipinos would vote for Binay as president or down from 41 percent in June.

He remains, however, the top contender for the 2016 presidential polls.

Interior Secretary Manuel Roxas II, the presumptive standard bearer of the ruling Liberal Party, saw his ratings improve but still came in a distant second with 13 percent.

“Again, if the detractors feel strongly about the allegations made by discredited local politicians, they should bring it before a court of law,” Salgado said.

“This would afford us the opportunity to cross-examine the accusers and scrutinize their so-called evidence, unlike in the Senate subcommittee probe where such rights are not allowed,” he said.

He noted that the ratings of his main accusers in the Senate – Senators Alan Peter Cayetano and Antonio Trillanes IV – have not improved either.

“The drop in the ratings of personalities involved in the ongoing Senate subcommittee probe shows that people do not appreciate abuse of senatorial privilege,” he said while describing the Senate probe as a “witch hunt in aid of ambition.”

“Unfortunately these personalities will probably ignore this lesson and just redouble their vicious attacks,” Salgado said.

He stressed the accusations against Binay were “of no importance” to the Vice President as he continues to lead “despite their grandstanding and baseless attacks, and amid a widening field of contenders” in the presidential race. “He will remain focused on his work,” Salgado said.

He said Binay, in fact, is set to meet with beneficiaries of government housing projects.

“The Vice President is pressing his appeal for the restoration of the budget allocation for overseas absentee voting which has been removed by the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) from the 2015 budget,” Salgado said. “He is encouraging our OFWs to join his appeal for Congress to restore the budget.”

Turning the tables

Meanwhile, the opposition United Nationalist Alliance (UNA) dared Cayetano and Trillanes to undergo lifestyle check to prove their own credibility.

“Just because you are part of the Blue Ribbon subcommittee investigating the Makati City Hall Building 2 does not make you a credible or honorable person, or reading Biblical passages make you any holier than anyone,” said UNA interim secretary general JV Bautista.

“The case is that these people (Trillanes and Cayetano) think they’re more popish than the pope, and speaking as though they are morally upright. The truth is that the telenovela in the Blue Ribbon are their shield on their PDAF, DAP, etcetera, etcetera,” Bautista said.

Bautista cited Cayetano’s even admitting that no public official puts his assets in his name.

“Maybe, he is the one doing that. The fish is caught by his own mouth. He (Cayetano) should be the one to be investigated,” Bautista said.

Bautista said that last week, Binay took the initiative to show his statement of assets, liabilities and net worth (SALN) covering almost three decades.

“The Vice President has already expressed his willingness to undergo a lifestyle check. Are the two senators ready to reveal their true lifestyles? They should also be transparent and open, and show they have no skeletons in their closets,” Bautista said.

Bautista pointed out that one senator’s PDAF has been “red flagged” by the Commission on Audit (COA) and his name appears on at least three lists of those who had received millions of kickbacks from alleged pork barrel scam mastermind Janet Lim-Napoles. PDAF stands for Priority Development Assistance Fund, the official term for congressional pork barrel. The Supreme Court has declared it unconstitutional.

“These senators should be more forthcoming about their PDAF, their ties with Mrs. Napoles and their DAP (Disbursement Acceleration Program),” he said.

Bautista emphasized that Binay, a former Makati City mayor, has never been suspended or penalized for corruption or unethical practice.

“The funny thing here is that this one senator projects himself as Mr. Clean kuno, and dismisses the reports as politically motivated,” he said. “And they have not said anything about their DAP as payoffs for impeaching former Chief Justice Renato Corona.”

Bautista said Binay has religiously released his SALN and income tax returns for the last 28 years, proving his openness to lifestyle check.

Too early to tell

For Valenzuela City Rep. Sherwin Gatchalian, it was still too early to tell if the 10-point drop in Binay’s rating in the latest Pulse Asia survey would have an effect on the Vice President’s chances in 2016.

Gatchalian pointed out that when Binay declared that he was running for vice president in 2009, he started with only a three percent rating, or a far third from then vice presidential candidates Loren Legarda and Roxas.

“But look what happened, from being a cellar dweller, Binay’s numbers started to rise, overtaking Senator Legarda and eventually wrestling the vice presidency from erstwhile frontrunner and sure winner Mar Roxas by a margin of more than 800,000 votes,” he said.

He said Binay is capable of bouncing back from a “temporary setback in his ratings.”

“The drop in his ratings could serve both as a challenge and a wake-up call for VP Binay that there is no room for complacency since the presidential election is still more than a year away and many things can still happen on the way to 2016,” he said.

But Eastern Samar Rep. Ben Evardone said he expects his LP colleagues secretly planning to join Binay’s camp to now have second thoughts.

He said Roxas’ ratings are beginning to climb and he has not even started campaigning yet.

Pulse Asia president Ronald Holmes said the controversy over the Makati City hall parking building project was to blame for the 10-point decline in Binay’s ratings.

“The biggest factor is the negative reports from the Senate investigation,” Holmes said in a television interview. But he said the figures could still change as the election is still months away.        – With Helen Flores, Paolo Romero