FPJ staying out of debate

Describing himself as a man of action, not words, Koalisyon ng Nagkakaisang Pilipino (KNP) standard-bearer Fernando Poe Jr. said yesterday he was not inclined to join a televised debate with other presidential aspirants.

"I’m just wondering why (there are calls for debates). Ang paghihirap ng tao ang dapat mabigyan ng atensyon (The hardships of the people must be attended to first)," he said in ABS-CBN’s "Impact 2004" hosted by STAR publisher Max Soliven. The show was pre-taped yesterday and will be shown tomorrow night on ANC cable television channel.

In his first formal guest spot in a political talk show since declaring his presidential bid last November, Poe said debates only cause "antagonism and divisiveness," adding there is more important work to be done than argue with other presidential aspirants.

Asked to comment on perceptions that Poe shirks debates because he is unprepared, the actor said, "It’s not that I’m not prepared. Kulang lang talaga ako sa salita kasi puro ako gawa (I really don’t talk much because I’d rather work)."

He said he was able to "build my companies not by talking but by working," adding that he started producing films in 1963.

In a later interview, however, Poe said he might accept the challenge to a debate "depending on the situation."

His spokesman, Sorsogon Rep. Francis Escudero, said Poe is more concerned with "listening to the people" and consulting with local leaders in his campaign sorties, which is why his speeches are short.

In a related development, the divided opposition found common cause yesterday, lambasting the latest results of a survey that showed President Arroyo in a dead heat with front-runner Poe in the run-up to the May 10 elections.

Former Negros Oriental congressman Miguel Romero, KNP spokesman, said Pulse Asia’s survey showing that the race was too close to call was "part of Malacañang’s grand conspiracy to rob FPJ of his imminent landslide win."

Romero said the Pulse Asia survey results released Tuesday, in which Mrs. Arroyo had a 0.2 percent lead over Poe, was intended to condition the minds of voters on an Arroyo victory, "which can only happen via possible wholesale poll cheating."

Poe himself was dumbfounded on the survey results. During the taping of "Impact 2004," he said, "If they believe the surveys are true, then why are they bent on disqualifying me?"

In Lipa City, another opposition presidential hopeful now running as an independent, Sen. Panfilo Lacson, expressed wonderment when asked to comment on Mrs. Arroyo’s showing in the survey.

"Katakataka!" the former Philippine National Police chief blurted out, adding people would not believe that Poe, his opposition rival, has been edged out as the front-runner by Mrs. Arroyo.

"Previous surveys showed that 72 percent of the electorate dislike her and are not satisfied with her administration. How can she enjoy more than 30 percent support as reflected in the latest survey?" Lacson asked.

Poe, on the other hand, was surprised that his rating plunged in so short a span of time since the last survey was taken.

But despite his doubts on the Pulse Asia survey, he said he hopes to have a better showing next time. "Lahat naman tayo umaasa na magkaroon ng mataas, umangat ang rating," he said.

Romero noted that the results of the survey taken from Jan. 23 to Feb. 8 and Feb 16-20, showed an unbelievably close fight if elections were held today.

"This is highly improbable, if not downright absurd," Romero said, expressing incredulity at how Mrs. Arroyo was able to inch past Poe with 31.9 percent approval rating as against the actor’s 31.7 percent.

He said this did not tally with the overwhelming public support for Poe and the KNP ticket in their provincial sorties during the first two weeks of the campaign.

The former lawmaker also said that some of their experts have gone over the survey details and discovered that the poll firm’s method sampling in Mindanao concentrated only on Northern Mindanao instead of other parts of the region where Poe is perceptively stronger.

Escudero said they are convinced Malacañang was behind the survey although the KNP has no proof of this.

"We are not accusing anybody, but up to now, nobody has come out to announce that they commissioned the survey," Escudero said. "In any survey, we must know who’s behind it, how was it done and what kind of questions were asked."

Romero said the conditioning of the public mind was Stage 2 of the Palace plan to keep Mrs. Arroyo in power, Stage 1 being the doomed disqualification suit against Poe over his citizenship.

Lacson also cried foul over the survey results showing him with a low level of support in Southern Tagalog, his home region.

"The survey shows that I only have the support of 9.3 percent of the population of this region. I don’t think that is fair to me," he told journalists covering his campaign here.

"If I don’t get 50 percent of the votes of my region, call me a liar," he said.

Lacson said he has done campaign sorties in Cavite, his home province, and the neighboring provinces of Quezon, Laguna, Rizal, and yesterday, Batangas, and can feel the support the people are giving him.

The Pulse Asia poll had him in fourth place, a slot he has consistently held since before the start of the campaign period.

He said the "situation on the ground" is different from that depicted in surveys.

"We know, because we have been monitoring their (administration’s) campaign sorties," he added.

He also said he and House Minority Leader Carlos Padilla, his lone senatorial candidate, are ready to "adopt" some of Poe’s running mates in case the Supreme Court bars the movie actor from pursuing his candidacy.

"We are willing to merge with them for the sake of unity but not with the group of Sen. (Edgardo) Angara," he said.

Angara heads the Laban ng Demokratikong Pilipino (LDP), whose group has been recognized by the Supreme Court as the "rightful LDP faction."

Meanwhile, another presidential candidate, Raul Roco topped a student poll at the Ateneo de Manila, according to the school’s The Guidon newspaper.

Roco, who wound up third in the Pulsa Asia survey, has been popular at the universities, having topped a similar poll at Jose Rizal University in Mandaluyong earlier this year.

Going It Alone

Lacson, Padilla and the senator’s LDP supporters, including Makati Rep. Agapito Aquino, the party’s secretary-general, had a falling out with their party boss when the latter insisted on supporting Poe.

Lacson said he would not quit the LDP, saying "it’s the first and last party I have affiliated with."

However, he said he and his group are not enticing Poe’s candidates and other political parties to merge with them.

"I think it’s better that we continue going it alone since we are covering more ground," he said.

The former PNP chief expressed elation over the reception he got in several towns in his Batangas visit, although journalists noticed that the crowds here were expectedly thinner than those he encountered in Cavite, Laguna and Quezon.

Batangas, is after all, the home province of four key leaders of Mrs. Arroyo: former justice secretary Hernando Perez, who is running for governor; Defense Secretary Eduardo Ermita, Sen. Ralph Recto, whose wife Vilma is mayor of this city; and Transportation and Communications Secretary Leandro Mendoza.

Lacson said in the towns he visited, Batanguenos urged him "to jail Nani Perez and Jose Pidal in case I get elected (in May)."

"Ipakulong mo sila, yan ang isinisigaw sa akin," he said.

He had accused Perez of receiving millions of dollars in connection with a power contract awarded to an Argentine firm, and First Gentleman Jose Miguel Arroyo of hiding hundreds of millions of pesos in supposedly illegal funds using the false name Jose Pidal and three friends as dummies.

Both Perez and Arroyo had denied the accusations.

Lacson’s leaders and supporters in this province include outgoing Gov. Hermilando Mandanas, Malvar Mayor Cristeta Reyes, who openly endorsed him to her constituents and municipal personnel at the town hall; retired Makati Judge Jose Manuel Diokno, who welcomed him at the Sto. Tomas public market; and Malaya owner-publisher Jake Macasaet, who hosted a lunch for his group in his farm here.

Diokno was the judge who convicted former Zamboanga del Norte congressman Romeo Jalosjos of statutory rape in December 1997.

"I believe Ping Lacson is the only candidate who can bring peace and order to our troubled country. With peace and order, economic growth will follow," he said in an interview.

Macasaet said he would support Lacson "all the way."

While Lacson was speaking to a crowd at the Malvar town hall, two white-and-blue colored Presidential Security Group helicopters passed by overhead. Asked later about the choppers, the presidential aspirant said he did not notice them.

Some supporters claimed the PSG was spying on them. — With Jess Diaz, Jose Rodel Clapano