Vegetable vendor wins Eastern Samar town mayoral race

MANILA, Philippines — A vegetable vendor at a public market has been proclaimed mayor of Dolores town in Eastern Samar.

Rodrigo Rivera, 62, ran as an independent against Dr. Zaldy Carpeso of the PDP-Laban. Carpeso is the brother of the incumbent mayor, Shonny Niño, who was unopposed in his vice mayoral bid.

Rivera got 11,508 votes against Carpeso’s 10,946 or a difference of only 562 votes.

Rivera, who finished only second year high school, served for nine years as barangay captain of Gap-ang before he started selling fish and vegetables at the public market.

Dolores is a third class municipality with 46 barangays and 30,124 registered voters.

Youngest mayor

In Pampanga, residents of Masantol town elected their youngest mayor.

Jose Antonio Bustos, 21, garnered 17,689 votes against Aguinaldo Guintu, who obtained 16,824 votes.

Bustos is not new in public service as he headed various non-government organizations and served as national youth chairman of Patrol party-list group.

He said his administration would introduce a new brand of governance that is focused on consultation with his constituents.

More incumbents get fresh term

Meanwhile, more local officials who ran for reelection were successful in their bids.

In Tarlac, 11 incumbent mayors were reelected.

Cristy Angeles of Tarlac City and Elma Macadamia of San Clemente ran unopposed while Nora Modomo of Sta. Ignacia and Eloy Eclar of Gerona won by a wide margin against their opponents.

Venus Jordan of La Paz, Romeo Ong Capitulo of San Jose, Estelita Aquino of Moncada, Freddie Domingo of Pura, Donya Tesoro of San Manuel, Erlon Agustin of Camiling and Max Roxas of Paniqui are the other incumbents in Tarlac who were reelected.

Seven other towns will have new local chief executives.

Alice Guo made history as the first female mayor of Bamban. Noel Villanueva will reassume his old post in Concepcion. Elected mayors were Boots Rodriguez of Capas, Rex Villa Agustin of Victoria, Jappy de Dios of Anao, Celso Banag of Ramos and Iluminado Pobre Jr. of Mayantoc.  – Miriam Desacada, Ric Sapnu