Happy Valentine’s Day to our readers!

Happy Valentine’s to all our readers. I know that the majority of people express their love through lovemaking. This is why today you can expect the motels to be full with cars waiting for other guests to leave. Restaurants enjoy brisk business today where usually, they break down tables to two persons seating capacity. I should know I ran Chikaan Restaurant for 36 years and Valentine’s Day beats all kinds of holidays on the calendar in terms of full capacity!

But for lovers not yet married, take it from me not to use condoms simply because condoms are no guarantee that your girlfriend won’t get pregnant. This is why I was alarmed to read in the Facebook page of Mayor Tomas Osmeña that he was giving free condoms to anyone who would go to Harold’s Hotel. Hmmm free condoms from Tommy Osmeña only goes to show that the Mayor did not do some research on the quality of condoms, as it is never a guarantee.

Secondly, for a couple who wants to make love today, what is important to them is not a condom but rather a room that they could use for a couple of hours. Anyway, it is still a reality that come November a lot of pregnant women are going to have a baby as it is exactly nine months after February. So be a responsible person and don’t do anything to change your life just for a couple of hours of fun. So Happy Valentine’s to all our readers.

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We all saw the poster that was printed in the newspaper that Cebu Governor Hilario Davide III apparently confirmed that the controversial 20-story Capitol resource center, which would cost the provincial government nearly P1.3 billion, will finally break ground next week. Gov. Davide calls this project as the “flagship” project of his administration. Wow! Gov. Davide calls this his “flagship” project when it starts barely three months before the May 2019 mid-term elections.

It just makes me wonder why Gov. Davide is pushing hard to start this project even if it was getting a lot of heat from heritage advocates and interruptions during the proposal stage. It has already triggered a lawsuit in the Office of the Ombudsman on the issue of the conduct of its bidding process and the eligibility of the contractor. Jon Siegfred Sepe, provincial general services officer, said that the ceremonial groundbreaking will be done on Monday, Feb. 18. He said the contractor already posted P38 million performance bond.

Everyone knows that this is the very same contractor that built the controversial Cebu International Convention Center (CICC) in 2006. Now they have emerged as the lowest calculated bidder during the bidding for the 20-story Provincial Resource Center. We know well enough that Gov. Davide has repeatedly criticized third district Rep. Gwen Garcia for the CICC project, calling it overpriced and an “P840-million mistake.” The building was constructed during her term as governor. So can we say it this early that Gov. Davide is making a P1.3 billion mistake? I mean, a flagship project should not be started very late into his administration and this one is super late if you ask me. I’m not yet saying that there could be some corruption in this project in the sense that Gov. Davide is pushing this project very late in his administration.

My last piece on this issue comes from the Facebook page of my good friend Prof. Jobers Bersales who said, “I just pm’d Dr. Rene Escalante, NHCP Chair, re the Capitol Resource Center project. This was his response when I showm him the attached news clipping from SunStar today; “It has no clearance yet as far as the national cultural agencies are concerned.” And this: “We will study our options and we will see.” Maybe a legal option is on the menu! Abangan!

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With the National Elections already opened for the public to choose who among the 60 candidates running for Senator that the voters would choose. But it seems that a newly released Pulse Asia survey on the 2019 senatorial race shows that the old names in the Senate still dominate the upper chamber, thus you can say that the midterm elections, suggests that the voters are not keen on changing the composition of the powerful legislative chamber. This is undoubtedly a challenge for President Rodrigo Duterte’s political party, PDP-Laban, as it packs its Senatorial slate with relatively unknown allies and neophyte candidates from among its own members. This year’s Mid-Term elections will test if Duterte’s endorsement is the magic that can give his allies a fighting chance. 

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