This is very dismaying. Mayor Robredo has significantly improved the delivery of government services in and attracted investments to Naga city while maintaining a healthy budget. Household income in Naga is 42% more than the national average, doctor-to-population ratio is 1:684 (versus 1:20K national average). Its economy has grown faster than the national average. If there’s one Philippine locality that has a chance of attaining a world class living standard, it’s Naga. Aside from the fact that Mayor Rbrodo received the Ramon Magsaysay award, his administration has also received a public service award from the UN.

And now, it looks like Naga’s promising future is about to go to the dogs for a seemingly flimsy reason.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chinoys Hit Ruling vs. [Naga City] Mayor
By Rainier Allan Ronda
The Philippine Star 05/10/2007

A Chinese-Filipino civic leader accused the Commission on Elections (Comelec) yesterday of being "anti-Chinese" for disqualifying Naga City Mayor Jesse Robredo from running in the May 14 elections due to his Chinese ancestry.

Speaking at a media forum at Club Filipino in Greenhills, San Juan, Teresita Ang See said it was sad that the Comelec ruling showed discrimination against Filipinos of Chinese origin.

"How can a Jesse Robredo, a Ramon Magsaysay awardee from the Philippines, who was born, bred and educated as a Filipino, elected for five terms and performed spectacularly as a mayor, finally be disqualified from his mayorship at the last minute because of his Chinese ancestry?" she asked.

Ang See, spokeswoman for the Citizens Action Against Crime and the Chinese-Filipino civic group Kaisa Para sa Kaunlaran, said the Comelec decision had manifested the commissioners’ "ignorance of the law."

"Your move to suddenly and whimsically disqualify Naga City Mayor Jesse Robredo needs a lot of explaining to us, the Filipino people, and to your own conscience," she said.

"Next, are we Filipinos going to be asked to disclaim our national heroes for being of Chinese descent too?"

During the forum, Ang See distributed an open letter which she had written to the Comelec chairman and commissioners.

"On his father’s side, Robredo is a natural citizen of the Philippines by virtue of the Treaty of Paris of 1898," she said.

"On his mother’s side, Robredo is also a natural born citizen by virtue of the citizenship provision in the 1987 Constitution, which made it clear that those born of Filipino mothers before the 1973 Constitution are considered natural born citizens.

"More than that, both the 1973 and 1987 Constitutions have corrected the gray areas and shortcomings of the previous Charters about who is a natural born citizen."

Ang See said Robredo has always held a Filipino passport, voted in Philippine elections, and has no first-hand experience of China.

"Though he acknowledges and is proud of his Chinese ancestry, his love, loyalty, sacrifice and service to the Philippines and our people cannot be discounted or doubted," she said.

Ang See singled out two Comelec commissioners as having questionable knowledge of the law and qualification as commissioners in coming out with their ruling.

"How can anyone who obviously fails to understand the citizenship provisions in the 1973 and 1987 Constitutions, and I specifically refer to Brawner and Ferrer, qualify as election commissioners?" she asked.

"If there is anyone who deserves to be disqualified, it is Brawner and Ferrer, who deliberately ignored and circumvented the truth."

Ang See said the two commissioners were law school classmates and law firm partners of the Villafuertes, the political opponents of Robredo in Camarines Sur.

"The only explanation is that they are, after all, classmates and/or partners of Robredo’s rival in Bicol— the Villafuertes— who could not make a comeback while Robredo is there," she said.

"It is a sacrilege to our Constitution, and it further erodes our people’s confidence in the Comelec, which has been badly shaken recently, if after proving himself more Filipino than many Filipinos, Mayor Robredo is disqualified."

"We hope that the remaining commissioners have some decency and integrity left to act on the case based on its merits and not based on political considerations." ution which provides that those with Filipino mothers but with foreign fathers, upon reaching the age of majority, must select their citizenship in a statement signed and sworn to before any authorized officer.

iirc, Mayor Robredo is also Atenean, having graduated BSME.

I think Robredo went to college in La Salle (mech engineering). He finished HS in Ateneo de Naga.

DEMAND AND SUPPLY By Boo Chanco
The Philippine Star 05/11/2007

...........

Worse, there was this item about a political dirty trick in Naga City engineered by politicians allied with Ate Glue. The really disappointing thing is, the Comelec is playing along with the dirty trick. They actually disqualified incumbent Mayor Jesse Robredo from seeking re-election supposedly because he failed to prove he is a Filipino citizen.

It is a naked and despicable strong arm tactic. The Comelec has resolved the citizenship question four times in Robredo’s favor — before this latest decision. His birth certificate states that he is a Filipino citizen and that his parents are both Filipino citizens; his father’s birth certificate states that he (the father) is a Filipino citizen. He was allowed to run five times, petitions for his disqualification having been denied all along.

Robredo is finishing his fifth term as mayor of Naga, and is running for his sixth. He is a Magsaysay awardee and is probably one of the best mayors in the country today. Aside from the Magsaysay award, Asia’s Nobel Prize, he has won many other national and international awards and so has the city of Naga under his stewardship. Robredo should be running for President.

If the Comelec can so brazenly play along with the trapos in Camarines Sur to stop a model public official from being elected, what hope do we have for good government after all the fun and games are over? I was ready to give the Comelec the benefit of the doubt, against my better judgment, until this Robredo decision was made. Even if the Comelec or the Supreme Court rectifies this travesty now, it would have done enough damage, confusing voters on Robredo’s eligibility.

The scary thing about it is that the political dynasty behind the dirty trick on Robredo is headed by a politician who may end up Speaker of the House, if Joe de V loses his re-election bid, or I am told, even if he wins. This is the kind of scum Ate Glue surrounds herself with. How can we be hopeful of the next Congress, with people like these?

Rab, I stand corrected. But since he graduated from AdN, Atenista pa rin.

Get Real : Unbeatable
By Solita Collas-Monsod
Inquirer
Posted date: April 14, 2007


MANILA, Philippines -- Under his incumbency as mayor, his city has received more than 30 international, national and regional citations in diverse fields of local governance. To cite a few of the later ones: 2004 UN Public Service Award for Local e-governance; 2004 UN Development Fund For Women (Unifem) and UN-Habitat Women-Friendly City Award; 2004 and 2003 PCCI Most Business Friendly City Award; 2003 World Bank citation as Model City for Government Procurement; 2002 UNDP CyberCity Award for I-Governance initiatives. Not to mention enough Galing Pook (Asian Institute of Management) and Gawad Pamana ng Lahi (Department of Interior and Local Government) awards to put Naga City in their respective Halls of Fame. That record is hard to beat, whether in the Philippines or abroad.
He himself has received major individual awards, including the 2000 Ramon Magsaysay Award for Government Service, The Outstanding Young Men of the Philippines (TOYM), 1998 Konrad Adenauer Medal of Excellence as Most Outstanding City Mayor of the Philippines, and the first ever “Dangal ng Bayan ” Award of the Civil Service Commission. That record may be even harder to beat.

I am speaking of Jesse Robredo, who is serving his fifth term as mayor of Naga City, and running for his sixth term. Clearly, the citizens of Naga appreciate his services, and have regularly voted for him (and his ticket) by lopsided margins. And why not? After all, the awards for the city and for him are based on real accomplishments: a professional, merit-based city government bureaucracy, a transformation (within his first two years) of the city from third-class to first-class rating, a six-fold increase in revenues, day-care centers in each of the city’s 27 districts, five new high schools, a public hospital for low-income citizens, farm-to-market roads, and clean water systems for Naga’s rural communities, a people’s council and participative governance that has effectively harnessed the cooperation of the citizenry and renewed civic consciousness.

To add to all this, power doesn’t seem to have gotten to his head. He doesn’t go around with bodyguards, his campaign entourage consists of three people, he has been seen sweeping the streets (no civic action is too small, including reporting a broken street lamp). And most impressive of all -- when he reached the three-term limit in 1998, he did not follow the “trad-pol” [traditional politico] custom of fielding their wives or close relatives to keep his political seat warm until he could run again.

So imagine my surprise to learn that Robredo’s wife Maria Leonor, who is a lawyer, has also filed, at the last minute, her candidacy for mayor of Naga, the same position that Jesse is running for. What gives? Bicol region political kingpin Rep. Luis Villafuerte recently announced that he was supporting the opponent of his son for the governorship. Is the Robredo wife’s candidacy yet another Bicolano intra-family feud? Naturally, I called Mayor Robredo for clarification.

Here’s what I got: running for a second term in 1992 following a highly successful first term, Robredo faced two cases filed by political opponents (read: the Villafuerte camp) -- one with the Bureau of Immigration and Deportation (BID), and one with the Commission on Elections (Comelec). Not for corruption or anything to do with his performance as mayor of Naga. The case with the BID was about his being an alien (Chinese) and his failure to register as such, and therefore he deserved to be deported. The case with the Comelec was for disqualification because he was not a Filipino. Both cases were dismissed for lack of merit.

But the matter did not end there. It has been cropping up again and again. An attempt was made to reopen the BID case during Joseph Estrada’s presidency, and the decisions and appeals on this issue have varied, depending on which administration is in power: Then BID head Rufus Rodriguez ordered the case reconstituted; then-secretary of justice Nani Perez reversed Rodriguez’s order on appeal; Perez’s successor Merceditas Gutierrez reversed Perez; the case is now with Justice Secretary Raul Gonzalez.

With regard to the Comelec case, the issue was revived in 2001, and the Comelec then ruled that Robredo was a natural-born citizen. That decision was reiterated in 2003. But the Villafuerte camp brought it up again in 2004 (dismissed) and yet again at the beginning of this month (pending).

One would think that having been adjudged a natural-born citizen time and again over the past 15 years, Robredo should not be worried. But he says he is. Because he knows that Villafuerte, as head of the President’s political party, is now much more powerful; moreover, he says that of the three Comelec commissioners in the division hearing the case, two were classmates of Villafuerte.

So Robredo expects the worst: that the decision will not only go against him, but also handed down too late for an appeal.

Which is why wife Maria Leonor is also a candidate, albeit a reluctant one, for mayor. That is Jesse’s Plan B: in case he is defeated by crook, his wife will pick up the gauntlet.

There is irony here: The Villafuerte camp seems also to be expecting the worst (for them) -- that Robredo’s citizenship will be upheld for the nth time. And they, too, seem to have a Plan B: A few days ago, the division superintendent of the Department of Education in Naga was replaced by someone reputedly close to the Villafuerte camp. The division superintendent is, by the way, a member of the board of canvassers, where wholesale cheating can take place.

That’s Philippine politics for you. I’m rooting for the good guys.

According to the partial and unofficial results, as of 1pm today, Robredo is winning by more than 20,000.