3-cornered fight for Calinog’s top post in 2010 shaping up
With only about ten months to go before the next national and local elections in May next year, the political landscape in the municipality of Calinog as far as who would run for certain elective positions is already starting to take shape, with three prominent names being mentioned already as likely rivals for the town’s top elective post.
Heading the list, of course, is incumbent Mayor Alex Centena, whose dramatic yet circuitous return to the municipality’s high chair came about following a decision of the Commission on Elections (Comelec) en banc to declare him the duly-elected vice-mayor of the said town in the May 2007 elections, and as such is deemed the rightful heir to the mayoralty seat abandoned by the late Mayor Teodoro Lao, who succumbed to a lingering illness early last year.
Providing him stiff challenge in his bid for a fifth term at the helm of this south-central town is bitter rival Salvador Divinagracia, Jr., who assumed the reins of the municipality following Lao’s death and before the Comelec en banc decision declaring Centena the rightful winner in the 2007 vice-mayoralty race. Divinagracia, who served as town mayor for about nine months before being kicked out of his post, is seeking vindication, something he believes he can only get by beating Centena in a fair election.
Completing the list of mayoralty hopefuls is Raymundo Lao, the brother of the former mayor, who reports said is being egged on by his family to run and seek the town’s top executive post after a falling-out with Divinagracia immediately after the late mayor’s death.
Sought for comment on this latest development, Centena said he is not bothered by all by such reports and in fact welcomes whoever would want to offer themselves in service of the Calinognons.
“That is a positive development. At least a lot of Calinognons would want to throw their hats into politics so they could contribute to the progress of our municipality. The merrier, the better,” Centena said, adding that political-wise, the break-up of the Lao-Divinagracia tandem in the last elections would augur well on his bid for an unprecedented fifth term as mayor of the said town.
In another development, Centena said he is hell-bent on filing appropriate cases against Divinagracia and other responsible officials of the Calinog LGU following the discovery of certain financial irregularities that transpired during the latter’s stint as mayor amounting to several millions of pesos. The said discrepancies and deficiencies came out during the Financial and Compliance Audit and Value-for-Money Audit conducted by the Commission on Audit (COA) on the financial records of the said municipality.