GIBO says rivals starting to panic

ILOILO CITY—Lakas-Kampi-CMD standard bearer Gibo Teodoro on Tuesday remained unfazed by the intrigues hurled against him, in fact welcoming it as a sign that the other presidential bids are getting scared of him.

“Ako’s natutuwa sa intriga dahil nagpapakita na ang mga kalaban nanenerbyos nasa akin (I’m pleased with the intrigues against me because it shows that my opponents are getting nervous),” Gibo told reporters here.

I’ll move in and move up, and moving to win. I have a good chance of winning the election because of the support of the local officials,” the former defense secretary added.

The Harvard-trained lawyer and 1989 bar topnotcher observed that lately, the groundswell of support to his side is becoming overwhelming, especially from volunteers’ groups coming from the different sectors of society like the academe, youth, women, and business, among others.

He called on his tens of thousands of volunteers to refocus their campaign tack—that more than attending rallies for him, they should campaign for him in the different areas more vigorously.

Earlier, the camp of Lakas-Kampi-CMD standard-bearer Gibo Teodoro said the string of demolition jobs hurled against him at this crucial stage of the presidential race only proves that his candidacy is now surging and posing a serious threat to his rivals in the May 10 elections.

Former press secretary Mike Toledo, Gibo’s spokesman and director of the G1BO 2010 Media Bureau, noted that while some armchair political analysts have attempted to shut Gibo out of the presidential race, his rivals now appear to be on panic mode in the last 30 days of the campaign as smear jobs against him have surprisingly surfaced lately one after the other.

“For someone who is supposed to be out of the running, it is funny how he has lately been the target of one demolition job after another,” Toledo noted. “It only shows that contrary to what certain self-styled pollsters and political analysts are saying, Gibo’s campaign has been on an upward trajectory and rival camps are getting freaked out to the point of concocting rumors and intrigues in a frantic bid to blunt his campaign surge.”
Toledo noted in a radio interview that some political analysts had based their analyses excluding Gibo from what they erroneously presume to be three-way fight in the presidential race on so-called surveys that fail to factor in Lakas-Kampi-CMD’s built-in advantage: its nationwide reach and grassroots machinery that would swing local support and votes in Gibo’s favor.

These armchair analysts have also overlooked Gibo’s lock on the youth vote, which accounts for 52% of the balloting in this year’s elections, Toledo said.

History has likewise shown that political analysts and surveys have erred several times in predicting the outcomes of presidential elections, Toledo pointed out on radio.

He cited as an example the 1948 US presidential elections when veteran political analysts had mistakenly predicted that Gov. Thomas Dewey would win over Harry S. Truman.

This was the common perception then that even the Chicago Tribune had erroneously bannered Dewey’s supposed victory over Truman, Toledo recalled.

In England, pollsters have failed to predict that Conservative Party’s John Major would win over then Labour leader Neil Kinnock in 1992, Toledo noted.

Even in the Philippines, Toledo noted that the surveys overlooked Fidel Ramos as a major contender in the 1992 presidential race.

In the United States, many failed to predict that Barack Obama would win over more popular nominees in the Democratic Party and eventually, in the presidential elections.

“What we see in Gibo’s campaign sorties is the high level of support for him by the people, especially the youth and also our local government officials,” Toledo said in the vernacular during the radio interview.

He noted that a great majority of about close two million first-time voters alone from the youth sector will vote for Gibo, who they believe deserves to be the country’s next president on the strength of his issues-based campaign, unblemished reputation and impressive track record.

“Eleksyon ito ng pangulo, hindi karera ng kabayo na kailangang pag-usapan sino ang nangunguna, number one, number two, number three, eh hindi po dapat yon, ang pinag-uusapan, ano ang plataporma mo. Ano ang solusyon mo sa mga problema ng ating bayan (This is a presidential election, not a horse race where one talks about which horse is number one, number two or number three. That’s not what we should be talking about, but the candidate’s platforms, and their proposed solutions, if any. to our country’s woes),” Toledo said.

Toledo said Gibo’s rivals “now appear to be in panic mode as the Lakas-Kampi-CMD bet cements his lock on the vote of students and other young voters—who make up a bulk of this year’s electorate—and starts gaining extra momentum from the robust support of local executives and other candidates of Lakas-Kampi-CMD at the onset of the local campaign season.”

Last week, 50 provincial governors banded together under G4G, or Governors for Gibo, to reiterate their support for the presidential bid of the former defense secretary all the way till May 10.

His lawmaker-backers led by congressman Jose Aquino also said that over 100 members of the House of Representatives, most of them first- and second-termers, are supporting his candidacy till Election Day.

The governors led by Gwendolyn Garcia of Cebu, Mix Dominguez of Sarangani and Joey Salceda of Albay backed a manifesto of support during a meeting of the League of Provinces of the Philippines at the Discovery Suites.

Toledo noted earlier, that the latest campaign developments within the ruling party Lakas-Kampi-CMD, particularly the successive demonstrations of support by members of the First Family for Gibo, prove he is and will always remain President Arroyo’s presidential candidate.


Toledo noted that President Arroyo herself made a surprise appearance during last Tuesday’s meeting of the Lakas-Kampi national executive committee to ask party officials to campaign for Gibo, which was followed by demonstrations of support from presidential sons and Representatives Juan Miguel “Mikey” Arroyo in Pampanga and Diosdado Ignacio “Datu” Arroyo in Camarines Sur, and from Rep. Ignacio “Iggy” Arroyo, the brother of First Gentleman Jose Miguel “Mike” Arroyo, in vote-rich Negros Occidental. -30-