Political turncoats

TEAM Rama partisans hit Councilor Dave Tumulak for declaring independence even as Vice Mayor Edgar Labella and five councilors shed off their UNA coats and took their oaths as PDP-Laban members.

But Dave declared himself independent, meaning he just took off his Team Rama coat. He still has to join BOPK, although he is already on speaking terms with Mayor Tomas Osmeña. Labella and company supposedly asked the permission of UNA boss former vice president Jojo Binay before jumping over to PDPLaban. They took off their old coats and put on new ones. Kinsa may political turncoat? At the local political scene, can we still call Labella and company Team Rama, without former mayor Mike Rama and Councilor Edu Rama? As members of President Rody Duterte’s political party, can they make things happen together with their anti-Duterte spokesman Councilor Jun Alcover?

Why did Councilor Tumulak decide to turn independent, in the first place? What happened within Team Rama that triggered the decision? The news obviously caught me and a lot of City Hall observers by surprise. It has been barely a month and a half into their term. It seems, judging from the instant vitriol from Team Rama’s online partisans, together they could not stand each other.

But we could have a better internal view had reporters covering Cebu City Hall looked into why the number one councilor was not chosen majority floor leader in early July. What was the consideration? The rest of the Team Rama councilors do not believe in Dave’s leadership prowess? A Cuenco had better pedigree than the councilor from Basak? Mike Rama could not accept Dave becoming election topnother on his own?

Councilor Tumulak was apparently mum. But did any reporter ask how did Dave take it? We could have bet- ter understood the situation and thus could have been sensitive to possible triggers for the split. Or Team Rama could have been alerted to the problem and sought to resolve the problem fast and not let it fester.

I hope our city beat reporters will rise to the more challenging situation at Cebu City Hall. They can start with these questions that remain unanswered.

Perhaps, they can also look into other Team Rama councilors who might also turn independent and join Dave.

*** I agree. Turncoatism is one symptom of the sickly democratic system that replaced the Marcos dictatorship. It is a system that lacks political parties united by principles and vision. Thus members of losing parties easily defect to the winning President’s political party as they seek projects for their respective constituencies. We call this system traditional politics.

With turncoatism now considered normal, politicians who fail to join the balimbing bandwagon are considered stupid, not principled.

But I thought the Duterte administration promised change. This is one question not asked of the movers of the recent mass oathtaking of PDPLaban members.

Meanwhile, the oathtaking in a sense publicly makes the position of Presidential Assistant for Visayas something that is political partisan in a trapo kind of way. Those without the PAV’s blessings cannot expect goodies from this administration. Really?

Perhaps we should watch more closely the performance of Team Dino-Labella in Cebu City. Bye Rama.

*** Change has apparently not happened at the Tagbilaran port. We brought a van to Panglao, Bohol last week so we could move around faster during the Geeks on a Beach 2016. To be able to do this, the van was transported via the ferry servicing the Argao, Cebu-Tagbilaran route. On our way home, a Tagbilaran port personnel asked us to set aside SOP for the Coast Guard.

*** Minus this minor irritant though, we had a great Bohol experience complete with a sumptuous dinner hosted by Gov. Ed Chatto, hundreds of geeks at the cultural center and a firefly tour for a delegation of Manila writers at the Abatan River in Maribojoc town.

Of course, some 500 geeks from all over the Philippines and a number from abroad gathered again to push forward the Philippine startup community during these times of change. The effort aimed to empower startups to lead change.

Hopes are high, of course, because of the dynamism of the Philippine startup ecosystem as well as the formation of the Department of Information, Communication and Technology (DICT). Mon Ibrahim, who used to head the ICT office under the DOST, has brought his team over to the DICT headed by Secretary Rodolfo Salalima. Since GOAB began four years ago, Ibrahim was there.

More on GOAB in my next column folks. But for the moment, allow me to say that the assembly next year could either happen in Palawan or Samal.