“WHO HAS TRACK RECORD OF POLITICAL BUTTERFLY-ISM?”

Liberal Party vice presidential candidate Sen. Mar Roxas was a principled man who refused to be part of any administration where government officials unashamedly stole from the public coffers and engaged in unethical acts

LP Director General Chito Gascon said this today as he ridiculed how the Nacionalistas defended Senator Loren Legarda on her being a “political butterfly.” 

“Pikon-talo sila (The truth hit a raw nerve in their camp),” he said, stressing that the whole country is aware how Legarda is a political butterfly, and that she may very well put her Nacionalista Party alliance aside at the opportune time after May 10. 

“Yung pagpapalit-palit niya ng partido at kakampi, matagal nang nasa record iyan. Kaya, siya ba ang tunay na may track record sa political butterfly-ism? Tsek! (Her changing political parties and affiliations has been on record for quite some time. So, does she have the real track record in political butterfly-ism? Check!),” he said. 

Legarda first run as a senator under the banner of the Lakas-CMD-NUCD during the 1998 national and local elections. She was caught crying on national television after prosecutors in the impeachment trial of former President Joseph Estrada walked out of the hearings following their failure to win the vote to open the Jose Velarde envelope, and later on joined the crowd that gathered at the EDSA Monument and called for the resignation of Estrada.  

But in the 2004 national elections, Legarda sought Estrada’s endorsement in her first vice presidential bid as the running-mate of the late actor Fernando Poe Jr., who was a close personal friend of Estrada. She later on joined Estrada in his provincial sorties shortly after President Arroyo pardoned him in the latter months of 2007.

Legarda is again running for vice president this year, this time as an ally of Nacionalista President Manuel Villar, whom she has condemned for his involvement in the C-5 road anomaly. She has been previously quoted in news reports as saying that the person involved in the double insertion scandal should be punished, and that she has worked to remove Villar as Senate president.  

A political butterfly is one who changes political affiliations for personal political reasons. The term usually implies disloyalty, unreliability, and opportunism. 

“Di tulad ng iba riyan na papalit-palit ng kulay, nanatili si Mar na tapat sa mga prinsipyong patuloy na dumadaloy sa kanyang ugat at patuloy na bumubuhay sa Partido Liberal mula pa kay Pangulong Manuel Roxas (Unlike others who change colors every so often, Mar Roxas has remained steadfast in the principles that run through his veins and that has kept the Liberal Party alive since President Manuel Roxas),” he said. 

 “Hindi siya katulad ng ibang kandidato na ang sinamahan ay mga partidong sa tingin niya ay higit na makatutulong para makamit niya ang kanyang mga ambisyong pulitikal (He is unlike other candidates who have already joined a number of parties only to pursue their politica ambitions),” he added.

03-03-2010