OUT OF thin air, the once reverend, once governor Among Ed Panlilio materialized last week in the political realm anew, raising the hand of gubernatorial bet Jomar Hizon of Pampanga’s Best.
Big deal.
What’s for real – Panlilio in flesh and blood, Hizon in all his bulk, caught in single frame at that! – touched on the surreal, given the sweet then-soured bonds between the suspendedpriest- turned-governor-turned-organic-farmer and the family empire tapa and tocino built.
It was but a dozen years back – not too far off to recede completely to memory’s back burner – that Panlilio ascended to the Capitol as though on the wings of angels. “Miracle in Pampanga” as the Philippine Daily Inquirer solemnized what indeed was the phenomenon of the first Roman Catholic priest, albeit suspended, ever elected provincial governor.
Among the major wielders of that miracle – by her own account – was none other than Doña Lolita Olalia-Hizon, matriarch of arguably Pampanga’s best manufacturer of processed food products.
Taking semblance as it were to the biblical multiplication of loaves and fishes was La Doña’s infusion of funds in multiples of thousand-peso bills to the Among’s campaign chest. Not to mention doing a Martha in her provision of safehouses for him during the campaign period until his proclamation as winner, and subsequent sitting at the Capitol.
From Day One of the Panlilio administration, it was a Hizon – Darius, the SEA Games 2005 gold medalist in shooting – that took upon himself to provide Panlilio’s personal security detail, 24/7.
So mighty, indeed, was the bond adhering Panlilio to the Hizon clan that thunderstruck was the Capampangan when, within but four months into the reverend governor’s administration, Doña Lolita was already doing a mater dolorosa in print, on radio-TV, and at the sangguniang panlalawigan lamenting over the perceived waywardness of the Among.
Reference now to my column of Sept. 23, 2007.
Her pound of flesh
…“I am not mad but I am disappointed. Not because of the money (that reportedly flowed from her immense treasure chest, not to mention the thousands of kilos of pindang and longganisa, during the campaign). He (Panlilio) can do much better if only he would consult us,” she was quoted as saying.
Even as Panlilio gave the re-assurance on television too that he still looked up to Mrs. Hizon as a son to his mother, the situation between them appears to have gone beyond a simple spat in the family.
For one, the governor in a Rotary talk was heard to have gone unson-like, defying the age-old mother-knows-best truism in alleging that Mrs. Hizon did not know the real situation at the Capitol as she rarely ventured out of her hallowed corridors. The figurative hyperbole here mine, not Panlilio’s.
Of still greater concern are some loose talks currently circulating at the Capitol picturing Mrs. Hizon as a Shylock demanding her pound of flesh. (To those who have forgotten their Shakespeare, Shylock is the ruthless, exacting usurer in The Merchant of Venice.)
This is most unfair to Mrs. Hizon – “the unkindest cut” to use another Shakespearean phrase – coming from the direction of one who has wallowed so much in her innate goodness.
Ingrato, is what some local coños have deemed the governor for “biting the very hand that fed him.”
Some self-anointed civil society hireling countered that Mrs. Hizon desired to “reign over if not rein in the Panlilio administration.” So, it was even more than a political payback that she most wanted.
From there we can most reasonably deduce that Mrs. Hizon was not a supporter but an investor in the Panlilio candidacy. The purported millions of pesos she poured into the campaign were not charitable donations but investments demanding instant returns once the Capitol was won. The time for ROI is now!
Indeed, a most unkind proposition given Mrs. Hizon’s defining persona as Mother Charity herself.
I wonder how her Conscience will take this.
Recall
“One of my greatest regrets in life is helping the candidacy of Gov. Eddie,” Doña Lolita declared in a press conference in Aug. 2008 in her home in Barangay Cabalantian, Bacolor.
This, as she led hundreds of her IBACA congregation and members of her Conscience Inc. in signing the recall petition initiated by the Kapanalig at Kambilan ning Memalen Pampanga, Inc. against Panlilio.
“These are clear signs that there is something wrong with his administration,” she said, referencing to the people who bolted from the ship of the current provincial executive as well as his former supporters who have rebelled against him.
“I’m also starting to wonder if he is going to abandon his promises to the people, like he abandoned the highest calling of his vocation,” she added.
In prior TV interviews, Doña Lolita had openly called Panlilio “psychologically incapacitated” and “a liar” even to the point of suggesting some DNA testing in some widely alleged but unproved Panlilio biological fathering.
Perjury
In early June 2009, the tocino queen filed with the city prosecutor’s office a case of perjury against Panlilio for allegedly “concealing” her P1-million campaign contribution from the Commission on Elections.
In her complaint-affidavit, Hizon said that on April 15, 2007, Pampanga’s Best contributed P1 million to Panlilio’s campaign kitty. But the receipt given her was not under her name and merely stated “anonymous” despite her request to Panlilio’s camp for correction.
She cited Section 7 (b) of Comelec Resolution No. 7794 that a candidate for governor without any political party and without support from any political party can spend only an aggregate amount of P5 million.
Panlilio allegedly declared only 57 contributors to his political campaign. Many of his supporters alleged that other donors were not listed in the report that he submitted to the Comelec provincial office.
Hizon accused Panlilio of violating Article 183 of the Revised Penal Code and the Omnibus Election Code.
Farce
The incontrovertible loss of Panlilio to Gov. Lilia G. Pineda in 2010 was as much a cause of celebration for the victor herself as a vindication of Doña Lolita, who, if ageing memory still serves right, tendered some feast for the Pinedas to mark the happy occasion.
In his epic comeback failure in 2013, Panilio received at most some quiet apathy from the Hizons, enmeshed as they were in the reelection bids of daughter Angie for city councilor and son Jomar for Bacolor mayor.
The nearest thing to connect Panlilio with the Hizons post his governorship was his organic farm called Eden located in the Hizon bailiwick of Barangay Cabalantian.
What gives now with the politically dead Panlilio suddenly resurrecting to endorse Hizon?
Yet another attestation to the truism of the impermanence of foes and friends alike, and the constancy of interests in politics?
An instance of the mafioso take of the enemy of one’s enemy is one’s friend?
A case of the sins of the parent not visited upon the child?
Or, the Christian edict of forgiving seventy times seven one’s erring brethren?
Whichever, I remain fixed on those famous last words of the French humanist Francois Rabelais: “Bring down the curtain, the farce is played out.”
