CABANATUAN CITY – Early boiling of local politics has created a huge crack in President Aquino’s party in Nueva Ecija, a provincial official and party member said Thursday.
Board Member Joseph Ortiz (2nd district) was referring to reports that Liberal Party member, 2nd Dist. Rep. Joseph Violago is teaming up as vice governor with former 4th Dist. Rep. Rodolfo Antonino (National Unity Party) who is supposedly running for governor against LP member 3rd Dist. Rep. Czarina Domingo-Umali.
Umali is already named by her husband, last termer Gov. Aurelio Umali, as the provincial LP standard bearer, along with another LP member and incumbent Vice Gov. Jose Gay Padiernos.
Aside from being with the LP, the Umalis have their own local party, Unang Sigaw Partido ng Pagbabago (USPP).
“Malaking problema ‘yan sa LP,” said Ortiz, himself a close ally of both Umali and Violago. He noted that besides the apparent Umali and Violago break-up, another party member, Mayor Julius Cesar Vergara of this city, is politically at odds with the governor over the conversion of this city into highly urbanized status.
Umali opposes the conversion which Vergara pushes. Reports said Vice President Jejomar Binay of United Nationalist Alliance (UNA) is looking into the possibility of fielding Antonino and Violago as opposition candidates for governor and vice governor of Nueva Ecija in the 2016 elections.
Incumbent 4th Dist. Rep. Magnolia Rosa Antonino- Nadres (NUP) is Antonino’s daughter. Violago, on the other hand, is on his third and final term and is believed to be grooming his wife Micaela or his brother Lito to run in his district in 2016.
