The politics of the Pacquiao kidnap plot

FOR SURE, President Aquino would opt to live an easy life a few days before his successor is elected.

But he finds it hard to steer clear of sensitive issues, including the biggest landmine of the lot—the touchy subject of security facing the nation.
There was no way Aquino could skirt around the topic after the bandit group Abu Sayyaf earlier this week beheaded its Canadian hostage John Ridsdel.
Aquino suggested that despite the Ridsdel incident, more terror plots by the outlaws have been neutralized and promised with the same old tired vow to use the “full might of the state” to destroy these lawless elements and pursue them until all members are eliminated.

This went down badly because it turns out, as the President himself revealed, among the scenarios hatched by the Abus as they seek to align with the extremist Islamic State (IS) included the kidnapping of the his own sister Kris, a mega television personality, and world boxing champion and the people’s sports hero Manny Pacquiao.

Pacquiao, running for senator not under Noynoy’s Liberal Party, is aware that his foiled kidnapping comes with the territory of being a boxing icon and a wealthy individual.

But as part of a hotly contested election this year, an upset Pacquiao has made a mental note not to ignore the fact that Malacañang never bothered to tell him about the kidnap plot, and that he came to hear about it only in the media through an 800-word statement released by the Palace.

Certainly that oversight would be fodder for attacks from Pacquiao’s UNA party led by Vice President Jejomar Binay, a bitter rival of the Liberal Party’s standard bearer Mar Roxas, as the campaign winds down.

More than that, the President’s disclosure will definitely make Pacquiao more aware of his surroundings and that he will not think twice about his safety and that of his family’s as he goes on the hustings gunning for one of 12 slots at stake for the Senate this year.

Meanwhile, the Abu Sayyaf’s brazen act of brutality has not escaped the attention of administration critics.

My friend, Inquirer columnist Ramon Tulfo, wrote recently that the government should respond to Abu Sayyaf atrocities not with “an empty threat, idle boasts and hot air” but with an appropriate way “that would really send a message that it means business.”

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Sports personalities with “quiet aspirations” of challenging former congressman Jose “Peping” Cojuangco Jr. for the presidency of the Philippine Olympic Committee would likely emerge from the shadows a few weeks before the POC elections on the last Friday of November this year.

POC first vice president and spokesperson Joey Romasanta said the incumbent Cojuangco has indicated that he will run for an unprecedented fourth term as POC chief.

Romasanta did not name the probable Cojuangco challengers but hinted that at least two individuals might be interested in running against his boss.
During Cojuangco’s 12-year tenure, the Philippines topped the Southeast Asian Games—the lowliest of sports hostilities in the Asian continent—as the host country in 2005. But it has figured in one sports debacle after another since then, including a seventh-place finish in the same SEA Games in Burma (Myanmar) in 2013.