Juan Country » Mike Defensor

Getting to know QC Vice-Mayor Herbert Bautista

Carlo Ople — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 03:21:17 +0000

We got our chance to sit down, have dinner, and talk with Quezon City Vice-Mayor Herbert Bautista last night. I took the initiative in trying to organize the meeting since I felt that it was unfair to only publish Mike Defensor‘s side especially since I’ve been a resident of QC for the longest part of my life. Before we go on, let me just thank Chuck Cabral and Tito Mike Orosa for helping me connect with Herbert. This event wouldn’t have happened without their support.

First Impressions
I literally did not notice Herbert when I went in the room. He was seated on the floor charging his cellphone while he was texting when we came in. It took me two to three glances before i realized that the Vice-Mayor of Quezon City was in the room! He quickly got up and went over and greeted us while shaking our hands. Personally I felt that he was really stressed or burdened that night. There was definitely a gloomy cloud hovering over him. Eventually all the bloggers arrived and Herbert joined us for dinner. We had a Filipino home cooked meal of tilapia, rice, kaldereta, and liempo. After the dinner, we all took our positions and got ready for the session.

Herbert answers Mike’s Allegations
The session heated up pretty quickly since the first topic for discussion was Mike Defensor’s allegations. According to Mike, 30% of QC’s budget went into food and drinks and it was not inspected because Herbert signed a waiver for non-inspection. In his defense, Herbert said that these programs really needed to be procured via emergency because it takes so long to do it the normal way. The food and drinks budget was also allocated for all the training and seminar sessions that the office of the Vice-Mayor and not just for simple feeding programs. With regards to the waiver for inspection, he shares that it’s also part of the justification.

Here’s the video interview which Blog Watch uploaded:

In the interest of fairness, I’ll leave it to you guys to figure out who to support.

With regards to his plans for Quezon City, Herbert says that he will allocate more funds to social services and development. Unlike Mike, he’s not promising anything big and says that as a politician, he can promise a lot. But as an administrator, he can’t because he knows what can be done and what can’t be done given the budget and the population of QC.

Herbert Bautista has a lot of experience, being in local government for over a decade. He’s been a councilor, a Vice-Mayor, and he practically grew up serving Quezon City. Other than his record, Herbert strikes me as a person who wears his heart on his sleeve. He’s very “human” and he’s actually one of the most approachable politicians/celebrities I’ve ever met. However, that’s both and advantage and a disadvantage.

My suggestion for Bistek is that he needs to hire really good marketing/pr professionals to help him with his campaign. They have to iron out the message that they want to communicate to the voters and they need to properly handle the case being filed against them by Mike because it’s damaging.

Thanks again to Vice-Mayor Herbert Bautista for accepting our request for a blogger session. Thank you and good luck with the upcoming elections!

QC Vice-Mayor Herbert Bautista answers Mike Defensor’s allegations on ANC

Carlo Ople — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 14:31:42 +0000

I just came from a rather interesting dinner-blogger session with Quezon City Vice-Mayor Herbert “Bistek” Bautista. The session heated up quickly since we immediately dove into the major pressing issue which was Mike Defensor’s allegations of 30% of his budget being used for “food and drinks”. I’ll write a piece on Herbert either later tonight or tomorrow morning. For now, let me re-post a video of Herbert answering Mike on an ANC show hosted by Karen Davila.

So, what do you guys think?

QC Vice-Mayor Herbert Bautista should answer Mike Defensor’s allegations

Carlo Ople — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 12:47:17 +0000

In a recent blogger event, QC Mayor candidate Mike Defensor laid out a strong challenge to Vice-Mayor Herbert Bautista. He shared with us official documents showing that Herbert spent 30% of his 750M budget on food and drinks in the last 3 years. There were also waivers attached signed by Herbert saying that no inspection was needed to physically validate the orders. 30% of 750M is roughly 230M-240M pesos and that’s no small amount. That money could have gone a long way in rehabilitating government hospitals like the one in East Avenue (where I was operated on with no anesthetics).

Why does Herbert need to answer this
If Vice-Mayor Herbert Bautista really did spend 30% of his budget on food and drinks, I’m afraid to entrust to the guy the 10-12 BILLION budget of Quezon City for 2010. That’s a huge amount and if he’s already shown that he can’t properly handle his budget then I have no idea how much of the 10B-12B will actually go into social services. Note that I’m not condemning Herbert now. What I want is for him to answer these serious allegations. There are just two questions:

1. Did you really spend 30% of your budget in the last year on food and drinks?
2. If yes, why?

I would like to take this opportunity to call out to any supporters, staff, or campaign teams of Vice-Mayor Herbert Bautista. I am more than willing to organize a free blogger event for you to answer these allegations so that you also have a voice. Mike Defensor made a pretty convincing case against you and I won’t be surprised if the bloggers will be swayed to support him if you don’t speak up.

To Mike Defensor’s Team
I haven’t been following the case since day 1 and I wasn’t able to ask this during the blogger event but I’ll ask this now. Hopefully someone in Mike’s team will be able to read and answer on his behalf. If you already have a solid case against Herbert and you have the evidence to back it up, have you filed cases against him already? If yes, that’s great. If no… why?

Thank you to Mike Defensor and his family for inviting us into his home. Here’s to hoping that Herbert will do the same (kahit ‘wag sa bahay okay lang ).

Pictures courtesy of Rochelle Chua

Quezon City is now Yellow Country

Carlo Ople — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 08:56:29 +0000

Quezon City is now officially color yellow. Mayor Sonny Belmonte, Vice Mayor Herbert “Bistek” Bautista, and Joy Belmonte have all switched to the Liberal Party. This is a huge blow to the administration party since SB and his team has been a solid supporter of GMA for the longest time. Note that Belmonte has been with LAKAS for 17 LONG YEARS. Yes you read that right, SEVENTEEN. They took their oath before LP President Mar Roxas this afternoon in front of their supporters.

According to news reports, Belmonte is seeking a seat in Congress while his daughter will run for Vice Mayor. Herbert will run for Mayor. From what we’ve seen so far, it looks like they’ll be up against Mike Defensor who already has his face plastered all over QC.

This is a big step forward for the Liberal Party. It looks like there’s no stopping the growth of the “Yellow Army”.

Mike Defensor running for QC Mayor?

Carlo Ople — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 02:13:54 +0000

I had a very early morning meeting today and I had the chance to take a rather relaxing drive around Quezon City. You know it’s election season when tarpaulins of numerous local officials are plastered all over the metro. One tarpaulin caught my eye – it was the tarp of the former Chief-of-staff of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo: Mike Defensor. The main message of his tarp was to go out to register and vote. I made a few calls to a couple of friends and asked around and apparently Mike is rumored to be gunning for the Mayorship of Quezon City.

In all honesty, this guy used to be one of my idols. When he was in congress, he represented the brand of politics that I admire: young, passionate, and non-traditional. More of heart than wallet. However, when he became PGMA’s COS, everything changed. He was like a horse with blinders on, defending the President from all the issues thrown her way despite the evidence saying otherwise. As a result, Mike lost in the recent Senatorial elections. No amount of Boy Abunda PR can save you from that.

In 2010, it’s looking like a face-off between Mike Defensor and Herbert Bautista. It will be an interesting match-up and I can’t wait how the communication campaigns of both these candidates will be like.

By the way, I’ll be writing about the insanely numerous tarpaulins of Joy Belmonte in a separate article. Watch out for that one.