Butch Bagabuyo “A man of courage is also full of faith.” – Cicero WHEN Davao Mayor and now presumptive President Rodrigo Roa Duterte refused to file his certificate of candidacy despite the huge crowd of hungry and overly abused Mindanaoans begging him, the PDP-Laban of Sen. Koko Pimentel and no other political party showed uncommon courage to fight for what it thought was the right thing to do. God favored the poor so much so that even before midnight of Election Day, Sen. Grace Poe Llamanzares conceded defeat to “Super Digong,” which was a first ever in the Philippines. Right there and then, everybody wanted to become members of the PDP-Laban headed by Sen. Pimentel, a poor man but a bar topnotcher. The exodus, sort of, created the beginning of more of the same happening in all political exercises in our country. Hordes of shameless job applicants are trooping to Davao City complete with their resumes. Others even came with prepared contracts and lists of recommendees. But because presumptive President Super Digong  has reigned for 22 years or so as the mayor of a once upon a time “killing-fields” of our country, he made a retreat away from the madding crowd for the much needed re-charging. And when Super Digong re-appeared, he went straight to the tomb of his loving parents to ask for guidance even as he cried aloud like a newly born child. There is our man – humble and poor. The presumptive president of 90 million poor, starving and overly abused for the longest time but hopeful Filipinos came out to meet his well-wishers. But lo and behold, as events slowly unfolded, we came to know and hear, to our horror, Davao has become a “standing room only” for the very few ruling elite and their dummies as well as the owners and/or operators of the Imperial media--those responsible for blocking off Super Digong’s phenomenal turnout in all his rallies after rallies from start until the miting de avance. Undoubtedly, history is about to make a repeat of the 1986 “changing of the guards” but institutionalizing the Imperial Manila mania. Now that practically all the trapos have been proclaimed headed by the 12 prima-donnas millionaires of the enclave of the ruling elite, horse-trading between the rich and powerful to the exclusion of the poor and probinsyanos is about to begin with a force much stronger if not, more destructive than super typhoon Yolanda. God save the Philippines! Our presumptive president is poor and humble. And, 90 million Filipinos are poor and abused for the longest time. Ergo, this time, the poor must rule or never! Unless, we, the 90 million poor Filipinos, continue to unite and hire buses with our hard-earned pesos and troop to Davao City on June 12, we will lose our newly achieved independence from Imperial Manila. Sadly, a cursory look of the newly appointed officials speak volumes of more of the same abuses if not, worst, the famous ruling elite compose the cabinet; there’s not even one who comes and is with the poor. Definitely, this is not the change we’ve all been dreaming of and fought for but a nauseating repeat of debilitating greed. Believe you me, right now Imperial Manila is building impregnable structures to shield our man from ourselves: the small people to whom our Super Digong dedicated his life. Enough is enough! Enough of greedy Imperial Manila. Presumptive President Duterte was unknown to imperial Manila until his landslide victory, courtesy of the 90 percent poor Filipinos. Why can’t the cabinet be like him--poor and unknown but with oozing love for the millions who are poor? As I’ve written on Friday, permit me to remind us all that the few die-hard remnants of the PDP-Laban who dared fight the so-called strongman Ferdinand E. Marcos are still around and are now focused in “morning the night” as it were. By so doing, we believe we could derail if not, stop all the tracts leading to a sad and pathetic history repeating itself. Now that the fresh and stunning landslide victory of  Super Digong is here to stay, I dare say, we are determined to right the wrong of the past. And because God is good, we firmly believe that the next Speaker of the bigger house of Congress as well as the Senate president shall come from the largest and most potent political party in our country today, the PDP-Laban of Duterte and Pimentel. But only if the duo and their growing, nay, multiplying members from Mindanao strongly resist the temptation of being lost in the concrete jungles of Imperial Manila, if you know what I mean. In order to ensure unity in diversity, we will continue the 24/7 BMS (Basic Membership Seminar). In the meantime, we, the small-time but die-hard members of the PDP-Laban, will continue to fight with all we’ve got the insidious and creeping attempt by big business in Imperial Manila to make a repeat of the 1986 fiasco. As I keep repeating, with God on our side, we can make miracles after miracles happen as what we’ve just done in the contest for the presidency. To repeat, permit me, to suggest the following:
  • Start a determined campaign to have an exclusive bus caravan (no cars and every poor individual contribute what little we have to hire at a much discounted rate a bus) from all points in the paradise-like islands of Mindanao-Basilan-Sulu-Palawan-Tawi-Tawi and converge at the freedom park in Davao City for the Independence day celebration this June 12th.
  • Every participating bus must be headed by a non-politician Mindanaoan, and the names of the head of every bus as well as the participating members in that same bus should be submitted not later than June 6ththis year to the Cagayan de Oro City Council of the PDP-Laban, care of Gangging Pimentel/Jobags Bagabuyo/Welvert Cuenca, VIP Hotel, City of Cagayan de Oro or by email to bagabuyos@yahoo.com or by phone or text to yours truly (Atty. Rogelio “Butch” Bagabuyo, tel. No. 0918-803-0197/ 0928-434-5041), and/or to our Facebook account to be opened starting Wednesday.
  • No bus should travel faster than 60 kilometers per hour, and to ensure absolute compliance to this unique rule, only the participating bus that submits to the coordinator the exact time of departure from the originating place as well as the exact time of arrival at the designated area, the name of the leader and the members will be considered as part of the bus caravan.
  • Every participating member should provide himself with his own provision plus one other (“Byoppoo”) with enough paper bags to ensure the area be cleaned after the event.
  • This kind of discipline will prove to one and all that the real strength lies not in wealth and machinery but in well-disciplined warm bodies. This is the kind of power that prevented and sent chilling if not, freezing effects to the illegal operators of the Smartmatic’s counting machines--clearly designed digital “dagdag-bawas” machines known as VCM (vicious count for Mar), formerly the OMR (Oplan Mar Roxas), all indicating cheating in favor of the Liberal Party standard bearer from being implemented against our presidential choice in the last May 9 presidential elections.
Trust me, the big business, the very few ruling elite and the trapos of the filthy rich will, without fail, put up the roadblocks one after the other but, we, the 90 million poor Filipinos are all solidly behind our Super Digong as we are confident he knows the best of the thousand and one ways of skinning a cat.