Will Emano’s magic still work?

Bencyrus Ellorin

MAGICIANS are masters of sleight-of-hand tricks. They develop fine and quick motor skills to make their tricks believable. The objective is to make the audience believe in what they see or what their eyes perceive. This is also known as the mastery of deception.

Not only is sleight of hands employed in magic but also in war and politics.

A day after Mayor Oscar Moreno “invited” Gov. Bambi Emano to run against him in the 2019 mayoral race, the young Emano went to his favorite microphone to belabor his acceptance of the challenge, and the purported party processes and his father’s (their kngpin’s) wishes.

A few days later, another young Emano, the younger sister of the governor,  Councilor Nadya Emano-Elipe, said she is the anointed one against Moreno.

The Emanos, no matter how they deny it, is relentless in all fronts to bring down Moreno. All kinds of cases have been filed against the mayor. All kinds of legal tricks have been thrown at the mayor — all, including the proverbial kitchen sink.

At the sidelines, Dongkoy Emano plays the underdog. He has, since time immemorial, claimed to have been cheated by Moreno. But that’s it, and he offers no evidence.

The strategy of making Moreno ineffective and vulnerable by the 25 dismissal orders from the Ombudsman may have misfired on Emano’s group. If at all, it has exposed the group’s weakness — that, essentially, they cannot win against Moreno in a fair election, and the best way for this family to regain city hall is to dethrone and disqualify the mayor, and hope that their next opponent will be weaker.

But the rule of law and Moreno’s performance at city hall has demonstrated the incumbent’s moral and political strength.

Now, the Emano group unleashed yet another trick, and that is to make the camp of Moreno feel overconfident by putting the young councilor to the fore.

But what you see and hear from the family’s propaganda machinery is inconsistent with what their political operators are actually doing. They are, in fact, trying to strengthen their mass base. Literally, their kingpin has been attempting to strengthen himself. He has been seen in public often, puffing his favorite Philip Morris.

And so, the moment the Moreno group prematurely rests on its laurels, they will pounce. They did this in the last elections. Just when the Emano propaganda machinery sent chatters they were ready to hang their gloves because they were a “poor political party”, they fielded their best political operators in Cagayan de Oro. But then again, that was not enough. If anyone was surprised, it was the then congressman and mayoral candidate Rufus Rodriguez whose base was eaten by the aggressive final campaign of the Emano camp.

But will Dongkoy’s sleight of hand still work this time? I seriously doubt.