In a news story posted in GMANews.TV, Losing Vice Mayoral Candidate, Incumbent Vice Mayor Martin Ilagan claimed that he was approached by certain people who offered to rig the election in his favor. Instead of accepting the offer, Vice Mayor Martin Ilagan made a counter offer to protect his votes in the amount of PHP [...]
In a news story posted in GMANews.TV, Losing Vice Mayoral Candidate, Incumbent Vice Mayor Martin Ilagan claimed that he was approached by certain people who offered to rig the election in his favor. Instead of accepting the offer, Vice Mayor Martin Ilagan made a counter offer to protect his votes in the amount of PHP 500,000 (yaman mo pala Martin, Pautang naman, LOL).

San Pablo City vice mayor Frederick Martin Ilagan, who lost his reeelection bid, told the House panel that two people who claimed to be a “brokers” for the Commission on Elections (Comelec) and technology provider Smartmatic — Ed Bumagat, and Manolo Gonzales — offered to rig the elections for him and his local partymates.
“The offer made me think for two days,” Ilagan said, adding that the proposal was made during the second week of February.
The defeated vice mayor said he eventually made a “counter-offer” of P500,000 to the operator to “protect” the votes for him. – READ FULL STORY
Again, the question here is, “Why is he just telling the public about this NOW?” These people approached him before the election and if he is truly concern about election fraud then he should have reported it then and not after.
He said he didn’t raise the matter to authorities immediately because he “just thought of [them] as scam artists or syndicates trying to get money from [his] party” after they failed to contact him again.
Is he even thinking when he said this? If the people who approached him were SCAM artist then, as City Vice Mayor, he should, at least, had them arrested and investigated. I guess he is just the type who entertains SCAMMERS or maybe he is already surrounded by them that he had grown immune to them.
Ilagan said he was no longer interested in the vice mayoral post, and was there are at the hearing to “shed light” on the poll fraud issue.
Shedding light? Is that really your intention? If you can’t use the system to cheat then the next best thing is to create doubt and discredit the election process. Just be a man and accept the lost.
By the way, I voted for Martin Ilagan in the last May 10, 2010 elections but after knowing that he even considered the offer made to him by these unscrupulous people (and even made a counter offer), I don’t think I will ever vote for him again.
I used to think of him as the future of San Pablo City but I guess being surrounded by TRAPOS and being exposed to dirty politics had affected him and transformed him into one himself.
Tags: comelec, election fraud, rig, smartmatic
About The Author

Romelo Itong is a Freelance Web and Graphics Designer from the Philippines. When he is not designing new websites for his clients, you will find him blogging about various topics, issues and events. (Follow on Twitter | Friend on Facebook)



