DON’T LOOK now but the political fallout from the fiduciary blowup ignited by Pampanga 3rd District board member Shiwen Lim has drifted to City of San Fernando Mayor Vilma Balle-Caluag.
And her honor – if she chooses to – can only blame the newbie bokal, aka Estelito Lim, as he has only himself to blame for this consequence as unmitigated as the quagmire of his own making.
The blame game has been much overplayed by Lim that it backfired and struck him senseless, granting that he has some semblance of sense in the first place.
For the promised interest of unreturned investments, he blamed his self-declared – sans any court issuance – bankruptcy of his Umpukan venture.
For the public outcry of the scores of victims of his schemes, Lim blamed a “media outlet” for publishing on Aug. 1 the notice of garnishment of his accounts with Land Bank of the Philippines-JASA Branch. “Hindi ko alam ba’t sinapubliko pa ng ibang Tao,” he said in a post on the same day.
Aye, the very publication of the story – only Punto! carried it – Lim blamed on politicians still smarting from his winning alliance with their rivals in the last polls, thereby driving them to instantaneously see red at his courtesy call on Mayor Vi, with whom he established a putative friendship most manifest in TikTok and other platforms during the campaign.
As immediate was the backlash in social media with the mayor’s good name virtually dragged into the quandary. Just goes to show how impacted is the public mind with the perceived bond of friendship gluing the two as one. (Posts adjusted for punctuations, capitalization, abbreviations, grammar. Direct imputation of scamming deleted)
“Ooooppps! Ka-friendship ni Mayora? Hmmm.”
“May kilala ako, Mayora Vilma ang pangalan. Galit sa kurakot at mandarambong, pero ito oh friendship niya naglalaro ng yaman-yaman, (deleted) pala.”
“Galit sa mga kurakot pero may BFF na (deleted).”
“Kunwari lang naman yata galit si Vilman sa kurakot. E malamang alam nyang (deleted) yang kaibigan niya. Pareho pa nga yata.
“Ganyan pala ang kaibigan na gusto mo Vilma, (deleted). At puro utang…”
“Eto yung mga uri ng kaibigan ni Vilma, kaya wag kayong maniniwala sa mga mayayaman na nagti-TikTok agad. May mga scammer dyan. Magkakaibigan sila.”
“Sinasabi ko na nga ba eh mga friendship! Same-same sila mga pasikat pero manloloko!”
“Grabe ang friendship goals nyo Mayora ha! (deleted)”
“Proud siguro si friendship Vilma hahaha.”
“Kadiri ang friendship nyo! Huwag niyo na kame idamay, Mayora please lang.”
“Bestie sa pag-(deleted) sa mga tao ano? ‘Yan ang tunay na pagkakaibigan.”
“Tanong ko lang po tandem din po ba kayo pagdating sa pag-(deleted)?”
“Mag-friendship talaga kayo ni Vilma. Parehas kayo ng galawan…”
“Vlogger yan sa TikTok … umaastang mayaman (deleted) naman pala, tapos kaibigan pa ni Mayora Vilma, ay matik yan!”
Ostensibly, these netizens’ collective mind is fixed on that age-old truism of same feathered birds flocking together, and – if I may add – the predators among them preying, aye, scavenging, in pairs.
Or, that ancient adage too of one’s real self revealed in the kind of friends one keeps.
Of course, sayings, maxims, euphemisms, trite as truisms are, do not come anywhere close to Gospel truth. But still, grains of it obtain in them. Else they would not have survived, more so thrived, all these years.
In the matter of showing who your friends are to show who you are, the certainty lies in knowing that kind of person you are based on what you’re willing to indulge, oblige, tolerate, or accept. Like, you keep friendship with a scammer, you may not be one but will surely be imbued with some aura of that character.
Partner in crime, then? Mayor Vi does not make one to Lim evidently. A collateral damage to Lim’s self-inflicted but all too public offence, the mayor is most like it.
The Lim-Vi connection – luxuriant LV, some wag says now uncopyrighted from Louis Vuitton – has so settled in the public mind, particularly in the City of San Fernando and the 3rd District of Pampanga, that the two have become peas in the same pod, for the cara y cruz addicts, head and tails of the same coin. Again, thanks to their virtual omnipresence.
Hence, a TikTok disconnect needs to be established, not merely emphasized here.
For starters, what hath Mayor Vi to say of her friendship with the beleaguered Lim?
“A friend in need is a friend indeed.” Will she answer to that call?
Photo: Sherwin Lim FB page
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