Sonny Belmonte, today’s Quezon City mayor tops other alternates after Gloria. Even, Gloria, doesn’t deserve to be compared to Sonny. I mean, it’s the other way around. Sonny’s qualifications to presidency is much more relatively qualified if only to compare it with the fraudulent Gloria.
Below is the continuation of Sonny’s profile which I started last issue. This is based from William Esposo’s piece printed in one of the country’s national newspapers.
In 2001, Quezon City (QC) suffered from a P1.058 billion budget deficit. On his very first year as QC mayor, Sonny Belmonte wiped out that deficit and registered a P262 million surplus. QC subsequently averaged an annual surplus of P202 million on his first term of three years as mayor.
From 1997 to 2001, Quezon City had an income vs. budget average shortfall of P590 million a year for those five years. From 2002 to 2004, QC under Belmonte’s stewardship enjoyed an average positive variance of P233 million a year on income vs. budget.
Unbelievable reversal from deficit to income you might say, especially in this Arroyo era of mammoth fiscal deficits, year after year. But the facts are facts and numbers don’t lie.
After having transformed what was once a disaster zone into a model local government operation right on his first three years as QC Mayor, Belmonte was subsequently recognized by both government and non-government organizations with the following awards:
• Gawad Galing Pook Award for Effective Fiscal Management in 2003 and Gawad Galing Pook Award for Molave Youth Home in 2005
• Hall of Famer, Most Business Friendly City (2003, 2004, and 2005) by the Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry
• Most Livable Community Award for 2003 by the Metrobank Foundation
• Kabalikat sa Pabahay Award for Local Government Unit with the Most Number of Community Mortgage Programs, by the Housing and Urban Development Coordinating Council.
• MOST OUTSTANDING CITY MAYOR FOR 2003
If job experience is to be the gauge, Sonny Belmonte’s government service has chalked up an enviable record of sterling performances.
In July 2001, Sonny Belmonte was elected as Quezon City Mayor and in 2005 he was re-elected to a second term by an unprecedented margin of 436,000 votes, winning nearly 80% of the votes cast. Not the publicity seeking type, Belmonte’s solid accomplishments as Mayor spoke volumes of him.
In terms of qualifications and experience, it is hard to top Belmonte’s track record as a CEO of government corporations, a legislator and a local government official of no less than the biggest city in the country in terms of population.
We must therefore remember that when we got together as a nation in 1986 and placed Cory Aquino in Malacanang Palace , we did not have a candidate then with the national recognition, the experience and the track record of Sonny Belmonte. But we had unity and we believed in democracy then and so we succeeded.
We have great people in our country who can give us good governance but it is up to us to put them in positions of power so they can uplift us. After all, we are our nations’ stakeholders.
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