PALO, Leyte – Leyte Governor Leopoldo Dominico Petilla and his cousin, Vice Governor Carlo Loreto, led over the weekend the oath-taking of hundreds of their allies in Leyte province, sealing their dominance in local politics.
Both Petilla and Loreto are now in their last term as key officials of the province. They are also both members of the powerful clan that ruled Leyte for decades.
Petilla was the inducting officer of Loreto while Court of Appeals Associate Justice Edgardo Delos Santos administered Petilla’s oath.
The newly-elected members of the Sangguniang Panglalawigan took their oath before outgoing An Waray Party-list Rep. Victoria Isabel Noel. Town mayors, vice mayors and councilors from 39 of the 40 towns in Leyte who are allies with the political clan attended the mass oath-taking, including the newly-elected officials from Baybay City.
Other clan members who also took oath at the Oriental Hotel in Palo on Saturday were Dominico’s sister-in-law, Palo Mayor Ann Petilla, the wife of former Governor Carlos Jericho and cousin former Leyte Rep. Jose Carlos Cari, the new mayor of Baybay City.
Tacloban City Councilor Jom Bagulaya chose to take her oath with the provincial government officials instead of joining the oath-taking of city government officials led by the Romualdez clan.
Bagulaya’s mother, Mimiette, is a former governor, vice governor, and board member. She is a known ally of the influential clan.
In his inaugural speech, Petilla called for unity among elected local leaders now that the election is over. He said that partisan politics should now be set aside and elected leaders must concentrate on their job as public servants.
“Achieving the goal of solving people’s problem through public service can only be achieved if elected officials will work together and will not include politics in their agenda,” he said.
“Today signals the start of working together as one. We need to unite, we need to be strong as a province, we need to be strong as a nation.” He added that being united will help to convince prospective businessmen to invest in the province in order to boost the local economy.
“Investments not only coming from the Philippines but multinational companies are coming in. they traditionally invest in big cities but here, they are investing in municipalities that signals strong confidence to our local business sector,” Petilla said.
“This creates more jobs for our constituents.” Under his third and last term, the governor vowed to continue focusing on reducing poverty incidence, curb malnutrition, and solving insurgency.
“Solving malnutrition is very important because if we do not address this, the child’s brain will never develop, and no amount of education can help them if they are malnourished.
They will never learn if they don’t have enough nourishment,” he said. “Our peace and order situation is improving with the help of our Philippine National Police and the Philippine Army.
Most of the towns that were used to be affected by insurgency had been declared as free from insurgency,” he added. Leyte province has been identified by the national government as a model province in ending the insurgency.
The Petillas’ rise to power in Leyte started in the early 1990s when Leopoldo Petilla, Dominico’s father, became governor. Leopoldo’s wife, Remedios replaced him in 1998 and ruled the province until 2004.
Their son Carlos Jericho was the Leyte governor (2004-2012) before he was appointed as Energy Secretary during the Aquino administration. Another son, Leopoldo Dominico has been the governor since 2013.
The Petilla clan is a sub-branch of one of the country’s oldest political dynasties. The first member of the clan was Jose Ma. Veloso, Remedios’ grandfather. He became Leyte first district representative for three terms (1922-1925; 1935-1938; 1941-1946) and senator for two terms (1916-1919 and 1925-1935) during the Commonwealth period. (PNA/roel amazona)
