The princess and the presidentiables

Anyone who can list big names such as Oprah Winfrey, David Foster and Celine Dion among her supporters must possess genuine talent – and Charice, the petite singer who hails from Laguna, is perhaps the only Filipina singing talent with that kind of backing.

Now with the upcoming launch of her debut 12-song CD on the Warner Music label, Charice is poised to become the Manny Pacquiao of international pop music.

	Charice

Charice turns 18 years old on May 10th and on the following day, May 11th, she will be launching her new CD, simply titled Charice, on the Oprah Winfrey Show with another YouTube teen phenomenon, Canadian Justin Bieber. I can’t even begin to imagine the audience ratings for Oprah’s show on that day with Charice and Justin. Her album’s executive producers are David Foster and Jaymes Foster. With such a powerful team supporting Charice, there’s no doubt that every Filipino’s wish to see a Filipino talent break into the international entertainment market has finally come true.

Charice’s first U.S. single, Pyramid, released last March has already climbed to the upper reaches of Billboard Magazine’s music charts. It is enjoying popular airplay in the U.S. and of course, also in the Philippines. The first single revealed a new Charice like we’ve never heard or seen before – high-tech and danceable. But her fans need not worry that she has been managed beyond recognition. We at the Pilipino Express were fortunate to receive a preview listen of the entire 12-song album and I can assure you that Charice has not abandoned her roots. The album successfully presents Charice’s new pop image while still allowing her to showcase the amazing voice that brought her to the world’s attention in the first place, as evidenced in her follow- up single Note to God, which is also in the top 10.

If you are a Charice fan, like me, mark May 11th on your calendar to watch her on the Oprah Winfrey Show. It’s one Oprah show we wouldn’t want to miss. And I hope our kababayans will support this incredible talent by actually buying her CD – not just pirating it.

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When Filipinos vote on May 10, they will not only elect their new president but will also elect a Vice-President, senators, mayors and a long list of local candidates vying for their votes.

It is estimated that over 50 million Filipinos are eligible to cast their votes. The candidates and their campaign teams are now all in high gear trying to convince each one of the 50 million to go out and vote for them. Voter’s apathy has always been a problem in the Philippines. In previous elections, many Filipinos just did not care enough to vote resulting to very low turnout.

This time may be different though because the Comelec will be conducting an automated counting of the votes. It may be an incentive for the ordinary citizen to spend time to vote just to test the system.

The original Comelec promise is for the results to be announced within 24 hours after all the results have been filed electronically. It is no secret that the Philippines has always been notorious about the delay in announcing the official results – ranging from weeks to months – leading to accusations of vote rigging. For the results to be made public in 24 hours is something incredibly hard to believe. Many have made their scepticism known, leading to a proposal to do a parallel manual count to verify the results. It is all a question of trust. No one trusts anyone anymore. Every candidate or political party that has the financial means has conducted a survey and isn’t it surprising that they are all leading in their own respective polls, which they paid for. As such, every candidate claims that if there were no “cheating,” he or she would be the sure winner.

It seems to be a no-win situation especially for the Comelec. The Comelec can make all the guarantees and promise to the citizenry that the counting will be conducted with honesty and integrity, but the public perception has already been flawed and tainted by past experiences of cheating and rigging. The memories of the “Hello, Garci” vote-rigging scandal in the 2004 election – allegedly involving the incumbent president – are still too fresh in the minds of the voters.

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In this issue of Pilipino Express, we are featuring brief profiles of the Presidentiables. Not everyone knows the background of each presidential candidate and we hope that through our brief summary of who they are, our readers will have an idea of who the next Chief Executive will be.

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Election fever is also heating up in Winnipeg. Six months before the scheduled civic election in October, the very popular and long time NDP MP from Winnipeg North, Judy Wasylycia- Leis, is highly anticipated to be a major contender for the City of Winnipeg’s top post. Who will it be? Mayor Sam or Mayor Judy?

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