Leonardia upbeat on city,
bizmen accord on tax code
BY CHRYSEE SAMILLANO

Bacolod Mayor Evelio Leonardia yesterday said he is positive that both the city and the businessmen will reach a consensus involving the new rates in the 2011 New Revenue Code of Bacolod City.

“So far, we feel that we are on the right track in terms of finding a win-win solution,” he said, during a meeting with the officials of the Metro Bacolod Chamber of Commerce and Industry and the Bacolod-Filipino Chamber of Commerce and Industry at the government center yesterday.

Leonardia said there were new ideas raised during the meeting that they are entertaining. “I am happy that they have a very open mind and their premise is that this is all about public-private partnership,” he said.

Governor Alfredo Marañon Jr. yesterday confirmed his attendance at the August 30 meeting of the Nationalist People's Coalition in Manila, which is also expected to be attended by the six congressmen of Negros Occidental, Vice-Governor Genaro Alvarez Jr. and Kabankalan City Mayor Isidro Zayco, newly-designated NPC provincial chairman.

Marañon, who was ousted as the NPC provincial chairman for still unknown reasons, said he is not hoping for anything at the meeting.

He, however, said that his philosophy in life is “God has His own mysterious ways of doing things”, and added that “We may not like it, but it's good for us”.

Negros Occidental Governor Alfredo Marañon Jr. yesterday joined the call to convince Leni Robredo, wife of the late Interior and Local Government Secretary Jesse Robredo, to join the senatorial race in the 2013 elections.

Marañon, in his speech after the DILG-sponsored mass for Robredo at the San Sebastian Cathedral in Bacolod City, yesterday said that he called for Mrs. Robredo to run for senator “so that she can continue the work that her husband had started”.

A campaign is now ongoing at a social networking, Facebook, to encourage the wife of Robredo to continue the vision and dreams of her husband for a better Philippines, by running for senator.