Almusalan para kay Teddy (Breakfasts with Teddy)

Supporters launch breakfast drive for bet

By Maricar Cinco
Inquirer Southern Luzon
First Posted 00:14:00 08/17/2009


LOS BAÑOS, Laguna, Philippines—It’s a long day ahead for Bayan Muna Representative Teodoro Casiño’s bid to become senator, one that a group of his cash-strapped supporters hope to start with what nutritionists say is the most important meal of the day—breakfast.

A group of lawyers, doctors, teachers, scriptwriters, and businessmen started selling tickets to breakfasts with Casiño in a bid to raise funds for one of the poorest members of the House of Representatives.

They call it “Almusalan para kay Teddy (Breakfasts with Teddy),” sessions with Casiño over pan de sal, coffee, or classier fare for those who could afford.

Mostly alumni of the “UPLB Perspective,” the student paper of the University of the Philippines Los Baños, Casiño’s supporters hope the breakfast sessions could also help introduce Casiño as a “poor, but deserving” candidate for senator.

Casiño and his supporters kept in touch through the Internet.

Then when he confirmed, also through the Internet, that he was running for senator, the first question that was raised was where the campaign funds would come from.

“We asked him, ‘what about your funding,’ he said he had none,” said Val Aguilar, who works for a construction and sales company and one of the core organizers of the breakfast sessions.

Instead of soliciting funds from the rich—businessmen and other politicians—Casiño’s supporters thought it best to bring him closer to people, small groups, and make money out of it at the same time.

Smaller than town hall meetings, Casiño’s supporters hope the sessions would help the candidate present his platform.

“It’s not like a panel or a press conference,” said Jenny Bonto, a volunteer for Casiño.

Bonto recalls one session when Casiño was answering questions from his audience as he changed his child’s diapers.

“He is as real as you are and is there just to ask for help,” she said.

More than money, however, Bonto said Casiño’s supporters hope to solicit something more valuable during the breakfast sessions—“informed and committed support.”

Another supporter said breakfast was thought of because “breakfasts and mornings connote everything positive.”

“All that is good is heralded in the morning,” said another supporter.

“It’s not (spending) five or ten thousand pesos (for activities) like moneyed politicians do,” added Jojo Salas, who is now director for a financial firm.

The first breakfast session was held in Los Baños, Laguna, and the second in Libis, Quezon City, last July.

The group hopes to do it at least twice a month and spread it to Cebu and Davao. Funds will be raised, too, from supporters abroad.

Breakfast fare varies from the all too common “pan de sal” to the more expensive fried chicken, depending really on who Casiño’s audience would be.

Bonto, who said she has stopped believing in elections since 1986, will vote again.

“It’s not every day that a non-trapo (traditional politician) runs,” she said. “I want to do this for myself and my family.”

Salas said Casiño had been offered by bigger political parties to run under their ticket, but he declined.

Bonto said a Casiño victory would be a signal of “change in itself.”

The campaign, she said, would be “a quantum leap.”

“We are trying to re-engineer a mindset,” she said.

The next breakfast session with Casiño is set August 18 at Park Square, Makati City. Schedules are posted at the http://almusalan.teddycasino.org/.