As the election campaign heats up, Senator Edgardo Angara Thursday denied the allegation of Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile that he acted as the emissary of Nacionalista Party (NP) standard bearer Sen. Manny Villar to persuade Sen. Richard Gordon to withdraw from the presidential race in exchange for huge amount of money and a Cabinet post should Villar win in the May 10,2010 polls.

“There is absolutely no truth to that. I was surprised to hear my name being dragged into the issue,” Angara said in a statement.

Enrile identified Angara as the one who was used as an emissary by Villar to convince Gordon to withdraw from the presidential contest.

But Villar’s camp slammed the allegation of Gordon, saying its useless to do that.

Gordon during an interview the other day with Mike Enriquez at radio station DZBB claimed that Villar sent an emissary and offered to reimburse his spending in the campaign in exchange for his withdrawal from the race.

Gordon even blamed the media which he said only published and broadcast news of candidates with strong showing in the surveys like Villar and LP bet Sen Benigno Noynoy Aquino III.

Instead of focusing on intrigues, Angara urged candidates to tackle more important issues that will address country’sproblems.

“We should move on to the more important issues of the national campaign. Whoever will win the country’s leadership faces big challenges like a dwindling food and water supply, a growing
population, poor educational standards, lack of healthcare, and a slipping national competitiveness.”

“So let’s move on from petty politics to a serious and honest examination of our candidates’ platforms,” he said.

The Senator noted the significance of the upcoming election, saying that the six-year period from 2010 to 2016 will be critical for the Philippines, as the country faces the daunting challenge of a growing population, an environment under extreme stress, rapid technological breakthroughs, and a dramatically restructured global financial market.

“With such unprecedented changes in our social, environmental, technological and political spheres, we need to map out an intelligent plan for the country. We can do this by focusing on infrastructure,
job generation and by preparing for the morning-after scenario through human capital investments” he said.