A GOP landslide that never was

Observers and party supporters alike agree that if the Republican Party only chose “to unite,” it could have easily achieved a landslide victory in this year’s general elections.

But unity was elusive, resulting in the split of the traditionally solid votes of the Republican bloc in the Commonwealth, as reflected in the 3,228 votes received by the GOP ticket of Gov. Juan N. Babauta and Lt. Gov. Diego T. Benavente and 3,371 votes garnered by GOP breakaway gubernatorial tandem of Rep. Heinz S. Hofschneider and Rep. David Apatang.

“Imagine, if the Republican was intact, it could have been a clear landslide victory,” said a GOP supporter yesterday.

Backed by the entire party, the Babauta-Benavente team easily cornered a total of 5,194 votes during the 2001 general elections, some 2,231 higher than their closest opponent, Covenant Party’s Benigno R. Fitial and Rita H. Inos.

Partial result of last Saturday’s election showed Fitial and his running mate, Timothy P. Villagomez, leading the four-way race with 3,497 votes.

James, a 25-year old supporter of the Republican Party from Precinct 3 who asked that he be identified only by his first name, traced the GOP’s failure to lead the race to the party’s “failure to hold a primary” earlier this year, which led to Hofschneider and a significant number of his supporters to break away and campaign hard against the BB team.

“It’s all because of the primary that was never held,” said James.

He said that if Hofschneider was given a chance for a primary and lost but chose to break away still, then the party’s official standard bearer, Babauta, would have kept the support of most party supporters.

“I blame the Republican Party board for not having an open mind in protecting the party. Republicans could have made it a landslide. It’s crazy. I think the Republican shot themselves in the foot,” said the frustrated party supporter.

GOP chair John S. Reyes was not immediately available for comments yesterday but in earlier statement on the issue, the GOP leadership cited that the party has no clear and convincing basis for a party primary or an open primary as requested by the Hofschneider-Apatang team.

A report submitted by the GOP Gubernatorial Candidate Committee, chaired by former congressman William S. Torres, said that the Republican Party By-Laws “sanctions neither a primary nor an open primary, or for that matter, any formal process, procedure or protocols for conducting one.”

“Therefore…it is the conclusion of your committee that the committee has little, if any, choice on the matter but to urge compliance with the guidelines in the Party By-Laws, and further, to deny Petitioners (Hofschneider-Apatang) filing accordingly,” said the ad hoc committee in a Jan. 28, 2005 report.

The committee, which was tasked to assess the credentials of the party gubernatorial candidates and recommend on the proposed holding of a primary, favored to affirm the re-election bid of the BB team, citing that the Hofschneider-Apatang team submitted three separate letters about their intent to run for governor and lieutenant governor respectively for the 2005 general elections.

It said that, unlike the BB team which specifically asked for the party’s endorsement, the Hofschneider-Apatang tandem “specifically avowed and manifested in no uncertain term its declaration.”

Further, the ad-hoc committee cited that Apatang was not a Republican Party member.

Current Affairs and history instructor at Northern Marianas College, Sam McPhetres, agreed that the issue of party primary might have contributed to what happened in the election.

“But primaries are not required by law. It’s a party issue. Back in the old days, the parties had primaries but losers would say, ‘Well, I don’t have to abide by the result of the primaries.’ They think that they’d have enough support and could win anyway,” he said.

McPhetres said, though, that he could not recall an instance where a team loses in a primary and goes on to win the actual elections.