While catchy jingles, heart-wrenching commercials, and having popular celebrity endorsers are the norm, two executive candidates from the Ang Kapatiran party prefer to make their message known discreetly, with their belief and hope that the electorate will choose wisely based on character and platform, and not necessarily on those who make the loudest noise. Councilor John Carlos “JC” de los Reyes, candidate for President and lawyer Jun Chipeco, candidate for Vice-President are an unlikely and virtually unknown pair.

De los Reyes explains “Ang Kapatiran is loud and clear on representing the youth. They have staked their bet on the youngest presidential candidate, and I am humbled that the committee has chosen me to represent their voice. It takes a lot of humility for the vice-presidential candidate and senatoriables to support the youngest candidate, whereas no other political party would go for an unknown, a councilor with credentials even lesser than theirs.”

Chipeco explains his reason for his first foray into politics, “I can’t just sit as an observer. From a country that was once admired by all Asian nations, we now have the same status as Bangladesh. We have become a country of symptoms, of band-aid solutions. We are good at addressing very short-term solutions. Over and over again, the same problems keep recurring. It’s because we keep electing the same so-called leaders, and we keep expecting different results. It’s time to challenge the establishment of these so-called leaders, and we hope that Filipinos will listen to our message.”

Details on Transformational vs. traditional politics at the Purple Thumb