For Filipino Boxer, Money Opens Door to Politics
MANNY PACQUIAO’S black Hummer was nowhere in sight. The parade that he was supposed to lead had already wound down in front of the town hall here. His seat, the seat of honor, stood vacant on a stage on which singers, three beauty queens and the province’s ruling political class sat waiting.Mr. Pacquiao, possibly the best boxer in the world and a new congressman in the Philippines, had awakened at home a little earlier, still jet-lagged from a trip to the United States, where he had been promoting his next fight. He was the main financial sponsor of the annual “foundation day” festival here in Alabel, the capital of Sarangani, the southern province that was carved out of another in 1992 and that he now represents in the House of Representatives.
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