Atty. Angeles’ road to public service, ends with just 49 votes short

By Moses Billacura

Minutes before the results were released, Attorney Katrina Angeles came out from the RV that served as their HQ Office to hug her husband and fellow lawyer Joseph Angeles.

Win or lose, there was that congratulatory hug that turned out to be a comforting one for Joseph, who a few minutes later learned that he lost in the UCP Nomination Contest for the Edmonton-West Henday riding, March 2.

Angeles, arguably the best public service candidate in recent memory from the growing Filipino community in Edmonton, just lost by 49 votes, 305 to 354. He was out with other volunteers, braving the minus double-digit temperatures, thanking them one by one for all their efforts.

“Hindi tayo pinalad sir,” said Joseph as he shook hands with supporters to thank them.

Angeles lost to Slava Cravcenco, who will officially represent UCP in the Alberta provincial general elections for the MLA post on May 29 against NDP’s Brooks Arcand-Paul and Green’s Kristina Howard.

“Taos puso po akong nagpapasalamat sa lahat ng lumabas at bumoto. It was a really close fight,” said Katrina Angeles. “Salamat po sa mga volunteers, salamat po sa mga nagbigay ng pagkain, salamat po sa bumisita. Special mention to Dorothy and Kit Cornel sa paglabas ng RV nyo as our HQ”.

Statistics Canada reported in 2016 that other than English and French, Tagalog (Pilipino or Filipino) is the most common mother tongue in Alberta province. About 172,600 people in Alberta can speak the dialect in recent data.