DAGUPAN City Mayor Benjamin S. Lim is deadset about fighting House Speaker Jose de Venecia in the next congressional elections, a confrontation that may well be described as a battle royale.

Lim, as earlier gleaned from his actuations, was expected by observers to severe his ties with the fourth district congressman which he did lately apparently due to differences in the implementation of projects in the city.

He did not only cut such uneasy relationship with the solon but went further by announcing his readiness to fight the House leader in 2007.

Observers saw some chain of events that somehow led to the mayor’s decision. One indicator was Lim’s complaint about the ongoing construction of the new Dawel-Lucao road which tends to favor a rival in the mall business. Sources close to him said he sensed that De Venecia might have had a hand in the change of plans as to where the road would link to the national highway somewhere in Lucao.

The mayor also learned thru a recent visit by President Macapagal-Arroyo that De Venecia was to be blamed for the aborted multi-million-peso bangus processing plant, the mayor’s pet project.

Reports also said that the slow implementation of the city’s housing project that aims to accommodate squatters to be affected by the bangus processing project is being blamed on him.

The mayor since the start of his political career was not really on good terms with the Speaker. He had to contend with a relative of De Venecia in his first congressional fight, it will be recalled, a bruising battle he won because Dagupan rallied behind him while he got small pickings in the other towns in the district.

Their relations quite improved when Lim was prevailed upon to seek the mayorship in 2001 instead of seeking his second term that will have put him in an early clash with De Venecia.

Supporters of both sides were unhappy with the development however. Former President Fidel V. Ramos was set to reconcile the two, according to his media handler Ed Malay in a radio interview. Malay revealed that he himself tried to dissuade Lim from slugging it out with the Speaker and advised him to instead seek his third term or run for governor as Gov. Victor E. Agbayani is already in his last term. (DOS)