Month: August 2020

governance

Illegal and extra-constitutional #RevGov

August 22, 2020 by
I

Just some quick notes here.

1. The people advocating a revolutionary government are in effect calling for a self-coup, or an “autogolpe” in Spanish, where a legitimately elected leader illegally dissolves the other branches of government and assumes extraordinary powers for himself.

2. A power grab is a power grab, regardless of who the beneficiary is. Remember that a President is not the same as the government. Government is a balancing of the powers of the three branches of government—the executive, the legislative, and the judiciary. The different branches are supposed to act as checks and balances for each other.

If, and that is a big IF, a President accedes to the proposal and declares a revolutionary government and dissolves the legislature and controls the judiciary, that is still clearly a power grab.

“A RevGov could also happen if the insiders—the people in actual and constitutional control of the government actively assisted by the military (or the military officials themselves)—set aside the constitution, sweep out the incumbent officials, install new ones, and run the government according to their will and ways,” warned former SC Justice Artemio Panganiban in 2017, when President Duterte was still openly flirting with the possibility of declaring a revgov.

Since then, Duterte seems to have dropped the idea.

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civil society

We need many Ninoys

August 21, 2020 by
W

ninoy wasn’t perfect but he was one bright star.

and he was for real, nothing like the three “brightest stars” kuno … “shining” in the sky … that duterte claims himself, go, and cayetano to be.  hello.  not one of them, not all of them together — kahit isali pa natin si inday sara at ang buong konggreso — can hold a candle to ninoy.

were he still alive, ninoy would be 87, retired na siguro but still nakiki-alam malamang, still holding forth with his ten-centavos worth on every issue under sun and moon, leveling up popular discourse at the very least.  what i’d give for some informed intelligent talk about nation, with wisdom that comes from age and experience, with credibility that comes from integrity and love of country.

one thing his political opponents couldn’t fault ninoy for, ever, was corruption.  and so they hit him hard with the communist card, tagged him a godless enemy of the state, without evidence other than that he was friendly with certain anti-america anti-bases huks and communists, but then so was marcos, friendly with certain other anti-america anti-bases communists but secretly, of course, in the run-up to martial law.  [read joseph paul scalice’s Crisis of Revolutionary Leadership: Martial Law and the Communist Parties of the Philippines, 1959–1974 (2017)]

which is not to say that ninoy couldn’t have played his cards better.  i can understand. for instance, that he thought it a great idea to facilitate, hasten, a meeting (which would have happened anyway without his help, it is said) between the communist ideologue joma sison and the rogue huk bernabe buscayno, but did it have to happen in / around hacienda luisita?  of course nakarating ang intel kay marcos, and of course marcos exploited it to the hilt.  ninoy laid himself wide open for that.

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governance, public health

The perfect heist #stenchofcorruption

August 12, 2020 by
T

The grandest heist in our history is happening under our very eyes.

It is the perfect con: It is big, it is simple, it is scaleable, it is recurring, it is unaccountable, it can go unnoticed for years. It is taking candy from a baby.

Every Government has a milking cow. In the Marcos era it was the coconut levy and sugar industry funds, in others it was the privatization of Government controlled corporations, the NFA rice cartel. But all these pale by comparison with the latest scam in terms of size, audacity and disgrace. The new idea is to take food directly from the mouths of the poor.

I am referring to the raid on our health and social institutions. 

The 2020 budget for health and social services is P800 billion. This includes P173 billion for Universal Health Care, P109 billion for Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program (4Ps) and P37  billion for unconditional cash transfers. It totals some P5 trillion over 6 years of an Administration. It is a milking cow on steroids.

And the cow is getting fatter.

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public health

The last line of defense is crumbling: A desperate plea from your Filipino Medical Frontliners

August 7, 2020 by
T

by Dr. Edmund Villaroman

Our passion to help is the only thing that gets us to wake up early each and every day and leave behind our families. Some struggle to get to work with the limited transportation, or others even pedal their bicycles for miles just to get to the hospital. We don our PPEs, endure the discomfort for hours, oftentimes missing meals, and with limited restroom breaks, just to give the best care to our COVID-19 patients. This same passion drives us to continue serving despite being overwhelmed by the sheer number of COVID-19 cases.

A lot of us have been infected in the line of duty and some have fallen severely ill and sacrificed their lives in the name of professional service and dedication to our patients. We comfort our patients because their families are not allowed inside the COVID-19 wards. We are the closest to being family at their bedside. Patients die in front of us everyday and we shed tears for each one of them.

Most of us go home fearing we are infected ourselves, and worse that our own family might contract the virus from us. Many sacrifice not seeing their families for a long time and opt to stay in the discomfort of temporary shelters to prevent community transmission.

We lack the proper PPEs to protect ourselves. We lack the proper medicines to treat our patients. We lack proper testing and tracing of our COVID-19 patients and their relatives. We lack the proper critical care beds to admit our distressed patients. We lack the mechanical ventilators for our patients who can barely breathe.

What we lack most is a leader who knows how to navigate nation in these desperate times. We need someone who understands and accepts the gravity of the pandemic and lays down a road map from a healthcare and economic perspective. People are suffering and dying everyday. Waiting for a vaccine isn’t a plan but a hope and a prayer. We need a concrete, comprehensive and compassionate plan to include the different stakeholders of our society.

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disquiet, governance

The Anti-Government SONA

August 4, 2020 by
T

In the absence of a feasible and laudable plan to re-open schools, I am imagining how homework for many students would be when they are asked: What did you take from the President’s State of the Nation Address?

This exercise is often perceived as perfunctory in civics classes but has the deeper purpose of completing the feedback loop, making sure that the population, especially the young, is aware of the State’s plans, at the very least. Knowingly or not, teachers assigning homework related to the SONA actively take part in the State’s project of “nation-building.”

The role of the annual SONA is no different from sales rallies where company executives show up for their salespersons on the ground to deliver a rousing speech, just to be sure everyone is on the same page. In not so many words, Erap’s best sales pitch was when he exited through Commonwealth Avenue after his speech and met with protesters in the pouring rain; GMA’s was her bringing of three kids onstage and the myth of the bangkang papel. These proved to be effective talking points for their respective administrations’ annual push forward.

This year’s SONA was special. Stripped of the usual trappings and the faux Hollywood vibe, we see the SONA now for what it is. We expected a masterplan for the coming months, formulated for both Legislative and Executive branches, to address the fatal and colossal pandemic. But we got no categorical answers from Duterte. With the twice-a-week feed of “Late Night with Rodrigo Duterte” and the illusion of micro-management it brings, it would have been great to hear a New Year’s resolution of sorts, upon which we could anchor the next three to six months. So while this show of incompetence is not new, it was still disappointing.

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