Iron fist...

TATLO LANG ang maaari ‘nyong puntahan: Mamatay kayo, sumurender kayo, o maaresto kayo. (You can only do three things: Die, surrender, or get arrested).

More serious vow than empty threat did Police Regional Office 3 (PRO3) director Chief Supt. Aaron Aquino issued before some 10,000 surrendering drug pushers and users gathered at the Bren Z. Guiao Sports Complex last week.

Tandaan 'nyo, ang kapulisan ay hindi nakikipag-bolahan sa inyo. (Remember, the police are not joking around with you), Aquino stressed.

As though his words were not enough to convince the assembly of dopeheads, as we called them – okay, ourselves – in our own long bygone psychedelic times, he rattled off the latest statistics in the anti-drug campaign in Central Luzon: 10,194  drug pushers/users surrendered in Pampanga, bringing to nearly 30,000 the regional total; 1,000 drug suspects arrested; and, with the most emphasis, 65 killed for resisting arrest – all in the three full weeks of July, 2016.

Gusto 'nyo bang mamatay na rin kayo (Do you also want to die)? So Aquino asked.

Hindi (No)! So thundered the assembled drug suspects, but of course.

So what must they do to stay alive, or to avoid what PNP chief Director General Ronald “Bato” dela Rosa euphemized as “changing your birthdate to November 2”?

Stop selling and/or using illegal drugs. Don’t even think of fighting arresting cops. 

And should they backslide to their old, bangag ways? Docketed in the police files are their real names, even aliases; their addresses, and other information, which would make it far easier to track them down.

And yes, Aquino said, it is not only the police that would do the hunting for recidivists, but the Armed Forces of the Philippines too: Kaya hindi lang bala ng 9mm ang tatama sa inyo, pati bala ng M-16 at M-14 ay tatama sa inyo (Not only bullets of 9mm but also those of M-16s and M-14s will hit you.)” 

As severe, if not more so, is the fate awaiting policemen involved in drugs: Itatapon namin itong mga pasaway na mga pulis sa Basilan at sila ang ilalaban namin sa mga Abu Sayyaf doon. Tuwang-tuwa nga si Presidente Duterte nang malaman na itatapon ang mga pulis na ito sa Basilan. (We will throw these rogue policemen to Basilan to fight the Abu Sayyaf there. President Duterte was very happy when he learned that these policemen would be sent to Basilan).

Of the 100 cops assigned in Central Luzon earlier announced by Aquino as allegedly involved in illegal drugs as users and/or pushers, or even protectors, 83 have been deployed in Mindanao, the rest having gone AWOL. This, according to Aquino himself during an informal meeting at Camp Olivas just this Wednesday past.

And, he said, there’s a next batch – “even higher in number than the first one” – of cops involved in drugs to exile to the South, “most preferably to ‘BaSuTa’ (Basilan, Sulu, Tawi-Tawi).”

Hard as Bato. The way of this Aquino.

...Heart of the matter

TO AQUINO’s fist of fury, Gov. Lilia G. Pineda’s heart of the mother.

At the surrender and pledging rites of the over 10,000 drug suspects, she pleaded

Pinakiusap ko po kay PD, kay RD, sa mga chief of police na huwag na ninyo silang katukin, baka sabihin lumaban. Ipakuha 'nyo na lang sa kapitan para ilabas sila. Pinakiusap ko na po 'yon, na huwag nang kakatukin tapos lulusubin ang bahay. Lumabas na lang po kayo, sagot po kayo ni Gov (I requested the police provincial director, the police regional director, the chiefs of police not to knock on your doors, it might be said they resisted. Let the village chiefs get them. I requested for that, that they don't knock on your doors and barge into your homes. Just come out, you will be in Gov’s care).”

Pineda there well aware of police Operation Tokhang (knocking on the houses of drug suspects to convince them to surrender) turning into knock-knock-bang-bang – the drug suspects ending up dead, reportedly while fighting it out with the cops or grabbing their firearms.

No, it does not end with the surrender of the drug suspects: "I don't want them to just surrender. We will assist them and their families through the provision of educational and livelihood assistance."

This, even as she lamented where she could have gone wrong -- Saan ako nagkamali? – shocked at the large number of surrenderees.

Pineda has called on all LGUs and government line agencies in the province, the religious sector and the academe and all other stakeholders to enlist their support in a holistic approach towards the reformation and rehabilitation of the surrendered drug victims.

This, as she acknowledged that the P10-million allocation for Dalan ning Pamagbayu (Road to Change) approved by the Provincial Peace and Order Council “is not enough” to address the needs of the “reformists.”

LGUs can allot the necessary budget for rehabilitation and closely monitor their activities.

Line agencies, like TESDA, can provide services to develop the skills and capabilities of the surrenderees towards economic productivity.

"What is critical is to engage them in activities to make sure that they will totally quit their addiction and have a better life. I am planning to conduct a tree planting activity in Mt. Arayat as part of their physical fitness cum livelihood program," the governor said.

“And, of utmost important, the support system from their families as they turn over a new leaf in their life towards a brighter, drug-free future.” The Gov, all a matter of the heart there, as ever.

Feeling Rody's SONA

ABSENT THE brilliance of Marcos and his rhetorical prowess too, the speechwriter of Cory, the smarts of Ramos, the charm of Erap and the statistical savvy of Gloria, Rody Duterte still managed to deliver his first SONA with enough aplomb to impact his message to the Filipino people.

It was enough for Duterte to be simply Duterte to deliver. And how. On the emotional plane, to me, personally.  

He got this non-believer at: We cannot move forward if we allow the past to pull us back.  Finger-pointing is not the way. That is why I will not waste precious time dwelling on the sins of the past or blaming those who are perceived to be responsible for the mess that we are in and suffering from.

Except maybe extract a lesson or two from its errors we will not tarry because it is the present that we are concerned with and the future that we should be prepared for.

And as if he were reading my mind: Lest I be misunderstood, let me say clearly, that those who betrayed the people’s trust shall not go unpunished and they will have their day in Court.

Instantly flashed there that meme of the recently released GMA telling former President BS Aquino III “O, Noy ikaw naman”    

No, I did not cry – as Communications Secretary Martin Andanar said he did just reading the draft of the SONA – but I shared some epiphanic high with:  Thus to our religious bishops, leaders, priests, pastors, preachers, imams let me assure you that while I am a stickler for the principle of separation between church and state, I believe quite strongly that there should never be a separation between God and State…

And high still: Human rights must work to uplift human dignity. But human rights cannot be used as a shield or an excuse to destroy the country — your country and my country.

Patriotism stirred, right there. Even deeper: All of us want peace, not the peace of the dead, but the peace of the living. We express our willingness and readiness to go to the negotiating table, and yet we load our guns, fix our sights, pull the trigger. It is both ironic and tragic— and it is endless.  While we extol the bravery and heroism of our soldiers — kayo, the rebels -- do the same for your members and fighters.  What I see instead are the widows and the orphans. And I feel their pain and grief.  And no amount of cash assistance or the number of medals can compensate the loss of a human life. Sorrow cuts across every stratum of society. It cuts deeply and the pain lasts forever.

A different pain though, as searing and less empathetic, inflicted anew: …(H)uwag kayong umasa diyan sa mga pari pati Human Rights, hindi nakakapigil yan ng kamatayan. So huwag ninyong gawin. Eh tapos nandiyan ka nakabulagta and you are portrayed in a broadsheet na parang Mother Mary cradling the dead cadaver of Jesus Christ.  Eh yan yang mga yan magda-dramahan tayo dito.

Dead cadaver. But for the intensity of the pathos that picture exuded, the editor in me could have laughed at, even ridiculed, Duterte’s redundancy of double dead there. 

So he philosophized, in some attempt to convince: He who is the cause of the cause is the cause of them all.  Ikaw yung nag umpisa, you swallow —

No, I cannot swallow such causality to (ir)rationalize murder.

Ulitin ko ha: He who is the cause of the cause is the cause of them all. No matter how often, how strongly, iterated.

On the other hand, and closer to heart, some other lingering pain finding relief: The PCO, in coordination with the Office of the Executive Secretary, is drafting the Administrative Order on the Task Force on media killings.

This government does not condone violence and repression of media. The bona fide media... Bona fide media...Sometimes they pronounce it "bonafid". But whatever that thing is, the bona fide media has always been our partner for change. Medyo klaro yan. Anong gawin mo sa hindi bona fide media? Iyan ang problema.

And release: There is an Executive Order, it's out. As an example on the part of the Executive Branch to make transparency and integrity as yardsticks in government performance, savings and expenses while engaging the public to be vigilant in participating in government programs and projects.

Ending on the highest note, whence springs renewed hope: We are imbued with resiliency that has been tested and proven. More difficult times as in the past. We have a bond to act together. We have to help each other. For then and only then can we truly prevail. And the Filipino, disciplined, informed, involved, shall rise from the rubbles of sorrow and pain. So that all the mirrors in the world will reflect the face of a passion that has changed this land.

Aye, no SONA – and I have had a surfeit of these from the Marcosian to the Cory-ente, from the Fidelisms to the Eraptions, from the Glorenomics to the Noynoyan – ever roused the full scale of sentiments in me than Duterte’s first.  

So high and so deep that the issues of the West Philippine Sea, lower taxes, unilateral ceasefire with the CPP-NPA-NDF, the Lumad land, Gina Lopez’s crusade against mining, and all others promising a greater life to the Filipino, aye, even our pet advocacy of the Clark airport as domestic hub, became no more than afterthoughts.     

Yeah, beyond merely thinking while listening to Duterte’s SONA, I so felt it. As much better, as for the worse. Wow. 

San Antonio de Mimosa

IT COMES with age, advancing age. The current of events flowing to confluence with the ebbing tides of memories. Not exactly that sense of déjà vu but instances where the present finds instant link with the past.

Like last week’s news of “dispossessed” Mimosa golfers taking to task the Filinvest Group which took over Clark’s premium leisure estate. A flash in the diminishing memory bank prompted a quick search through clippings yellowed by time, and voila, this Zona Libre piece in The Voice, Oct. 24-30, 1999. Not so much for context  in the light of what-is, as for a simple what-was story. Any conclusion from there, strictly the reader’s.   

San Antonio de Mimosa

MORE THAN simple awakening, last week’s Focus on Señor Don Jose Antonio Gonzalez sounded a lot like an epiphany, some revelatory manifestation akin to Saul’s at Gate of Damascus. Minus the blinding light and the booming voice though.

“Of what use is earning P100 billion when you die – and all of us are going to die – if you were not able to help people,” the Señor Don was quoted as saying, in paraphrase of the biblical admonition to the rich and powerful: “What does it profit a man if he gained the whole world but loses his soul?”

I wanted to cry as I read the story. Like I do whenever I attend priestly ordinations. Seeing the spiritual transformation, one man’s transcendence from mortal pursuits to divine missions.

But I could not. I could not for the life of me sense, even if only minutely perceive, a San Antonio de Mimosa rising out of the cocoon of Señor Don Jose Antonio Gonzalez. Blame my hardened biases for this. The coño mindset blurs any and all other images of the Señor Don.

Dispensa, Señor Don. But much as I would like to believe the very convincing parable this paper’s editor wrote of you, I just cannot take it as gospel truth. Again, blame my biases.

My ossified intellectual and emotional fixity on Señor Don Jose Antonio Gonzalez is that of the conquistador not altogether dissimilar to Pizarro or Cortez, they who doomed the Incas and the Aztecs to extinction.

Wasn’t the old Mount Pinatubo Golf Club which restored and rebuilt the Clark golf course from tons of volcanic ashes in 1992 doomed by the Señor Don’s takeover of the course?

Not the conscience-driven corporate man but the astute businessman in the mold of Gordon Gecko of the film Wall Street do I see in the Señor Don.

Gecko’s corporate motto “Greed is Good” is all that comes to mind when I read about the Señor Don’s reported run-in with banks to the tune of P4.6 billion, of CDC demands for back rentals amounting to some half billion pesos, of unpaid BIR taxes and Pagcor obligations amounting to way over a hundred million more. Simply mind-boggling.

Dispensa, Señor Don. Yo no comprendo. I do not understand. You had that mighty sum from the banks. Mimosa – the casino and its voluptuous Russian cancan girls, most especially – was one giant money-making venture. You did not pay CDC, BIR and Pagcor. But you’re claiming near bankruptcy.

Donde esta dinero, Señor Don?

En la Palma de Mallorca? Or is it Ibiza? Or in one unobtrusive ciudad de Madre España? As some wags have long been circulating in the Manila coffeeshops.

“I was overwhelmed by the spiritual wakening,” the Señor Don said. That brought to mind one of the Psalms: “If today you hear His voice, harden not your hearts.”

So the Señor Don heard the voice.

Now, will he start fulfilling the obligations stipulated in his agreement with the CDC sometime in June? To pay the CDC P325 million for back rentals; return 22 to 25 hectares of leased property to the government; pay the BIR P22 millionand Pagcor 83 million.

As he appeared to have rendered to God what is God’s, shall he now render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s?

So my editor sees a spiritually transformed Señor Don Jose Antonio Gonzalez. One who is not even a shadow of the long-ago Castilian stonewalling every attempt of the CDC to make him pay back rentals. One who is not remotely connected to the Castila who sneered at the former Indio boss at CDC – the current one is of Parian-Insulare gentry – snootily telling him: “Don’t serve me those demand papers if you don’t want to see them thrown into the garbage can.”

So the Señor Don has been transformed, epiphanized, if we go by our editor’s account.

So should we now also change our perception of the Señor Don? Should we now also hear the voice and soften our hearts?

Epiphany leads to conversion. Thus, Saul becoming Paul. The process though is not instant. It involves remorse, repentance, restitution, recompense, retribution.

Dispensa, Señor Don.

But it is still a long, long way before I can see you under the same lights you are now seen in that well-crafted Focus article last week.

Besides, when it comes to missions of apostleship, I am a little wary with the  Señor Don. Or have you forgotten all about his Malou apostolate?

Maybe, I should undergo an epiphany of my own.

(For the record: It is to the credit of JAG, as the Don is fondly called, that the Mimosa course became one of the most desired golf courses in the country, even hosting then No. 1 Tiger Woods in an exhibition play, and the value of membership shares shot through the roof. Mimosa’s Viva Las Vegas was also, at JAG’s time, the premium entertainment venue north of Metro Manila.       

It was during the CDC presidency of Rufo Colayco, sometime in 1999, that JAG lost control of the Mimosa Leisure Estate, which then came under CDC administration – and its reported dilapidation -- until its award to the Filinvest Group this year.)

Name game replay

KERK, CORK, creek airport what?

Asked the erudite Ding Cervantes in his story on the Clark airport’s international code of CRK. A matter of phonetics there. 

Over the weekend, Pampanga’s re-minted 3^rd District Rep. Aurelio “Dong” Gonzales said he would file a bill in the House seeking to change the name of Clark International Airport to Diosdado Macapagal International Airport.

To give due recognition to the first Kapampangan ever to become President of the Philippines. A matter of honor there.

Ay, ay ay, here we go again. In this seemingly never ending name with what we have always referred to in this paper as plainly CIA – Clark International Airport.

Yeah, the periodic comings and goings of these moves to rechristen the CIA makes us seemed trapped in a time warp. Here’s what appeared here on March 3, 2014 headlined Clark ain’t it.

CLARK INTERNATIONAL Airport. The name made its debut in Executive Order No. 192 issued by President Fidel Ramos on July 27, 1994 creating the Clark International Airport Corp.

In 2001, during the incumbency of Dr. Emmanuel Y. Angeles, the Clark Development Corp. Board passed Resolution No. 07-08 stating thus:

“RESOLVED THAT, Management’s recommendation to rename Clark International Airport to Diosdado Macapagal International Airport in honor of the late President Diosdado Macapagal, be APPROVED, as it is hereby APPROVED, subject to required legislation.”

However, Angeles’ board and all succeeding boards through his successors at the CDC – Tony Ng, Levy Laus, and Benny Ricafort – all failed to effect the required legislation for the DMIA.

But the airport carried the name DMIA just the same.

On October 14, 2011, the CIAC Board approved Resolution No. SM-10-05, Series of 2011 that:

“RESOLVED THAT, the restoration of the name ‘Clark International Airport (CIA)’ to refer to the Clark Aviation Complex within the Clark Freeport Zone to enhance its international acceptance and to preserve its historical significance, be APPROVED, as it is hereby APPROVED.

“RESOLVED FURTHER THAT, Terminal 1 will be named as DIOSDADO MACAPAGAL TERMINAL (DMT) in recognition of the legacy of former President Diosdado P. Macapagal as the first Kapampangan to become the (sic) President of the Republic of the Philippines.”

Rationalized CIAC President-CEO Victor Jose Luciano then: “We will project Clark as Clark, including its history.”

Yeah, whatever he meant, given that Clark – previously known as Fort Stotsenberg – was named after Major Harold Clark of the US Army Signal Corps who died in a seaplane crash in Panama Canal in 1919. Come to think of it now: Naming Clark after the aviation pioneer showed some American prescience of what the future holds for the place.  

“We made a survey among pilots and other players in the aviation industry. The Clark International Airport or Diosdado Macapagal International Airport went by three letters and these are CRK,” Luciano said then, referring to the code of the International Air Transport Association for Clark.

The inspired and spirited defense for the DMIA by the eloquent Alexander Cauguiran, once CIAC EVP, failed to turn the tide against the CIA. (See “Name game” March 6, 2012 at a.caesar.blogspot.com)

So it was – still is – CIA. Until Pampanga 1st District Rep. Joseller “Yeng” Guiao raised the yellow banner and cried Cory Aquino International Airport for Clark.

Identity crisis

Now, what can we make out of this name game? 

Still in search of a permanent name after some twenty years, the airport in Clark already makes a pathological case of identity crisis.

The psychologist who coined IC – in humans, Erik Erikson called that stage of psychosocial development where IC may breed as “Identity Cohesion versus Role Confusion.”

A condition verily as endemic in the corporate body of the airport in Clark.

So, what really is the role of the Clark airport in the life of the nation?

Pawned to the Almighty Dollar in its American past, the Clark airport served as forward base to imperialist designs, to American hegemony – to quote the militant activists of the period. A role it served to the fullest in the Vietnam War.

Another role designed for Clark to suit the American purpose was being an alternative landing site for the space shuttle program, the very reason for the construction of its second runway.

With the Americans gone and after the ashes of Mount Pinatubo were cleared, Clark assumed the role of “economic engine” for the development of the devastated areas in Central Luzon and catalyst for that of Northern Luzon.  

As stated above, in 1994, President Ramos defined Clark in his Executive Order 174 as “future site of a Philippine premier international airport.”

Twenty years hence, that future has never come any nearer.

At times Clark serves as alternative airport whenever the Ninoy Aquino International Airport is buffeted by strong winds and heavy rains or when its instrument panels, radar or landing lights get to their regular dysfunctional modes.

Also as the go-to airport for Taiwan and Hong Kong aircraft when those cities are lashed by super storms.

The coming of the low-cost carriers – AirAsia Phil. and Zest Air, merged and now gone; Tiger and Cebu Pacific, now joined and still around – assumed another role for Clark – that of being an LCC hub. Notwithstanding the early basing of legacy carrier Aseana, and the subsequent coming of Emirates and Qatar. Indeed, premium in the agenda of the CIAC is the completion of the low-cost terminal.   

With constricted traffic – both air and ground – at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport, the Clark airport primed itself anew as premier international gateway for the country.

But the Metro Manila-nesting imperial dragons would have none of that, preferring to pop up one proposed site – Bulacan for Ramon Ang, after another – reclaim land around Sangley Point announced by Cavite’s Abaya brothers of DOTC’s Joseph Emilio land Philippine Reclamation Authority’s Peter Anthony, as replacement for NAIA.

A Consuelo de bobo role for Clark is to serve as “twin” to NAIA. Naturally the lesser of the twins left with the latak or leftover, with firstborn Manila by right getting the premium flights for the choicest destinations.

No matter though, NAIA-Clark twinning has become the buzzword for Pampanga’s business elite and political leaders. To their learned judgment, the best possible scenario to push for the Clark airport.

Cory Airport

Even but a cursory consideration will find this as the tipping point of Congressman  Guiao’s proposal of a Cory Aquino International Airport for Clark.

With the Manila airport named after his martyred father and the Clark airport for his sainted mother, what stronger impetus can move the son, BS Aquino III, to engage himself in their twinned development.

Cry bootlicker, as the Pinoy Gumising Ka Movement did.

Still, Guiao can find ready justification for his act in the exigency, if not the expediency, of the moment. Thoroughly Machiavellian, though it may be. 

An unsettling thought from the inspired genius of Dik Pascual, Philippine Star columnist and supremo of Capampangan in Media Inc., to cap this piece: No twinning of Ninoy in Manila and Cory in Clark but conjugating…er, coupling. And with their son BS presiding, it’s political dynasty taken to the air there.

Whoa!   

Our article of faith

A FREE press should:

Always fight for progress and reform,

Never tolerate injustice and corruption,

Always fight demagogues of all parties,

Never belong to any party,

Always oppose privileged classes and public plunderers,

Never lack sympathy with the poor,

Always remain devoted to the public welfare. 

Nine years ago, Punto! Central Luzon was established, grounded on Joseph Pulitzer’s so-called Seven Commandments on the function of the press in a democracy. That, which we have taken to heart and lived up to – to the best of our efforts. 

As indeed, Pulitzer anew: "An able, disinterested, public-spirited press, with trained intelligence to know the right and courage to do it, can preserve that public virtue without which popular government is a sham and a mockery.”

Pananaw ng Malayang Pilipino. Our motto transcends sheer sloganeering, becoming our very article of faith, articulated in the core values we pursue in the practice of our calling – embodied in our own Eleven Commandments:

I.                    No business to promote.

II.                 No vested interests to protect.

III.               No politics to serve.

IV.              No personality to praise.

V.                 No agenda – hidden or otherwise – to advance.

VI.              No favor.

VII.            No fear.

VIII.         All truth.

IX.               All accuracy.

X.                 All fairness.

XI.               All free.

Tempered as we are though by the words of the great American editor William Allen White in his The Emporia Daily Gazette  dated April 25, 1923 yet: “A newspaper has one obligation and one only, to print the truth as far as it is humanly possible, and to comment upon the truth as candidly and as kindly as humanly possible never forgetting to be merry the while. For after all the liar and the cheat and the panderer are smaller offenders than the solemn ass.”

Nothing straighter to the point than that.

Nothing straighter to the point than Punto! in that.  

From Day One. To Year Nine now. For ever.      

  

Wapelo

BY THE time this issue is out – July 13 – the United Nations’ Arbitral Tribunal would have rendered a ruling, expectedly favorable, on the case filed by the Philippine government against China’s encroachment into the West Philippine Sea.

We find some significance, if not renewed interest, in this piece that appeared here on April 16, 2012.

Chinese hegemony

“IN A state so insignificant our commerce would be a prey to the wanton intermeddlings of all nations at war with each other; who, having nothing to fear from us, would with little scruple or remorse, supply their wants by depredations on our property as often as it fell in their way. The rights of neutrality will only be respected when they are defended by an adequate power. A nation, despicable by its weakness, forfeits even the privilege of being neutral.”

So wrote in 1787 Alexander Hamilton, pen-named Publius, of the then fledgling United States in The Federalist No. 11, titled The Utility of the Union in Respect to Commercial Relations and a Navy.

We are now that nation, most despicable at our weakest, forfeiting not just neutrality but our very own territory. Sabah is but a generation removed from today, still relatively too recent to be forgotten.

And last week, it was the Scarborough Shoal.

The Chinese intrusion into the sandbank is but the latest of that country’s infringement upon our territory, the area well within the Philippines’ 200-nautical-mile exclusive economic zone, as recognized by international law.

To China, the shoal is but a part of its irredentist claim to all of the South China Sea, including waters abutting the coasts of Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei and the Philippines, not to mention Taiwan, which it has always regarded as its province.

To many, China’s Scarborough affair has found an analogy in the stranger who barges into a home, rapes the wife, and then proclaims ownership over the whole household. With the man of the house kept outside, a weakling reduced to whining.

Come to think of it, this is the second time that we, as “a nation despicable by its weakness,” have forfeited territory to the China bully.

In February 1995, it was discovered that China had already occupied the Mischief Reef in the disputed Spratly Islands and set up structures which the Chinese said were meant to shelter their fishermen working the waters in the area.

Mischief Reef, claimed by the Philippines as Panganiban Reef, is 150 miles west of Palawan – well within the Philippines’ 200 mile exclusive economic zone too, while it lies a very distant 620 miles southeast of China.

Still, China had its way. No matter the protestations of the Philippines and Vietnam, no matter the alarms in the ASEAN over China’s territorial aggressions, diplomatically termed “assertions.”

A powder keg in the South China Sea, so were the disputed Spratly’s considered in many “strategic studies” since. The Scarborough Shoal now providing an added fuse.

Defused last Friday, April 13, was the tension at the Scarborough Shoal.

After days of stand-off seven Chinese vessels including their marine survey vessel, the Zhungguo Haijan 75, left the area by noon, and around 7 p.m., five more vessels pulled out leaving only one in the shoal. So reported Lt. Gen. Anthony Alcantara, Northern Luzon Command chief.

"Wala nang tension [There's no more tension]." So was Alcantara quoted as saying, underscoring that the Chinese pull-out was "apparently the result of the negotiation by our foreign affairs department with that of the Chinese counterparts."

So all’s well that ends well?

Not quite, from this corner.

The quote from that little red book I have consigned to memory – of the Great Helmsman’s counsel to the youth: “China is yours as well as ours, but in the long run it will be yours” – gravely bothers me.

Paraphrased thus: “The Philippines are yours as well as ours, but in the short run, they will be ours.”

Chinese hegemony here. Or haven’t you yet noticed who rules and reigns in this country, from its economics to its politics? Sy, Tan, Go, Kong, Wei. Co-Wang-Co.

Wapelo.

Traffic transfer

BRIMMING OPTIMISM. That was the general reaction of local executives, notably the mayor of Angeles City to the prospect of the Clark International Airport as hub of domestic flights, which President Duterte himself broached.

“I personally told the President that [the transfer of domestic flights underscored] and the regional Asian flights to Clark to immediately ease traffic in the short term,” declared Mayor Edgardo Pamintuan.

And lest he be slammed for self-puffery, the mayor was quick to bring in witnesses to the fact: “Alex Cauguiran reiterated that also to the President when we met him together with Dennis Uy, Simon Paz and Dan Concepcion three weeks ago in the Malacanang of the South in Davao City.”

Pamintuan himself reiterating Cauguiran’s dual airport mantra: “Motorists coming from the North will no longer add up to the volume of vehicular traffic along EDSA. We will have an airport in the north which is Clark and NAIA in the South which will serve passengers south of Metro Manila.”

EDSA, aye, there’s the rub. Which makes this bullishness – in its basic meaning of “confident optimism” – over the projected transfer of domestic flights to Clark no more than gung-ho – in its full meaning of “unthinking enthusiasm.” When tempered with the reality on the ground. Think, boy, think.     

As it is now, Angeles City is already gridlocked in several EDSA pockets, and not only during rush hours: the whole stretch of Pandan Road from MacArthur Highway to the rotunda leading to Marquee Mall and the North Luzon Expressway, all the way to EPZA on the astern fringes of the city; the Balibago stretch of MacArthur Highway up to, aye, even beyond Dau in Mabalacat City; the junction of the Circumferential Road and Angeles-Porac Road, with the heavy volume of dump trucks and school service vehicles.

Even worse are the traffic jams at all ingress-egress points to the Clark Freeport at the Main Gate, to turn worst with Capilion complex and Honda Cars showroom taking over whatever room for road expansion possible; and at the Friendship Gate with its ever-expanding Koreatown.

So, nearing completion now is the Clark east lateral road that will connect the freeport’s Main Gate to the Mabalacat Gate. While traffic volume along MacArthur Highway, particularly in Dau, may be considerably eased with this road, it will only be transferred to its terminus – the Mabalacat Gate leading to a two-lane access to MacArthur Highway in the city’s poblacion area already gridlocked as is, and no space for any expansion. Except to demolish the houses and buildings hemming it.

Now, consider the volume of vehicular traffic domestic flights at Clark will impact upon the roads of Angeles City, and for that matter Mabalacat City.

That Clark makes not only the best twin to NAIA but even its better alternative is a no brainer.

That whatever premium Clark has over NAIA – in scope and scale, from its twin runways to its 2,500-hectare expanse – is being squandered with the continuing contraction of its access is no mere food for thought but cause for action by the government.

There is more than enthusiasm in this talk to transfer the domestic flights to Clark. There has to be change – not just to come but in real time.    

   

 

The Blind Bellman of Sto. Tomas

NO URBAN legend – somnolent Sto. Tomas is far too rustic to ever come anywhere near the fringes of cityhood – but rural lore is the town’s campanologist… okay, the ringer of the church bells for over 50 years.

So what’s so extraordinary about him? It just so happened that he – Miguel Guevarra Lingat – has been blind as a bat since birth.

“Ige” – as those close to him, our family included, fondly call him – is never batty though. No matter the daily rigors of climbing the steep, narrow, winding and enclosed staircase to the church belfry to ring the bells.

For as long as I can remember, there has never been a campanero in our parish church other than Ige. And no other than him too who can really make the bells distinctly sound the message intended, be it celebratory or funereal.

If fading memory still serves right, there is the palagad – slow one-two-one two cadence of the big bell to call the faithful to early morning Mass – which turns to siyam – nine continuous dongs from the big bell signaling the start of the Mass, and the dupical – continuous turning of the small bell at the end of the Mass. It is the dupical too that accompanies baptisms.

In those days of my youth in Sto. Tomas, we knew from the punebre  -- the slow tolling of the bells to announce death in the parish – the gender of the deceased: the big bell for a man, the small one for a woman.

Never been married, Ige made bell ringing his lifelong vocation. Even on Good Fridays when the church bells fall silent, Ige does his chore of calling the parishioners to join the night’s procession with the matraca – a clapper of wood and metal.

For his services to the church, Ige has received special citation and blessing from Archbishop Paciano Aniceto himself, and public recognition from the local government unit.

At the 2010 Most Outstanding Kapampangan Awards rites, it was the turn of the province to honor Ige with a special award of recognition. Instead of making a speech, Ige played the harmonica as his way of expressing his acceptance of the award. That geysered in me more memories of Ige from the childhood onto young adulthood I spent in Sto. Tomas.

From the third week of October, leading to All Saints’ Day, groups go from house to house at night singing the gosu – the life of a saint, usually Sta. Lucia – and ending with a prayer for the poor souls in Purgatory. It is some sort of Halloween trick-or-treating mixed with caroling.

Ige made himself a permanent solo fixture of the gosu with his harmonica, playing simply the melody.

Not so extraordinary feat there, you may say, what with the likes of Jose Feliciano with his guitar, Stevie Wonder and Ray Charles with their pianos lording the global music scene in their times.

So how about this yet another facet to Ige’s multi-tasked life? That of being Barrio Poblacion’s one-man aguador?

Before the waterworks system finally came to Poblacion less than ten years ago, households drew their potable water supply from those Magsaysay pumps, which later morphed to artesian wells.

With the tambayuc – a bamboo slat over his shoulder, from where hung two tucung – oil tin cans filled with water he himself pumped out of the wells, Ige made his way house after house filling the tapayan with the day’s supply of water.

So how did he know the way to each house, I once asked him.

“Bibilangan ku ing takbang ku. Pakirandaman ke ing pali ning aldo keng lupa ku ampon deng misasabing tau. (I count my steps. I feel the warmth of the sun on my face (whichever side is heated). And I listen to the sounds of conversations).” Indeed, he could distinguish people by their voices.

Some years back, he was passing by our house when upon hearing me talking to my mother he blurted: “Cesar, ati ka pala. Komusta na ka? (You’re home. How are you?).” 

Extraordinary too is Ige being once known in town as the “Incredible Digester.”

That title he got from his unbelievable capacity to gorge on a variety of food in one seating which earned him too some money from the side bets: clean-up he wins, left-over he loses.

In one “contest,” he finished one large bilao of bibingki (rice cake) downed with three “family size” Sprite. In another, it was three small bilaos  of pancit guisado (noodles) and a dozen pandesito, again with his favorite drink, Sprite, by the liters. Then there were too 20 pieces of balut at one time and eight large watermelons at another. Never did Ige lose in any of them.      

Sightless, it was awesome for Ige to have served for long as the ears and mouthpiece of the local folk when it came to the latest events in the community, tsismis not excluded. He put to flesh the umalohokan (town crier) of yore.

Ige got his information from the corner sari-sari stores – the socialization sites of rustic Sto. Tomas – as well as from the households he serviced with his water deliveries.

Pre-Pentium times, the fastest way to circulate any information around Barangay Poblacion at the time was to have it overheard by Ige. Especially if it came in the tone of a conspiratorial whisper.

For national news, Ige relied on the transistor radio tied to his waist. His favorite programs were Lundagin Mo Baby of Johnny de Leon, Ito ang Inyong Tiya Dely of Dely Magpayo and Kahapon Lamang of Eddie Ilarde.

Ige got the greatest joy of his life when one time he heard Ilarde mentioned his name and read a story about him published in a national newspaper through the then Department of Public Information. Ilarde ended his spiel with a dedication to Ige of Freddie Aguilar’s Bulag, Pipi at Bingi:

“... Madilim ang 'yong paligid, hating-gabing walang hanggan

 Anyo at kulay ng mundo sa 'yo'y pinagkaitan

 H'wag mabahala, kaibigan, isinilang ka mang ganyan

 Isang bulag sa kamunduhan, ligtas ka sa kasalanan…”

Blind bellman. Blind musician. Blind water carrier. Blind town reporter? And magnificent eater, on the side. Miguel Guevarra Lingat is the star of folklore, the stuff of legends.          

SO I first wrote here in December 2010, after the Capitol’s citation bestowed on  Pampanga’s unarguably ablest PWD, reprinted now as a tribute. On July 1, Ige crossed over to ring the golden bells by the very gates of heaven.

  

No cause to panic, but...

WITHIN A week after the self-congratulatory celebrations over the salvation of Pampanga from the devastations of the Mount Pinatubo eruptions a quarter of a century ago, comes this damper: Pinatubo danger not over yet!

“We don’t want to cause panic but the danger is not over yet,” declared Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology (Phivolcs) director Renato Solidum at the Capampangan in Media forum at Bale Balita in Clark last week.

No, Pinatubo is not set to erupt anytime soon. Maybe, no sooner than another 600 years. The danger lies in unusual heavy rainfall that could arise…rather, pour like the proverbial cats and dogs with La Niña.   

The siyam-siyam or heavy rains like those wrought by Typhoon Ondoy hitting the Pinatubo area and the contiguous communities, Solidum said, will – rather than may – remobilize volcanic debris and trigger lahar flows and flooding in Pampanga.

“Watch out for the behavior of lahar in the area called Delta 5 near the Porac-Angeles Road where threat could emanate at the Pasig-Potrero River,” he advised, raising the imperative of “flood-quarrying” or an “engineered-design” quarrying along the said river and other adjacent river channels in order to prevent heavy siltation that may compromise the structural integrity of the FVR Megadike system.

Kapampangans generally believe it was the FVR Megadike that saved the province, particularly the capital of San Fernando from rampaging lahar flows that, prior to its completion in 1997, buried whole villages, notably, Cabalantian in Bacolor town on October 1, 1995. 

“The dikes have to be continuously maintained and the channels should be regularly dredged,” Solidum said.

No cause to panic, the Phivolcs chief could not overstress more in the wake of  this apparent downpour on the parade of celebrations for the 25^th anniversary of the “triumph of the Kapampangan spirit of unity and resiliency” over the Pinatubo tragedy: “Ang point ko lang ay huwag tayong pakakampante. Logic lang, kinulong mo ang tubig sa isang megadike, therefore ang purpose niya (megadike) ay saluhin ang tubig at lahar. Ang main threat diyan ay yung nasa loob. Ngayon, sa lapad naman ng ilog at megadike ay hindi naman natin alam kung saan ang tumbok.”

Points well taken, Sir. The Kapampangan learned lifelong, and life-saving, lessons out of the Pinatubo devastation the hard, no, make that the hardest, way: Not all who cry danger are doomsayers.

Oh, how Kelvin Rodolfo was virtually denounced when he first broached the foreboding scenario of a Pampanga buried in lahar.

Indeed, how Porac Mayor Roy David, dubbed the “lahar fighter,” was dismissed as the boy who cried wolf for his insistence that lahar, which by then already devastated his whole town, would ultimately swamp San Fernando and all areas downstream Pasig-Potrero.

“E mu ke piyabe-yabe keng problema mu,” was how the mayors dismissed David’s alarums. Why, even the provincial government, at the instigation of certain business leaders, extracted from Phivolcs a declaration that the capital “is safe from lahar.” So as not to panic incoming investors and those transferring from Angeles City which bore the brunt of the initial eruptions.  

Only for these mayors and businessmen to panic themselves when, within two years, David proved prophetic with the first lahar flows reaching their outlying villages. The Cabalantian tragedy turning that panic into raw terror. 

Finding fearful articulation in the “Time to Panic” rallies and marches in San Fernando to supplicate the Ramos administration for the megadike.    

“To dike or to die.” So was the collective cry.

The dike was built. The people did not die.

Nothing lost in any translation of Solidum’s caution: The dike is to be maintained, the rivers it contains regularly desilted, constantly center-channeled to veer away from the dike and prevent it from being eroded.

Twenty-five years hence, vigilance still makes the core of our continuing Pinatubo experience.