Duterte de profundis

...what if I say to you now I’m an atheist? An agnostic?

So argued President Duterte in response to the invocation of God’s name in criticisms, principally by religious personalities, of his war against criminality.

All for the sake of argument, the President hastened, affirming his faith: Pero maniwala ako ng Diyos…

It is just that, he also believed, the death penalty needed re-imposition, both as punishment and deterrence: Hindi tumalab yung death penalty noon kasi hindi in-impose. One, because of the Catholic Church. Second, the bleeding hearts, because only God can kill. Ang problema niyan, I ask you, what if there is no God?

Duterte de profundis – okay, hugot – now: Where were You when we needed You? So where is now God when a one-year-old baby, 18-month-old baby is taken from the mother’s arms brought under a jeep and raped and killed. So where is God?

To that question, we just leave the answering to the men and women of the cloth. Maybe, best leave it to God Himself, if He, indeed, does exist. To follow the Duterte drift.

And religiously…okay, dutifully, follow it, I did: leading me to this Zona piece of November 18, 2013.

A god in ruins

“I DO not mean to be… God must have been somewhere else or he forgot that there is a planet called Earth.”

In near tears, Davao City Mayor Rodrigo Duterte uttered, overwhelmed by the death and destruction he came upon in Tacloban.

Coming upon the images of the dead bodies littering the streets of the devastated city, of the father carrying his dead daughter, of the wife finding her dead husband and one daughter and still searching for her other three, of the mother cradling her lifeless child in a makeshift hospital, of countless other scenes of anguish and despair, I did not do a Duterte. Terrified as I am of casting even but the minutest iota of doubt over the omnipresence and the omniscience of God.

What instantly came to mind was the Book of Job, tailor-made for Supertyphoon Yolanda’s impact, thus: “When a sudden flood brings death, he mocks the plight of the innocent. The land is given to the power of the wicked…” (Job 9:23-24).

(Find juxtaposition there of the tragedy of Leyte and Samar and the plunder of priority development assistance fund (PDAF) and the pillage of Benigno Aquino’s disbursement acceleration program (BA-DAP). Indeed, the biblical times are visited upon us.)

Job’s lamentation amounts to nothing less than a direct, if angry, indictment of God for His mindless indifference, indeed, even for some sadistic glee.

Absolute apathy of the Almighty, thus: “I call for thy help, but thou dost not answer; I stand up to plead, but thou sittest aloof…” (Job 30:20)

Where Duterte expressed fearful doubts, preceded by a more fearful apology, Job accused God of un-being His very being. In matters of the divine attribution of justice, mercy and compassion, at the least.

Infuse some religious conceit there and the question gets propounded:   

So how can God – in all his mercy, justice and compassion – allow such hellish suffering to this the only Christian nation in Asia?

One. He did not. The people invited the disaster upon themselves for their sins. 

Two. The devil did it, in the service of God. In some sort of Joban experiment to test the sufferers’ fidelity to Him.

We look up the Book and find it was the Satan that challenged God to a wager that the blamelessness and uprightness of Job were due to the blessings he had received from God. Thus, taking these away, the Satan said, would lead the man of Uz to “curse you to your face.”  (Job1:11)

Back to the present. The greater, okay, worse suffering in these disasters always impacted upon those with the least, if any, material blessings. It is always the poor that gets the worst beating.

So what need still to try them who, in effect, have been in continuous and arduous tests all their miserable lives?

All too ungodly of anyone named God.

So when the poor and the innocent die by the thousands, even as the wicked get possession of the Earth, with God letting it all happen – on a bet, or by plain indifference – of what use is worship, to what end is morality and ethics, of what good is faith?

The very easy answer: Leap from faith.

God was not – as Duterte supposed – somewhere else. Neither did he forget planet Earth.

God, simply, was not.

God did not – as Job accused – mock the plight of the innocent. Neither did he give the land to the power of the wicked.

As God was not, so he did not. So he could not. All in the not is not.         

It was not only Tacloban, the rest of Leyte and the other spots in the Visayas that Yolanda devastated. A god also lies in ruins there. 

TO THE issue at hand now, Duterte thus: So where is now God when a one-year-old baby, 18-month-old baby is taken from the mother’s arms brought under a jeep and raped and killed. So where is God?

Instantly comes to mind the similar lamentation of the abandoned child Glyzelle Palomar before Pope Francis at the UST grounds: Many children get involved in drugs and prostitution. Why does God allow these things to happen to us? The children are not guilty of anything.

The Pope could only hold her in comforting embrace, discarded his pre-prepared speech, and responded in his native Spanish: She is the only one who has put forward a question for which there is no answer and she was not even able to express it in words but rather in tears.

Pray Duterte not to curse at the Pope anew.

So ...what if I say to you now I’m an atheist? An agnostic?

Then, G.K. Chesterton: Once abolish the God, and the government becomes the God.

All power, all glory be, Deo-terte Almighty!

Freedom of exemptions

 MOST EXEMPTIONS, least information.

Indeed, with its 166 exemptions, is there still anything left of substance, if not of consequence, to President Duterte’s executive order on Freedom of Information in the Executive Branch?

“Freedom of Exemptions.” So National Union of Journalists secretary-general Dabet Panelo called – so aptly – the administration’s much-hyped FOI in an ABS-CBN interview with Karen Davila.

More impact on the people than on the media, Panelo lamented of Duterte’s FOI though, given in-depth research, investigation and vetting integral in media procedure at getting at the news.

Said Panelo: "The FOI is actually for the people because we will do our job anyway. The people, this is their weapon. Pag pumunta sila sa barangay, bakit walang gamot sa barangay? Bakit walang gamot, bakit walang paracetamol? Nasaan ang listahan? Bakit naubos? Bakit walang nebulizer? Nasaan ang gastos? 'Yun 'yun eh."

Yeah, and the people have the elemental right to know what government is doing or not doing for them and why.       

“Precisely in the public interest.” So the erudite Vergel Santos, chair of the board of trustees of the Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility, said of the listed exemptions in the FOI. Also in the same interview with Davila.

"The more general problem is that every exception necessarily narrows the freedom," Santos lamenting the curtailment of what the measure professes to open. 

Santos expressed no surprise in the FOI unacted in the House and the Senate "because the potential target of FOI are members of Congress." And segued to the President.

"There’s so many self-contradictory things about the President. He tells you he’s a populist leader…This falls perfectly into the sort of character that he is. He is ruling with an iron fist." Santos calling the spade a shovel there.

Seeing a national peril in President Duterte’s “soaring popularity rate” leading “people to believe everything that he says."

Yeah, how can President Duterte, with his 91 percent – now said to be 97 percent – across the nation approval rating can ever be wrong?

Believe. As his legions of lemmings do.

Or perish. Perhaps with a cardboard saying “Anti-Duterte. ‘Wag tularan.”  

Outrageous? Yes. Outlandish? Think again.

Observed Santos: “We are now surrendering to the idea that every issue in this country should be decided by the numerical majority.”

Yeah, as in the 16 million voters who went for Duterte believing themselves the majority rather than a simple plurality.

Yeah, as in the congressmen and senators of varied colors – the yellows and reds included – coalescing with Duterte’s handpicked heads for both Houses, who in the preceding regime were but by their lonesome sorry selves.

Indeed, the rightness and righteousness of everything Duterte now finding rightful ground there. Hence, the wrongness of everything not Duterte. 

Santos, en punto: “So this is our point: Democracy has its own checks when it comes to these things."

As in the protection of the right of the minority against the tyranny of the bully, in the silence of the majority.

An FOI that is truly free, there. Not one with the exemptions making the rule. 

Or, am I just being biased? Having written this after watching and reading “bias media” ABS-CBN?

Shucks. My own FOI – freedom of interpretation.

Educating Edu

IT WAS a request.

Councilor Edgardo Pamintuan Jr. has clarified that it was never his intention to dictate on and censor media.

"I made a request to our friends in media and it was a request not a dictate. From my point-of-view, a request can be granted or denied. It was even defined in several dictionaries as a 'polite way of asking for something'," Pamintuan Jr. said.

So stressed a press release Wednesday from the Angeles City Information Office in the wake of Pamintuan’s brickbatting by the Pampanga Press Club and the provincial chapter of the National Union of Journalists of the Philippines for having “cautioned” the media against publication of press releases from opposition councilor Carmelo “Pogi” Lazatin Jr.

It was a request, alright. To re-quote him in his press release of 13 Sept. slugged Pamintuan Jr to Lazatin Jr.: Study pa more, to wit:

"They can write all the press releases they want but I am requesting our media friends to be discernful.

No plainer and simpler than a request there, indeed. If only Pamintuan stopped there. But he went on: Filing a questionable measure is one thing and getting it published in newspapers is another. Pero huwag naman yung nagmumukha tayong katawa-tawa at walang alam sa batas at mga pambansang regulasyon. Sabi nga doon sa spot.ph site, 'there are laws that have us cheering on the lawmaker who filed it and there are laws that make us laugh out loud or cringe in shame.’

There lies the whale of a difference between a request and a… No, “dictate” was never even once mentioned in both statements of NUJP-Pampanga and the Pampanga Press Club. Go, Honorable Councilor, read them.

How Pamintuan came up with “dictate” as his expressed alternative to “request” I can only surmise as having been induced by some subconscious dissonance.

Admonition. That, to me, makes the addenda to Pamintuan’s “request” statement. Precisely, as it was preceded by: The councilor son and namesake of Angeles City Mayor and League of Cities of the Philippines National President Edgardo Pamintuan also cautioned the media against publishing press releases from Lazatin Jr's camp. (Underscoring, mine).

To caution, Honorable Councilor, means “to warn.”

And that warning to media is grounded on Pamintuan having earlier lambasted, in his same press release, Lazatin’s proposed ordinances and resolutions as "out-of-this-world", and urged the sophomore local lawmaker to "study pa more so that your proposals will not look mere propaganda.”

Hence, publishing Lazatin’s proposed ordinances and resolutions – being out-of-this-world and mere propaganda – would reduce media to being katawa-tawa at walang alam sa batas at mga pambansang regulasyon. Right there is Pamintuan’s admonition – “a strong warning with dire consequences.”

Indeed, as Pamintuan quoted: There are laws that have us cheering on the lawmaker who filed it (sic) and there are laws that make us laugh out loud or cringe in shame.

For Pamintuan to impact this on the media, however, is way out of line, as much politically as rationally. For the object of either honor or ridicule or scorn there is the lawmaker and the laws. The media or the publisher not even mentioned there.  

To paraphrase, in the case of Facebook or Instagram: There are posts that have us cheering on the uploader, and there are uploads that make us laugh, cringe in shame, or scandalized too. The object of our reaction being the uploader, not FB or Instagram. Got the drift?   

Discern between the message and the messenger. And while at it, discern the difference between “discernful” – as Pamintuan requested media to be – and discerning. 

Discernful – getting red underline in Word, invisible in Google – is a most uncommon word. Usual usage in the instance of Pamintuan’s statement would have been: …I am requesting our media friends to be (more) discerning. An action or behavior there.

Semantics now: the suffix -ful means “full of” or “notable for.” Discernful then takes the adjective form that may mean “full of discernment.” A personal attribute then. Now, to request media to be “discernful” presupposes they have an utter lack, if not totally devoid, of discernment.     

That is an insult Pamintuan inflicted upon media. Unwittingly, maybe, to give him the benefit of the doubt.

This is not the first time though that I find Pamintuan -- innocently, if not ignorantly, but just as ignominiously – insulting, albeit on Facebook. On the occasion of Eid ul-Fitr this year, he wished his Muslim friends “Eid Mubarak,” complete with Assalamu Alaikum...accompanied by a photo of a bottle of expensive whiskey.

I commented: This is an insult to Islam. You invoke the name of Allah and at the same time post a bottle of whiskey which is haram (forbidden by the Law)…      

Pamintuan’s response: Sorry. No pun intended.

Until now I am still searching where the pun lies in that post. Duh!

Study pa more.

So Pamintuan haughtily told Lazatin.

Educate Edu pa more.

So I am telling his handlers now: Your ward just does not get it.

It can’t be any simpler than the heading of the PPC statement: MEDIA HERE TO REPORT, NOT TO JUDGE.

And still articulated some more by PPC president Deng Pangilinan: Media do not and will never act as a judge or even discern who or what party is right or wrong, especially in reporting facts from news sources in straight news articles.

Plainer still: Ano man po ang usapan o maging away ng mga konsehal sa bawat isa, wala po kaming pakialam sa mga iyon. Ang aming layunin at misyon ay ang mailathala ang mga pangyayari sa konseho.

Yeah, E duh, pa more.

Day of Faith

LIKE THE recurring refrain of a mournful song that long ago seared the very soul, the events of September 23, 1972 come as painfully, albeit less terrifyingly, fresh at each anniversary.

So indulge me in reliving once more that day of days of 44 long years ago through this piece I found the courage to write but four years back.

Day of Faith

A SATURDAY. Up early for a “DG” – discussion group – at the Assumption College in San Fernando.

Something uncanny: there is nothing but pure static on the radio. The usual though – light banter, small-town gossip among passengers – at the jeepney from somnolent Poblacion, Sto. Tomas to the capital town.

Something really uncanny: there are no newspapers at the news stands. Only komiks are being hawked by ambulant newsboys.

At the Assumption bus, some sense of gloom, a foreboding of doom, guarded whispers among us students of something terrifying…

On campus, a disturbing quietude. Still some two dozen hardcore KM-SDK activists go on with the DG originally to finalize the agenda of the demo at the gates of Camp Olivas planned for Tuesday.

Marcos has declared Martial Law. First heard from a kasama with a brother in the military. The PC – Philippine Constabulary – has been rounding known activists since last night. Not even a murmur of Makibaka, Huwag Matakot! heard.

Just then, a platoon of uniformed constables enters the campus. Enough for all of us to find any and all means out of Assumption except the main gate where, we presumed more PCs are posted, maybe even with machineguns.

Downtown San Fernando, in front of the town hall were 6X6 PC trucks, military fatigues are everywhere. Long hair is sheared not by scissors but mostly by bayonets and hunting knives.

Jumped on a passing jeepney, just in time. My long tresses – down to my shoulders and back – saved for the day.

Proclamation 1081 – declaring Martial Law in the Philippines though dated September 21, 1972 came into the open on September 23.       

Martial Law! The news is out – even in barriotic Sto. Tomas. Arriving home, in time to see my mom stoking the last flames flickering on a mound of ash that used to be my beloved Communist Manifesto, Das Kapital, Lenin’s thoughts in volumes of pamphlets, Mao’s The Five Golden Rays and the Little Red Book, Amado Guerrero’s Lipunan at Rebolusyong Pilipino, posters of Che Guevara, Marx, Lenin and Mao.

In between tears, a jumble of Marx-Lenin-Mao thoughts – The history of all hitherto existing society is a history of class struggle… Capital is dead labor, that vampire-like, only lives by sucking living labor, and lives the more, the more labor it sucks…The way to crush the bourgeoisie is to grind them between the millstones of taxation and inflation…Trust the masses, rely on the masses, learn from the masses…The people, and the people alone, are the motive forces of history…

And Che’s mind too: What do the danger and sacrifices of a man or a nation matter, when the destiny of humanity is at stake?

All gone in a holocaust!
An early morning date with the neighbourhood barber the next day. After a long while, the sun burns my ears and nape again.

Lie low, really low. Take refuge in the rice paddies. In morbid fear of what tomorrow may bring.  

So what hath Martial Law immediately wrought?

Resumption of classes. By the main gate of Assumption College the dreaded Black List is posted – names of activists who will not be re-admitted unless with clearance from the PC commander.

A piece of advice from my political science professor: “Don’t go to the PC alone, they will just arrest and detain you, as they did to a number of your comrades. Bring somebody influential with you.”

So whom am I to seek but my spiritual director and rector at the Mother of Good Counsel Seminary – the Rev. Fr. Paciano B. Aniceto. (I was not even a year out “on probation” from San Jose Seminary.)

At the Pampanga PC Command beside the Capitol, Apu Ceto vouched for me as a character witness before a panel of interrogators, and then took my case to the provincial commander himself – the dreaded Col. Isidoro de Guzman who would later earn infamy in the Escalante Massacre in Negros.

Alone at the interrogation room, I was subjected to romanza military at my every answer the berdugos did not take to their liking.

“KM o SDK?”

Wala po – A smack on the head.

“Name? Alias?”

Caesar Lacson y Zapata. Nickname: Bong. No alias – A slap on the face.

“Ikaw si Carlos. Di ba ikaw itong nasa mga letrato (shoving to my face a number of photographs of marches, rallies and demos)”

Kamukha ko po – the table suddenly kisses my face.

Then off to the detention center at the side of the command. At each single cell, the sergeant – Pascua or Pascual? – shoves my face between the iron bars and asks the detainee: “Kasama mo ito?” and then turns to me: “Kilala mo yan?”

Of course we knew one another but no one ratted out. Conscientization most manifest there.

Contusions and all, I managed to be remanded to the custody of Apu Ceto. I have written this and I write it again: The good father, in what could only be deemed as a leap of faith – in his God unquestionably, in me too, maybe – signed a document that said in part, “…in the event that subject activist-provocateur renew his connection with the Communist Party of the Philippines and its various fronts in the pursuit of rebellion; or undertake acts inimical to peace and order, or in gross violation of the provisions of Proclamation 1081 and other pertinent decrees, the signatory-custodian shall be held responsible and as liable…” with a proviso that in my stead, he would be placed in the PC stockade.
Did he tell me to change my ways? Did he impale in my conscience the gravity of my case, his implication in any instance of carelessness or recidivism on my part thereon?
No. From the Constabulary command, his mere request was for me to please accompany him to church.
Before the Blessed Sacrament, he knelt and silently prayed. He did not even ask me to pray with him. He just motioned me to sit near him.
By the side of the good father, in that darkened corner of the Metropolitan Cathedral, I wept. Washed by a torrent of tears was my rebirth, the renewal of my faith.
No spectacular drama presaged my epiphany, no blinding light, so to speak, shone on my own Damascus Gate. There were but flickering votives. And Apu Ceto.     

My return to faith. That’s principally what Martial Law wrought.

It ain't fair

EDGARDO PAMINTUAN was 8^th in the World Mayor Prize 2012, already a hall of famer in the Most Outstanding Mayor of the Philippines search of Superbrands Marketing International, and is the national president of the League of Cities of the Philippines – just to cite the most manifest recognition of his excellence in governance.  

Yet, Angeles City has just been tagged as among the worst cities in the world to drive in, ranked 147^th of 186 – in descending order, with only Manila at 170^th and Cebu City as the worst of the worsts, among Philippine cities. The tagger – Waze, a popular traffic and navigating app used by cab drivers and commuters.

Has not Pamintuan, time and again, initiated traffic innovations such as the creation of a traffic management council with a traffic czar to boot, the holding of  traffic summits, traffic re-routing like that at Koreatown, etcetera, to decongest the city roads and ease traffic flow?

That ain’t fair. To the excellent Pamintuan.

“So, who will pay for this? Mayor Ed Pamintuan, your move.”

So we wrote in an editorial on the cracks on the Clark perimeter road parallel to the Capillion Green Frontier project and followed up in a news story saying: “No action was apparently undertaken by Pamintuan and the city government who exercise jurisdiction on the road. Calls to his office remained unreturned at presstime.”

So the mayor texted us Sunday: “I checked all possible calls from you (to) both city hall staff in charge of receiving calls, mine and Jay (Pelayo) and city executives regarding my comment on the damaged road. Sadly, we never got any calls from your end. Be that as it may, this (is) my comment (which) I’m sure will be given a space as my office and my position as mayor was cited.

“When I saw on FB a photo of the Clark perimeter road on August 31, 2016, I texted at once Sec. Art Tugade and reported to him the cracked cemented road and he answered on the same day, August 31 at 8:18 PM…’Yes Brod Mayor.’

“The following day, Sept.1, at 7:13 am, I got another text message from Sec. Art – ‘Txt from Noel Manankil – Good morning Sir, pinapa-rush na po namin yung pag-seal ng mga cracks sa daan at kausap na po namin yung mga engineers ng Capilion.’

“Hope this clear issues as to my lack of interest in bringing the matter to whoever was responsible for the damage and repair…”    

Yes, for Punto! reporting his apparent inaction on the cracked perimeter road, that ain’t fair to Pamintuan. He texted, he acted. Fair and square, need we still ask for more quarters?  

Just last week, the Angeles City Police Office was “honored” as the Best City Police Office in the whole of Central Luzon – by no less than PNP Director General Ronald de la Rosa himself – and Top 2 in the entire country.

No less than the city’s top cop, Senior Supt. Sidney Villaflor has given due credit to Pamintuan’s all-out support to the police for this signal accomplishment.

Why, in two months’ time alone (July 1 to August 31) the ACPO registered no less than 20 “drug personalities” in anti-drug operations, 197 others arrested and 1,514 surrendered.

Now, for the nitpicking malcontents to still raise the issue of three shabu laboratory raided in Angeles City only this year and lay this down at the feet of Pamintuan just ain’t fair to the truly hardworking, crime-fighting hizzoner.

For these muckrakers to cry “unfairness” in Mabalacat City Mayor Marino Morales shamed as a narco-politician for the proliferation of drugs in his domain vis-à-vis Pamintuan’s squeaky-clean image despite the shabu labs found in his city, is just…well, really ain’t fair. To Pamintuan, duh!

It is not though in being mayor but in his peace panel persona where the unfairest slash of all on Pamintuan these recent days was delivered. 

"Angeles City Mayor Edgardo Pamintuan, adviser of the government's peace panel, had earlier condemned the killings. He alleged that the CPP's armed wing, the New People's Army, and its political wing, the National Democratic Front (NDF) are behind the killings due to land disputes."

So reported Jessica Bartolome in gmanews.com, getting the swiftest response of a threat of civil suit from the mayor.

"I never said that! That is a case of malicious reporting. The reporter twisted the truth," said Pamintuan. "The victims were progressive farmer leaders. How can I accuse the NPA and NDF of masterminding the slaying when I know for a fact that the revolutionary forces and progressives (sic) organizations have almost similar goals and will never harm each other.”

Malicious reporting. Twisted truth. It ain’t fair.

And Pamintuan knows that for a fact. In fairness, as the sosi is wont to say.   

What wrong?

DO NOT hesitate to attack me, criticize me, if I do wrong in my job.

Did we hear you right, President Duterte?

I am not at liberty to be angry at anybody. It is your sworn duty to ask questions. It is also my obligation to my people for the money spent in this trip and for all the things that cost the Filipino, I have to make an official report. Wala akong galit sa inyo (I am not angry with you).

Is that really you speaking, President Duterte?

Every time you press that button in your camera, you record history of this country kaya importante kayo (that's why you are important),

Aww, really, really, President Duterte, are your arrival statements in Davao City for real?

Why, but a day before, in Indonesia, you accused the media of "spinning stories several times over" and excising relevant facts and telling lies to crucify you.

For whatever reason, the things you say, they (the media) can spin stories several times over. If they are after you, they would — I said — make it appear to be the worst of you. Kaya ako, bantay sa press (So I watch out the press). They can spin. They will spin everything to make you bad.”

And now you’re telling the media not to hesitate to attack you?

Of course, there is the condition to your dare – if I do wrong in my job. And that takes the whole cake, icing and crumbs unspared, so to speak.

So, President Duterte, when were you ever wrong in your job?

Not when you proffered the shame list of politicians, judges and policemen you said are involved in illegal drugs, notwithstanding that a number of those in the list were long dead.

Not when you threatened the Supreme Court with martial law, even if you may have misread that the 1987 Constitution provides that the declaration of martial law can be scrutinized and reviewed by the High Court, to wit: "The Supreme Court may review, in an appropriate proceeding filed by any citizen, the sufficiency of the factual basis of the proclamation of martial law or the suspension of the privilege of the writ or the extension thereof, and must promulgate its decision thereon within thirty days from its filing. (Article VIII, Section 18).

Not in your execution of the war against drugs, no matter the number of bodies falling like flies, human rights issues be damned.

That’s why I said, ‘[W]hat crime against humanity?’ In the first place, I’d like to be frank with you, are they (drug users) humans? What is your definition of a human being? Tell me.

There, precisely, what human rights have they who are not humans. So right, you are. 

Not when you accused the United Nations of having done nothing for this country, despite the hard facts to the contrary – from the health services of WHO to the nutrition interventions of the WFP, from the UNDP Recovery Program in the immediate wake of the Yolanda devastation to the FAO support for fishery and agriculture rehabilitation – all in billions of the almighty $.

So take us out of your organization. You have done nothing. Where were you here the last time? Never. Except to criticize. When have you done a good deed to my country?

No, President Duterte, you were never wrong in shoving that to the face of UN.

Why, even in the matter of that pu…ina directed at President Obama, you did not do anything wrong.

You can review the tapes. I did not say [pu…ina]. May sinabi ako, pero (I said something, but) not in relation to Obama. I said, ‘Do not disrespect me. Son of a whore, we will be wallowing in the muds like pigs if you do that.’ That’s what I said.

To whomever, matters not. Just as you never said pu…ina to the Pope. Maybe, not even tarantado to Ban Ki Moon. You did not say it, President Duterte, so what, how, why, and where can be any wrong there?

So, what is there to attack? To criticize, about one who has done nothing wrong in his job? Indeed, about President Duterte who can do no wrong?

To still engage in criticism then will be nothing less than “spinning stories several times over.” That ain’t no journalism, not even of the yellowest kind.

Yeah, President Duterte is right. As always.

Oh, ye god!

Continuing crusade

AQUI en la Pampanga hay mucha piedad pero poca caridad.
It has been sixty-four years since that lamentation over the “wealth in piety but  poverty in charity” expressed by Bishop Cesar Ma. Guerrero, the first to occupy the bishopric of San Fernando, noting “the stark class differences between the rich and the poor, the strife between the landlords and the tenants, and a deteriorating socio-political-economic situation bordering on socialism.”
These were manifest situations of the imperative of revolution in his See. And a revolution did indeed obtain then in Pampanga, with the Huks already “at the very gates of Manila.”
Marked as apostates pursuing the establishment of a “godless” society, the Huks naturally had to be stopped, and their ideology uprooted to “save the country and preserve Mother Church.” A strategic policy of the Cold War placed the Church at the bulwark of the war against communism.
It was at the very cauldron of that simmering social ferment that Bishop Guerrero organized the Cruzada – the Crusade for Penance and Charity – in 1952.

In revolutionary praxis, the Cruzada served the ends of a counter-revolution. The conscientization of the oppressed masa that was the spark to start the inevitable prairie fire, doused by the sprinkle of holy water, the heart soothed by hymns and prayers, the soul seared with the promise of redemption, of eternal bliss in the hereafter. So long as the hardest of toils, the worst of privations, indeed, all injustices and oppression be borne as Christ did with His cross.

Unrepentant communists would readily see it as the affirmation of that Marxist dictum: “Religion is the opium of the people.”
Images of the Virgen de los Remedios and Santo Cristo del Perdon were taken all around the Pampanga parish churches and capillas where they stayed for days, the faithful seeking their intercession and intervention through non-stop prayers and nightly processions.
A hymn to the virgin was composed with peace as recurrent refrain: “…ica’ng minye tula ampon capayapan / quing indu ning balen quequeng lalawigan / uling calimbun mu caring sablang dalan / ding barrio at puruc caring cabalenan / agad menatili ing catahimican…” (…you gave us joy and peace / to the mother of our province / when taken in procession / in all the barrios in the towns / peace descended upon them…) Forgive the poor translation.
The charity end of the crusade – lamac – was institutionalized – all the barrio folk, even the poorest of them, shared some goods that would accompany the images to their next destination and shared with the neediest there.
The Cruzada in effect became an equalizing and unifying factor among the faithful, regardless of their socio-economic situation. And relative peace did come to the province. For a time.
The breadth and depth of the devotion to the Virgen de los Remedios of the Capampangan moved Pope Pius XII to approve her canonical coronation as the patroness of Pampanga on September 8, 1956.
Since then, without fail, no matter the rains and high water, the Capampangan faithful flock at the annual commemoration of the canonical coronation. In a ritual of renewal of faith in their Lord of Pardon, of rededication to their Indu ning Capaldanan (Mother of Remedies), in celebration of their Tula ding Capampangan (Joy of the Capampangan).

Sixty years hence, that “deteriorating socio-political-economic situation bordering on socialism” may have been arrested – the communist insurgency virtually as dead as Marx and Mao, if not deader.

“The stark class differences between the rich and the poor, the strife between the landlords and the tenants,” though still obtain. In various manifestations, in the farms and factories, in the mills and in the malls – as much the wages of sin, as the sin of capitalism – from workers’ exploitation to farmland-grabbing, from contractualization to union-busting.      

So, did Bishop Guerrero’s Cruzada of peace through charity and prayers fail?

So we do still come in prayerful celebration every Sept. 8, in thanksgiving, in supplication.
O Virgen de los Remedios / damdam ca qng quequeng aus / iligtas mu que’t icabus / qng sablang tucsu at maroc / ibie mu ing quecang lunos / ‘panalangin mu que qng Dios. (O Virgin…/ hear our pleas / free and save us / from all temptation and evil / grant us your compassion / pray to God for us).

The Cruzada can only continue.  

Martial bonds redux

“GINAGAWA KO ‘yan nung panahon ko kaya it’s the right thing to do. It varied. The threat is national so it’s just right that we should trust the President.”

So spoke – in her first press conference as House deputy speaker – the former president, now Pampanga 2^nd District Rep. Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, on President Duterte’s declaration of a “state of lawlessness” in the wake of the blast in Davao City that claimed 14 lives.

“President Duterte knows all the lessons, because he was helping me a lot during my time. He was my adviser on peace and order and drugs. He knows my experience, he knows all the lessons,” Mrs. Arroyo said.

Indeed, the former president knows whereof she stands. Experienced as she was in the ways of states – of emergency, of lawlessness, of rebellion, even of martial law, to wit:

In 2003, President Arroyo declared a state of lawlessness following the two consecutive bombings in Davao International Airport that caused 21 deaths and at the Sasa Wharf Terminal with 16 fatalities. The declaration though was limited to Davao City.

Early into her presidency, in 2001, she declared a state of rebellion after a mob protesting the arrest of deposed President Joseph Estrada virtually stormed the very gates of Malacanang; and also in 2003 at the time of the Oakwood Mutiny led by Navy Ltsg. Antonio Trillanes IV, now honorable senator of the Republic.

In 2009, Mrs. Arroyo declared martial law in Maguindanao in the aftermath of the Ampatuan Massacre of 58 persons, 32 of whom were journalists.

Of her martial law declaration, here is something unearthed from the Zona archives, dated December 07, 2009:

Martial bonds

YOU DON’T use a .45 to kill a fly.
I remember reading that from a mimeographed sheet that came out of Fort Bonifacio in 1972 shortly after Ferdinand Marcos put the entire archipelago under martial law. The statement was supposed to have come from the incarcerated Sen. Benigno “Ninoy” Aquino.
Ninoy’s contention was that martial law was an inappropriate reaction, nay, an overkill, to the socio-economic and political problems besetting the country.
Summed up Proclamation 1081: “…WHEREAS, the rebellion and armed action undertaken by these lawless elements of the communist and other armed aggrupations organized to overthrow the Republic of the Philippines by armed violence and force have assumed the magnitude of an actual state of war against our people and the Republic of the Philippines;
NOW, THEREFORE, I, FERDINAND E. MARCOS, President of the Philippines, by virtue of the powers vested upon me by Article VII, Section 10, Paragraph ('2) of the Constitution, do hereby place the entire Philippines as defined in Article I, Section 1 of the Constitution under martial law and, in my capacity as their commander-in-chief, do hereby command the armed forces of the Philippines, to maintain law and order throughout the Philippines, prevent or suppress all forms of lawless violence as well as any act of insurrection or rebellion and to enforce obedience to all the laws and decrees, orders and regulations promulgated by me personally or upon my direction…”
“An actual state of war” against the republic, Marcos justified his martial law. A perpetuation of himself in power, so Marcos did with martial law.
Fast forward now to the present. “An overreaction.” So yelled former President Fidel V. Ramos at President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s Proclamation 1959 that imposed martial law in Maguindanao.
“Heavily armed groups in the province of Maguindanao have established positions to resist government troops… the condition of peace and order in the province of Maguindanao has deteriorated to the extent that the local judicial system and other government mechanisms in the province are not functioning, thus endangering public safety…” So asserted GMA’s proclamation.
“A rebellion was in the offing.” So seconded Justice Secretary Agnes Devanadera. To dummies, GMA’s martial law is a pre-emptive strike against a rebellion that is yet a-brewing. Which broke altogether whatever legal leg it stood on.

Imminent danger

The erudite Christian Monsod stressed that the “imminent danger” clause of the 1935 Constitution that Marcos abused had been excised from the 1987 Constitution precisely so it would not be taken in vain again. Monsod knows whereof he speaks, being one of the framers of the fundamental law now in effect.
By making a “looming rebellion” as justification for GMA’s martial law, the government raised the ghost of a dead constitution, and along with it the phantoms of a Marcosian past.
Indeed, the spectre of the Great Ferdinand is beginning to haunt and hound our days.
No-election scenarios with GMA holding on to the presidency after June 2010 are given renewed vitality in coffeeshop talks.
“An emerging Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo dictatorship” the Filipino people should resist with all might, said the militant bloc of Congressmen Satur Ocampo, Teodoro Casiño, Liza Maza, et al.
This, even as they re-affirmed their principled stand that Proclamation 1959 was neither constitutional nor necessary given that there is no rebellion or invasion in Maguindanao, and that a state of emergency had already been declared in the area providing the armed forces, the national police and other government agencies with enough powers to deal with the aftermath of the Maguindanao massacre.
“We believe Proclamation 1959 is meant to be a precedent. It is an attempt to impose martial law even without the requirements specified in the Constitution. If GMA gets away with this one in Maguindanao, she can get away with it in any other province or the whole country,” they warned in a statement.
Raised too were the ghosts of an elections past – 2004’s to be exact.

Cover up

“One possible reason for the martial-law declaration might be to cover up the massive fraud that marred the 2004 presidential and 2007 senatorial elections in the province.” So said Sen. Aquilino Pimentel Jr. “President Arroyo and her cohorts are afraid the Ampatuans may expose the rigging of election results in Maguindanao that enabled her to win over opposition challenger Fernando Poe Jr. in the 2004 elections, and administration candidates to sweep the senatorial polls in the province in 2007.”
Seconded Makati Mayor Jejomar Binay: “There have been reports that the Ampatuans have threatened to make the Arroyo administration pay by telling all they know about the massive cheating in the province during the 2004 presidential elections…(if such reports are true) then this reduces the martial-law proclamation into a hunt for evidence of election fraud. It would now appear that the Arroyo administration is using the full might of the state—the Armed Forces, the police and all agencies of government—to recover original election returns or certificates of canvas reportedly in the possession of the Ampatuans as a state of martial law will allow the administration to conduct raids and searches without going through the courts.”
Binay decried the Arroyo administration for “exploiting the nation’s outrage to cover up another serious crime, that of stealing the 2004 elections.”
Nunquam iterum. Never again to martial law. Never again to a Marcos!
Unlearned of our past, we are a nation damned.

COME TO think of this now: Duterte’s declaration of state lawlessness, the issue of Marcos burial at the Libingan ng mga Bayani, back dropped by the very month martial law was declared. Sheer coincidence?

Go ahead, conspiracy theorists, make your day.

What peace we seek

Facebook grab of GPH-NDFP nego photo

 

PEACE IS in the horizon.

So was the multi-titled – mayor of Angeles City, 8^th Best World Mayor, president of the League of Cities of the Philippines, and GPH peace panel adviser – Edgardo Pamintuan quoted as saying upon returning to his beloved city. 

"We are tired from the long flight but it was a very fulfilling trip. After years of stalled negotiation, we now see peace in the horizon. The signing of the joint statement (between the GPH and the NDFP) in Oslo, Norway was a giant first leap towards the attainment of peace," Pamintuan said, via press release from his office.

Furthered the PR: The joint statement signed in the presence of Norwegian third-party observers and the Foreign Affairs Minister of the Royal Norwegian Government settled several issues including an indefinite ceasefire, amnesty for NDF leaders still in jail and the reaffirmation of previous agreements. It also brings to forth (sic) the agenda of social and economic reforms which is being tackled by a committee.

Pamintuan’s role in the talks, he explained thus: "As president of the League of Cities of the Philippines and Angeles City mayor, my role as adviser involved not only offering insights and the LGU perspective but also helped consolidate the GRP peace panel. We also achieved unity with the NDF panel even on several contentious issues laid on the negotiation table. Knowing the panel members from both sides because of my presence in previous talks and experiences helped a lot in the success of the first phase of the peace negotiation."

Yes, our collective pride as Filipinos swell at this epochal moment in our history as a nation, and prouder yet as Angelenos for the key part taken in it by our much accomplished mayor. Luid!

Peace for our time.

So British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain cried upon arriving at the Heston Aerodrome in London on Sept. 30, 1938, brandishing the Anglo-German Declaration he signed with Adolf Hitler.

“The settlement of the Czechoslovakian problem, which has now been achieved is, in my view, only the prelude to a larger settlement in which all Europe may find peace. This morning I had another talk with the German Chancellor, Herr Hitler, and here is the paper which bears his name upon it as well as mine... We regard the agreement signed last night and the Anglo-German Naval Agreement as symbolic of the desire of our two peoples never to go to war with one another again,” Chamberlain declared.

Less than a year after inking that agreement, Hitler incorporated the whole of Czechoslovakia into his Third Reich and invaded Poland triggering WWII.

No, by no means do I imply Pamintuan’s peace overture going the way of Chamberlain’s.

Pamintuan himself articulating the determination and express commitment of both panels to the peace process, thus: "We will work for that target even if we need to double or triple our efforts. We are optimistic about this timeline. However, should there be a need to extend that period, then everyone should be open to it. Peace negotiation is a process and must not be snagged by technical limitations. This is an almost five-decade war that is rooted on poverty, injustice and rights abuses and we must address the basic causes."

Poverty. Injustice. Rights abuses. Ay, there’s the rub.

The root of the insurgency finding fertile field in the all-out war against illegal drugs – the poor making up most of the so-far 2,000 casualties, in sheer disregard of due process, in virtual negation of the rule of law, in the naked abuse of human rights. All in the name of security, of safety, of public order. Of peace?

Alas, what can stop the killing? Indeed, why end the killing? When the greater part of the nation is heartily applauding.

Peace of the grave.

What peace there be for those neutralized, aye, exterminated with extreme prejudice?

But for those that loved them, who else shall weep for the eternal injustice of their peace?