Gardeners see the tell-tale signs
In the last week of September, barely a month before the deadline for the filing of candidacies, one notes how very few there are who find it an advantage to be identified with the administration.
For starters, at the most basic level, one recalls that what really made one past regime an international pariah was the systematic violation of human rights it could not credibly deny. Shocking as it may sound to some, today the Aquino government’s human rights record has also become shameful on an international scale.
The three top United Nations officials responsible for defending human rights have expressed alarm over the Aquino government’s intransigence on human rights observance. The three are VictoriaTauli-Corpuz, from the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michael Forst, the UN Rapporteur on
Forst
the situation of human rights defenders, and Christof Heyns, the UN Special Rapporteur
Heyns
on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions.[1]
“From his callous handling of relatively small incidents like the Manila tourist bus massacre, to large-scale calamities like Typhoon Yolanda and the Zamboanga siege … to inexplicably shocking incidents like abandoning the SAF to be slaughtered at Mamasapano, and to blaming victims for the never-ending string of media killings, Aquino has demonstrated nothing but contempt for [his people]. His continuing stubborn refusal to allow the UN to do its work only confirms that contempt,” one metropolitan daily editorialized last week.
Aquino has so far actively refused to risk international scrutiny. He has not allowed UN officials to visit the country to see for themselves the environment in which human rights defenders are obliged to work.
His anointed successor, Sec. Mar Roxas, had the temerity to insult the people of Zamboanga by congratulating them on the second anniversary of the Zambo siege. “Happy Anniversary!” his posters and banners intoned. An angry populace immediately asked, happy for what? For 120,000 displaced people? For 10,000 houses burned? For the many who died when they were caught in the conflict among civilians, soldiers and rebels? For 200 civilians who died of sickness after the siege? For thousands of civilians who have no homes yet?
Secondly, one sees unprecedented levels of corruption clearly made possible by the government’s dictatorial stance. Yes, the issue in this area is dictatorship versus the rule of law. While businessmen were generally happy with PNoy, given that the latter hardly engaged in extortionate activities of any sort, it nonetheless became clear to them now that PNoy, after all, does something much worse: he systematically disregards the rule of law with regard to public funds, treating them as if they were his very own to do with as he pleases, either authorized by or responsible to no one. In other words, he has this bad habit of acting like a dictator rather than as a President of a democratic republic.
The Supreme Court unanimously told him that this was wrong and he should stop it forthwith. But he has no ear for this kind of admonition from a co-equal branch of government and will not be stopped, or so it seems. He continues with his illegalities and in this one year 2015 alone he already accumulated some Php 425-Billion in Presidential Pork! Is it this stubbornness that finally moved businessmen to rate him as “most corrupt” after all?
In a petition for certiorari, prohibition and mandamus, the Philconsa or Philippine Constitution Association together with some Catholic Archbishops from the National Transformation Council said that their examination of the 2015 budget revealed “scandalous and unconscionable freight” of lump sum appropriations amounting to P424,144,763,000.00 “cleverly embedded” in nine strategic departments and two other agencies, which the group said were “highly vulnerable to the whirligig of transactional, rent-seeking and patronage politics.”
Among the contested portions of the General Appropriations Act of 2015 were Section 65 on lump sum appropriations, Section 70 which provided new meaning to “savings,” and Section 73 which allows realignment of funds.
Petitioners unmasked “Section 73 of the GAA 2015 as the subtle, crafty and ingenuous vehicle to undermine Sec. 25(5), Article VI of the Constitution and the Supreme Court’s interpretation of the same.“
Earlier on, in a New York Times survey conducted over a two month period involving 1,476 expat executives in the 13 countries and territories throughout Asia, the Philippines scored 9.40 out of 10 on corruption, giving it the number one spot – the most corrupt in all Asia.
Corruption had penetrated every nook and corner of government long ago – from Officers who pull you over for a bribe, all the way to the Bureau of Customs and more. Every new administration tends to get worse than its predecessor but the PNoy regime beats them all. Some $2-billion dollars, or roughly 13% of the Philippines annual budget is lost to corruption each year, this according to the United Nations Development Program.
Tiglao
The Manila Times writer, Mr. Rigoberto Tiglao, has reported that nearly one-fourth of imports into the country in the last five years have been unreported and untaxed, totaling $94 billion – for an astronomical P4 trillion—or more than four times the estimated smuggled value of just $21 billion from 2005 to 2009.
It is no secret that the current head of customs, Alberto Lina, owner of the Lina Group of Companies which deals a lot with the Bureau, is in a continuing conflict-of-interest position but the administration has the gall to let him continue in office.
Presidential crony, Virginia Torres, formerly of the Land Transportation Office, publicly admitted that she owns the 34 containers of Global Classe, which is the consignee of tons of smuggled Thai sugar worth more than a hundred million pesos. It’s no wonder then that the Bureau of Customs is unable to collect enough to meet Department of Finance targets. In desperation they would rather run after the “balik-bayan” boxes of the new heroes – returning overseas workers – who already keep the national economy afloat with their billions of dollars in remittances.
Similarly situated is the Bureau of Internal Revenue Commissioner, Madame Kim S. Jacinto-Henares who established a reputation in media as an unyielding tax-evader-buster. It is now revealed that she is the lawyer of the big-time tax evader firm “Dunkin’ Donuts,” a company owned by no less than the Philippine Daily Inquirer’s Chairperson, Marixi Rufino-Prieto. No wonder that mainstream media could cast Kim into the image of a tough and clean revenue collector, despite her inability to meet targets.
To make up for collection deficiencies, the Department of Finance illegally transferred public trust funds by the billions, such as the coco levy funds, which the Supreme Court ordered put in escrow with either the Development Bank of the Philippines, the Land Bank or the UCPB. Showing absolutely no respect for Supreme Court orders, the government hauled off billions of coco levy trust funds into the uncertainties and vulnerabilities of the General Fund and shamelessly bragged about the sudden increase in government revenues, preparatory, many feared, to their being used for the coming elections. Farmers’ organizations rushed to the Supreme Court in a Petition for Prohibition, which was speedily granted but with no real guarantee that the government will obey the Court at last and show the world some adherence to the Rule of Law.
And quite shamelessly, too, the DSWD (social welfare department) would even attempt to use part of the coco levy trust funds to add to their cash distributions known as CCT or conditional cash transfers. And yet, in its 2014 audit report, the CoA said that P382 million in local and foreign cash donations for Yolanda victims, representing a third of the P1.15 billion that the DSWD received, remained in the agency’s bank accounts. Who was collecting the interest earnings? The CoA report also said the DSWD failed to distribute P141 million worth of family food packs for the typhoon victims, leading to the spoilage of the perishable goods. Is all this ineptitude or plain corruption or both?
Many had long suspected something crooked with PNoy’s “straight path” (Daang Matuwid) propaganda line. But they were always careful not to mar the memory of Ninoy, if not also of Cory too. The ineptitude at Luneta would immediately be matched by the corruption in the unseating of Supreme Court Chief Justice Corona when he unabashedly bought up the lower house for an impeachment and the senate for a conviction. Yolanda came and one thought that this was it – nothing could be worse than this, until the incredible Mamasapano, and, as well, the revelation that the BBL or Bangsamoro Basic Law (draft) was not only about Peace but about many pieces of silver and gold.
This is why it is so significant that the Obama administration has rejected a discreet request from President Aquino for $300 million in military aid. The US seems clearly worried about corruption and the government’s competence to manage the influx of resources.
It was the New York Times, which reported that the request had been made in private talks wherein the Philippines argued the need for a substantial buildup of planes and ships to deter Chinese expansionism.
To repeat: it was the Obama administration, not some local Philippine rival, complaining about corruption in the PNoy administration. In other words, the US government was making a hard-nosed assessment of the state of governance under PNoy—and the verdict was quite negative indeed.
Thirdly, the moral and military pillars of society are quite unhappy with PNoy governance. Earlier this month, the Manila Times adopted for its editorial the first anniversary statement by moral leaders in the National Transformation Council of their historic “Lipa declaration.” And they said, “one year after the Lipa declaration, we have to ask, is there anything we said in Lipa and in all the other assemblies, that now appears to have been in error, or in excess of our constitutional, moral and patriotic concerns?
“Have we unfairly and unjustly condemned the Aquino administration, and misread our people’s capability to stand for our Constitution and the dignity and honor of the nation?
No, we have not. The Aquino administration has not shown the slightest desire to do penance for its grievous wrongs, and mend its ways. As it approaches the end of its borrowed time, it has shown no effort, and no desire, to conduct a clean, honest and credible election, nor to prosecute those who have debased the rule of law and the constitutional order and ripped off the coffers of the nation.
“The apparent game plan is still to manipulate the 2016 presidential election through the Commission on Elections and its Venezuelan partner, Smartmatic, in order to ensure the continued plunder of the economy, the continued destruction of all our institutions and the continued exploitation of our political system.
In their effort to make the regime accountable to the Constitution and the rule of law, some members and friends of the National Transformation Council asked the Supreme Court to “declare void and unconstitutional the Framework Agreement on the Bangsamoro (FAB) and the Comprehensive Agreement on the Bangsamoro (FAB) through which some false friends of the Republic in the name of a bogus peace seek to balkanize Mindanao.”
They have also asked the High Court “to stop the illegal and massive realignment of public funds which would allow Smartmatic and the Comelec to control without any accountability the next elections.
To end the administration’s unilateral exercise of impunity, they filed (on August 27) “a mandamus suit against the President, the Ombudsman, the Budget Secretary, the Justice Secretary, the Senate President, the Speaker of the House, the senators and congressmen, the heads of various agencies, and all those involved in the misuse and abuse of the P50-billion Disbursement Acceleration Program (DAP), which the Supreme Court has declared unconstitutional.
Their faith in our highest court remains strong and unimpeachable, “but we fear that even if the court should act favorably upon all our petitions, such action may not be sufficient to end the evil that now envelops the system. So we must be prepared to do more. We have been told that Mr. Aquino has less than one year to stay in power, and that we should be patient and wait for the next administration to take over.
“But just as it took just one tiny moment to issue the order that led to the bribery and total corruption of Congress and the removal of the Supreme Court Chief Justice, and to the Mamasapano Massacre, it would not take much longer for Mr. Aquino to commit our poorly equipped troops into an unwanted, needless and ruinous war at the West Philippine/South China Sea, or to completely hijack the next election, if in his judgment that could “save” him and his friends from any and all imagined peril.
“We pray to Almighty God, in whose hands we put the nation’s safety and well being, that nothing like this would ever happen. But given what we have been through these last five years, we cannot afford any undue risks at this time. Mr. Aquino must step down. More than ever we need a caretaker government, now.”
Two weeks or less after the moral leaders said their piece, retired highly influential military leaders took an ad in the Philippine Daily Inquirer to manifest to all and sundry their clear and strong support for the nation’s moral leaders.
“WE, RETIRED OFFICERS from the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP), the Philippine National Police (PNP), the Philippine Coast Guard (PCG), the Bureau of Fire Protection (BFP), the Bureau of Jail Management and Penology (BJMP), reservists and veterans express:
- our great apprehension and alarm over the Framework Agreement and the Comprehensive Agreement (FAB and CAB) forged with the rebel Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) by the Executive Department of the Government;
- our opposition to the passage of the Bangsamoro Basic Law (BBL), in its original form, even as it now undergoes congressional scrutiny.
“AS VETERANS of the long campaign against Moro insurgency and terrorism, and as stakeholders in the nation’s future, we have experienced the sacrificial demands of war and all its horrors, and we realize the need for all Filipinos to be united against any threat, internal and external, that will dismember our nation, degrade our sovereignty and violate the Philippine Constitution.
“WE KEEP IN MIND that as a nation, united but ethno-culturally diverse, we can be strong and progressive only if we live and work together in peace, good faith and harmony, condemning war and strife as abhorrent but never shirking from our responsibility to defend our national interests and preserve our core values as one people.”
Then, in very strong words their manifesto read:
“WE KNOW NOW that the present administration has been so obsessed with putting an end to the conflict in Muslim Mindanao that its peace panel had given extraordinary concessions as demanded by the rebel group, apparently to achieve peace at any price, in a settlement coaxed chiefly by Malaysian facilitators, with advice from foreign intervenors, and thereby producing the FAB, and the CAB and the draft BBL that will implement these two agreements.
WITH MEANINGFUL CONTRIBUTIONS from civic groups and resource persons including many retired senior military and police commanders who were involved in solving the Mindanao problem and invited precisely for their deep knowledge and firsthand experience, we have AGREED that the FAB, the CAB, and the BBL (in its original form) are seriously flawed in that they:
1. violate the Constitution;
2. seek to establish a political entity which has all the makings of a state (people, definite territory, independence or sovereignty, and government) and which has the effect of creating an “imperium in imperio” (state within the state);
3. insidiously undermine national security;
4. wrongly presume the rebel MILF to be the representative of the major stakeholders, such as the Sultanate of Sulu, the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF), Lumads or indigenous people, Christians, etc. and;
5. grievously failed to provide very clear terms of demobilization of the MILF forces and the decommissioning of all types of weaponry in its control and possession, in relation to the grant by Government of numerous economic benefits, powers and privileges and possible immunity from charges against its members.
WE have CONCLUDED that the implementation of these crafty agreements is in reality:
1. an express trip to the dismemberment of this country’s territory and creation of a Moro state in Mindanao as well as;
2. presaging not the much-hoped-for lasting peace and robust socio-economic growth of Mindanao but the renewal of organized violence and horrendous destruction of life and property.
WE HEREBY MANIFEST:
“Our unsullied SUPPORT for and re-affirmation of the PHILCONSA petition to the Supreme Court to declare the FAB and the CAB unconstitutional and to void and prevent their implementation, as well as to related actions of various entities and individuals being taken against the FAB, CAB, and BBL (in its original form), or to any move or measure that would prevent these three instruments from materializing.
Our view is that for peace – peace durable and balanced, peace with justice and honor, peace for all regardless of cultural differences – to be able to descend to Muslim Mindanao so that socio-economic development can set in, any agreement or legislation that may be crafted for the purpose must perforce proceed from the nation’s trust and confidence in the good faith and sincerity of ALL stakeholders in the peace process, not only the MILF.
OUR CONVICTION that to be able to restore the people’s trust and confidence, the MILF must show that, despite Mamasapano, it can indeed be trusted, and this can be done by including provisions in any ensuing peace agreement or legislation that maybe made which expresses explicitly, in no disputable terms, that:
1. the political entity, to be called Bangsamoro Autonomous Region, is a constituent part of the Republic of the Philippines;
2. it renounces its policy of separatism and goal of independence;
3. under an internationally supervised decommissioning process and within six months after an agreement has been ratified;
(a) it undertakes to decommission all its combat elements with all their weapons removed for eventual destruction;µ
(b) dismantle their command structure, training facilities, and communications systems;
(c) cease to wear military uniforms; and
(d) be re-integrated into the mainstream of society to live the life of civilian citizens; and
it respects and subscribes to the Constitution of the Republic of the Philippines.
Done in Quezon City, Philippines on September 11, 2015.
LGen. Edilberto P. Adan (Ret.) Chairman and President, Association of Generals and Flag Officers (AGFO) Inc.
Commo. Amado A. Sanglay (Ret.) Chairman, National ROTC Alumni Assn. (NARAA) Inc.
LGen. Raul S. Urgello (Ret.) Chairman and President, KAMPILAN Inc.
RAdm. Tagumpay R. Jardiniano (Ret.) Former Flag Officer-in-Command, Philippine Navy
VAdm. Eduardo Ma. R. Santos (Ret.) Former Flag-Officer-In-Command, Philippine Navy
MGen. Melchor Rosales (Ret.) President, PMA Alumni Assn. Business, Industry and Retired Chapter Inc. (BIRCI)
Commo. Rogelio A. Dayan (Ret.) Philippine Navy
Commo. Vicente Buenaventura (Ret.) Philippine Navy
BGen. Miguel C. Sol. (Ret.) President, The Fraternal Organization of ROTC Reservists and Veterans (FORVETS) Inc.
BGen. Michaelangelo Siscar (Ret.) President, GHQ Chapter National ROTC Alumni Association Inc. (NARAA)
Gen. Renato S. De Villa (Ret.) Chairman, Filipino War Veterans’ Foundation (FILVETS) Inc.
PDir. Van Luspo (Ret.) Chairman and President Phil National Police Retirees Assn. Inc.
BGen. Emiliano D. Templo (Ret.) Fomer Chief, Civil Relations Service AFP
BGen. Rodrigo B. Gutang (Ret.) Founder and Chairman, Veteran Generals and Flag Officers Federation
PDGen. Umberto A. Rodriguez (Ret.) Former Chief, Philippine National Police
BGen. Ismael F. Musico (Ret.) Chairman, Cavaliers 57 Inc.
MGen. Guillermo Ruiz (Ret.) Former Commandant, Philippine Marines
BGen. Danilo D. Lim (Ret.) RAM Foundation Inc.
Col. Manuel Ramiro (Ret.) President, Phil Air Force Chapter National ROTC AlumniAssociation (NARAA) Inc.
PDDGen. Agerico N. Kagaoan (Ret.) Philippine National Police
Col. Noli P. Espejo (Ret.) Chairman, Phil. Military Academy Alumni Assn. Inc. (PMAAAI)
Gen. Generoso S. Senga (Ret.) Former Chief of Staff, AFP
Gen. Alexander Yano (Ret.) Former Chief of Staff, AFP
Gen. Efren L. Abu (Ret.) Former Chief of Staff, AFP
Gen. Dionisio Santiago (Ret.) Former Chief of Staff, AFP
LGen. Alfredo L. Filler (Ret.) Former Vice Chief of Staff AFP
MGen. Jose Magno Jr. (Ret.) Former Commander, CENCOM and SOUTHCOM AFP
Col. Cesar Pobre (Ret.) Ph.D. Former Dean College of ProfessorsPhilippine Military Academy
Commo. Liberato L. Lazo (Ret.) President, Kapisanan ng Kawal Mindanao
Commo. Carlos L. Agustin (Ret.) President, Philippine Defense and Armed Forces Attaché Assn.
Col. Ramon Resultay (Ret.) President, The Last Watering Hole Inc.
I fully concur with what was articulated by AGFO.”
Are the gardeners who have seen the tell-tale signs exaggerating? Only time will tell – and quite soon enough.
FINIS
[1] See the formal statement at the website of the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights
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