HE FINALLY OWNS UP TO IT
September 6th 2010 00:00
Picture taken from live broadcast of ABS-CBN TV News program
As Chief Executive of the Philippines Government, he finally owns up to it. I am referring to President Noynoy Aquino who, when questions about the performance of some members of his cabinet came up, said that ultimately the blame on the bus hostage taking fiasco near the Quirino Grandstand that killed 8 Hongkong tourists rests on him.
Those are brave words, but those are hardly enough. This is the president who one Filipino columnist described before the May 2010 election as the candidate who’s “only remarkable achievement as a politician was his unremarkable achievements” – or words to that effect.
To me, he is still just a son of two considered heroes of this republic who may have been mistaken by 15 million Filipinos as a prince and therefore should be an heir to the throne. Well, he promised an ideal government and he won the election.
The Hopeless Romantic in me thinks he is not doing very badly. At least he is keeping the dreams of Filipinos for a better government. But dreams like that, to be truly meaningful, have to become reality. You don’t make dreams like that become reality by committing blunders upon blunders in your decisions.
So far, he issued an executive order (his first) revoking “all midnight appointments” by his predecessor. Then, almost immediately after the issuance, Malacanang amended that EO (effectively revoking his own EO) because they realized they will paralyze a large part of the government machinery if they removed all the midnight appointees.
To set an example against tax evaders, the government filed a case against a businessman who supposedly owns a chain of pawnshops who cannot pay taxes but who can buy a Ferrari. This was a widely publicized move which the President even mentioned in his first State Of the Nation Address (SONA). Then, in an equally widely publicized statement, the real owner of the chain of pawnshops said he is not the businessman being charged! It was in fact his brother who has nothing to do with the operation of the pawnshops and who has already divested his interests in the business a long time ago who was being charged.
Malacanang issued a Memorandum Order (MO) on another matter and that too was rescinded pretty fast, etc.
Then, the deaths of the Hongkong tourists came.
Dang, man! Jackie Chan, the Chinese Karate movie idol, was criticized by some his own countrymen for seeing the real picture on that bungled bus hostage taking rescue effort and for commenting on it.
For me, it was like, whoa! From celluloid to real life hero!
And here we are, we have a real life President who seems to be just acting out his true-to-life role!
Okay, maybe I am being a bit too harsh, but sir, we need to get serious here!
As it turns out, this country is not really without an expert on hostage taking incidents. Just days after that fateful evening near the Quirino Grandstand a Filipino officer, who had trainings with FBI on handling hostage crisis situations, came out on television making comments on what happened?
And there are better trained “special forces” or whatever you call them… within the Philippine Military and National Police force.
I mean, where in the world were these people when the hostage taking incident was taking place? Couldn’t a man, who has full authority over both the police and the military and the whole national civilian government, have located experts within all those organizations under him to handle the situation?
Maybe the answer to this lies on the man.
Reports said the head of the Department of Interior and Local Government (an awardee on public service), at the very least, should have taken control of the situation. But he couldn’t have because the President kept him out of the loop and sent another guy.
WE don’t have much choice, he will be President of this country for the next six 6 years. I hope Mr. Aquino and the whole new dispensation get out of their illusory lives, shape up and do something good – for real!
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Comment by Anonymous
You can imagine what we foreigners think about the whole incident from the sight of his brother being arrested as the kidnapper was watching TV to the wrong bodies in the wrong coffins when they arived in HK.
I had in interesting conversation with a group of filpino friends of mine two days ago.
I pointed out that healthy democracy does not get landslide elections bery often and that the fact that the landslide was here with it's semi educated massa electorate made it even more likely that the Presient although a good man would be a bad choice as leading any country is incredibly difficult but this one impossible. It was the semi evil in Gloria's personality that made here are relatively successful cycnial president.
The Filipino's, two of them businessmen said they were not investing right now for they were going to wait and see if any more taxes went up. Note Noynoy's no new taxes promise and then vat on toll roads swiftly applied and they questioned his judgement on taking his car as well as other laeding politicans their's and sitting in the traffic.Itt may look good but it is dysfunctional. Classic Filpino sentiment before rational judgment.
The other who works for the UN pointed out that the former leader of the SWAT team was getting texts from friendns all over the world, saying where are you and what are you doing. His answer - politics has moved him inside, and so we saw a farce of incompetence leading to deaths and this countries reputation once again in disrepute and many countries across the world issuing travel advisories against coming here.
Plus ca change!
Comment by Anonymous
You can guess what we foreigners think from the time he saw his brother arrested to the wrong body labelling delivered in HK. It was a shameful farce.
I had an interesting conversation on the subject with Filipino frends over the weekend.
I pointed out that electoral landslides are rarely a good thing and here even worse, for it's all sentiment.
Two of them both businessmen are not investing becuase they don't trust Aquino's judgement whether following up a no new taxes promise with new vat on tollroads or politicians now sitting in traffic, so even less is getting done.
The other who works for the UN said that the former SWAT leader has been moved aside due to - Politics, and so once again a bad decision has been made for the wrong reason and has led to a very bad outcome indeed
Comment by Market Newbie
Gizmo Peek
Stock Market Punk
You have a good point about landslide victories. Really sad isn't it? Especially given the way things have resulted so far.
Thanks for the comment.
Comment by Market Newbie
Gizmo Peek
Stock Market Punk
You have a good point about landslide victories. Really sad isn't it? Especially given the way things have resulted so far.
Thanks for the comment.