FORGET the limp assertion of Press Secretary Ignacio Bunye that among those who attended the Malaca?ang-assembled Council of State meeting, there was a “ratio of 4:1” against the idea of the 2007 election being scrapped (the Zimbabwe model?).
Or even the bolder claim of the increasingly marginalized former President Fidel Ramos that 99 percent of those present batted for next year’s electoral exercise to push through—and eventually make way for a parliamentary system (French model?)
The plain fact is that the 2007 election campaign kicked off on Friday when an assortment of politicians risked life and limb to scramble on board the float of the arriving Filipino sporting idol Manny Pacquiao and not so much rain as piss on his victory parade.
This should have been the people’s moment with their beloved Manny. But instead they had to put up with the odious sight of politicians—with 2007 very much on their minds—impudently milking the occasion for all its worth.
It was a grotesque display of political opportunism as a full contact sport, shamelessly violating the space of this great Filipino returning to receive the acclaim and adulation of his adoring public.
With Pacquiao now back among his nearest and dearest in his hometown of General Santos City in South Cotabato, we fervently hope that someone with his welfare genuinely at heart caution the boxing hero on what political sins await to be committed in his innocent name.
——————————————————————————–
One surprise development to come out of the Council of State meeting was news of the designation of newly retired Chief Justice Hilario Davide Jr. as presidential adviser on electoral reforms.
But our information is that the appointment is just a stop-gap measure—the Palace having actually given Davide a time frame of 60 days to come up with a report (though the conventional wisdom is that the initiative which would achieve the desired effect in one fell swoop would be the sacking of the entire bunch of current Comelec commissioners).
The Department of Foreign Affairs is buzzing—much to the consternation of career officers—with talk that Davide is being lined up to be the next Philippine permanent representative to the United Nations.
With the Supreme Court blessed round of farewell parties for Davide now over and done with, and with the revered erstwhile CJ being lined up for dutiful post-retirement employment, congressmen are hoping that the High Court can now give its undivided attention to ruling on the contentious Executive Order 464, which forbids government officials from appearing before congressional hearings without the consent of the Palace.
Tattle on the legal circuit is that the tight schedules of the justices were unduly stretched of late by the need to spend time brushing up on the delicate footwork for the rigodon that they so gracefully performed at Davide’s farewell bash.
Incidentally, an administration senator who was present at last week’s Council of State gathering was asked that same night at a diplomatic dinner for his take on Davide’s appointment.
“Ah,” he ventured with a knowing smile, “Davide is still looking for his proper page in history.”
——————————————————————————–
Watching an opposition lawmaker ranting and raving last week about the rampant corruption in the Bureau of Customs was rich indeed.
For many of these very same monosyllabic characters from Binondo (though their new?found roots are more in the elegantly gated villages of Makati City) that he was going on and on about were allegedly firmly in his pocket in the not-too-distant past.
Those were the days when another monosyllabic character (currently languishing in a jail in the States while deportation proceedings are under way) who was very much in the then Palace loop of influence would break away from dinner parties to wearily field calls from some Pagcor casino or other and confirm that he would bankroll the huge losses that the opposition lawmaker in question was running up on a nightly basis at the gambling tables.
