fm tribune.net.ph Filipinos are bleeding Written by Larry Faraon Sunday, 08 September 2013 08:00 On Sept. 11, Wednesday the vicinity of Edsa shall come alive with the “Edsa Tayo” rally. The Filipinos are hurting. Commencing with the Million March two weeks ago, the planned protest gathering promises to generate more warm bodies and heated up spirits calling for a more determined and sweeping abolition of the diabolic system of the Priority Development Assistance Fund or the pork barrel. The Filipinos’ wounds are beginning to bleed profusely. Unfortunately, it would seem however that the horns of this present administration’s insensitivity to what pains the Filipino have been showing in mismanaging the pork barrel issue. The red carpet welcome of the Mrs. Janet Napoles’ surrender in Malacañang was just for starters and complemented with the president himself escorting Napoles to the suspect’s lair in Camp Crame. Taking immense flak on the un-presidential gesture, the president stepped into his usual flair of blind items in hitting at his own men and forged an escape by mocking the men of the National Bureau of Investigation as “smelling rats,” prompting NBI director Nonatus Rojas to take the cudgels of gallantry by resigning irrevocably. In his mind, the NBI compromised the safety of the Napoles and therefore the highest executive officer of the country should take responsibility! The Filipinos are beginning to smell the stench of a possible fractional cover up of the pork scam, a selective diffusion of a bombshell that could explode right at the faces of the administration itself and party mates if not strewn beforehand. The Palace slip shows off almost consistently, when for instance the Malacañang soundboards would unabashedly exonerate their colleagues with any involvement in the pork scam as they did with Department of Interion and Local Government Secretary Mar Roxas who according the Commission on Audit findings cannot be immaculate in his pork barrel allocations or with Executive Secretary Jojo Ochoa’s clearance from the Department of Justice Secretary herself who doubles as a Cabinet secretary and a national prosecutor herself. Furthermore, the Senate hearings started wheeling with less speed as usual with the grueling documentation and innuendoes of the senators like airplanes landing on nowhere runways. There is already a lackluster disposition brewing among the Filipinos willing to forego the Senate hearings, articulating their loss of hope of pinning down the real guilt on the real culprits — a sentiment common among whistle-blowers in the past. The cyclical pattern of the Senate drab is causing the Filipino psyche an impatience that mirrors his dwindling spirit and faith in whatever societal system there is in this country. The pain may not be tortuous but it is definitely pricking the almost spent spirit of the Filipino. Immediately after the expose of the pork barrel scam, cyclone “Maring” took its deadly and damaging toll on the poor Filipinos who gnashed their teeth in anger over the corrupted monies that should have alleviated their plights. The figures of endless “zeroes” landing in the pockets of the corrupt and avaricious instead of the meal tables of the poor and marginalized further exposed the gaping wounds of the Filipino soul. And as if to add insult to injury, there went Bureau of Internal Revenue’s Kim Henares digging into the taxes unpaid by professionals including manicurists in order to increase revenues at a time when the Filipinos are about to abandon the duty in the face of multi-billion dollar question, “Where do our taxes go?” And more recently, together with the unscrupulous business partners of government who hid under the Napoles’ skirt and issue raised the prices of rice and gasoline in the dead of the night. The Filipinos are definitely deeply wounded. The organizers of this “Edsa Tayo” march may not be dreaming of another Edsa revolution on Sept. 11, but definitely blood would spill, not with violence but from the wounds gaping and blood dripping and drenching the already fragile spirit of the Filipino. So where do we go from here?
Posted on: Sun, 08 Sep 2013 12:34:13 +0000
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