TOPIC: Sorry Yellow?
Guests: Charito Planas, Former Vice Mayor (Quezon City) and Jose Linggoy Alcuaz, Former NTC Commissioner
[PART 1]
[PART 2]
[PART 3]
Wednesday, March 9, 2011
Monday, March 7, 2011
A Trojan horse
DIE HARD III
Herman Tiu Laurel
3/7/2011
Ten years ago, a professional civil servant from the Commission on Audit (CoA) named Agustin Chan was in the thick of investigating a P224-million anomaly in a special fund earmarked for the tobacco industry. The trail that led to the northern provinces became his basis for issuing “tracers” or demands for government officials who were directly responsible to answer his queries.
In particular, he wrote the Ilocos Sur provincial accountant on Sept. 4, 2001 for a listing of expenditures charged against the fund for that year, as provided for by Republic Act 7171. But even before that, he already raised the matter in April 2001 to the governor of the province who usually got the biggest allocation, Chavit Singson, to liquidate P124 million in accumulated cash advances or be made liable for “malversation of public funds.”
Six months later, CoA auditor Chan and his driver Alex Recacho were ambushed and killed along the national highway, in Sitio Baoay, Barangay Paing, Bantay, Ilocos Sur. Neither the Yellows, in “civil society” or academe, nor the institutional Catholic Church ever let off a squeak to denounce these twin murders.
Fast forward 10 years: March 3, 2011, Ateneo de Manila. A religious mass cum candle-lighting ceremony was held at the Church of the Gesù with white robed participants and melodramatic chorale evoking a sanctified (or sanctimonious) air to honor “whistle-blower” Heidi Mendoza who testified on the massive corruption in the AFP (Armed Forces of the Philippines).
Since her testimony a few weeks ago, a teleserye-like atmosphere has unfolded, with heart-wrenching cries and spiels (a la ZTE-NBN crybaby Jun Lozada), along with nuns and priests “securing” her, a dramatic backstory of her resigning from a “corrupt government,” peppered with “public clamor” for her to return because “her children asked her to,” and then, an offer of the CoA chairmanship from the President, to which Mendoza was quoted to have said, “I won’t give him a hard time (convincing me).” Wow naman, how cute!
Yet what is the reason for this blatant double standard in civil society’s treatment of one CoA auditor over another? Here, I am not only comparing the Jesuit institution’s treatment of Agustin Chan to their darling today but to many others also killed in the line of duty, such as State Auditor IV Anita Gallito, head of the CoA Unit at the Education Department’s Division Office in Tandag, Surigao del Sur, who was gunned down in front of her home in Tago town.
These killings of Chan and Gallito shocked the audit community; but there never was a quip from “civil society.” Neither has the Ateneo nor its affiliates, such as its School of Government, given due credit to those who first raised and exposed the AFP corruption issue and started it all — the Bagong Katipuneros (a.k.a. Magdalos). Why is it that all the accolades seem reserved only for the Ateneo and civil society’s “darling?”
Weeks before the “Mendoza-as-CoA chairman” drama aired, our “investigator” Oliver already alerted us to the “plot” to appoint Mendoza. At the time, no one had the dimmest idea of that yet, as media were not even aware of the then CoA Chairman Reynaldo Villar’s avowed legal battle to stay on in his post.
Oliver attributed the push for Heidi Mendoza’s elevation to the “usual forces that wish to privatize government functions,” i.e. the same people who pushed for Swiss firm SGS to take over Customs functions and for Vitaliano Nañagas to be appointed as chairman of the Social Security System (SSS) in 2001 to privatize the fund, only to be deposed by SSS employees. He then cited the grapevine’s report of a foreign private company expected to be subcontracted for CoA’s financial audit functions in the event of a Mendoza appointment.
I remained skeptical until I heard American gofer Harvey Keh of the Ateneo School of Government at the Ciudad Fernandina Kapihan, floating Mendoza’s name for the chairmanship of the CoA. Coming from Keh, who represents an institution that has spawned quite a number of apologists for the likes of CodeNGO, this is another sure sign of foreign interests at play.
Make no mistake: Heidi Mendoza is an asset from SGV, a breeding ground of corporate operators such as the Hyatt 10’s Cesar Purisima (who wants to restore SGS to Customs). And just as it was for Cory Aquino since Edsa I, Gloria Arroyo in 2001, and now, Aquino III, Heidi is being made out to be another “gift from God” by the Yellows.
However, 25 years of Cory’s legacy and 200 days of Aquino III have only shown that “gifts from God” do not necessarily deliver heaven on earth. There have been and there are many more heroic public servants whom the Ateneo, the Jesuits, the nuns, and civil society have inequitably and inexplicably never sought to give due respect to, and more whistle-blowers than they have ever reached out to help, such as the late Sammy Ong (who exposed Hello Garci), anti-jueteng witness Sandra Cam, along with Jose Barredo and Dante Madriaga of the fertilizer fund and ZTE-NBN scams, respectively.
Given the record of these Yellows and their patrons in giving the Filipino nation such “gifts from God,” we should henceforth be wary of another one. After all the hype surrounding the conferment of “sainthood” to the Yellows’ icon, the Filipino people are almost certain to open the gates of their hearts again — this time, to another Trojan horse — only to regret it a little too late.
(Tune in to Sulo ng Pilipino, Monday, Wednesday and Friday, 6 to 7 p.m. on 1098AM; TNT with HTL, Tuesday, 8 to 9 p.m., with replay at 11 p.m., on GNN, Destiny Cable Channel 8, on “Cuba, Venezuela on the Libyan Crisis” with Ambassadors Juan Carlos Arencibia and Manuel Perez Iturbe; visit http://newkatipunero.blogspot.com for our select radio and GNN shows)
Herman Tiu Laurel
3/7/2011
Ten years ago, a professional civil servant from the Commission on Audit (CoA) named Agustin Chan was in the thick of investigating a P224-million anomaly in a special fund earmarked for the tobacco industry. The trail that led to the northern provinces became his basis for issuing “tracers” or demands for government officials who were directly responsible to answer his queries.
In particular, he wrote the Ilocos Sur provincial accountant on Sept. 4, 2001 for a listing of expenditures charged against the fund for that year, as provided for by Republic Act 7171. But even before that, he already raised the matter in April 2001 to the governor of the province who usually got the biggest allocation, Chavit Singson, to liquidate P124 million in accumulated cash advances or be made liable for “malversation of public funds.”
Six months later, CoA auditor Chan and his driver Alex Recacho were ambushed and killed along the national highway, in Sitio Baoay, Barangay Paing, Bantay, Ilocos Sur. Neither the Yellows, in “civil society” or academe, nor the institutional Catholic Church ever let off a squeak to denounce these twin murders.
Fast forward 10 years: March 3, 2011, Ateneo de Manila. A religious mass cum candle-lighting ceremony was held at the Church of the Gesù with white robed participants and melodramatic chorale evoking a sanctified (or sanctimonious) air to honor “whistle-blower” Heidi Mendoza who testified on the massive corruption in the AFP (Armed Forces of the Philippines).
Since her testimony a few weeks ago, a teleserye-like atmosphere has unfolded, with heart-wrenching cries and spiels (a la ZTE-NBN crybaby Jun Lozada), along with nuns and priests “securing” her, a dramatic backstory of her resigning from a “corrupt government,” peppered with “public clamor” for her to return because “her children asked her to,” and then, an offer of the CoA chairmanship from the President, to which Mendoza was quoted to have said, “I won’t give him a hard time (convincing me).” Wow naman, how cute!
Yet what is the reason for this blatant double standard in civil society’s treatment of one CoA auditor over another? Here, I am not only comparing the Jesuit institution’s treatment of Agustin Chan to their darling today but to many others also killed in the line of duty, such as State Auditor IV Anita Gallito, head of the CoA Unit at the Education Department’s Division Office in Tandag, Surigao del Sur, who was gunned down in front of her home in Tago town.
These killings of Chan and Gallito shocked the audit community; but there never was a quip from “civil society.” Neither has the Ateneo nor its affiliates, such as its School of Government, given due credit to those who first raised and exposed the AFP corruption issue and started it all — the Bagong Katipuneros (a.k.a. Magdalos). Why is it that all the accolades seem reserved only for the Ateneo and civil society’s “darling?”
Weeks before the “Mendoza-as-CoA chairman” drama aired, our “investigator” Oliver already alerted us to the “plot” to appoint Mendoza. At the time, no one had the dimmest idea of that yet, as media were not even aware of the then CoA Chairman Reynaldo Villar’s avowed legal battle to stay on in his post.
Oliver attributed the push for Heidi Mendoza’s elevation to the “usual forces that wish to privatize government functions,” i.e. the same people who pushed for Swiss firm SGS to take over Customs functions and for Vitaliano Nañagas to be appointed as chairman of the Social Security System (SSS) in 2001 to privatize the fund, only to be deposed by SSS employees. He then cited the grapevine’s report of a foreign private company expected to be subcontracted for CoA’s financial audit functions in the event of a Mendoza appointment.
I remained skeptical until I heard American gofer Harvey Keh of the Ateneo School of Government at the Ciudad Fernandina Kapihan, floating Mendoza’s name for the chairmanship of the CoA. Coming from Keh, who represents an institution that has spawned quite a number of apologists for the likes of CodeNGO, this is another sure sign of foreign interests at play.
Make no mistake: Heidi Mendoza is an asset from SGV, a breeding ground of corporate operators such as the Hyatt 10’s Cesar Purisima (who wants to restore SGS to Customs). And just as it was for Cory Aquino since Edsa I, Gloria Arroyo in 2001, and now, Aquino III, Heidi is being made out to be another “gift from God” by the Yellows.
However, 25 years of Cory’s legacy and 200 days of Aquino III have only shown that “gifts from God” do not necessarily deliver heaven on earth. There have been and there are many more heroic public servants whom the Ateneo, the Jesuits, the nuns, and civil society have inequitably and inexplicably never sought to give due respect to, and more whistle-blowers than they have ever reached out to help, such as the late Sammy Ong (who exposed Hello Garci), anti-jueteng witness Sandra Cam, along with Jose Barredo and Dante Madriaga of the fertilizer fund and ZTE-NBN scams, respectively.
Given the record of these Yellows and their patrons in giving the Filipino nation such “gifts from God,” we should henceforth be wary of another one. After all the hype surrounding the conferment of “sainthood” to the Yellows’ icon, the Filipino people are almost certain to open the gates of their hearts again — this time, to another Trojan horse — only to regret it a little too late.
(Tune in to Sulo ng Pilipino, Monday, Wednesday and Friday, 6 to 7 p.m. on 1098AM; TNT with HTL, Tuesday, 8 to 9 p.m., with replay at 11 p.m., on GNN, Destiny Cable Channel 8, on “Cuba, Venezuela on the Libyan Crisis” with Ambassadors Juan Carlos Arencibia and Manuel Perez Iturbe; visit http://newkatipunero.blogspot.com for our select radio and GNN shows)
It's the Anglo-U.S. con game, stupid
INFOWARS
Herman Tiu Laurel
6/2/2008
The country is up in arms against the Lopezes for the swindle of people's hard earned money for astoundingly overpriced electricity, with much of it never delivered. Meantime, some well-meaning citizens and consumer advocates who are siding with Winston Garcia, unknowingly perpetrate a grand deception to merely transfer Meralco to Arroyo's cronies, even with just the false hope of negligible power rate reductions in mind. And while a church leader says government is "not known as a good businessman," this, too, wrongly implies that it's better to make power a commodity for profit instead of a tool for public service. The real culprits in the exorbitant power prices in the Philippines—the Anglo-U.S. overlords, along with their predatory policies, which are enforced on us through corrupt leaders they help install—are escaping scrutiny in the cacophony of acrimonious debate and propaganda.
That is why a few clarifications are in order.
First of all, privatized electricity is without a doubt higher in cost than publicly owned and operated electricity. The reason is simple: the profit factor pushes up the price automatically. Add deregulation to privatization then you have a money juggernaut gone amuck, as what had happened with Enron in 2001 by way of artificial power shortages to jack up rates. If the Bible points to money as the root of all evil, then by syllogistic consequence, making electricity a commodity for money-making rather than a service for the public good now makes it the root of the Meralco and IPP-PPA evil, bedeviling the Filipino people. Not surprisingly, the idea of privatizing electricity originated from England and the U.S., with Thatcher, Reagan and Bush, Enron, Bechtel, etc.
Second, the Lopezes admitted that it faced financial collapse in the first quarter of the 1970's. The Lopezes were forced to seek government's bail-out, the two biggest factors were: (a) the peso devaluation that crippled Meralco, which had huge obligations to its U.S. benefactors and international banks (led by IMF-WB), all denominated in dollars; and (b) the sudden, inordinate rise in the world price of oil, which was the main fuel of its power plants at that time. These two are undoubtedly within the purview of the Anglo-U.S. powers to manipulate to their advantage, which is why in today's oil price hike, 60 percent is attributed to oil trade speculation in cahoots with banks. The same thing happened from 1971 to 1973, when they triggered the 6-Day Arab-Israeli War and oil price spikes, down to their conspiracy with OPEC and the Saudis to recycle petro-dollars through Third World debt entrapments.
Since time immemorial, exchange rates are manipulated to the advantage of the U.S. The decline in today's dollar, for instance, is due to the controlled depreciation the U.S. hopes will stem its imports, promote domestic production and push its exports all over the world. Thus, we can see U.S. Chevy's and Fords in the Philippine market again in numbers not seen since the 1960's. But it still hasn't worked effectively since China has not revalued as the U.S. wants.
The Lopezes were bankrupted by the peso devaluation of the 1970's, in the same way that Napocor's debts ballooned after the 1997 Asian Financial Crisis. Napocor was laden with dollar obligations from Ramos' IPP contracts, including the supply of oil and coal for IPPs. Thus, it was a devastating triple whammy for Napocor: the dollar doubled in value, its profitable power plants and markets were privatized, and its fuel supply contracts rose in cost.
Third, in the 1992-93 Philippine power crisis, Meralco signed a long-term supply contract with Napocor to ensure a steady, cheap power supply for distribution to its six-million customers. At that time Royal Dutch Shell and Texaco were already jumpstarting the Malampaya offshore natural gas platform and needed to ensure their market. So Ramos intervened to broker the natural gas IPPs, which the Lopezes gleefully accepted even if it had to renege on its contract with Napocor as there was more money to be made that way. But then, Meralco simply had to conspire with Gloria to have the penalties for violating the supply contract with Napocor, a whopping P52 billion, passed on to consumers. Only opposition from the likes of this writer, FDC and Nasecore stopped it.
Fourth, what Royal Dutch Shell, IMF-WB, the oil giants, Wall Street and the Washington-London axis want, they get. With Gloria's imprimatur, imagine them indexing the low-cost natural gas for electricity to high priced diesel, which we are only beginning to discover through probes into the Malampaya-Lopez-Arroyo connections!
Fifth, in the domestic war between the Lopezes and Arroyos et al, who are all puppet-agents of the Anglo-U.S. powers, the Lopezes will win because the economic agents are more permanent while the political puppets are more expendable as the shock absorbers and red herrings of the people's wrath. When someone asked who I am siding with in the Meralco-Lopez fight against Gloria-Garcia. I said that I'm siding with neither as I side only with the people against them all, the Anglo-U.S. imperial swindlers and their puppet-agents. To believe that the Gloria-Garcia side will really bring about the correct power price reduced to the level of the average Asean or Asian power rates is to be a fool. The Epira privatization law and the whole structure emerging from it, including the IPPs, the inutile ERC and the manipulated Wesm, stops any attempt at really arriving at an economic power price. Bring it to court and it'll take the next twenty years to resolve, all in favor of the money mongers. This is why I make a call for revolution to turn things around--peacefully, I hope.
Peaceful revolution can succeed if our electoral system can be trusted--as shown in Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador, Nicaragua, Argentina, Brazil and Chile where patriotic and pro-people forces and reforms won by election. Otherwise, we'll need the intervention of enlightened, pro-people military forces to aid genuine civilian leaders march up the path of reform and change peacefully. The imperative reforms are the restoration of the pubic ownership and management of the energy sector as a public service, to junk the Epira and its conversion of electricity into a commodity for profit. Then a medium term program for energy self-sufficiency be put in place. Indeed, the country is most ready for revolution after the Meralco-Lopez versus Arroyo-Garcia comedy that has outraged to the maximum.
(Tune in to my shows, "Talk News TV," on Destiny Cable Channel 3, every Tuesday, 8:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m., "Kape't Kamulatan, Kabansa" on 1098AM, Monday to Friday, 8:30 a.m. to 9 a.m., and "Suló ng Pilipino" every Monday, Wednesday, Friday, 6 p.m. to 7 p.m. on the same station)
Herman Tiu Laurel
6/2/2008
The country is up in arms against the Lopezes for the swindle of people's hard earned money for astoundingly overpriced electricity, with much of it never delivered. Meantime, some well-meaning citizens and consumer advocates who are siding with Winston Garcia, unknowingly perpetrate a grand deception to merely transfer Meralco to Arroyo's cronies, even with just the false hope of negligible power rate reductions in mind. And while a church leader says government is "not known as a good businessman," this, too, wrongly implies that it's better to make power a commodity for profit instead of a tool for public service. The real culprits in the exorbitant power prices in the Philippines—the Anglo-U.S. overlords, along with their predatory policies, which are enforced on us through corrupt leaders they help install—are escaping scrutiny in the cacophony of acrimonious debate and propaganda.
That is why a few clarifications are in order.
First of all, privatized electricity is without a doubt higher in cost than publicly owned and operated electricity. The reason is simple: the profit factor pushes up the price automatically. Add deregulation to privatization then you have a money juggernaut gone amuck, as what had happened with Enron in 2001 by way of artificial power shortages to jack up rates. If the Bible points to money as the root of all evil, then by syllogistic consequence, making electricity a commodity for money-making rather than a service for the public good now makes it the root of the Meralco and IPP-PPA evil, bedeviling the Filipino people. Not surprisingly, the idea of privatizing electricity originated from England and the U.S., with Thatcher, Reagan and Bush, Enron, Bechtel, etc.
Second, the Lopezes admitted that it faced financial collapse in the first quarter of the 1970's. The Lopezes were forced to seek government's bail-out, the two biggest factors were: (a) the peso devaluation that crippled Meralco, which had huge obligations to its U.S. benefactors and international banks (led by IMF-WB), all denominated in dollars; and (b) the sudden, inordinate rise in the world price of oil, which was the main fuel of its power plants at that time. These two are undoubtedly within the purview of the Anglo-U.S. powers to manipulate to their advantage, which is why in today's oil price hike, 60 percent is attributed to oil trade speculation in cahoots with banks. The same thing happened from 1971 to 1973, when they triggered the 6-Day Arab-Israeli War and oil price spikes, down to their conspiracy with OPEC and the Saudis to recycle petro-dollars through Third World debt entrapments.
Since time immemorial, exchange rates are manipulated to the advantage of the U.S. The decline in today's dollar, for instance, is due to the controlled depreciation the U.S. hopes will stem its imports, promote domestic production and push its exports all over the world. Thus, we can see U.S. Chevy's and Fords in the Philippine market again in numbers not seen since the 1960's. But it still hasn't worked effectively since China has not revalued as the U.S. wants.
The Lopezes were bankrupted by the peso devaluation of the 1970's, in the same way that Napocor's debts ballooned after the 1997 Asian Financial Crisis. Napocor was laden with dollar obligations from Ramos' IPP contracts, including the supply of oil and coal for IPPs. Thus, it was a devastating triple whammy for Napocor: the dollar doubled in value, its profitable power plants and markets were privatized, and its fuel supply contracts rose in cost.
Third, in the 1992-93 Philippine power crisis, Meralco signed a long-term supply contract with Napocor to ensure a steady, cheap power supply for distribution to its six-million customers. At that time Royal Dutch Shell and Texaco were already jumpstarting the Malampaya offshore natural gas platform and needed to ensure their market. So Ramos intervened to broker the natural gas IPPs, which the Lopezes gleefully accepted even if it had to renege on its contract with Napocor as there was more money to be made that way. But then, Meralco simply had to conspire with Gloria to have the penalties for violating the supply contract with Napocor, a whopping P52 billion, passed on to consumers. Only opposition from the likes of this writer, FDC and Nasecore stopped it.
Fourth, what Royal Dutch Shell, IMF-WB, the oil giants, Wall Street and the Washington-London axis want, they get. With Gloria's imprimatur, imagine them indexing the low-cost natural gas for electricity to high priced diesel, which we are only beginning to discover through probes into the Malampaya-Lopez-Arroyo connections!
Fifth, in the domestic war between the Lopezes and Arroyos et al, who are all puppet-agents of the Anglo-U.S. powers, the Lopezes will win because the economic agents are more permanent while the political puppets are more expendable as the shock absorbers and red herrings of the people's wrath. When someone asked who I am siding with in the Meralco-Lopez fight against Gloria-Garcia. I said that I'm siding with neither as I side only with the people against them all, the Anglo-U.S. imperial swindlers and their puppet-agents. To believe that the Gloria-Garcia side will really bring about the correct power price reduced to the level of the average Asean or Asian power rates is to be a fool. The Epira privatization law and the whole structure emerging from it, including the IPPs, the inutile ERC and the manipulated Wesm, stops any attempt at really arriving at an economic power price. Bring it to court and it'll take the next twenty years to resolve, all in favor of the money mongers. This is why I make a call for revolution to turn things around--peacefully, I hope.
Peaceful revolution can succeed if our electoral system can be trusted--as shown in Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador, Nicaragua, Argentina, Brazil and Chile where patriotic and pro-people forces and reforms won by election. Otherwise, we'll need the intervention of enlightened, pro-people military forces to aid genuine civilian leaders march up the path of reform and change peacefully. The imperative reforms are the restoration of the pubic ownership and management of the energy sector as a public service, to junk the Epira and its conversion of electricity into a commodity for profit. Then a medium term program for energy self-sufficiency be put in place. Indeed, the country is most ready for revolution after the Meralco-Lopez versus Arroyo-Garcia comedy that has outraged to the maximum.
(Tune in to my shows, "Talk News TV," on Destiny Cable Channel 3, every Tuesday, 8:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m., "Kape't Kamulatan, Kabansa" on 1098AM, Monday to Friday, 8:30 a.m. to 9 a.m., and "Suló ng Pilipino" every Monday, Wednesday, Friday, 6 p.m. to 7 p.m. on the same station)
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
