Reprinted from the Philippine Star issue of March 16, 2009

Why Filipinos don't like the 'Pulis'

CTALK By Cito Beltran
Updated March 16, 2009 12:00 AM

In an effort to explain why the police are not as popular or respected, some PNP officials, raised the worn out or “gasgas ng” excuse that it is the fault of TV and movies that ridicule or demonize the police. Instead of getting sympathy, many people simply shook their heads at such a “lazy” knee jerk response.

The Filipinos are eternal optimists and would readily support the PNP if only the PNP leadership would be as honest about their short-comings as they were in admitting their shortage of firearms and ammunition.

By nature and consequence of the job, it is normal that some degree of unpopularity is expected among those who are truly violators of the law or truly victims of abuse by law enforcers. In a professionally run system most of that would be minimal.

If many Filipinos don’t like the “Pulis” it is because there is a very long history of events and abuses that created the situation we are in. The history of the Police in the Philippines has mostly been about good cops. Unfortunately when good cops are placed under crooks or dirty politicians, you have local overlords who used and abused their authority over the police.

The solution was suppose to be the integration and nationalization of the police, but thanks to the integration of the PMAers who established discrimination on the basis of school and batch seniority, the PNP became a schizophrenic institution confused and abused by “Mistahs”.

We should not blame art which imitates life, rather the PNP should do an independent survey in order to list down what Filipinos clearly don’t like or hate in or about the PNP.

Last Saturday I decided to list down and observe peoples’ reactions and comments on the issue. It didn’t take too long for the first reason to drive by in the loudest manner. Two motorcycle cops weaving and waving with sirens blaring as they cleared the way for some arrogant person in an SUV.

The cops may just be doing their job, but they are the initiators of the abuse that the President said is illegal! So the blame and the anger are aimed at cops because we don’t see the jerk in the tinted SUV.

Next up you have uniformed policemen driving by in a Pasig Police AUV blasting their siren going up Shaw Boulevard using the siren as a horn because he is a policeman. How many Filipinos did he annoy?

Then you see policemen in uniform with their sidearm riding on their personal motorcycles with no license plate or using a plate with the word “POLICE” but even worse, they don’t wear the helmets required by law. Ironically, police patrols regularly stop drivers with “modified” or repainted car plates, people who place commemorative plates in the wrong position get flagged down if not shaken down.

On the other hand, just down the corner or some intersection, you will find policemen stopping motorcycle riders with helmets and legal license plates conducting routine inspections like border guards in Gaza.

Do the PNP even realize how much fear or terror their “Men In Black” creates? Imagine a couple of guys armed with automatic weapons wearing combat attire in black driving beside you on motorcycles?

I have good friends within the PNP and I consider myself very pro-PNP but things that have to change. First and foremost, the PNP has to drill and grill their officers with the fact that “THE LAW APPLIES TO ALL ESPECIALLY THE POLICE”.

The PNP needs to emphasize on training officers with the rules of engagement. Whether we like it or not “rules of engagement” and the “Miranda doctrine” have purpose in law enforcement. Only when Police Officers treat Filipinos with respect will they be worthy of full respect.
The funds of the PNP must be spent FIRST on what is needed and on the least or lower ranked members. Spending money for the Scuba training of senior officers in the eyes of the public is nothing more than a junket. How many more guns could have been bought just from the gasoline and food they consumed at Anilao? One 9mm or an M-16 maybe?

Invest first on the needs of the lower rank policemen, their training as well as their families. Give the lower rank Policemen media training, financial competency. Invest in systems that preserves the assets of the PNP such as patrol cars, get help in drive proficiency, etc.

The PNP senior officials should be the first to undergo a social and political sensitivity training. If the PNP has some image problem, blame it on the junket and lifestyle of PNP officials who have become the example for their people. The “Euro-generals” caused more embarrassment and unpopularity to the PNP than any “Pulis Patola” movie

The PNP Transformation program is a very praise worthy undertaking. The initial honesty about their need and lack of firearms actually got me to thinking of soliciting donations from well-armed people I know. But when the “gasgas” excuse of blaming things to TV and Movies came up, I seriously questioned just how sincere some people are about transformation?

We all need to help the PNP. We must all support the PNP. They have good and great men and women in the service. But it is only the PNP that can decide if they really want help and if they are willing to face and fix what needs to be fixed.

Reprinted from the Philippine Daily Inquirer issue of March 16, 2009

Inquirer Opinion/ Editorial

THE DOCUMENTS STUPID

Regardless of what the House of Representatives will choose to do with the impeachment complaint filed against Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez by three-time Senate topnotcher Jovito Salonga and others, her fate in history is all but sealed. The reason is she perfectly illustrates a classic Filipino saying, down to the last crooked syllable. “It’s hard to awaken those who are pretending to sleep.”

Whatever little of her reputation has survived her close association with and solicitousness for the Arroyo administration will forever be consumed in the aptness, the very justice, of that worldly-wise expression.

It is hard to wake up those who are only pretending to sleep.

Is there any other officer of the law, in the post-Marcos era, who has as sedulously struggled to keep one’s eyes shut in the face of evidence of graft and corruption? Even the Arroyo administration’s irascible Justice Secretary Raul Gonzalez, notorious for his partisan approach to the administration of justice, at least tries to reckon with inconvenient reality. Gutierrez simply denies the reality, period.

Consider her breathtakingly brazen decision-making process on the anomalous P1.3-billion Mega-Pacific contract. While in our legal system the Supreme Court is not a trier of facts, it cannot pretend to be blind in the face of overwhelming evidence. Thus it had ruled that the automation contract was anomalous on its face (the same finding reached by the Senate blue ribbon committee), and directed the Ombudsman to finally conduct an investigation. For some reason, Gutierrez dragged her foot, and was eventually admonished by the Court and given a deadline to meet. Just before the deadline expired, the Ombudsman announced that a host of minor personalities and at least one election commissioner would face charges.

In the end, however, and based on hearings it conducted after the Court’s original deadline, it found no one guilty of any crime. The Mega Pacific contract was illegal, but in the Ombudsman’s view no one actually broke the law.

Those who are pretending to sleep are the hardest to wake.

We are led to consider yet again this Filipino expression because of the Ombudsman’s recent inaction—that would be the polite term—in the case of the World Bank-funded road projects.
The Washington, DC-based multilateral financing institution had blacklisted three Filipino contracting firms, one of them permanently, because of what it said was evidence of collusion. As quickly became clear, the Ombudsman was furnished copies of the World Bank findings a long time ago, but did, well, almost nothing.

In a Senate hearing, Gutierrez even said there was nothing much she could do, because the reports were marked confidential.

Last week, the bank’s representative to the Philippines, Bert Hofman, diplomatically reminded the Ombudsman and those senators and congressmen who had chosen to be obtuse that, in fact, evidence of collusion was readily available—assuming that they wanted the evidence in the first place.

“I notice, in the Philippines, the witness statements have drawn a lot of attention and a lot of press. But really, what I hear from my [Department of Institutional Integrity] INT colleagues is, ‘Look at these documents,’” Hofman said at a forum.

“Most of the evidence we find in the collusion were from documentary evidence. They do interview witnesses. They do interview people to corroborate the evidence found in the documentation,” he said. But: “This is all evidence on the bid itself; nothing to do with witnesses, nothing to do with statements, nothing to do with hearsay. This is all in the bid documents themselves,” he said.

In 10 years of experience fighting rigged bids worldwide, the World Bank, Hofman said, had found the same patterns of collusion, which include: almost similar bids, “questionable disqualification of bids” and “abnormally high bids.”

We can read between the lines of this diplomatically worded reminder. The powerful Ombudsman has the mandate to initiate an investigation even without a complaint. That she considers herself hamstrung by the confidentiality of the World Bank report means she had not bothered to look at the bidding documents themselves. She has access to them, but apparently she could not bestir herself, after receiving a warning from the bank, to probe the documents.

Moral: It is difficult to awaken those only faking sleep.

MISSING THE ACTION by: Kiko Ortelano

TARGET

We are not referring to a brand of a processed meat. We are also not referring to a popular chain store in the United States.

Among Ed Panlilio is the TARGET!

We are aware of this from the very start of his term as governor of Pampanga. The initial strategy was to destroy all the people around the gov so that in the end, it will be the governor who will really take the heat. Even to his nemesis in the the province, it was obvious that the gov was a difficult direct target as he was really a clean politician. All sorts of things were done just to ensure his defeat in the electoral exercise and yet he still won.

Then the gov made a "mortal political sin"! He exposed the payola in Malacanang! The political malpractices that pervades the country was exposed by the gov of the president's own home province! What was worse is that it showed the people that such malpractices are being hatched and propagated by the highest officials of our land!

Political Operators know that the quarry operations is the most obvious and tangible achievement of the gov so far. This is the real reason why the PB and the mayors will never cooperate with the gov on the continuing succes of BALAS and all his other laudable projects. This is the very reason why the PB is really firm on its intent to continue producing legislative measures to curtail the powers of the gov on the quarry operations. The PB is doing this even to the extent that the BALAS operations will fail to the detriment of the province. It does not matter that the quarry operations of the province was recognized and awarded by GALING POOK with no less than the president giving the award in Malacanang!

The issue on JUETENG is another one. The lies that the Secretary of the DILG and PNP Regional Director for Central Luzon has kept on barbling in public shows their futile attempt to justify their inaction and obvious conspiracy to protect JUETENG. They can not fool us! We see everyday around our neighborhood the operations of jueteng. We see how the local executives from the Municipal to the barangay levels, including the police, ignore jueteng operations. We are also aware of the payolas that these local executives receive from jueteng down to the barangay officials. They may deny these in public forum specially in their interaction with media. They may fool some people sometimes specially those who do not discern lies from truth. BUT WE THE PEOPLE KNOW.

It is good that the president ordered the PNP to stop to all illegal gamblings. But if the PNP under the DILG leadership were doing their job, it is absolutely unnecessary for the president to issue such order. Motto Propio, the DILG and the PNP should have eradicated jueteng as it is illegal and it is their mandate to stop illegal activities wether there are complaints or none.

It is also very well that Archbishop Aniceto and Auxilliary Bishop David made public their acknowledgement that there is jueteng in the province and that government officials should really put a stop to it. NOW LET US SEE HOW SECRETARY PUNO OF THE DILG REFUTE THE SATEMENTS OF THE TWO PRINCES OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN PAMPANGA.

Every one of us should support the gov in his crusade for Good Governance. Everyone of us who hope for a better Pampanga should share in the burden of transforming not just Pampanga but the whole country into the path of RIGHTEOUS LEADERSHIP. We all can share in our own little way. We can include our leaders in our daily prayers. We can start inside our homes by educating ourselves together with all the members of our family about the necessity of Good Governance in our midst. We can help by sorting, recycling, and composting our garbage. We can help by not betting on jueteng. We can help by reaching out to our neighbors so they too can advocate Good Governance. WE CAN HELP!

LUID KA!

Editorial

Attorney Mike

Philippine Daily InquirerFirst Posted 19:11:00 03/04/2009Filed Under: Impeachment,the House of Representatives — betrayal of public trust and culpable violation of the Constitution, because of alleged inaction — right after she absolved everyone involved in the Mega Pacific scam. (This scam, to be sure, is included in the present complaint.)
After the Senate blue ribbon committee had established the anomalies in the Mega Pacific contract as facts, and the Supreme Court (after castigating the same Ombudsman for slowness of action) confirmed the existence of irregularity, what did Gutierrez do? She absolved everyone, like a priest at a Lenten rite. Her decision, we wrote in this same space on Oct. 6, 2006, “asks us to believe, against all evidence and experience, in a crime without criminals, an evil deed without evildoers.”
Thus, the supreme irony: In her tenure as Ombudsman, Gutierrez has served as midwife to the perfect crime.
It may be that “Attorney Mike’s” defense of a batch mate would not have come about without the enterprising work of a reporter (in this case, Kara David of GMA News). But this is not the first time that Arroyo had had the opportunity to speak to reporters. That he took the opportunity to ask the public to let the ombudsman alone tells us something about his essentially political approach even to legal matters. That he took advantage of the opportunity to say anything at all — well, that says something about his relationship with Gutierrez. Apparently, while he requires the services of the avuncular Jesus Santos or the pugnacious Ruy Rondain to defend his actions, Attorney Mike thinks nothing of lawyering for his law school year mate. What, after all, are friends for?

Editorial

Shameless

Philippine Daily InquirerFirst Posted 19:53:00 03/03/2009Filed Under:

That, according to the citizens who filed an impeachment complaint against Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez, is what she is. And arbitrary, tyrannical, partisan, and possibly downright incompetent, too. The complaint lays down a powerful indictment of an ombudsman who, according to the complainants, either deliberately bungled or simply sat on some of the most shocking cases of official malfeasance in living memory.

Here are Gutierrez’s credentials to the hall of shame:

• The extortion case against former Justice Secretary Hernando Perez, in which she stands accused of either being so incompetent as to deserve removal from office, or of deliberately bungling the filing of extortion charges so that the courts were left with no choice but to throw out the cases.

• The Mega Pacific case against Commission on Elections Chair Benjamin Abalos Jr., in which the Supreme Court found the contract for election voting machines tainted with corruption and void, firmly establishing a case for prosecution. Instead, Gutierrez absolved Abalos and company.

• The fertilizer fund scandal involving former undersecretary of agriculture Jocelyn Bolante, in which charges separately filed by the Senate, former solicitor general Frank Chavez and the late journalist Marlene Esperat ended up gathering cobwebs on her desk. She created task force “Abono” and announced in December 2008 that she would resolve the case by the end of January 2009 — a deadline that came and went without any resolution or concrete action.

• The curious case of the police generals and their confiscated euros, and the evidence gathered, including an admission from Police Director Eliseo de la Paz that he broke regulations, that resulting in no concrete action by Gutierrez.

• The World Bank findings of collusion among contractors and government officials. Gutierrez got an oral briefing on the matter in 2006 and documents were sent to her as far back as 2007. She had a firm basis for launching an investigation, but didn’t do so.

There is also the matter of using her powers to suspend politicians with whom Malacañang has not been too friendly, like Gov. Neil Tupaz of Iloilo province, or out of a personal vendetta, such as Gov. Enrique Garcia of Bataan, the political rival of her brother.

All of these, according to the charges against Gutierrez, constitute betrayal of public trust and culpable violations of the Constitution. The ombudsman is supposed to be the protector of the people, but instead she has become a bodyguard of crooks. This is obviously a shameful thing to have to endure, but instead of hanging her head in shame, the ombudsman has taken to handling the damning charges against her by means of the well-honed mantras, “Where is your evidence? Bring it to the proper forum!” and “Let he who is without sin cast the first stone” — mantras that are, incidentally, beloved of the very administration with whom she is alleged by the complainants to be in collusion.

In responding to the charges, the ombudsman alternated between shrieking calumny on her accusers and dropping the names of legal luminaries who are prepared to represent her, not to mention threatening to file libel charges against her accusers. In no way, beyond a general and predictable denial of guilt, has she actually addressed the charges. But that is probably because addressing the charges would be difficult since she has very little to show for her almost four years in office.

What Gutierrez has demonstrated, however, is a determination to fight, and her determination to stay in office sends a clear signal to members of the House of Representatives that they have to tread carefully around her case. Even if she has done little by way of prosecuting crimes, she can undoubtedly claim to possess mountains of evidence against everyone, on both sides of the aisle, and she retains vast powers to use — and inflict — on anyone who crosses her the wrong way.

The members of the ruling coalition are thus confronted with the problem of having in their hands a strong case against a powerful official who will cling to power at all costs but who also happens to have the goods on a great number of them or their patrons and allies up and down the official hierarchy. And can the representatives afford to embarrass the Philippine National Police by poking into the euro scam once again? Can they afford to antagonize Bolante and his patrons? Perez and his pals? Abalos and his henchmen?

Beacons of good governance (2)

ROSES & THORNS By Alejandro R. Roces Updated March 03, 2009 12:00 AM
(Part 2) From the March 04, 2009 issue of the Philippine Star

In the course of our daily lives, we come across people who make life happier and easier to live. Few have a genuine commitment to make life better not only for himself but for others as well. I take off my hat to those whose primary goal is to be able to contribute in making the world a better place to live in. Last week, we featured the five local government units and the innovative programs implemented by their respective leaders in improving the quality of life of the people living in their communities. Let me feature in today’s column the other five LGU-awardees cited and given the Galing Pook Awards by President Arroyo in formal ceremonies held last February 12 at the Malacañang Palace.

The lone champion in the Visayas region this year is San Carlos City in Negros Occidental which adopted the sustainability framework in its development strategy for the San Carlos Sustainable City Project. Economic growth and ecological balance were integrated in the province’s overall development objectives, in which the active involvement of all sectors in the province was a key factor. Led by Mayor Eugenio Jose Lacson, rural communities were transformed into agro-industrial areas, thus making these economically viable and the people socially responsible and mindful of the environment.

Governor Joey Salceda organized the Albay Public Safety and Emergency Management Office (APSEMO) with the objective of developing more pro-active and disaster-resilient communities in Albay, where each year, 198,000 houses are threatened by destruction from typhoons usually affecting 350,000 people, with another 300,000 people threatened by tsunami. This is aside from the threats of volcanic eruption which can cause about 127 villages to be buried in mudslides and eight municipalities and two cities inundated by floods. The program became a disaster management program model which many disaster-prone communities here and abroad can use in preventing calamities from inflicting damage to life and property.

In San Fernando City, Pampanga, the people have been rallied into a common vision to transform the city into a business center and tourist junction, the Gateway to the Northern Philippines. They aspire to make the city as the flagship province in the Central Luzon region, a champion of Good Governance by 2015, a Global Gateway by 2020 and finally, a Habitat for Human Excellence by 2030. San Fernando City’s Mayor Oscar S. Rodriguez effectively leads the citizens to participate in achieving an ambitious road map for the province, leaving no stone unturned in the realization of these goals. Using the Public Governance System (PGS) patterned after the Balanced Scorecard Tool from Harvard, officials, business establishments and citizens share in the task of improving governance, raising its standards based on excellence, all for the benefit of their people.

The Family Townhomes for the Poor were built for the urban poor by the City of Taguig. Aside from homes, the project also provides livelihood opportunities to the beneficiaries, thus creating a model for capacity building. Credit goes to Mayor Sigfrido Tinga and his constituents for this model program which can be replicated by other municipalities.

For years, the Province of Pampanga was earning an average of only P22.5 million yearly in quarry taxes. Fiscal management and accountability measures were strengthened in quarrying operations under the program called Biyaya A Luluguran at Sisikapan (BALAS) Program, whose successful implementation led to increased quarry collections raised to P230 million in the first year alone. This is another undertaking that proves that anything can be achieved if everyone will just cooperate and participate.

May these local government units and their achievements serve as inspiration and models for other local governments to emulate. We look forward to seeing more and more LGUs do their share in ensuring competence and honesty in public governance which our people deserve.

At Large
The persecution of Dennis Villa-Ignacio

By Rina Jimenez-DavidPhilippine Daily InquirerFirst Posted 01:23:00 03/03/2009Filed Under:

No wonder Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez can’t do her job. She’s so busy answering her critics and neutralizing potential threats.

One of these threats happens to be Special Prosecutor Dennis Villa-Ignacio, whom she has not only virtually marooned in a limbo of responsibility (all the cases he used to handle have been re-assigned to other lawyers), but also gone after with a flurry of charges that range from the ridiculous to the petty.

The first salvo fired against Villa-Ignacio were charges that he had technically malversed funds when he channeled the budget earmarked for his office’s Christmas party to a charitable cause, a Gawad Kalinga project. The decision to make more practical use of the party budget happened to have been made from a consensus of the entire office, but Villa-Ignacio’s accusers say the decision to donate it to GK was made without their consent.

I thought at the time that deputy ombudsmen, who called a press conference to air the charges, had better things to do than besmirch a civil servant’s decades-long service with accusations of malversing Christmas party funds. But it seems Gutierrez’s proxy warriors weren’t through yet with Villa-Ignacio.

Most recently, another press conference was called in which all the deputy ombudsmen “urged” Villa-Ignacio to resign before his term comes to an end (next year) since he apparently was no longer interested in doing his job and had not been reporting for work.

When I asked Villa-Ignacio about this, he replied that not only is he rightfully entitled to leave credits, he also has no practical need to report for work since Gutierrez has taken all responsibility from him. “One of these days, I won’t be surprised if I report for work and find that my desk and chair had been taken away.”

* * *

At this point, let me say that I am writing from a not-so-objective point of view. The Villa-Ignacios and my family have been neighbors for over two decades in the same gated village. In fact we served simultaneously on the board of directors of our homeowners association in the early years, when Villa-Ignacio was an “ordinary” prosecutor known to everyone in the neighborhood as “fiscal.”

But in fairness to both of us, this is the first time I am writing about him. Not even at the height of the plunder trial of former President Joseph Estrada, where Villa-Ignacio led the prosecution team, was I ever tempted to wangle an exclusive from him. Nor did he ever approach me to do a profile or even offer a few words of encouragement. I think it was precisely because we are cordial neighbors that we respected each other’s boundaries. In fact, this column was inspired by a long lunch we shared in Tagaytay City the other weekend, in the course of looking over a personal project of Villa-Ignacio and his children. Oh, the stories he could tell!

Dennis says he knows what — or who — is behind all this pressure to make him leave his post before his retirement. He is set to retire in 2010, but before then all the cases before the Ombudsman for corruption and plunder that involve or could involve certain top officials and their kin have to be resolved in their favor. Or else some people’s plans for a cushy retirement would be in peril.

* * *

These officials know that with Villa-Ignacio as special prosecutor charged with shepherding all the cases brought to the Ombudsman through trial at the anti-graft court Sandiganbayan, once a case is deemed fit for trial, Villa-Ignacio will go at it with the tenacity of a pit bull.
He is famous for crossing swords with Rene Saguisag, who was on Jose Estrada’s defense team, in an argument that descended into a personal clash. This, Villa-Ignacio says today, he deeply regrets because he respects, and was even inspired by, Saguisag the human rights lawyer and the man.

Villa-Ignacio was part of a prosecution team that the members had dubbed the “Fellowship of the Ring,” after the band of hobbits, an elf, a dwarf, a wizened wizard and noblemen made famous in the Tolkien trilogy. The prize at the end of the group’s trek was not the destruction of a ring that rules them all, but the prosecution of a corrupt former president. So you can imagine how Villa-Ignacio felt, after securing Estrada’s conviction on plunder charges, when the former president was pardoned, on the very day, as he tells it, he was set to appear before the Sandiganbayan to appeal for the garnishment of certain properties.

* * *

At present, Ombudsman Gutierrez faces several challenges. She has yet to explain satisfactorily why she didn’t take any action on the World Bank report disclosing corruption and collusion in the bidding for several infrastructure projects, in which the First Gentleman was implicated by at least one witness.

She has yet to act on the recommendation of the Senate blue ribbon committee to conduct further investigation of and prosecute former undersecretary of agriculture Jocelyn Bolante and other officials and individuals in the billion-peso fertilizer fund scam.

And she has yet to act on the many leads uncovered in the course of investigations into the NBN-ZTE deal, despite the heavy publicity and the direct testimony of many witnesses.

Gutierrez protests that she is “looking into” these cases, but that these aren’t the only ones her office has to deal with. One would think that with so many high-profile and indeed controversial cases on her plate — too many, she says, than she has time to attend to — Gutierrez would welcome the assistance of someone with a proven capacity for hard work and successful prosecution. Instead, she chooses to waste her and her associates’ time going after a respected colleague.

One wonders not just at Merceditas Gutierrez’s sense of priorities, but even her sense of proportion.