Poor Mitos, bad Abad
-A A +AThursday, August 2, 2012
PRESIDENT Aquino continues to draw flak for what he did to former vice president Noli de Castro during the anniversary celebration of ABS-CBN’s TV Patrol last week. The critics said the President was rude in his choice of forum to hit back at de Castro, who had been making snide remarks about the government in his newscasts.
Malacañang’s response to the criticism was a vow purportedly made by the President not to stop saying what he thinks about media or any of its members, regardless, presumably, of the circumstances of time and place. “You can expect the President to be always frank about his statements,” Palace spokesman Edwin Lacierda said.
Fair enough. Freedom of expression is not the monopoly of anyone. If we can say anything against the President, what can prevent him from doing the same thing to us?
If an opinion writer is free to write that the President is inept and lacking in intellectual capacity to govern, shouldn’t the President have the same freedom to say that the writer is a hack whose integrity is severely compromised?
And why should the President be required to observe parameters that we ourselves don’t follow? When we write or say something on radio or television, do we ever consider that the person we attacked could be having lunch with friends or family members by the time he reads or is able to listen to what we said?
And yet, here we are, condemning Aquino for not waiting for the proper time to speak against de Castro. When is the “proper time”? Freedom of expression is a two-way street. Media should be willing to take what it is ready to give.
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Budget Secretary Florencio Abad has just claimed the dubious distinction of being the first Cabinet member to have made a female member of Congress cry publicly. And she wasn’t just any ordinary congresswoman, she was Mitos Magsaysay!
We all must have read about Magsaysay, one of former president Gloria Arroyo’s closest chums. She is also, but naturally, President Aquino’s staunchest critic.
A report in yesterday’s Inquirer said Magsaysay cried because her Priority Development Assistance Fund has not been released and Abad would not tell her who ordered it withheld.
I say poor Mitos and bad Abad! Other congressmen have already gotten their pork and she still has to see a single centavo of the P140 million due her. Imagine an empty-handed little girl in a room full of children licking their lollipops and the delivery boy would not tell her why!
Who was behind the decision to withhold her pork, Magsaysay repeatedly asked Abad.
Ultimately, the buck stops with me, he replied, just as repeatedly. Naughty boy. On second thought, maybe not, because even Magsaysay herself knew who. His name is Weather Weather Lang.
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I thought that there is an order issued by Judge Ester Veloso barring the lawyers in the Ellah Joy Pique case from discussing outside of the courtroom what happened inside it. So why are we now getting opinions from the attorneys on how the results of the DNA tests on certain blood samples would impact on their respective causes?
I’m asking because I represent a group that is interested that the truth comes out, regardless of who it favors. We raised P200,000 as bounty for the capture of Ellah Joy’s killers and we want to make sure that the reward is given to the right person at the right time under right circumstances.
In the meantime, the money stays in the safe hands of Dra. Mila Tolentino, our group’s treasurer.
Published in the Sun.Star Cebu newspaper on August 03, 2012.
Opinion
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