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Wednesday, March 12, 2003
Kintanar: Streegan and scouting
By June Kintanar
THE news that the national executive council of the Boy Scouts of the Philippines (BSP) abolished the Cebu City council shocked me. I was once a member of this council representing the Cebu City Government and there was nothing wrong with the local boys scouts’ governing body.
Some of my co-members then, aside from the no-nonsense scout executive Hernan Streegan of Rhine Marketing Corp., were influential and upright members of the Cebu community, like Cheling Garcia of Veco, former judge Pedro Son, businessman Gus Go and others. How can they commit a wrong as what the national council alleged?
In fact, the Cebu City BSP Council can be considered the best in the country. Streegan’s name, for one, is synonymous with scouting. After his hectic schedule as a businessman, he devotes the rest of his precious time to the council.
Scouting in Cebu improved through the years because of Streegan’s dedication to the movement. I know this because I saw him in action. Without him and the other responsible members of the council, I don’t know what would have happened to the local boys scouts movement.
Actually, there was a time when the dirty hand of politics showed itself in the affairs of the city scout movement. A politician in Cebu province tried to discredit the city BSP council just to accommodate a protege who wanted to control the scouting movement in Cebu. But thanks to Streegan and the members of the scout council, the move was thwarted.
To repeat, the local council should be left alone. It can stand alone, anyway, even without the help of the national council. If the national leadership believes the city BSP council is too independent for comfort, then it should let go. After all, the bottom line is performance.
Is the scouting movement in Cebu effective in training our boys the value of leadership? If it is, then the national council should not touch the Cebu BSP council.
****
It’s good that while bullets are flying thick and fast between the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) and government troops in Mindanao, President Gloria Arroyo is still holding on to the prospect of talking peace with the rebel group. That’s an act of statesmanship, they say.
But, others ask, can we eat statesmanship? The truth is, government has bent over backward so much. So the “hawks” among our officials are insisting that war is the only language rebels understand.
But there are also “doves” among our government officials. They think that the best route is to win the hearts and minds of rebels. But how, por Dios y por santo, are they proposing to do it?
The bombing at the Davao City airport and the recent passenger bus robbery in the Pikit portion of the Davao-Cotabato national highway indicate that the MILF and other lawless elements are really posing a challenge to the government.
Do we still insist on making peace not war? Or should we, perhaps, call on some American soldiers to fight for us?
(March 12, 2003 issue)
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