Monday, July 26, 2004 Mongaya: Arroyo’s Sona By ANOL MONGAYA
PRESIDENT Arroyo’s State of the Nation Address as the 13th Congress opens today should give us a clearer idea of her assessment of the present situation and what she plans to do.
I just hope the President would tell us how to make both ends meet with the way prices have been spiraling up while salaries would only get an P8 a day hike. When even those belonging to the so-called middle class are groaning, I could just imagine how ordinary workers, employees and farm hands are coping.
Angelo dela Cruz also symbolizes the ordinary Pinoy who would rather risk it all in a war-torn country like Iraq in the so-called search for greener pastures because he or she has lost hope of finding one here.
President Arroyo should not only address the plight of millions of Filipino workers abroad, but she should also direct government attention to what made them go overseas in the first place and then solve the problem.
For years, we have been looking at the overseas Pinoy as our main source of non-borrowed dollars because we have failed in making things work here in the country.
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President Arroyo described her decision to give more importance to a Filipino’s life than the interest of the United States as a ‘defining’ moment. I hope it is the start of a more independent course in our special relationship with this former colonial master.
Nevertheless, I agree with the view that President Arroyo feared more the possibility of massive protests bigger than what the death of Flor Contemplacion stirred up years ago. Many in the Sun.Star Superbalita office recently saw an e-mailed video of the horrible beheading of the Korean hostage. I could just imagine the political storm if the video was that of Angelo instead.
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Speaker Jose de Venecia is expected to head the Lower House for the fourth time. However, his rainbow coalition has broken into two. The second faction, which still belongs to the camp of President Arroyo, is said to be closer to her husband Mike.
The Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism (PCIJ) said: “The First Gentleman’s involvement in Kampi was obscure in the initial weeks until his personal appearance at a Kampi meeting at the Shangri-la Makati Hotel on Thursday evening. At the same time, his son Juan Miguel or Mikey, the newly elected congressman of Pampanga, was hosting a dinner party for de Venecia at the Manila Polo Club, also in Makati. President Arroyo herself was at that party.”
A friend considers the formation of the pro-Arroyo faction (in contrast to the pro-de Venecia group) as an Arroyo masterstroke that should check the Speaker’s power during her six-year term. It’s still the same old ‘divide and rule’ in my book.
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It looks like even the anti-de Venecia Kampi has given its blessings to the appointment of Rep. Ace Durano as the country’s next tourism czar. Rep. Nerissa Soon-Ruiz, who had criticized the planned appointment of Durano, reportedly changed her mind. Ruiz, who recently joined the pro-Arroyo Kampi, said President Arroyo “knows what she is doing.”
I have been receiving anti-Durano text messages recently. But if Nerry’s turnaround is an indicator of Kampi’s sentiments, then the Cebuano solon would easily sail through the hearings of the committee on appointments.
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Are members of Congress really our representatives? Come to think of it, Congress has long been a hall filled with millionaires and billionaires in a country with majority of the population classified as poor.
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Former general manager of the Mactan-Cebu International Airport Authority (MCIAA) Angelo Verdan still hopes to regain his position. He expressed confidence that the Court of Appeals would rule in his favor. He said the Civil Service Commission (CSC) did not question the appointments of former general managers who were also not eligible.
But when should we start naming civil service eligible applicants to such positions? Is Verdan saying that we should just do away with the CSC requirement?
(e-mail: superbalita@ sunstar.com.ph and anol_cebu@hotmail.com cell phone: 09179761193)
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