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Sunday, September 11, 2005
Malilong: The day the truth died
By Frank Malilong
The Other Side
I NEARLY died with the three impeachment complaints.
On the evening of the day Congress hammered the final nails on the coffin that bore the truth, I was lying in the emergency room of the Cebu Doctors Hospital while doctors scurried to rein in a runaway heart. Did the impeachment proceedings upset me, my son would later ask.
It did not. The results were a foregone a conclusion even before the roll call vote began. President Arroyo had the numbers in the House and they were going to steamroller the opposition in due time. All those claims about the pro-impeachment bloc nearing the magic number to overturn the justice committee report that junked the complaints were pure braggadocio. Fifty-one is nowhere near 79, as any grade school pupil will tell you.
Okay, I will admit that the childishness of some congressmen did bother me somewhat. Antonio Roman of Bataan, for example, lost his manners when he screamed at our Raul del Mar, who was presiding the session, to recognize him. Raul however handled the outrage adroitly, telling Roman to wait for his turn. I enjoyed that part as I did the spirited exchange between Luis Villafuerte of Camarines Sur and Peter Allan Cayetano of Taguig-Pateros at dawn.
Indeed, I was so engrossed in the proceedings I hardly had any sleep the day before my hospitalization. My doctor and namesake, Francisco Chio Jr., would later diagnose my condition as paroxysmal atrial fibrillation apparently related to a hypertensive cardiovascular disease. Apart from that and slightly elevated levels of uric acid and cholesterol, I was okay, Jun said.
I wish I could say the same thing about the nation. So many things have been said, diagnosing our ills, but the sad fact is that there is no echocardiogram or ultra-sound procedure or a thyroid panel that would give these opinions exact scientific bases. I can take medicines to alleviate my condition and leave the rest to God, but the nation? Look at what the opposition is offering to us and you will see a big bold letter “X” written all over it. We cannot drink this poison and so we may have to leave everything to divine intervention.
The truth died on Tuesday but don’t tell me only GMA and her allies were to blame for the demise. The opposition killed it, too, because they were not interested in it but only in ousting Mrs. Arroyo.
(September 11, 2005 issue)
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