Sunday, April 15, 2007 Malilong: Naming party-list nominees By Frank Malilong The Other Side
ANY sportsman will tell you that the choice of referee is crucial in a contest. His integrity should be beyond question.
If, for example, he is rumored to have been involved in a game-fixing scandal in the past, his calls will be always be suspect. In a close match, he could be the reason why the loser cannot accept the outcome of the game.
The Commission on Elections (Comelec) has yet to recover from the shock of the Garci scandal and here they are officiating in what could be the match our lives. The distrust in the Comelec, as presently constituted, is not totally undeserved and if we only had a choice, we could have picked a more trustworthy referee. Unfortunately, we don’t have that luxury.
Given the people’s general disdain for the institution and the immensity of the nation’s stake in the May 14 elections, I was hoping that the Comelec would do something to inspire trust in their ability as an umpire or at least refrain from doing anything that would further impair their shot reputation.
I am therefore totally appalled by the electoral body’s stubborn refusal to bare the names of the nominees of party-list organizations participating in the May 14 polls. What are they trying to hide? Who are they trying to protect?
The claim that there is no need to release these names because in the party-list elections, you vote for the party and not for the nominees is rotten and stinking hogwash. An organization is only as good as its leadership. A party may have the best advocacy and the most charming platform but how can it possibly contribute to the cause of good governance if its leaders/nominees are known thieves and hoodlums?
The Constitution itself not only guarantees but seeks to promote transparency in government affairs. Unless the Comelec can establish that making known the names of the party-list nominees would endanger the security of the state, we can only surmise that their refusal to so disclose is based on dark and sinister motives. And with a referee acting like that, who will believe that the results of the game will not be tainted?
***
There must be quite a number of government retirees who are suffering as a result of the Government Service Insurance System’s program to modernize the system of distributing monthly pensions. I have literally been swamped with letters, calls and text messages from these poor pensioners after I wrote about their plight.
One of these letters came from Erlinda V. Semilla, who is now based in Los Angeles, California where she migrated after retiring from a public nursing school. Even from that far side of the globe, she says, she also feels the agony of her fellow retirees, many of whom have not received their pensions since January this year.
She said that unlike in the case of former DBP lawyer Esperanza Valenzona, her GSIS e-Card was activated after she wrote President Arroyo for help.
The GSIS Cebu Field Office then promised her in a letter dated March 9, to credit her pensions direct to her e-Card “as soon as it is already activated by the Union Bank of the Philippines.”
Needless to say, the promise remains unfulfilled. “What’s happening to our country?” she asks. Good question.
