Friday, July 27, 2007 Malilong: Those that deserve punishment By Frank Malilong The Other Side
WHAT do the Abu Sayyaf, the owner of a nursing review center and that man, Lintang Bedol, have in common? They all deserve to be punished, that’s what. The Abu Sayyaf for beheading 10 Marines in Basilan, the review center owner for stealing the dreams of hundreds of would-be nurses, and Bedol for absconding with the electorate’s true will.
Getting killed is a risk that soldiers take when they go to war. War is cruel but ought that make savages of the combatants?
The Moro Islamic Liberation Front, in whose territory the soldiers were ambushed, says the 14 Marines were killed in a legitimate encounter. That may be true, but why were 10 of them beheaded and mutilated?
The sheer barbarism that the killers exhibited demands that our armed forces seek them out, wherever they may be and whoever may be coddling them. It is not a matter of vengeance but of honor that they be punished.
It is the same thing with the owner of the nursing review school whose name I have unfortunately forgotten but whose face I haven’t. (Who would when you see him bitching on ANC TV with sickening frequency?)
Because of him, hundreds, if not thousands, of nursing graduates had to go through the agony of retaking the board of examinations. He broke the hearts of many parents who had been looking forward to seeing their children make the final hurdle in their quest for that valued R.N. title and passport to the future. Worst of all, he shamed and irreparably damaged the name of the Philippine nursing profession.
Members of that ill-starred batch of nursing graduates are now on tenterhooks waiting for the results of their “retake.” What bothers me more, however, is that there has been no news at all on what happened to the investigation on the cheating.
Have the review center owner and his cohorts, two of whom were said to be members of the Board of Examiners, been charged? Are they in jail? Or are they out enjoying the fruits of their crime?
Finally, Bedol or more accurately, Bedol, et al. Because of them, the May 14 elections were indelibly tainted.
The sad thing is that we were not wanting in precedents; we just did not learn our lesson from them. Only the setting changed on May 14; the characters were the same as in 2004. We had the benefit of experience but so had they and they used it while we didn`t. That’s the story behind the triumph of evil over good.
How could we have so short memories? How could have the anger brought about by the fraud that was committed in 2004 vanished so completely in 2007?
A few weeks after May 14, I read that Nene and Koko Pimentel were filing cases against the teachers and Comelec people who committed, abetted or facilitated the cheating. Koko has since lost the 12th Senate slot to Migz Zubiri. I wonder what happened to the cases that he and his father said they were filing.
Abu Sayyaf, the bitchy nursing review school owner and that man, Bedol and his cohorts: can we deal with them in a manner that would discourage others from following them? How?
