Tuesday, May 06, 2008 Speak out: Open letter to Mayor Cortes By Joseph Dabon Basak, Mandaue City
(This is addressed to Mandaue City Mayor Jonas Cortes)
I have refrained from writing about you and your administration because, according to your Uncle Zoilo, you are very buotan.
Besides you have not committed anything near that of your predecessor.
But I take exception with the traffic rerouting last May 3, on account of the drag race at the reclamation area. Whosever brainchild it is has the brains of a child.
According to a City Hall insider, it was allowed to give one day for those dragsters to do their illegal thing legally. Is there a legal logic in this? Would it follow that we can also give one day for the snatchers to snatch legally?
Nothing can be as nonsensical in that reasoning. Why? This is because these megalomaniacs on wheels will race any way, legally or not. So instead of venting on them the full force of the law, we coped out, and allowed them to openly do as they wished.
Second, in these times of very expensive gasoline, nothing can be more reckless and thoughtless than to aggravate the suffering of the driving public by creating huge traffic snarls as the one created by the drag race. For the whims of the few, thousands suffered. What kind of decision-making is that?
Obviously, those dragsters have money to burn. But not all have that privilege. So if they insist on showing their super egos, let them do so without inconveniencing those who don’t share their passion. They have no business occupying a public thoroughfare so they can dissipate their excess libido.
Please don’t use the argument that it was only for a day. Responsibility and leadership have no days off. Many of our people are lining up just to buy rice so they may eat. The least you can do is to show some empathy by not allowing profligate activities to go on right beneath the noses of those who don’t even have a decent place to sleep in.
Lastly, you can do better by weeding out some of your people whose illusions of grandeur have placed their brains in their feet.
