Thursday, July 10, 2008 Talk back: Column favorable to Mayor Radaza By (Writer’s name withheld upon request)
IT is disgusting to read Anol Mongaya’s column dated June 30, 2008.
He should, instead of defending corrupt public servants, encourage private citizens to continue fighting against these kinds of government officials. He should not mix corruption committed by private citizens, if any, with corruption of public servants.
When a columnist is so dedicated to defend a corrupt official, we cannot help but smell stench in his intention. Let me dispute some of his comments:
--Price of computer. He wrote that another city paid P100,000 for the purchase of computers, which was higher than that spent by Lapu-Lapu City Hall. What is the point of comparing the price of "Camry" with "Corolla, a different specification?
--Attendance of prominent businessmen at City Hall’s party. The activity was apparently a part of a desperate effort to shift public attention by twisting the issue.
We can see that the effort, boosted by some columnists and using bottomless amounts of money, is succeeding and has resulted in many businessmen in the city giving up the fight against corruption, as they have realized that fighting against the powerful is not only a futile and meaningless sacrifice but is also risky for their businesses.
--Lapu-Lapu City as a business-friendly place. The credit for the survey should go to Mepza. The 120-plus Mepza firms say Mactan Island (part of Lapu-Lapu City) is a friendly place to start business because of Peza, etc. but not because of City Hall. (I have many stories about business permits issuance in the city).
Mepza companies have no idea what is going on outside the Peza area as they have no direct transactions with City Hall (except for statutory payment of quarterly tax: 40 percent goes to the City coffers).
That is the only probable reason we can think of why Lapu-Lapu had high rating in the survey.
--The advertisement to salute the "achievement" of Mayor Arturo Radaza was self-serving and proof of corruption in City Hall. Thus, it is not worth commenting on. We still hope to deter corruption here as long as we have Mr. Efrain Pelaez and columnists like Sun.Star’s Orlando P. Carvajal.
(Anol Mongaya’s response: I find amusing that a sober comparison of two events in Lapu-Lapu City could earn a reaction that spews so much emotion and is loaded with adjectives reminiscent of campus politics propaganda writing.
Stripped of self-righteousness, the letter writer’s line is simple. Mayor Arturo Radaza “is corrupt.” The columnist who writes favorably about the mayor must also be corrupt.
But my column basically noted that more prominent businessmen like the Gaisanos, the Benedictos, representatives of the Gokongwei group, Manny Osmeña of Hilton Hotel, Raymond Bragg of Shangri-La Hotel, Mariquita Yeung and several more expressed support for Mayor Radaza during a thanksgiving dinner. The group of disgruntled businessmen who attended an earlier conference only had Mr. Efrain Pelaez.
