"THERE'S money in quarry," Governor Ed Panlilio was quoted as saying on Sunday, guardedly exultant over the fact that in a matter of five days, P5 million went into the province's coffers from quarry tax collections.
Someone fed thousands with two fishes and five loaves of bread with lots of leftover in a single day, but He was more than a priest and governor.
Still, what the Panlilio administration has just achieved can be considered a minor miracle in a land long under the spell of quarry magicians.
A little mental exercise will tell you that that's a cool P1million a day from this controversial sand-mining activity in the province. You probably need a calculator to arrive at what the province could have earned at this daily take since Day One of the quarry tax collections.
Well, it's a humongous lot that required no less than the filing of graft charges against former Pampanga governor Mark T. Lapid and his father, Senator Lito M. Lapid, by reelected Vice Governor Joseller "Yeng" Guiao. Some say the earnings could have reached billions of pesos. Which is why some angry concerned citizens, from well-meaning politicians to well-meaning priests, have described the tremendous losses the Provincial Government incurred from quarry tax collection irregularities as in the vicinity of plunder.
That is a case that may well be proved if the Panlilio administration continues to rake in millions day in, day out in its corrupt-free and systematic management of quarry tax collection.
And even if the plunder hunt fails, Panlilio's encouraging performance this early in the quarry front should still be a cause for worry for the Lapids. The discrepancy in quarry collections may be hard to explain away. And then, there are the attendant issues like negligence, fraudulent documentations, etc.
Will the P1 million a day income stay, increase or go down? It's early to tell which way. As a fair warning, the P5 million earned was advanced purchases. But there is a good, perhaps forgotten, reason to think about that this figure will further improve. Remember the National Resources Development Corp. (NRDC)?
During the Lapid the Younger watch, the NRDC came up with a very lucrative offer to the province through Guiao and the Provincial Board. The NRDC had guaranteed the province a minimum of P150 million. To make a long story short, the proposal was neatly nipped in the bud by dolts in the PB.
At the rate the Panlilio bright spice girls are doing, the province stands to even exceed the NRDC's offer. If it does well as it is starting to, the province could easily earn P20 million a month or a whooping P240 million year!
No wonder, the governor could only be ecstatic with his breath-taking understatement.
Because, and this one jaw-dropping, at the rate he is turning things around in the quarry front, Panlilio will be hard to beat in 2010, income-wise (for the province) and political-wise (for himself). That is as simple and clear as it could get.
