Tuesday, September 02, 2008 Editorial: The color of truth
RECALL-endangered Governor Eddie Panlilio has a quick retort to the circulating publication that is giving him, well, bad press.
It's black propaganda no less, the embattled governor-priest told Sun.Star Pampanga's reporter, and the articles therein were, what else, but untruthful.
The governor's reaction, if not a knee-jerk, was certainly a brain-jerk. It wasn't surprising in its descriptive mode. It was, for its characteristic naïve response to the publication's "sudden appearance."
Time to reflect.
He has been under the gun from his critics, detractors, former friends and former and still foes. He is now facing a recall process, which is not only gaining ground but a groundswell of supporters, and he's surprised that supposedly nasty things are being said about him.
Only last Friday, loyal men of old of his marched through the city streets leading to his official residence essentially denouncing his style of governance, if not his brand of leadership. It is likely that issues raised by those men, the so-called Balas boys, were part of the "black propaganda."
It is also likely that the publication so dubbed and discredited by the governor contained other damaging stories or articles, like the decimation of the ranks of his supporters in the civil society, particularly the more influential and moneyed ones, due to a number of plausible -- no, credible -- reasons.
If those articles were described as "black propaganda" because they were damaging to the governor, he could not have been more accurate. If, on the other hand, he labeled them as such because he believed they were not true, he should make a better case than just idly dismiss them as such.
Unlike the governor, we are certain that the public is no longer surprised as he is. Those issues he deemed and damned as black propaganda had been raised before. In fact, the recall move was premised on those very issues, packed in one simple phrase: loss of confidence.
With a lot more people than ever so eager to kick him out of the Provincial Capitol, and willing to spread the bad news about him at every opportunity, the governor must find a better way of addressing so-called black propaganda than just being one-color conscious, if not other colors blind.
