PEOPLE are talking...
STILL ABOUT MARY ANN. And the talk is good for the relatives and friends of Asst. Prosecutor Mary Ann Castro who want to see "justice" for the slain public official. Since she was shot dead in an ambush on her car minutes after she left the I.T. Park along Escario St., Cebu City last Thursday, January 17, interesting tidbits about the victim have included these:
* She had not been sacked or had retired from her job in the prosecution service, as some people speculated. She was just assigned to Masbate where she worked for more than a year already before her death. Suspended three times, she was believed to have gotten a new leash in her career reportedly with the help of an influential official from Cebu in the Duterte government who was earlier romantically linked to him.
* The gunshots that rang out coincided with the burst of fireworks nearby. Mary Ann's car that swerved to a sidewalk after she lost control over the vehicle rammed a wall filled with posters, one of which, notably, said "HUNGER AND POVERTY."
What 'pork to pork' is
SEN. PING LACSON called the transfer "pork to pork": from the pork allocation of House members allied to former speaker Pantaleon Alvarez to pork allocation of those allied to Speaker Gloria Arroyo.
The amount cut up was P75 billion: including P20 billion, divided equally among 297 House members with P60 million each; and P31 billion as local government support fund but tagged for farm-to-market roads and other pet projects of favored House members. DPWH was reportedly left with only P7 billion.
Lacson didn't say how the budget would be restored to its state before it was pounced upon and cut up. It's now unrecognizable, he said.
And House watchers had said, what harm could Gloria Arroyo do with such a limited time? Her term will end on June 30, yet look what she has done since she assumed as speaker (the "abominable" charter version, the scavenged budget) -- and still with five months to go.
Fiesta violent incidents
Fiesta Senyor and Sinulog 2019 will be remembered also for violent incidents that marred the celebration: the ambush-killing of Asst. Prosecutor Mary Ann Castro on January 17, the pre-Sinulog party drug overdose of an 18-year-old girl, and the day-after (January 21) shooting during a confrontation of members of two feuding families in Sambag, all in Cebu City.
No acts of terrorism that the mayor feared. Just the party noise or disorder that prompted him to consider extending the radius of the ban next time, that is, beyond 300 meters. Wait, that would be in January 2020, after the election this May. He could still be the mayor in the next Sinulog.
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