THE Senate we know in recent years is a Senate of hearings. Hearing this, and hearing that. Hearings about the pork barrel. The Mamasapano incident.
And now we have the hearing about Matobato.
Are we hearing the truth? So far, while killing our time (and our tax money) watching the senate soap opera that is the hearing, we have learned about these:
How many senators does it take to find out if Matobato is telling the truth?
For that, how many questions does it take to figure out if this witness finished Grade 1 or high school?
Or for that matter, has the witness figured out the difference between a CHDF and a Cafgu? Maybe in the allowance received or the uniforms provided.
Why do the senators repeat their questions over and over again? Maybe that’s making Matobato twist and jumble his answers, makalipong na ang mga pangutana.
Has Matobato figured out too that McDonald’s is not a hotel?
Has he figured it out himself whether he is Matobato the Cafgu, the bodyguard, the DDS, or Mato-Battousai the slasher? How many of these web of deaths is he really involved and is the accused President Duterte directly ordering him to “Do it”?
Actually, that’s the question in everyone’s mind, whether Matobato is telling the truth or telling a "scripted" testimony. The fact is most or all his testimonies were not put on an affidavit.
The fact is, when grilled or pushed further for details, he keeps changing or revealing details that draws away from the premise that Duterte ordered all the killings.
The question from Senator Pacquiao on Matobato is most basic, and impressive that it comes from his simple delivery: no one would believe a single word from Matobato if he keeps changing his story.
That leads to our question on the senators who have presented Matobato to the world: Duterte’s arch-enemies Senator Leila de Lima and Senator Antonio Trillanes. Do they want us to believe the story of one person that Duterte is evil incarnate?
It seems that is the truth we learned so far, that the arch-enemies of this administration has turned the senate probe into a vendetta. One wonders if their probe is seriously addressing the issues of the drug problem, the suppression of crime, or the deeper problem of poverty and the syndicates that prey on the desperate poor.
The truth so far, we are hearing noise. Some call that entertainment. Well, that’s how our politics is today.
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