Headlines
By: Ernesto M. Maceda
(The Philippine Star)
Updated: December 9, 2010 12:00 AM
Links: http://www.philstar.com/Article.aspx?articleId=637548&publicationSubCategoryId=64
During the SONA address in late July, President Aquino claimed that prices of prime commodities were stable.
Barely 4 months after, his administration approved the National Food Authority decision to increase the retail price of NFA rice from P25 to P27 a kilo last Tuesday without previous notice or public consultation. The price of galunggong fish has increased from P120 to P160 a kilo. Sardines have gone up from P10 to P12 a can. LPG prices have shot up from P500 to P720 per cylinder.
There is, therefore, no relief for the poor as yet. In fact, life has become harder under P-Noy because of the higher prices.
But why should the NFA lead the way by increasing the price of the poor’s basic staple, rice? When the P-Noy Administration assumed office, the price of NFA rice was only P18/kilo. It has gone up to P27 in less than 6 months. NFA Administrator Angelito Banayo justifies the increase by the need of NFA to reduce losses. But sir, the main cause of NFA losses is the overprice or tongpats on rice imports which ranges from P100-P500 million per total procurement depending on the quantity and the timing. When then Agriculture Secretary Arthur Yap bought about 2 million metric tons of rice at about $1,000 per metric ton, the Binondo rice traders suspected a $200/MT overprice. This is ultimately passed on to the poor consumer.
Stop the tongpats in imports. Stop the corruption in the diversion of NFA rice to favored commercial traders. Stop the overpriced shipping and hauling contracts. Stop the theft and “buriki” of rice sacks at NFA warehouses. Reduce the thousands of political protegees in the bloated NFA workforce. Review the overpriced lease of NFA warehouses. That will result in hundreds of millions of savings, thus removing the necessity to increase NFA rice prices.
In July too, DA Secretary Proceso Alcala promised to achieve self sufficiency in rice in one to three years. He has now changed his tune and admits the government will import from 1.3-1.5 million metric tons of rice.
Happy days are here again. During GMA’s time, FG controlled the importation of rice. Who will be the Godfather of rice in this administration? Will he be a Kamag-anak or a classmate?
Two acts are in order here. Increase the rice hectarage in every province and two, leave the importation of rice completely to the private sector. That’s the straight path for DA/NFA. Better yet, abolish the NFA and save P25-P50 billion in yearly losses contributing to the big government deficit.
The solution is right under your noses, Sec. Alcala and Administrator Lito Banayo, if you really want to avoid the temptation of an opportunity for instant wealth.
Will there be real reform in DA/NFA or will it be business as usual and happy days are here again?
* * *
EO # 1 UNCONSTITUTIONAL . . . The Supreme Court has declared Executive Order No. 1 creating the Truth Commission unconstitutional. Malacañang admits it’s a “temporary setback” in the anti corruption campaign.
Once again, the incompetence of Malacañang lawyers have come to the surface. The bottom line: they crafted an Executive Order that is violative of the Constitution, specifically the provision of equal protection of the law and the lack of power to create an office which is vested in Congress.
The lawmakers led by Sen. Joker Arroyo, Rep. Edcel Lagman and Rep. Mitos Magsaysay have been proven right. They also correctly argued that the Truth Commission is a useless duplication of the Ombudsman, the Department of Justice and even the PCGG.
What is also deplorable is you have a retired Chief Justice and 2 retired Supreme Court Justices failing to see that they were accepting appointments to an office of doubtful legality.
The diligence of a good father of the family should have motivated them to wait for the Supreme Court decision before assuming their positions and starting to spend millions of pesos of taxpayer’s money. They should refund all the money they received and spent. Estimated around P50 million.
And the P-Noy lawyers? They have just validated Senator Miriam D. Santiago’s observation that they are lightweights. In fact, she can now call them flyweights. Now will they follow Secretary Lacierda’s advice, do a Romano and submit an irrevocable resignation?
A few years in city government does not a good Executive Secretary make? It’s time to drink . . .
And the gall of submitting to the Senate a list of amnesty beneficiaries to include a sitting Senator of many years. To say the least, that’s gross negligence! No less than President Erap has this advise to P-Noy. Get an Executive Secretary with political savvy.
By the way, it was a 10-5 decision. The majority was led by Chief Justice Renato Corona and Justice Jose Mendoza, the ponente. The Minority are the new Aquino loyalists led by Justice Antonio Carpio and included Justices Conchita Carpio Morales, Eduardo Nachura, Roberto Abad and Maria Lourdes Sereno.
* * *
BILLIONS GIVEN AWAY . . .There are charges in India of gross corruption in the sale of telephone licenses at prices way off market value. At least some amounts were paid to the government.
In this country, 2G, 3G, and 4G licenses were awarded without any price paid to the government. That means a loss of revenue estimated at P5-10 billion. Note that telcos are raking in profits by the billions yearly.
This is one case of plunder that is easy to prove because not only India but USA and UK auctioned off their telephone licenses earning hundreds of millions of dollars or pounds for the government, but here given away for free.
Look at the lifestyle of all, yes all who serve as NTC Commissioners. They are all extremely wealthy.
Sunday, December 12, 2010
Slapped down
Opinion
By: Frederico D. Pascual Jr.
(The Philippine Star)
Updated: December 9, 2010 12:00 AM
Links: http://www.philstar.com/Article.aspx?articleId=637543&publicationSubCategoryId=64
BAGAC, Bataan (PLDT/WeRoam) — Tucked into this rustic village on the west side of this historic peninsula is Montemar Beach Club, a plush resort quickly making up for the years of neglect that saw an erosion of its facilities and clientele.
Its remarkable turn-around is a story worth retelling and studying. While entailing more than P180 million, its physical and financial rehabilitation that began in 2009 did not cost the majority owner anything in terms of capital expenditures or external funds.
In 1992, the beach club then under the control of the Cachos was on the verge of bankruptcy and foreclosure. When I was here two years ago, I saw why the once prime resort had gone to seed and its patrons continued to dwindle.
I muttered why we had to motor all the way to Bagac for something third rate. The resort was obviously mismanaged, neglected and run-down. I learned later that over half of its members were quitting in dissatisfaction, leaving P40 million in unpaid dues and bills.
The club was opened to the public in 1999 just to remain viable, but the yearly losses kept piling up, thereby eroding the shareholders’ equity to P56.3 million, or almost half the value in 1992.
* * *
BAILOUT: Last year, majority owner Philcomsat (Philippine Communications Satellite Corp.) stepped in to bail it out. It put in P52 million for the banks, P7 million for the Cachos, P90 million for renovation, and P32 million more as advances and leases.
That is a total infusion of P181 million, plus over P20 million in interest payments on the advances and leases that will be paid back. With new equity funds, Montemar is recapitalized with P120 million in shareholders’ equity.
For this bailout, Philcomsat becomes a 60-percent owner. Recall that despite its substantial exposure, it had no control and no board representation from 1992 through 2008.
For 16 years, the club was under the control of a board of trustees and Vicky Gonzalez, who was trustee, president, chief executive and general manager.
* * *
HORROR STORIES: The new officers, some of them from Philcomsat, talk of how the old trustees and managers appeared to have been unaware, to say the least, that the financial statements produced by their accountants were falsified from 1999 to 2008.
They tell horror stories of how the signatures of the external auditor was allegedly forged and the stamp of the Bureau of Internal Revenue faked to make it appear that Montemar management was timely filing with the BIR.
At the end of 2008, when Philcomsat directors uncovered what they said were anomalous financials, they asked for the resignation of the Montemar board and completely overhauled the club’s management.
Gonzalez, the trustees and the resident manager were removed. A new group, with Katrina Ponce Enrile as chief executive officer, took over.
* * *
MESS EXPOSED: Ponce Enrile talks of having found “a totally dilapidated club with filthy out-dated guest rooms, a disfunctional dirty kitchen where third-rate carinderia food was being cooked but could barely be eaten, and unkempt grounds and beach.”
She recounts how they found “a bloated unmotivated staff, housekeeping found sleeping or watching TV in the guest rooms, wait and kitchen personnel pilfering food supplies, lifeguards (six of them) nowhere to be found even when children were in the swimming pool.”
“Cleaners habitually shoved garbage and debris under the shrubs and bushes,” she continues, “and gardeners allowed the grass to turn brown and fallen leaves to pile up.”
* * *
TURN-AROUND: For immediate remedial measures, Ponce Enrile says, “we cut costs by streamlining the organization, retrenched superfluous staff, eliminated unnecessary expenses, trained the remaining staff.”
Consultants were brought in “to do the badly-needed rehabilitation, much of it for the kitchen and dining room, the guest rooms and the grounds.”
While all that was ongoing, the resort was hit by typhoons Ondoy and Pepeng in 2009, causing cancellations and days of shut-down for repairs and cleanup. The club’s revenues dropped 27 percent that year.
But after one year under the new management, Montemar reported profits of P6.9 million from operations, which Ponce Enrile says was the largest in the corporation’s 30-year history of losses.
Word about the upgraded Montemar has gotten around so that the share price that dropped to P40,000 during the bad years had bounced to P45,000 at auction last February. Ponce Enrile says they get calls everyday from people interested in acquiring shares, but none is available.
* * *
EQUAL PROTECTION: In the Supreme Court ruling striking down the Truth Commission created to pursue big crooks in the past administration, the key question is not whether or not anomalies occurred during the term of then President Arroyo.
High crimes and irregularities are committed in all administrations. The issue is whether or not creating such a plenipotentiary commission to dig out crimes only in a particular administration is a violation of the equal protection clause in the Constitution.
The Supreme Court has ruled that it is a violation. That there were some anomalies committed during the term of Ms Arroyo is not the central point. It is not right, the SC said, to zero in on just that while violating basic constitutional rights.
Obviously, one way out for President Aquino is to rewrite the order creating the Truth Commission to include all major irregularities committed in the past. But then, that investigative task is already assigned by the Constitution to existing bodies
By: Frederico D. Pascual Jr.
(The Philippine Star)
Updated: December 9, 2010 12:00 AM
Links: http://www.philstar.com/Article.aspx?articleId=637543&publicationSubCategoryId=64
BAGAC, Bataan (PLDT/WeRoam) — Tucked into this rustic village on the west side of this historic peninsula is Montemar Beach Club, a plush resort quickly making up for the years of neglect that saw an erosion of its facilities and clientele.
Its remarkable turn-around is a story worth retelling and studying. While entailing more than P180 million, its physical and financial rehabilitation that began in 2009 did not cost the majority owner anything in terms of capital expenditures or external funds.
In 1992, the beach club then under the control of the Cachos was on the verge of bankruptcy and foreclosure. When I was here two years ago, I saw why the once prime resort had gone to seed and its patrons continued to dwindle.
I muttered why we had to motor all the way to Bagac for something third rate. The resort was obviously mismanaged, neglected and run-down. I learned later that over half of its members were quitting in dissatisfaction, leaving P40 million in unpaid dues and bills.
The club was opened to the public in 1999 just to remain viable, but the yearly losses kept piling up, thereby eroding the shareholders’ equity to P56.3 million, or almost half the value in 1992.
* * *
BAILOUT: Last year, majority owner Philcomsat (Philippine Communications Satellite Corp.) stepped in to bail it out. It put in P52 million for the banks, P7 million for the Cachos, P90 million for renovation, and P32 million more as advances and leases.
That is a total infusion of P181 million, plus over P20 million in interest payments on the advances and leases that will be paid back. With new equity funds, Montemar is recapitalized with P120 million in shareholders’ equity.
For this bailout, Philcomsat becomes a 60-percent owner. Recall that despite its substantial exposure, it had no control and no board representation from 1992 through 2008.
For 16 years, the club was under the control of a board of trustees and Vicky Gonzalez, who was trustee, president, chief executive and general manager.
* * *
HORROR STORIES: The new officers, some of them from Philcomsat, talk of how the old trustees and managers appeared to have been unaware, to say the least, that the financial statements produced by their accountants were falsified from 1999 to 2008.
They tell horror stories of how the signatures of the external auditor was allegedly forged and the stamp of the Bureau of Internal Revenue faked to make it appear that Montemar management was timely filing with the BIR.
At the end of 2008, when Philcomsat directors uncovered what they said were anomalous financials, they asked for the resignation of the Montemar board and completely overhauled the club’s management.
Gonzalez, the trustees and the resident manager were removed. A new group, with Katrina Ponce Enrile as chief executive officer, took over.
* * *
MESS EXPOSED: Ponce Enrile talks of having found “a totally dilapidated club with filthy out-dated guest rooms, a disfunctional dirty kitchen where third-rate carinderia food was being cooked but could barely be eaten, and unkempt grounds and beach.”
She recounts how they found “a bloated unmotivated staff, housekeeping found sleeping or watching TV in the guest rooms, wait and kitchen personnel pilfering food supplies, lifeguards (six of them) nowhere to be found even when children were in the swimming pool.”
“Cleaners habitually shoved garbage and debris under the shrubs and bushes,” she continues, “and gardeners allowed the grass to turn brown and fallen leaves to pile up.”
* * *
TURN-AROUND: For immediate remedial measures, Ponce Enrile says, “we cut costs by streamlining the organization, retrenched superfluous staff, eliminated unnecessary expenses, trained the remaining staff.”
Consultants were brought in “to do the badly-needed rehabilitation, much of it for the kitchen and dining room, the guest rooms and the grounds.”
While all that was ongoing, the resort was hit by typhoons Ondoy and Pepeng in 2009, causing cancellations and days of shut-down for repairs and cleanup. The club’s revenues dropped 27 percent that year.
But after one year under the new management, Montemar reported profits of P6.9 million from operations, which Ponce Enrile says was the largest in the corporation’s 30-year history of losses.
Word about the upgraded Montemar has gotten around so that the share price that dropped to P40,000 during the bad years had bounced to P45,000 at auction last February. Ponce Enrile says they get calls everyday from people interested in acquiring shares, but none is available.
* * *
EQUAL PROTECTION: In the Supreme Court ruling striking down the Truth Commission created to pursue big crooks in the past administration, the key question is not whether or not anomalies occurred during the term of then President Arroyo.
High crimes and irregularities are committed in all administrations. The issue is whether or not creating such a plenipotentiary commission to dig out crimes only in a particular administration is a violation of the equal protection clause in the Constitution.
The Supreme Court has ruled that it is a violation. That there were some anomalies committed during the term of Ms Arroyo is not the central point. It is not right, the SC said, to zero in on just that while violating basic constitutional rights.
Obviously, one way out for President Aquino is to rewrite the order creating the Truth Commission to include all major irregularities committed in the past. But then, that investigative task is already assigned by the Constitution to existing bodies
Smuggling in Davao port keeps ‘dirty money’ flowing–trader
Regions
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 23:15:00 12/08/2010
p. A12
http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/inquirerheadlines/regions/view/20101208-307862/Smuggling-in-Davao-port-keeps-dirty-money-flowingtrader
Filed Under: Smuggling, Philippines - Regions, Graft & Corruption
DAVAO CITY, Philippines—The level of corruption in the Bureau of Customs (BOC), particularly at the Davao Port in Sasa here, is so extensive that it could involve a number of the agency’s top officials, a businessman said.
Rodolfo Reta, owner of Aquarius Container Yard, whose area was identified as a designated examination area (DEA) outside of the Customs Zone, even described the illegal activities at the port as being run by “a mafia.”
But Customs district collector Anju Castigador laughed off Reta’s allegations saying it was akin to sour graping.
Castigador said Reta’s company was a previous contractor under the BOC DEA scheme but its operations were suspended due to nonperformance.
Sources in the customs bureau said a syndicate known as Kimberly Gang is behind rampant smuggling nationwide. Gang leaders, a certain Julie and Noemi, are in cahoots with a certain Manuel of the customs bureau.
Corrupt system
“It is a systematic scheme that has gotten into the bone of the BOC. This is the reason despite reports of irregularities and corruption, many officials remain in their positions. They will do everything just to protect their operations,” he said.
Reta also said his company was doing its job religiously when Castigador decided to suspend its operations in February.
He said the real reason could be that “I spoke and I stood against the corruption happening inside.”
Asked who the leading smugglers are, Reta said they were the Koreans.
“Greed for money is running within the system of the Bureau of Customs. If the government is really bent on cleaning itself of corrupt officials, then they better look first at the Bureau of Customs here,” Reta said.
Gold, silver, bronze
He said BOC officials collect P150,000 for the quick release of cargo labeled as gold (rice, sugar, cars), P80,000 for labeled silver (vehicle and machine spare parts and perishable goods) and P60,000 for bronze (used clothing and products from China).
He said Customs officials and employees would bag about P30 million to P40 million a month for clearing smuggled goods.
He said he had personally witnessed dirty money flowing inside the BOC.
Reta said for example, on September 18 last year, then district collector Ronnie Silvestre issued a release order for several container vans even before it arrived at the Sasa Port.
The same thing happened on September 26 for container vans declared by a local company as “imported talcum powder.”
“But nobody knew what were really inside those containers because they did not pass through examination,” Reta said.
“What can I do? They would tell me to not conduct the procedure anymore. However, against my will, I would end up not conducting the procedure provided that they sign a document that indicated that there was no physical examination conduction on the vans,” Reta said.
For not conducting the inspections, his company’s services had been suspended.
“Someone has to start going public about all of these cases. As for me, I just wish I could sleep well again at night,” Reta said. Jeffrey Tupas with a report from Dennis Santos, Inquirer Mindanao
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 23:15:00 12/08/2010
p. A12
http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/inquirerheadlines/regions/view/20101208-307862/Smuggling-in-Davao-port-keeps-dirty-money-flowingtrader
Filed Under: Smuggling, Philippines - Regions, Graft & Corruption
DAVAO CITY, Philippines—The level of corruption in the Bureau of Customs (BOC), particularly at the Davao Port in Sasa here, is so extensive that it could involve a number of the agency’s top officials, a businessman said.
Rodolfo Reta, owner of Aquarius Container Yard, whose area was identified as a designated examination area (DEA) outside of the Customs Zone, even described the illegal activities at the port as being run by “a mafia.”
But Customs district collector Anju Castigador laughed off Reta’s allegations saying it was akin to sour graping.
Castigador said Reta’s company was a previous contractor under the BOC DEA scheme but its operations were suspended due to nonperformance.
Sources in the customs bureau said a syndicate known as Kimberly Gang is behind rampant smuggling nationwide. Gang leaders, a certain Julie and Noemi, are in cahoots with a certain Manuel of the customs bureau.
Corrupt system
“It is a systematic scheme that has gotten into the bone of the BOC. This is the reason despite reports of irregularities and corruption, many officials remain in their positions. They will do everything just to protect their operations,” he said.
Reta also said his company was doing its job religiously when Castigador decided to suspend its operations in February.
He said the real reason could be that “I spoke and I stood against the corruption happening inside.”
Asked who the leading smugglers are, Reta said they were the Koreans.
“Greed for money is running within the system of the Bureau of Customs. If the government is really bent on cleaning itself of corrupt officials, then they better look first at the Bureau of Customs here,” Reta said.
Gold, silver, bronze
He said BOC officials collect P150,000 for the quick release of cargo labeled as gold (rice, sugar, cars), P80,000 for labeled silver (vehicle and machine spare parts and perishable goods) and P60,000 for bronze (used clothing and products from China).
He said Customs officials and employees would bag about P30 million to P40 million a month for clearing smuggled goods.
He said he had personally witnessed dirty money flowing inside the BOC.
Reta said for example, on September 18 last year, then district collector Ronnie Silvestre issued a release order for several container vans even before it arrived at the Sasa Port.
The same thing happened on September 26 for container vans declared by a local company as “imported talcum powder.”
“But nobody knew what were really inside those containers because they did not pass through examination,” Reta said.
“What can I do? They would tell me to not conduct the procedure anymore. However, against my will, I would end up not conducting the procedure provided that they sign a document that indicated that there was no physical examination conduction on the vans,” Reta said.
For not conducting the inspections, his company’s services had been suspended.
“Someone has to start going public about all of these cases. As for me, I just wish I could sleep well again at night,” Reta said. Jeffrey Tupas with a report from Dennis Santos, Inquirer Mindanao
Labor group joins petition vs EO No. 2
By Jerome Aning
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 05:40:00 12/09/2010
p. A11
http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/inquirerheadlines/nation/view/20101209-307886/Labor-group-joins-petition-vs-EO-No-2
Filed Under: Civil & Public Services, Legal issues
MANILA, Philippines—A labor group has joined the Supreme Court petition seeking to stop the implementation of Executive Order No. 2, which recalled, withdrew and revoked the so-called “midnight appointments” of the Arroyo administration.
The Federation of Free Workers (FFW), a labor group that used to take a pro-government stance during the presidency of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, Wednesday said it had filed a petition for intervention in support of FFW national vice president Jose Matula.
Matula was appointed by Arroyo as commissioner, representing the workers, of the Social Security System (SSS) on Mar. 5, 2010, six days before the constitutional ban on midnight appointments.
But since taking his oath on April 14, Matula was classified as a midnight appointee under EO 2 and was not allowed to take his seat in the agency.
With the FFW leaders, Matula filed with the high court Wednesday a petition-in-intervention “with urgent prayer for the issuance of a temporary restraining order and writ of preliminary mandatory injunction”.
The FFW leaders alleged that EO 2 was unconstitutional since it “unduly expanded the meaning of ‘midnight appointment’” without basis in law.
Before his formal appointment, Matula had already been serving as SSS commissioner in an acting capacity since 2006. He said that under the SSS charter, his term should end on Aug. 15, 2012.
Citing Section 3 of Republic Act No. 8282 that created the SSS, Matula said workers’ representatives appointed to the commission have a term of three years.
‘Highly recommended’
The commission oversees the SSS, which has a membership of 28 million workers nationwide and assets of about P300 billion.
As an FFW official, Matula directly represents its more than 100,000 members who are active paying members of the SSS.
He was “highly recommended” to be appointed SSS commissioner by the members of the FFW governing board and other labor unions.
The FFW has been an active tripartite partner of the labor department and and enjoys consultative status with the International Labor Organization, as well as other regional and global federations and networks of labor and civil society.
The FFW is challenging the implementation of EO 2 by SS Commission Chair Juan B. Santos. Matula said he was informed by Santos that he was being terminated and being replaced by lawyer Ibarra Malonzo by virtue of EO 2.
Malonzo was to take his oath Wednesday.
The FFW’s petition also alleged that Santos and Executive Secretary Paquito Ochoa Jr., who represents the Office of the President, committed “grave abuse of discretion amounting to lack of jurisdiction in issuing and implementing EO 2.”
It cited that the Supreme Court, after taking cognizance of a similar suit filed by an official of the Office of Muslim Affairs, had issued on Oct. 12 a “status quo ante” order telling the executive branch to suspend the implementation of EO 2.
The FFW said the dismissal of Matula as SSS commissioner was an act in defiance of the court order.
The labor leaders said they filed the petition to “protect the material and substantial right” of Matula to his term of office at SSS and to “prevent serious and irreparable damage” to him, the workers and the entire SSS.”
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 05:40:00 12/09/2010
p. A11
http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/inquirerheadlines/nation/view/20101209-307886/Labor-group-joins-petition-vs-EO-No-2
Filed Under: Civil & Public Services, Legal issues
MANILA, Philippines—A labor group has joined the Supreme Court petition seeking to stop the implementation of Executive Order No. 2, which recalled, withdrew and revoked the so-called “midnight appointments” of the Arroyo administration.
The Federation of Free Workers (FFW), a labor group that used to take a pro-government stance during the presidency of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, Wednesday said it had filed a petition for intervention in support of FFW national vice president Jose Matula.
Matula was appointed by Arroyo as commissioner, representing the workers, of the Social Security System (SSS) on Mar. 5, 2010, six days before the constitutional ban on midnight appointments.
But since taking his oath on April 14, Matula was classified as a midnight appointee under EO 2 and was not allowed to take his seat in the agency.
With the FFW leaders, Matula filed with the high court Wednesday a petition-in-intervention “with urgent prayer for the issuance of a temporary restraining order and writ of preliminary mandatory injunction”.
The FFW leaders alleged that EO 2 was unconstitutional since it “unduly expanded the meaning of ‘midnight appointment’” without basis in law.
Before his formal appointment, Matula had already been serving as SSS commissioner in an acting capacity since 2006. He said that under the SSS charter, his term should end on Aug. 15, 2012.
Citing Section 3 of Republic Act No. 8282 that created the SSS, Matula said workers’ representatives appointed to the commission have a term of three years.
‘Highly recommended’
The commission oversees the SSS, which has a membership of 28 million workers nationwide and assets of about P300 billion.
As an FFW official, Matula directly represents its more than 100,000 members who are active paying members of the SSS.
He was “highly recommended” to be appointed SSS commissioner by the members of the FFW governing board and other labor unions.
The FFW has been an active tripartite partner of the labor department and and enjoys consultative status with the International Labor Organization, as well as other regional and global federations and networks of labor and civil society.
The FFW is challenging the implementation of EO 2 by SS Commission Chair Juan B. Santos. Matula said he was informed by Santos that he was being terminated and being replaced by lawyer Ibarra Malonzo by virtue of EO 2.
Malonzo was to take his oath Wednesday.
The FFW’s petition also alleged that Santos and Executive Secretary Paquito Ochoa Jr., who represents the Office of the President, committed “grave abuse of discretion amounting to lack of jurisdiction in issuing and implementing EO 2.”
It cited that the Supreme Court, after taking cognizance of a similar suit filed by an official of the Office of Muslim Affairs, had issued on Oct. 12 a “status quo ante” order telling the executive branch to suspend the implementation of EO 2.
The FFW said the dismissal of Matula as SSS commissioner was an act in defiance of the court order.
The labor leaders said they filed the petition to “protect the material and substantial right” of Matula to his term of office at SSS and to “prevent serious and irreparable damage” to him, the workers and the entire SSS.”
Secrets of the Communist Party
OUTLOOK
By Rigoberto D. Tiglao
Philippine Daily Inquirer
Thursday, December 2, 2010
DR. MARIO Miclat’s “Secrets of the Eighteen Mansions: A Novel” (Manila: Anvil Publishing, 2010) reveals in rich detail many of the covert factors that contributed to the growth of one of our country’s biggest problems: the Communist Party of the Philippines.
The “18 mansions” are the buildings in a secret compound in Beijing where the Chinese Communist Party in the 1960s and 1970s housed delegations of communist parties all over the world to facilitate its clandestine aid to their own insurgencies.
Mansion No. 7 housed the living quarters and offices in Beijing of the delegation from the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) founded and led by Jose Ma. Sison, aka Amado Guerrero. Miclat was a member of the CPP delegation who, with his family, lived and worked in that mansion starting in 1971. He returned to the Philippines in 1986, totally disillusioned with the party, which he says was a monster he “helped create, yet which devoured” him. He has since become an academic with a PhD and is at present dean of the Asian Center at the University of the Philippines.
Miclat’s is not a fictional novel, but a personal and political memoir of his nearly two decades as one of Sison’s earliest recruits, even living for two years in the “leader’s” “underground” house as his editor and translator, and then as a cadre in the party cell in Beijing. Many of the persons in the book are identified by their real names, others are thinly veiled, while a few are named only by their aliases, probably in order for Miclat to write more freely or to spare these persons from embarrassment.
For instance, “Herz” was one of Sison’s key operatives, who supervised the party’s youth organizations in the crucial years of the early 1970s, the era of student power that led thousands of idealistic teenagers to communism, wrecked lives and, for many, death in some lopsided fire fight. Herz now lives a very comfortable bourgeois life in Canada, even as his Filipino community newspaper continues to rant against the Philippine governments and paint the country black. Herz’s superior, “Goldie,” who recruited Miclat to the party and who, he claims, ordered the killing of a suspected, but unlikely, military agent was Monico Atienza, head of the party’s Organization Department during that period. After being comatose for months, Atienza died in 2007 after many years of living alone despondent and destitute on a meager UP assistant instructor’s salary.
Secrets’ secrets range from the personal to the political. For instance, the book claims that despite the rigors of running a revolution, Sison had the time to womanize, go on dates to nightclubs, and bear an illegitimate daughter. In a scene straight out of a soap opera, Miclat and New People’s Army chief “Kumander Dante” (Bernabe Buscayno) were shocked to see Sison’s wife pound “at the leader’s back with her fists even as she cried about her husband’s indiscretion.”
This might seem trivial today—after all, we had a President who boasted of his womanizing. But womanizing has been a capital offense in the “revolution” for dogmatic and practical reasons, punishable by death, or assignment to hazardous guerrilla front lines. After witnessing that conjugal spat, Dante “cried a like a little boy,” and between sobs asked Sison rhetorically: “How many good comrades have we condemned to die because of sexual opportunism?” I hope Dante will e-mail me to confirm or deny if this really happened.
What is not secret at all to those who have studied the insurgency, but which Miclat provides more details about, is that the Chinese government provided funds and arms to the CPP at its crucial embryonic stage. (A similar account was published in this newspaper on March 25, 2005 by Ricardo Malay, who headed the CPP cell later.) A courier was even arrested in 1974 by the US Federal Bureau of Investigation for carrying undeclared $75,000 intended for the CPP as she was exiting from Canada where she got the funds from the Chinese Embassy there.
As regards arms shipments, Deng Xiao Ping himself was so incensed over his Filipino comrades’ incompetence. The first shipment on the MV Karagatan in 1971 was easily intercepted by the military and most of the 1,200 M14 rifles smuggled were thrown overboard. In 1974, the MV Andrea, also financed by the Chinese, didn’t even reach China as it run aground on a sandbar, which was not unexpected as it was captained by a seasick-prone student activist who just got a crash course on seafaring.
The most earth-shaking secret in this book involves the bombing of the Liberal Party rally at Plaza Miranda on Aug. 21, 1971, the most crucial man-made event that formed the contours of our history since it happened. Miclat asserts with total certitude that it was Sison’s plot, and that he learned of this days after the bombing. He quotes Sison as saying before the attack: “We will force Marcos to declare martial law… People will rise up in arms when he finally shows his fascist face.” Two ranking comrades in Beijing knew of the attack beforehand. Miclat quotes “Peter,” one of Sison’s closest operatives, as telling him in October 1971: “Ninoy Aquino did not go to Plaza Miranda on the night of the bombing. Kumander Pusa phoned him.”
That it was Sison’s project had already been claimed by credible figures, such as former Sen. Jovito Salonga and journalist Gregg Jones in his book “Red Revolution.” For Miclat however, the attack seems to have left a deep wound in his heart. Before leaving for China two weeks before the bombing, he says he was asked to keep two grenades, which he was later convinced were the ones used in the carnage.
He could have dedicated his book to so many other people close to him. Instead he dedicates it “To an unidentified boy whose life was cut short by a terrorist bomb in Plaza Miranda, August 21, 1971.”
Email: tiglao.inquirer@gmail.com
By Rigoberto D. Tiglao
Philippine Daily Inquirer
Thursday, December 2, 2010
DR. MARIO Miclat’s “Secrets of the Eighteen Mansions: A Novel” (Manila: Anvil Publishing, 2010) reveals in rich detail many of the covert factors that contributed to the growth of one of our country’s biggest problems: the Communist Party of the Philippines.
The “18 mansions” are the buildings in a secret compound in Beijing where the Chinese Communist Party in the 1960s and 1970s housed delegations of communist parties all over the world to facilitate its clandestine aid to their own insurgencies.
Mansion No. 7 housed the living quarters and offices in Beijing of the delegation from the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) founded and led by Jose Ma. Sison, aka Amado Guerrero. Miclat was a member of the CPP delegation who, with his family, lived and worked in that mansion starting in 1971. He returned to the Philippines in 1986, totally disillusioned with the party, which he says was a monster he “helped create, yet which devoured” him. He has since become an academic with a PhD and is at present dean of the Asian Center at the University of the Philippines.
Miclat’s is not a fictional novel, but a personal and political memoir of his nearly two decades as one of Sison’s earliest recruits, even living for two years in the “leader’s” “underground” house as his editor and translator, and then as a cadre in the party cell in Beijing. Many of the persons in the book are identified by their real names, others are thinly veiled, while a few are named only by their aliases, probably in order for Miclat to write more freely or to spare these persons from embarrassment.
For instance, “Herz” was one of Sison’s key operatives, who supervised the party’s youth organizations in the crucial years of the early 1970s, the era of student power that led thousands of idealistic teenagers to communism, wrecked lives and, for many, death in some lopsided fire fight. Herz now lives a very comfortable bourgeois life in Canada, even as his Filipino community newspaper continues to rant against the Philippine governments and paint the country black. Herz’s superior, “Goldie,” who recruited Miclat to the party and who, he claims, ordered the killing of a suspected, but unlikely, military agent was Monico Atienza, head of the party’s Organization Department during that period. After being comatose for months, Atienza died in 2007 after many years of living alone despondent and destitute on a meager UP assistant instructor’s salary.
Secrets’ secrets range from the personal to the political. For instance, the book claims that despite the rigors of running a revolution, Sison had the time to womanize, go on dates to nightclubs, and bear an illegitimate daughter. In a scene straight out of a soap opera, Miclat and New People’s Army chief “Kumander Dante” (Bernabe Buscayno) were shocked to see Sison’s wife pound “at the leader’s back with her fists even as she cried about her husband’s indiscretion.”
This might seem trivial today—after all, we had a President who boasted of his womanizing. But womanizing has been a capital offense in the “revolution” for dogmatic and practical reasons, punishable by death, or assignment to hazardous guerrilla front lines. After witnessing that conjugal spat, Dante “cried a like a little boy,” and between sobs asked Sison rhetorically: “How many good comrades have we condemned to die because of sexual opportunism?” I hope Dante will e-mail me to confirm or deny if this really happened.
What is not secret at all to those who have studied the insurgency, but which Miclat provides more details about, is that the Chinese government provided funds and arms to the CPP at its crucial embryonic stage. (A similar account was published in this newspaper on March 25, 2005 by Ricardo Malay, who headed the CPP cell later.) A courier was even arrested in 1974 by the US Federal Bureau of Investigation for carrying undeclared $75,000 intended for the CPP as she was exiting from Canada where she got the funds from the Chinese Embassy there.
As regards arms shipments, Deng Xiao Ping himself was so incensed over his Filipino comrades’ incompetence. The first shipment on the MV Karagatan in 1971 was easily intercepted by the military and most of the 1,200 M14 rifles smuggled were thrown overboard. In 1974, the MV Andrea, also financed by the Chinese, didn’t even reach China as it run aground on a sandbar, which was not unexpected as it was captained by a seasick-prone student activist who just got a crash course on seafaring.
The most earth-shaking secret in this book involves the bombing of the Liberal Party rally at Plaza Miranda on Aug. 21, 1971, the most crucial man-made event that formed the contours of our history since it happened. Miclat asserts with total certitude that it was Sison’s plot, and that he learned of this days after the bombing. He quotes Sison as saying before the attack: “We will force Marcos to declare martial law… People will rise up in arms when he finally shows his fascist face.” Two ranking comrades in Beijing knew of the attack beforehand. Miclat quotes “Peter,” one of Sison’s closest operatives, as telling him in October 1971: “Ninoy Aquino did not go to Plaza Miranda on the night of the bombing. Kumander Pusa phoned him.”
That it was Sison’s project had already been claimed by credible figures, such as former Sen. Jovito Salonga and journalist Gregg Jones in his book “Red Revolution.” For Miclat however, the attack seems to have left a deep wound in his heart. Before leaving for China two weeks before the bombing, he says he was asked to keep two grenades, which he was later convinced were the ones used in the carnage.
He could have dedicated his book to so many other people close to him. Instead he dedicates it “To an unidentified boy whose life was cut short by a terrorist bomb in Plaza Miranda, August 21, 1971.”
Email: tiglao.inquirer@gmail.com
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