Pagcor should explain P1B spent for coffee

PNoy delivering his SONA 2011

If the disclosure of President Benigno Aquino about the Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corporation’s (Pagcor) alleged spending of P1 billion for coffee wasn’t revealed in his State of the Nation Address (SONA) 2011, I would have taken it as an incredibly silly comment not deserving a second thought.

But, PNoy is no stand-up comedian and SONA is a serious business that is very self-explanatory.

Being so categorical and blunt about the accusation, PNoy and his government sleuth must have uncovered more irregularities in Pagcor, on top of the many scams already discovered happening during the time of former President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo (GMA) and her erstwhile Pagcor handyman, Efraim Genuino.

“Isang bilyong piso po ang ginastos ng dating pamunuan ng ahensya para sa kape. Sa isang daang piso na lang po kada tasa, lalabas na nakakonsumo sila ng 10 milyong tasa,” he said.

“Baka po kahit ngayong iba na ang pamunuan ng Pagcor ay dilat na dilat pa rin ang mga mata ng ga umiinom ng kapeng it. Hanapin nga po natin sila at itatanong ko: “Nakakatulog pa po ba kayo?” he added.

It boggles my mind, and am sure it does yours, too, imagining how 10 million cups of coffee looks like! How big a heap is P1 billion worth of ground coffee!

This is simply outrageous that deserves not only a second look, but the culprits truly deserving of hanging by their balls!

One could just imagine how far the P1 billion could have gone if it was used for the homeless, the hungry and the sickly among the poor people in this country.

One could just fantasize how beneficial it would have been if this huge amount of money were donated to charitable institutions of different causes all over the country.

One could just picture out how relieving and heartening it would have been for parents to see their kids going to school with enough classrooms and adequate chairs instead of having multiple classes in one classroom, while some pupils have nothing to sit on, but on the floor.

There could have been a million worthwhile uses for the billion wasted for self-gratification.

In exposing Pagcor’s coffee anomaly, PNoy was not persecuting GMA and her previous administration. He was simply exposing the insensibility and indifference of man, or woman, for that matter.

PNoy used the SONA 2011 as the vehicle so we may know and we deserve to know.

Activist priest Robert Reyes and the “Malacañang diocese”

 

A bishop praying over Arroyo

Yesterday it was the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) chain of command being accused of corruption.

Today, sadly, the last place one would think it could happen, the Philippine Catholic Church hierarchy, is hounded by the same breach of trust.

Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO) chair Margarita Juico has been reported as admitting that the charity agency is verifying reports that former President and now Pampanga Rep. Gloria Macapagal Arroyo used its funds to get the support of a number of bishops, by giving out vehicles before she stepped down from office last year.

Fr. Robert Reyes

Not only that, says activist priest Fr. Robert Reyes, a staunch critic of the past administration, who says he is not speaking from out of the box, but as a member of the Church institution.

“Not just the Pajeros. She constructed houses (for priests), convents, cathedrals, and gave away cars,” Reyes, was quoted as saying in a phone interview.

Reyes said the money, used for “donations” to the churches, did not only come from the presidential or emergency fund, but also from the buckets of the PCSO and the Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corporation (Pagcor).

In effect, according to Reyes, Pagcor put the Church leaders in quandary whether to support gambling or not. Which is the lesser evil?

Another revelation that Reyes made was saying that Arroyo’s creation of the Presidential Advisers on Ecclesiastical Affairs was also for her to have a better insight of who among the bishops most likely needed vehicles or church buildings.

“The vital and fundamental role of the Church is to complain and set the records straight (in government). We (were) weakened as an institution because of this,” he said.

These are damning statements of bribery and corruption in the Church hierarchy in connivance with leading State officials in exchange for support and/or silence, depending on what the issues are.

Lucky were those who belonged to the so-called Arroyo’s “Malacañang diocese” for they have inherited expensive cars and became favored recipient of grants and other good tidings from Malacañang.

So when you hear any of these bishops croak in defense of any verbal attack on Arroyo, don’t be surprised for they are simply doing what is expected of them.

It is payback time for these ranking men of the cloth who talks a lot about morality, made a vow on poverty and who professes all the time of being incorruptible.

 

Crony politics

Gloria Macapagal Arroyo has barely a month to stay as president, yet she continues to be as recalcitrant as she can ever be.

Not contented with having appointed Renato Corona as chief justice of the Supreme Court, Arroyo has shown again her hostile and antipathetic character by reappointing Efraim Genuino as chair of Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corp. (Pagcor), extending his term into the incoming administration of apparent president-elect Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III.

Why can’t the outgoing president simply have the courtesy, the civility and the graciousness to allow her successor to make the appointments of government positions?

It is not a question of the appointment by Arroyo being “above board,” as Elena Bautista, chief of the Presidential Management Staff, claims it to be.

Rather, it is more a question of propriety, of respectability and of good breeding that she has to defer all her midnight installations in recognition of the authority of the newly elected president.

Actually, what President Arroyo is doing is simply playing crony politics.

One time or another Arroyo must have elicited some favors from her close friends or cronies.

It’s pay-back time. Quid pro quo.

Nothing wrong, perhaps, with that, but why make it a contentious legal issue to be debated upon and resolved by the new administration when it could have been avoided in the first place?

Can’t we just turn over the reins of power and let the new administration make the choices they want for the government positions?

Hope we have seen the last of President Arroyo’s midnight appointments – for the good of the nation.