Mar Roxas’ folly

THE silly exchange of challenges and retorts between LP standard bearer Mar Roxas, and PDP-Laban’s Davao City Mayor Rody Duterte while regrettable, is actually indicative of Mr. Roxas’ superficial grasp of the peace and order situation in the regions and provinces.

When he belittled the peace and order condition in Davao City under the stewardship of Mr. Duterte, he exposed his ignorance of how data are collated by the Philippine National Police that was directly under his control as Secretary of Interior and Local Government. Had he cared to learn how crime indexes are arrived at, he would have been the first to acknowledge the core strength of his political rival, erstwhile buddy, but he didn’t. Instead, he came off sounding like a wailing fish vendor when he chose to take issue with the off-the-cuff “sampalin kita” retort of Mr. Duterte instead of humbly correcting himself.

In fact, it’d be interesting to see Mr. Roxas’ reaction when confronted about the negative impact of his policy at the DILG not to appoint a permanent provincial police directors. He repeatedly ignored calls to appoint a permanent director in Pangasinan (in fact, in many provinces as well) to help sustain the campaign vs. illegal drugs in the province. His policy rotating provincial directors as ‘officer-in-charge’ effectively saved O-I-Cs from any accountability for the unsustainable police campaign that led to worsening drug problem in the province.

So how much does Mr. Roxas really know about maintaining peace and order in the provinces besides providing brand new jeeps? Sadly, his attempt at crossing swords with Mr. Duterte just showed how little and superficial he really knows.

Pulling Poe

IF Grace Poe pulls this one out of the fire, she will have scored a major victory of sorts.  No, not that she becomes a cinch to win the presidency. It is that her twin tiffs of residency and citizenship get to be tossed out the window. The Constitution allows only a natural- born Filipino to aspire for positions of congressman, senator, vice president and president.  If the Supreme Court finally declares Poe as not a natural-born Filipino, she gets disqualified as a candidate for president in May 2016.  Likewise, she will not also finish her Senate term until 2019. What a bleak scenario, indeed.

Maybe, if she had opted to run for vice president—pundits believed she’d win in a breeze—all this brouhaha hounding her would not have happened.  And then she might even be a cinch to become president in 2022?

Ah, another case of being too in a hurry to get there.  Haste makes waste, right?

(For your comments and reactions, please email to: punch.sunday@gmail.com)

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