Default mode

By + Oscar V. Cruz D. D.

The present administration must be in a default mode on prudence and the pursuant right judgments. It is not enough that it issues faulty Presidential Proclamations and shameful Executive Orders every now and then to the consternation of the Supreme Court.

It is neither enough that it recently declared an “all out war” in Mindanao so that not only many good soldiers are killed to the great sorrows of their families. Furthermore, thousands of innocent men, women and children have to abandon their homes and leave their farms behind for safety. While the administration may be keen in bringing to justice those guilty of the 10 July barbarism committed against the soldiers concerned, it may not claim innocence for the more killings and bigger destructions still in the making on account of the on-going war.

Lo and behold, considering that the above aberrations appear to be still insufficient—and there are too many to mention—the present administration just came up with another dangerous idea, another ominous plan: Nuclear power! The encompassing reason alleged appears ostensibly nobly acceptable at first glance, viz., to lower the electric power rates. What it does not want to remember much less admit is that the government itself is the ultimate cause of costly power in the country.

But there are questions the national leadership itself might want to consider and hopefully give reasonable answers: How much again will it cost the Filipinos to have a working nuclear plant? What company again will the Government engage, what contract again will the Government sign? What about the fault line detected at the grounds of the present non-functional nuclear plant? Where will the government throw the nuclear waste? What will the Government do in the event of terrorist attacks directed at the plant?

If the national leadership could even invent acceptable answers to the above questions—specially on the matter of the handling of the public funds, the disposal of nuclear waste and the relevance of terrorism—then let it put up nuclear plants in every street corner all over the land!

But then, this government does not even know what to do with garbage. It cannot even keep the floods away from no less than Metro Manila. It is incapable even of cleaning the country of illegal drugs, not to mention jueteng and video carera. It is not even able to stop smuggling and get the smugglers. And now, it wants to go nuclear! Is this the glorious legacy that the national leadership envisions to leave behind hopefully by 2010? Or is this the key component of the glowing vision of the Philippines as a first world Country come 2030?

(For past columns, click http://sundaypunch.prepys.com/archives/category/opinion/viewpoints/)

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