Punchline
Political will vs. business interests
By Ermin Garcia Jr.
POLITICAL will vs. business interests
The vaunted political will of Dagupan Mayor Benjie Lim is showing some results finally, particularly in the implementation of the city’s waste segregation campaign.
I have always maintained that a skeptic and pasaway community will be defeated once political will is unsheathed and foisted on the people for a legitimate cause for the community’s general well-being.
Let’s hope that the Lim administration sustains this effort and achieve zero waste disposal. The city has every reason to cheer him on to his next targets – the fish pens that poison the city’s rivers.
Go-go-go BSL! (I just wonder, however, if he would have the political will to take on the illegal gambling syndicates in the city).
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CONFLICT OF INTERESTS. But lest Mr. Lim begins to believe that he can now disguise political and private business agenda as political will, he should be warned that repudiation will be quick. He ought to know that it’s not difficult for anyone on the street to discern what is and what is not, i.e., what Mr. Lim’s business activities are, who his friends and relatives are, etc.
A case in point is the “legal” obstacle Mr. Lim foisted on Vice Mayor Belen Fernandez’s family to keep their hotel project in limbo. Any mayor in his right mind, who has the vision to create economic opportunities for the community, would do all to have a brand new hotel project situated in his town/city. So why is Mr. Lim digging up all “legal” excuses to keep the project’s application in the city’s archives? Any way one looks at it, it points to nothing else but personal agenda-interests and false pride on his part. Quite pathetic if I may so so.
Mr. Lim’s recent move recalls to mind how he, as mayor in 2006, tried to move heaven and earth to divert the construction of the diversion highway (now known as the JDV Sr. Expressway Extension) as far away as he could from the CSI Mall (owned by the Fernandez’s) in Lucao District. It was obvious to all that he simply did not want Ms. Fernandez, his arch business competitor, from enjoying an edge that the highway would provide. On hindsight, had the DPWH consented to Mr. Lim’s folly, the area where he had wanted the entry/exit to be situated would have been the scene of a daily chaotic traffic situation today. Gratefully, motorists today enjoy a bottleneck-free access to and fro the highway.
Mayor Lim of circa 2006 failed to see through his conflict of interests that he suffered from. Blinded by his own private business interests, he risked all against public interest. Sadly, I note today that the same conflict of interests is beginning to rear its ugly head in his mind. The tragic “what are we in power for?” syndrome is becoming evident in him again by demonstrating anew that he has no qualms about sacrificing public good where Belen Fernandez is concerned.
As things stand today, Mr. Lim was already ill-advised to keep the gag memo vs. the city council in place, and to deny the Fernandez family the needed permit for the latter’s environment-compliant hotel project to proceed aggravates the situation for him. The city loses if the Fernandezes relocate their plans to a neighboring town.
If he doesn’t watch out, his continued obstinacy to block the Fernandez’s business activities owing to his personal business interests will soon eat him up and eventually lose all the goodwill that he has began to earn for himself since he returned to the city hall.
If only Mr. Lim would focus on his legacy, he’ll yet be “the best mayor the city ever had”. But if he continues to prioritize his business interests over public interest as he appears to be doing again, then he will remain as “the mayor who would have been the best that the city ever had but failed.”
That, Mr. Lim, is the people’s promise. (I hope Mr. Lim had the chance to pray for enlightenment when he celebrated his birthday last Friday! Belated happy birthday, Mr. Lim!).
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HELP SWAT. Trillions of bytes and thousands of words have already cluttered airtime and space worldwide to decry and pontificate on the Luneta bus siege and hostage taking last week. In fact, it can be said that whatever one says or writes today about it would already be repetitious, so let me just say – everyone is right on hindsight!
However, there is one critical aspect of that incident that has escaped the minds of the uzis and the kibitzers among us. Staring back at all of us is the revelation that the vaunted and highly visible motorcycle-riding SWAT (that’s Special Weapons And Tactics for you) teams in many urban cities are in fact ill-equipped, ill-trained, and not always capable to respond effectively as hyped.
The Luneta siege said it all: They are not as effective as many of us have been made to believe but I must stress that their situation is not through their own fault.
Yet, all too sudden, our images of efficient and reliable SWAT teams swiftly flew out the window not because our brave cops fumbled like amateurs in Luneta but because of what the police directors themselves have admitted in congress hearings: SWAT teams have severe limitations that may not allow them to handle the highly sensitive and dangerous jobs contrary to what we’ve been made to believe.
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So it now appears that all the past public demonstrations and drills of SWAT teams in front of media evidently were all just for show… to demonstrate what they could do to save lives WHEN there are NO live bullets flying around their heads. This reality dawned on us when TV networks unwittingly showed how the Manila SWAT team rehearsed the assault while the negotiations with the hostage-taker were underway. They moved like clockwork and smoothly during the rehearsal (but without the “kill-or-be-killed” hostage-taker on sight) only to appear helpless and awkward when they were finally put on the spot – in the real world of “do-or-die” hostage-taking.
I point this out not to belittle the capabilities of our SWAT members but because our SWAT teams need all the help they can get from local government units. Our SWAT teams can only be as effective to the extent that our local government units and communities support them.
It’d be instructive for the Espino administration and the city mayors in the province to make an inventory of the special weapons and tools provided the teams and to review the training modules available to them. Accomplishing that, they should proceed to map out logistical plans to enhance the teams’ present limited capabilities.
We must act to make our SWAT teams truly efficient and dependable before some of us, or some of our own friends and relatives suffer the same fate as the Hong Kong tourists did.
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THANK YOU. I’d like to thank former CA Justice Teddy Regino and Atty. Arginald Esguerra for readily coming forward to help defend and protect press freedom. With their assistance, the libel case by San Carlos Mayor Resuello against the PUNCH was dismissed by the city prosecutor.
ERRATUM. Last week’s issue erroneously reported that it was Dagupan Councilor Maybelyn Fernandez who “proposed” the joint resolution endorsing the CSI Hotel project when in fact all she did was to report the endorsement resolution in her capacity as majority floor leader. PUNCH apologizes for this factual error.
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