nielsky_2003
02-26-2006, 05:13 AM
Time to bid adieu to democracy!
There is reason to fear and get ourselves scared of every member of the PNP given the events of Day 1 in the infantile life of Proclamation 1017 and General Order 5 – two living documents that none of us have ever had seen to be able to respond intelligently – not Saguisag, not Escudero, not Cory. The threats, open and veiled, coming from Malacanang are meant to be retaliatory acts of a beleaguered government to resort to these underhanded acts – to ban rallies, to censor broadcast, to close and take over newspapers, to arrest target personalities (or anyone in their absence), to raid offices and residences without writs, to jail or detain arch oppositionists if not kill anti-GMA frontline activists – or in short, to serve public notice that GMA is ‘the best person to lead this nation’ back to nowhere.
How could the chief PNP have the moral decency, as someone implicated in the controversial Garci scandal to – lead raids, enforce bodily arrests, become editor-in-chief of Tribune, explain the constitutional implications of Proc. 1017 and General Order 5, confiscate private property, violate basic human rights, and boast like a tiger that the PNP is in full control of the situation? In the first place, does Lomibao as much as know the real situation obtaining and what controls he has been employing without any sound legal basis? I am pushed at wits end unable to comprehend what PNP’s Crime Investigation and Detection Group is really all about. If CIDG, supposed-to-be reposed with lawful authority, is itself the agency to – raid, detain, kill, and steal – persons or any sort of stuff, then what PNP do we have?
The events of Day 1 are contemptuous. GMA said her piece as people in EDSA celebrate the 20th anniversary of People Power Revolution. Only then was it followed by a reading of Proclamation 1017. At about the same time, PNP has already arrested Congressman Beltran except that Congressmen Ocampo and Casino slipped out. Then PNP got old General Montano. The men of General Radovan, all looking like some underworld characters and rude, caught Randy David, Argee Guevarra by their arms and charged of inciting to sedition and violation of Proc. 1017. Their later release proves that Proc. 1017 cannot sustain its moral inadequacy until perhaps they have to close all courts of justice.
And maybe they will. If that happens, logically Gonzales has just elevated himself as the chief justice of the “Supreme Court” of the land of threatened lives. Remember this man, the self-confessed author of Proc. 1017 who has demonstrated himself as the all-knowing intellectual titan that he projects himself to be whenever there are emerging societal issues? He castigates Susan Roces, blames ABS-CBN for the stampede, subscribes to the absolute truths (untruths?) of intelligence reports, professes to be a consummate researcher before he would open his mouth, interprets the law as he (mis)understands them to be. Trained legal minds and historians simply know how bad the mind of this justice secretary works in the oblique – trailblazing all un-tread, virgin, un-tested legal waters. Sadly, in the days to come, there will be more of the same from this silent but fierce author of Proc. 1017.
Against this backdrop, what else must we expect of a shift to parliamentary government as Malacanang has been aggressively pushing? It would simply tread the constitutional path toward a rather ‘monarchical if dictatorial order’ free of the obstructionist role of check and balance, and the separation of powers. Whatever happened in Day 1, 2, 3 and to the coming days in our national life, there is reason to be scared of Gonzales who has raised the Sword of Damocles. And PNP as well as the damned AFP are sent like mad dogs in the wilds to sniff for every site that smells like newspapers, prints like Tribune, sounds like Randy, looks like Beltran, walks like Montano, crowds like EDSA, and grieves like Guingona. Democracy is about to be butchered in the slaughterhouse called, Malacanang, Inc. All the dirty departments of Malacanang and its skilled operators are at alert levels leaving nothing to chance.
What kind of undemocratic setting are all these – the supposed-to-be civilian-oriented police – directing the operations of Tribune; climbing up the walls of ABS-CBN; swooping down on every site for persons, objects or things like gangsters; chasing cars, and all that stuff? It could feel like a new government is in place with everything being placed under – police control. Truly, the PNP is the supreme protector of GMA – more military-like than the AFP itself. What can Karina David say of the PNP that has never shifted to the concept of a civilian national police? The coming days bear watching. We must take a final bow as we witness crumbles to the ground before our very eyes.
Is RP now a huge cemetery of dead ideas? In the end, it is Catch 22 . With Proc. 1017, they want the entire Filipino people to be afraid of their government when in truth and in fact, under GMA, the government is the one afraid of its own people and that is the greatest misfortune in governance.
There is reason to fear and get ourselves scared of every member of the PNP given the events of Day 1 in the infantile life of Proclamation 1017 and General Order 5 – two living documents that none of us have ever had seen to be able to respond intelligently – not Saguisag, not Escudero, not Cory. The threats, open and veiled, coming from Malacanang are meant to be retaliatory acts of a beleaguered government to resort to these underhanded acts – to ban rallies, to censor broadcast, to close and take over newspapers, to arrest target personalities (or anyone in their absence), to raid offices and residences without writs, to jail or detain arch oppositionists if not kill anti-GMA frontline activists – or in short, to serve public notice that GMA is ‘the best person to lead this nation’ back to nowhere.
How could the chief PNP have the moral decency, as someone implicated in the controversial Garci scandal to – lead raids, enforce bodily arrests, become editor-in-chief of Tribune, explain the constitutional implications of Proc. 1017 and General Order 5, confiscate private property, violate basic human rights, and boast like a tiger that the PNP is in full control of the situation? In the first place, does Lomibao as much as know the real situation obtaining and what controls he has been employing without any sound legal basis? I am pushed at wits end unable to comprehend what PNP’s Crime Investigation and Detection Group is really all about. If CIDG, supposed-to-be reposed with lawful authority, is itself the agency to – raid, detain, kill, and steal – persons or any sort of stuff, then what PNP do we have?
The events of Day 1 are contemptuous. GMA said her piece as people in EDSA celebrate the 20th anniversary of People Power Revolution. Only then was it followed by a reading of Proclamation 1017. At about the same time, PNP has already arrested Congressman Beltran except that Congressmen Ocampo and Casino slipped out. Then PNP got old General Montano. The men of General Radovan, all looking like some underworld characters and rude, caught Randy David, Argee Guevarra by their arms and charged of inciting to sedition and violation of Proc. 1017. Their later release proves that Proc. 1017 cannot sustain its moral inadequacy until perhaps they have to close all courts of justice.
And maybe they will. If that happens, logically Gonzales has just elevated himself as the chief justice of the “Supreme Court” of the land of threatened lives. Remember this man, the self-confessed author of Proc. 1017 who has demonstrated himself as the all-knowing intellectual titan that he projects himself to be whenever there are emerging societal issues? He castigates Susan Roces, blames ABS-CBN for the stampede, subscribes to the absolute truths (untruths?) of intelligence reports, professes to be a consummate researcher before he would open his mouth, interprets the law as he (mis)understands them to be. Trained legal minds and historians simply know how bad the mind of this justice secretary works in the oblique – trailblazing all un-tread, virgin, un-tested legal waters. Sadly, in the days to come, there will be more of the same from this silent but fierce author of Proc. 1017.
Against this backdrop, what else must we expect of a shift to parliamentary government as Malacanang has been aggressively pushing? It would simply tread the constitutional path toward a rather ‘monarchical if dictatorial order’ free of the obstructionist role of check and balance, and the separation of powers. Whatever happened in Day 1, 2, 3 and to the coming days in our national life, there is reason to be scared of Gonzales who has raised the Sword of Damocles. And PNP as well as the damned AFP are sent like mad dogs in the wilds to sniff for every site that smells like newspapers, prints like Tribune, sounds like Randy, looks like Beltran, walks like Montano, crowds like EDSA, and grieves like Guingona. Democracy is about to be butchered in the slaughterhouse called, Malacanang, Inc. All the dirty departments of Malacanang and its skilled operators are at alert levels leaving nothing to chance.
What kind of undemocratic setting are all these – the supposed-to-be civilian-oriented police – directing the operations of Tribune; climbing up the walls of ABS-CBN; swooping down on every site for persons, objects or things like gangsters; chasing cars, and all that stuff? It could feel like a new government is in place with everything being placed under – police control. Truly, the PNP is the supreme protector of GMA – more military-like than the AFP itself. What can Karina David say of the PNP that has never shifted to the concept of a civilian national police? The coming days bear watching. We must take a final bow as we witness crumbles to the ground before our very eyes.
Is RP now a huge cemetery of dead ideas? In the end, it is Catch 22 . With Proc. 1017, they want the entire Filipino people to be afraid of their government when in truth and in fact, under GMA, the government is the one afraid of its own people and that is the greatest misfortune in governance.