The President's new 'style' is in the making in Malacañang

The President said that yes-terday's STAR headline gave the wrong impression that crime was on the rise when, "in reality, it's going down dramatically."

The topic of our telephone conversation last night was some-thing else, but the Chief Executive, not one to quibble, expressed his concern that "scare" headlines like that only turned away foreign investors and caused disappointment in the domestic sector. Anyway, he got this sentiment off his chest in an earnest manner, instead of frothing at the mouth as so many of his critics and lampooners like to picture him. That's what this writer appreciates about Erap. He's always been up front and direct in his dealings with our editors and this newspaper, not attributing sinister motives to us, even when he is voicing a grievance about our coverage of the news.

Erap said to this publisher in a previous one-on-one that all he wants is a fair and accurate reporting of events and quotations that aren't out of context. As for our columnists, the President has told us often enough that what they write, although often hurtful, is their opinion, but he hopes they will always strive to be fair.

You can say of the Chief Executive, when all is said and done, that what you see is what you get.

According to a Malacañang insider yesterday, the President will reduce his public utterances, such as the number of speeches he delivers. He will be giving a couple of major speeches a month, or three -- but not more. There will be formal press conferences, timed to confront important issues, while "ambush" interviews will be avoided. (I must add, knowing Erap's free-wheeling style, that the term to use is "avoided as much as possible").

Two Cabinet members in the past week have already used the term "scarcity value" to define the new policy that the President should keep his public statements and appearances (including social events) to a minimum.

In an intimate huddle with one of his top advisers, Erap recently admitted that he had been doing things the wrong way. Owing to the fact that he had won by 40 percent of the popular vote, mostly the ballots of his beloved mahirap or the masa, he had believed that it was essential to make himself "available" to everybody. This resulted in him being forced to speak to everyone who approached him, without having "time out" to ponder and make important decisions. Now, "scarcity value" is going to be tried out.

Take time out to pray, too, Mr. President. Take the word of a confirmed sinner -- He answers them.

The brand-new "Chief of Staff" of President Estrada, Dr. Aprodicio "Prod" Laquian, really impressed the members of the Greenhills Walking Corp. when he spoke before the group yesterday.

When asked during the informal give-and-take when he was going to take over the Presidential Management Staff (PMS), so jealously held by Secretary Lenny de Jesus, Laquian smiled and replied that he was easing himself slowly into his new job, studying what to do, and didn't feel it a good idea to just jump in and "hit the ground running."

Prod, who has a Ph.D. in political science, major in urban studies, from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Mass., and a B.A. in public administration cum laude from the University of the Philippines, didn't strike anyone in the room as a dusty academic, but a doer.

What Laquian has going for him is that he's known Erap "from way back" and was among his "origs" in the San Juan crowd and in his campaign planning. His most salient quality, at this stage, is that he's not mesmerized by the "power" of his new assignment. He pledged he wasn't going to cling to his post kapit-tuko like some others might do.

"I can pack up and leave anytime," he grinned, and somehow that didn't sound offensive, "but I won't, because I know that President Estrada is sincere and can improve things."

He pointed out that, contrary to what his detractors say, Erap is "a very kind person." That can also be a defect, he shrugged, since "as the newspapers sometimes say, being pusong mamon enables people to take advantage of you."

Why did he come home after having emigrated to Canada in 1969, to recover his Philippine identity after becoming a Canadian citizen in 1983?

Laquian replied to this question by asserting that "God has been very good to me," and that he had happily carved out a career in his chosen field, earning an average of US$15,000 monthly, the income of his equally talented wife Eleanor del Rio-Laquian included. "I'm not after earning more money," he vowed. "Without sounding immodest, I hope, I can say that I'm worth around US$2.4 million."

He added, "However, with all the blessings that I received, I decided it's 'payback time'. It's time I did something for my country. And so I'm here."

When he was asked to return by the President, Prod recalled, "no salary or even position" was discussed. The President had simply said on the overseas line: "You've got to come home, Prod, and help me."

Anyway, he pointed out, when he asked Executive Secretary Ronnie Zamora what a Cabinet minister usually gets, he was told it was about P30,000 a month, and up to P45,000 with allowances and other perks included. Laquian grinned broadly when he pointed out that he used to earn that amount in a single day as a consultant of the World Bank.

Secretary Laquian (I guess that's his title) underscored that the first principle to observe is that "to run a country you need up-to-date information."

This is why, he explained, he is upgrading the computerization of the Palace, to link up with the data bases of the key officials in the administration, like Secretary Robert Aventajado, Police Director (General) Panfilo Lacson, Trade Secretary Jose "Titoy" Pardo, Public Works and Highways Secretary Gregorio Vigilar, etc.

On the other hand, simply collating information isn't enough, Prod pointed out. You've got to have honest-to-goodness people staffing your office to get the work down. And instinct. "As a boy from the slums of Tramo," he winked, "I know that there are more than 13 ways to skin a cat."

He described the President's practice of promoting different cliques, a sort of "divide and conquer" approach, as a "Rooseveltian management style," indicating that it approximated the way the late US President Franklin D. Roosevelt ran the White House.

I don't know whether this is effective, and I trust Laquian will, in his subtle way, eventually wean the Chief Executive away from it. It may have worked for the slick FDR in Washington, DC, but the idea of provoking factions "to watch each other" in a sort of balance of suspicion merely provokes turf wars of the kind which have been unsettling Malacañang.

If our officials, instead, learned to pull the harmony, not trying one-upmanship on each other, or attempting to wrest advantage at the expense of the "other" group, we'd have a more efficient Palace.

That's what I believe.

Another star of yesterday's forum, a double-header, was General Lacson whose exploits are no longer in question: he has transformed the police organization from a bunch mistrusted by the public into a force which is on the way back to regaining widespread respect.

Lacson's best quality is that, while direct, he's not dogmatic. (A far cry before he took over the PNP and started making waves, not sparing even retired PNP generals).

I informed him yesterday that, contrary to the report he had submitted to the President about the 11-man gang which kidnapped businessman Joseph Uy in Makati last February 1 (in a spectacular feat, Lacson and his police agents had rescued Uy only 34 hours later), two of the victims alleged to have been taken hostage in the gang's early kidnappings had "never" been abducted.

I referred to a categorical denial by the Yuchengco family of what I had reported in my column of last February 6, based on the PNP report, namely that Helen Dy and Yvonne S. Yuchengco had been among the kidnap victims. Our friend, Ambassador Alfonso T. Yuchengco, informed me that his two daughters had "never been kidnap victims."

Lacson accepted this denial, but politely replied that he would have his operatives recheck the matter. He revealed, while on the same subject, that the "mastermind" of the Joseph Uy kidnapping had, belying earlier reports, gotten away.

Lacson said that, based on their arrest and interrogation of the 11 suspects nabbed in the Uy caper, police units had raided the home of a certain John Yu Kiat, a relative of some of the victims, in posh Ayala Alabang. Before the raiding party arrived, though, the suspect had apparently "skipped" and is still at large, the object of a manhunt.

Ping, by the way, also took exception to yesterday's banner about "Criminality, instability worry top executives." He said that he had read through the story and (jokingly) found that the traffic problem seemed to be the major crime headache of the 50 chief executives surveyed.

He assured the group that the police were cracking down hard on the criminal syndicates.

On the drive against the drug lords, he said they had tracked down two Chinese bands, one from the mainland and the other from Taiwan -- and were on the way to unmasking their networks.

A few days ago, in another raid, they had seized a large shipment of chemicals bound for Luzon being unloaded in Cagayan de Oro from a vessel which had come from Kuala Lumpur. Lacson noted that if the chemicals had reached their destination, one of the clandestine shabu factories, there would soon have been many more tons of that narcotic (known abroad as "chemical ice") on the market.

Asked in the open forum about his relationship with the President, Lacson said that he was grateful that the Chief Executive had been supportive of him through thick and thin. He recalled that when Erap was still Vice President and he (Lacson) was being accused of many things (including, I might point out, the Kuratong Baleleng case) Erap had been warned by many of his friends and supporters to junk Lacson. "If you stick by Lacson," one of them told Estrada, "you'll sink with him."

"I can never thank the President enough for having stood by me, and never abandoning me," Lacson declared. He said that he could say without exaggeration: "I am willing to give even my life for him."

Believe it or not, coming from a tough, rough and ready cop, this remark touched the hearts of many in the audience.