Snake-bitten Pardo - Gotcha

We often take compulsory health insurance for granted and look at monthly contributions as pesky paycheck deductions. But when medical emergency strikes, we realize how important it is after all. More so since Philhealth (Philippine Health Insurance Corp.), which marks its fifth year today, has raised all benefits by half, and amounts for public employees and indigents to equal that of private members.

While the family worries about bills, Philhealth steps in with drug and hospital reimbursements for 40 million members: six million from private firms, 1.5 million from government offices, 500,000 self-members, and 32 million dependents.

It's inevitable in the snake pit that's Malacañang. Jealous Palace courtiers are back-biting Jose Pardo for being close and credible to Joseph Estrada. And while their initial tack was to picture the new finance chief as a shameless fawner, they're now hissing he has shamed the President.

Depending on how one looks at it, Pardo had good reason to chase after Estrada to every Palace meeting or social since he joined the Cabinet as trade-industry head. Like his predecessor Ed Espiritu, he had a stake: to prove to business friends that here was a team that could lead RP out of crisis. He had to use every available minute to give Estrada crash courses in economics, and pull him away from a midnight Cabinet that gave only drunk advice.

The midnight buddies met Pardo's push with shove. They gossiped that he was only after juicy government deals. When the press snooped around and turned up nothing, they began accusing Pardo of unleashing recent public laments from business groups about the administration.

True, Pardo had encouraged stock marketers and foreign fund managers to speak their minds out during a private meeting with Estrada in Tagaytay late January. His aim was not only for the President to hear their woes first-hand, but to let him charm them the usual way he does small groups with expressions of sincerity. Estrada promised to dissociate from two cronies involved in questioned stock deals, and let Pardo put in Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry head Miguel Varela as vice chairman of one of the biggest stock players, Social Security System.

That assured businessmen they were seeing a new, improved Erap ably tutored by one of them. Coincidentally, though, the Asian Institute of Management and the Economic Intelligence Unit ran surveys that rankled Estrada. AIM's poll of 50 C.E.O.s from the Sycip Policy Center complained about criminality and political instability. EIU showed expats in Manila's big businesses to be upbeat -- but only if there was better governance.

Estrada trashed the AIM poll for repeating complaints he already was fixing. Interior Sec. Fred Lim cried that kidnappings and robberies were down, although the C.E.O.s had referred to such crimes as pollution and squatting even on sidewalks. Spokesman Jerry Barican said Estrada will tackle EIU's plaints in regular meetings of the Cabinet's virtual excom, the Economic Coordinating Council.

But Palace courtiers are wary about ECC's forthcoming evaluations. Since Pardo sits as powerful vice chairman, they fear how he will ease them out of Malacañang forever. And so they're trying to intrigue him out of office by saying that the embarrassing AIM and EIU polls were Pardo's fault, the same way they're hissing the Manero fiasco arose from sacked justice secretary Serafin Cuevas' supposed carelessness.

Reader Danny Maclan of yahoo.com offers a timely idea just when Estrada froze government men's foreign travels to save public money. After all, there will always be exceptions to the freeze rule:

"To your overseas readers: monitor those who travel abroad on official time and report their luxurious tastes to our suffering countrymen. All of us should be watchdogs."

INTERACTION. Vivian Acabado, Guinobatan, Albay: "As a school requirement, I had practicum in both a private and a public office. I noticed that in private firms, employees report for work early and even compete for the early-bird award. In government offices, they observe Filipino time. Private employees work for pay and promotion; those in government know they'll get paid even for a job unwell done. Those in private offices loaf around less and are more cheerful; in government, it's the reverse. Yet, from what I know, there are more benefits in public than private offices."

Hey, I'd like to work in government for a change, Vivian.

Anne de la Cruz, skyinet.net: "Always tagging along with the President has paid off for Mar Roxas. Though he's from a different party, he's now a Cabinet secretary."

Let's tag along too, Anne.

A.A. Ballesteros, pworld.net: "After Manero's pardon, what? I keep reading the papers waiting for the next blunder."

Don't worry, A.A., there'll be more.

Wilcy Grace Dechavez, Sorsogon: "I'm about to graduate from college and have chosen a career. Yet I'm worried about not landing a dignified job and confused about 'dignity of labor.' Blue-collar jobs like vending or farming are for those who don't have higher education. I don't want to go into politics either; it's dirty. Without connections, I won't land a stable job. Much as I want to start my own business, I don't have capital. My entire generation feels like me."

Believe me, Wilcy, nothing beats starting at the bottom.

Veegee Garcia, livewire.net: "Whatever happened to MMDA's plan to regulate tricycles, pedicabs, illegal terminals -- all talk?"

Too close to an election year, Veegee.

Benjie Alvarez, BF-Parañaque: "Congrats to members of the 3-D Club. Malacañang has noticed that you're all more credible than Erap and his bright(?) boys."

Gil Utanes, quickweb.com: "Philippine STAR should give you a raise. Subscriptions grew (at least in my community) when people learned about 3-D."

Thanks, Benjie. But, Gil, I think I blew it when I denied (Gotcha, 2 Feb. 2000) being in on the plot.

Thank you, Rhoel Mendoza, Cecile of skyinet, J. Perez Danton, Atty. Carlos M. Lacanilao, Aida Aguas, Epi Espaldon, Reuben Lim.

YOUR BODY. Researchers have engineered cells that can store insulin until a pill triggers the hormone's release -- a technique that may one day offer needle-free treatment for diabetics.

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