The ultimate challenge

Ultimate Challenge 1

Will Congressman Teddy Locsin survive being caught between a rock and a hard place? Will he live up to the hopes and expectations of many broke and desperate candidates who are counting on him to find fraud and deception where no Filipino has gone before? Or will Teddy Boy be overwhelmed by “The Old Boys Club”?

As Congressman Teddy Boy Locsin attempts to put order into the congressional investigation regarding alleged electoral fraud, I can only offer him my condolences for being caught between friendships and loyalties.

Few people seem to have realized that as the Ring Master of this unwieldy circus, Teddy Boy Locsin also has to walk the tightrope because there are two hungry growling lions behind him both fighting for the vice presidency.

It does not make Teddy Boy Locsin’s life any easier given the fact that both are personally and politically close to him. One is his legislative teammate and friend Senator Mar Roxas, and the other his constituent and political neighbor Jejomar Binay, who is in the lead as vice president.

Knowing the acerbic and confrontational Locsin, he is not one to walk away from a fight or from controversy. But given the very high and very personal stakes in the matter, I wonder if Teddy Boy ever had a chance to reflect on whether it would be wise to take on this assignment or defer to someone who did not have relational issues and political issues that could complicate the outcome of the investigations.

I certainly admire Congressman Locsin and I certainly believe that he is best qualified for the job. However, being caught between the lions and his alliances may ultimately cost him more than he bargained for.

I do hope that the two lions heard the statement of Locsin regarding his mandate and the instructions given to him by the House leadership. “They will conduct the investigation to its full course regardless of the outcome”.

Let’s all pray that Teddy Boy comes out as our first Ultimate Challenge winner after the elections!

Ultimate Challenge 2

Our second “Ultimate Challenge” comes in the form of a question: “What can several billion pesos of drug money buy?”

 Someone asked a related question to me the other day and as I pursued the question I was startled to discover how widespread the public concern is about drug money and narco politics is in the Philippines.

According to several sources, the situation is so bad that we have the beginnings of a Mexican style drug war. Two sources pointed out that there is an ongoing “low intensity conflict” between anti-narcotics operatives and narco-politicians.

In one case, the talk is hot that a hit made on a local politician was sanctioned or acknowledged by no less than a respected foreign based anti-narcotics body. All this sounds like some made for TV series except there are real stakes and real players.

To begin with, narco politicians don’t really ask for pork barrel or government projects. What they try to do is influence who gets appointed into the judiciary, the Philippine National Police, the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency, Customs, Immigration and maybe even the Department of Foreign Affairs.

The first thing they want to “secure” is who gets appointed as “fiscals” or prosecutors, then judges as well as the “clerks” who shuffle the paper work around. This first line of “defense” insures that few cases are filed, few prosper to actual cases, and even fewer actually get tried and judged.

Key positions in the PNP will ultimately determine where the cops take their fight. While everyone was distracted by the “call to war against jueteng”, the drug lords were busy building tiangges, raising mules and causing hell in many Filipino homes.  

If you ever wonder why shabu laboratories keep popping up in the Philippines in the last decade, it’s because the criminal syndicates know they have “reached” into the judiciary and also because you don’t get shot as a drug dealer in the Philippines unlike China, Singapore, and I think even Malaysia.

That of course is why we really have to go after narco-politicians, the last thing this country needs are lawmakers who can now change the laws or write the laws that will weaken our ability to fight drug dealers, manufacturers and their corrupt agents who are in government.

This is also why I placed the issue as the 2nd Ultimate Challenge. It is a very serious challenge to the incoming government.

What steps will the next administration take to identify who the narco-politicians are inside and outside the new administration? Did narco-politicians give campaign contributions and how much money did they contribute to the campaign fund? Who are their contact persons?

What elective positions do narco-politicians hold or influence?

Who will be in-charge of this major concern in terms of identifying and pursuing cases against Narco-politicians? What legislative reforms will the new administration take, or are they willing to take in order to stop drug smugglers, drug laboratories and narco-politicians from creating a Mexican style operations in the Philippines? When and how will we purge government and law enforcement agencies of compromised and contaminated individuals?

Will we re-impose the death penalty for selective crimes such as drug dealing, terrorism, mass murder etc.? Or are we going to wimp out and fail the ultimate challenge?

All the noise that people made about the death penalty may sound holy and righteous. But how come you never really hear the anti death penalty people scream bloody murder about the regular public executions in China conducted on drug dealers?

Having the death penalty does not necessarily mean you will use it. But it will certainly make the “cost of business” more expensive for crooks and criminals.