For timidity in his true stance on Hacienda Luisita, President Noynoy Aquino is losing the initiative. Grabbing the lead on the issue is, ironically, his bitterest foe of the moment: Chief Justice Renato Corona. Verily politics hates vacuums.
Aquino’s Cojuangco side owns Hacienda Luisita. Corona bewails that the vast sugar estate is the real reason behind his woes. Supposedly Aquino’s political allies want him (Corona) ousted because of an adverse Supreme Court ruling on it. “They (Cojuangcos) want the ruling reversed,” Corona hammers in public forums.
Which is true — in part. The SC had voted 14-0 last Nov. for the Cojuangcos to parcel out the 6,000-hectare land to 6,300 farmhands. The Cojuangcos are petitioning to overturn the decision. They want upheld instead a stock distribution option, which the SC deems unconstitutional. The SC has yet to consider the latest pleading; Aquino is quiet about it.
Aquino was bolder during his presidential run. It’s time to divide the hacienda among the tillers, he had declared, in keeping with the true intent of the Constitution’s agrarian reform. He even set a timetable for it — five years — should he become President. The 1987 Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Law, thrice amended, requires all covered lands to be given out by 2014.
His Cojuangco kin reportedly resented Aquino’s pledge. When he did win the Presidency, he stopped mentioning it in public. Close aides aver that he never changed his mind, just that he is avoiding antagonizing his elders.
Aquino’s silence has been construed as turning his back on the small folk. Leaving the talking to a spokesman worsens things. The latter used to crow that land redistribution was “not just a campaign promise, but a matter of principle.” Now he’s stammering that, since Aquino held only less than a percent of Hacienda Luisita and has even sold that share, the President no longer has a say in its disposition.
And so Corona has picked up the ball that the President dropped. Aquino can only watch as his foe freely shoots hoops. Weakened is his recruitment of Virgilio delos Reyes as agrarian reform secretary precisely for the man’s long opposition to the Cojuangcos’ stock option. Lost in the din of impeachment is the fact that Aquino tacitly had directed Solicitor General Jose Anselmo Cadiz to argue in the SC for land distribution — and won it by a unanimous 14-0. Too, that even Aquino’s three appointees to the SC voted for land parceling. Aquino cannot even point up now a flaw in Corona’s ranting. That is, that in deflecting accusations of leading the SC in ruling upon ruling for the reviled Arroyo regime, Corona claims that he was but one vote among the 15 justices. But that on this Hacienda Luisita ruling, Corona implies that he had led the 14-0 rout.
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Remember how 2009 opened with a big stink in the government? The World Bank debarred three Filipino firms and an individual from further taking part in its roadworks. Allegedly the four contractors had engaged in “fraudulent practices” with various government divisions. A $33-million loan was compromised. Among the culprits: the Road Board under the executive branch, certain congressmen, and elected local execs. Inquiring into the mess, the Senate linked then-First Gentleman Mike Arroyo to two of the banned parties. The Ombudsman too was dragged into the fray. Though informed of the scam, it had never bothered to investigate motu propio, on the pretext that the World Bank withheld evidentiary documents.
In one fell swoop the Philippine government — national and local, executive and legislative, even the very anti-graft super body — was exposed to the world to be corrupt and inept.
Again 2012 opens with stink. The World Bank complains of mishandling of a $21.9-million loan. Mentioned this time is the third branch of government: the Supreme Court’s mishandling of the Judicial Reform Support Project.
Begun in 2003, the JRSP had progressed smoothly, especially in the area of court computerization. But in a report dated Dec. 28, 2011, the lender notes that things started deteriorating in mid-2010. “Project financial statements can no longer be relied upon” because of spotty project management, procurement, and fund handling. The report was addressed to Justice Teresita Leonardo de Castro, as JRSP management committee chair.
The shit hit the fan just when trial was to commence in the Senate of impeached Chief Justice Corona. At once he dismissed the wrongs as having been done before he took office in May 2010. SC Administrator and spokesman Midas Marquez deplored as unfair the timing of the World Bank release.
Still the inch-thick report is detailed. Supposedly non-essential purchases and spending were made under the JRSP loan, including for unrelated foreign travel and speakers’ fees. There were no checks and balances in requisitions, biddings, awards, payments, and extensions. Seventy of 133 randomly reviewed purchases proved to be ineligible. Releases of Philippine counterpart funding were delayed. The World Bank’s demanded refund of $199,900 has not been made.
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Reader Remberto Maclang won’t let pass un-rebutted another reader’s earlier remark about US naval patrols in the South China Sea:
“Mr. Barry Williams’ exhorted: ‘It might be nice to say thank you to the American public, since it is our tax dollars that pay for US Navy ships patrolling your waters.’ Prudence dictates that we heed him — to avoid history’s repeat. Admiral Dewey’s presence in our seas during our war with Spain in 1898 ensured our victory, remember? In our euphoria then, we overlooked to say thank you to the interloping Americans. Look what it brought us: 50 long years of bastardization.”
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E-mail: jariusbondoc@gmail.com