Ecleo and the need for political reforms

For tonight’s special presentation on Straight from the Sky, we bring you The Philippine Cable TV Industry… yesterday, today and tomorrow. Yes with our talk show getting a record 12 years of non-stop interviews, the only way forward was for me to accept the job as executive producer for MyTV channel. So I joined the 20th Philippine Cable Convention Conference a few weeks ago and I decided to make a show on the Cable industry. After all, your television time needs content, which the free TV cannot give.

So tonight we have with us the pillars of the Cable TV industry led by its President Elpie Paras and Mr. Paco Magsaysay of Asian Vision Cable Holdings whose father is my good friend, former Sen. Ramon Magsaysay, Jr., the acknowledge father of Philippine Cable TV. They will give us an insight of how the Cable TV industry evolved and what is in store for the future. Call it timely that we did this interview during the 20th anniversary of the Cable TV association. So watch this rare and interesting show tonight on SkyCable’s channel 15 at 8 p.m. and its replay at 9 p.m. on MyTV channel 28.

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Finally, the long but much delayed arm of the law has caught up on Dinagat Rep. Ruben Ecleo, Jr. who is also the head of the Philippine Benevolent Missionaries Association (PBMA). Ecleo was found guilty of parricide and sentenced last Friday to reclusion perpetua for the killing of his wife Alona Bacolod more than 10 years ago. Alona was found in a ravine on Jan. 8, 2002 in the town of Dalaguete after she disappeared for two days.

Suspicion that Ruben Ecleo was the perpetrator of that crime surfaced early when he did not exert any effort to search for his missing wife and when she was found in the ravine he didn’t care to check the body if it was her. More intriguing was that, he didn’t go to the wake nor attended her funeral. To make matters worse, a few months later on June 18, 2002, the family of Alona was massacred in Subangdaku, a crime that today remains to be unsolved.

People naturally asked who would want to kill the family of Alona Bacolod? What happened in the past 10 years led into a gruesome trail of unsolved murders, which can only be linked to Ruben Ecleo.

On June 18, 2002 when finally the Police authorities decided to arrest Ecleo at his lair in Dinagat Island, he did not surrender without a fight and ended up in a firefight killing 23 people. The families of those who died in the fight are still wanting for justice to be served and they have been forgotten.

That very same day, the family of Alona was massacred, her father Elpidio, her mother Rosalia and brother BenBacolod were killed by a suspected PBMAmember.

How could one man or one family do such dastardly act? It can only be traced to ugly politics where the Ecleo Family has become a political warlord in Dinagat Island. A case in point, last year on Feb. 10, 2011 the Supreme Court denied Ecleo’s appeal on a graft case before the Sandiganbayan with finality and ordered for his arrest. To date Ruben Ecleo is still missing and has not even showed up for his sentencing.

Yet a Philippine Star report, quoting majority leader Neptali Gonzales, said that the House of Representatives is not removing Ecleo’s name from the roll of its members until the his conviction on the parricide case would become final and executory.

What finality does the House of Representatives need? Wasn’t his conviction of the graft case, where he was sentenced for 30 years, already final?

This is the kind of House of Representatives that would do its utmost to keep in its roster criminals already convicted by our courts. Shame on Congress! As we used to say, “Sobra na… Palitan na!”

Come May 2013 the nation will once more go to the polls and elect “the usual” crop of members of the House of Representatives. But will it change these people? I doubt it. This is why I’ve always batted for genuine political reforms, through a Constitutional Convention (concon), which unfortunately, the Aquino regime refuses to embark. This is why many people are losing hope that this nation can change because we are not seeing those changes that we need in order for this country to move forward.

When Pres. Benigno “PNoy” Aquino III came into power, his slogan was “Walang mahirap kung walang corrupt”. Almost two years into power, you can see that the majority of the Filipino people are still deep in that vicious cycle of poverty and yes, corruption is still very much with us and that’s because Congress itself refuses to reform. A case in point is the highly-controversial pork barrel. In my book, we should remove the pork barrel and pay our legislators a monthly salary so that the temptation to misuse the fund will no longer be there. But for as long as PNoy keeps the pork barrel, he will never get rid of corruption in this county. We have to move now lest Myanmar overtakes our sick country!

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