DU30's two recent important appointments
While he made political history in the hometown of my wife in Bantayan Island which for decades has always had an Escario as its chief executive, unfortunately for Mayor Arthur Despi his stint as Mayor of Bantayan was short-lived when the Commission on Elections disqualified him because his former political group, ABAG-Promdi, disowned him and accused him of forging the signature of the group's chairman, a decision affirmed by the SC.
So now, Chris Escario took his oath as the new mayor of the town of Bantayan. But as the report goes, Comelec-Cebu Election Supervisor Lionel Marco Castillano said that the disqualification order of Mayor Despi needs to be implemented by the Department of Interior and Local Government before Escario can officially dispense with his duties as mayor. Now are we seeing more disqualification cases to emanate from the SC? Hmmm, there is that cliffhanging election protest case by then Senator Bong Bong Marcos against Vice President Leni Robredo, which the Filipino people are waiting for with bated breath!
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President Rodrigo "Digong" Duterte came up with two major appointments awaited by the Filipino people. First is former Armed Forces of the Philippines general Roy Cimatu who is perceived to be an Arroyo man. He has been appointed to the Department of Environment and Natural Resources to replace Gina Lopez who was recently twice rejected by the Commission on Appointments, and could no longer be reappointed by the president.
When asked about the appointment of Cimatu, Lopez did not want to say anything but came up with a wait-and-see attitude. Frankly speaking, few people know about Cimatu's thoughts about the environment and whether he is the kind who would please the members of the Chamber of Mines group rather than protect the nation's environment for the future generations of Filipinos. So this question remains to be seen.
Perhaps the most important appointment of Pres. Duterte was the naming of Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas Deputy Governor Nestor Espenilla Jr. as the replacement of current BSP Governor Amado Tetangco who retires on July 2. Espenilla's appointment signals the seriousness of Pres. Duterte's economic policy. Espenilla has been an insider in the BSP for more than 30 years and has the least political connections among the four contenders to the BSP post. He replaces Tetangco who has the reputation of being one of the best bankers in the world.
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In another breaking news, we learned that the conviction of pork barrel scam mastermind Janet Lim Napoles for serious illegal detention has been dismissed by the Court of Appeals. This was the original case where Benhur Luy, a Napoles relative, has a falling out with her and claimed that he was detained in the condominium of Napoles.
Now it can be told that Benhur Luy wasn't really "kidnapped" or detained against his will. But for the Filipino people, this issue exposed the infamous Napoles scam whereby she used the Pork Barrels of many senators and congressmen to defraud the Filipino people of these public funds so they could end up in the personal bank accounts of these public officials.
But Napoles cannot yet be released because she is on trial for plunder, a non-bailable crime in connection with the Pork Barrel scam. Of course certain pundits believe that there could be something brewing in Malacañang about the acquittal of Napoles as a "sweetheart deal". All I can say is for those pundits to point out that sweetheart deal.
Again I'd like to point out very clearly that the major mystery surrounding Napoles happened when she surfaced in Malacañang to surrender to then president Benigno "PNoy" Aquino III with whom she stayed for at least five hours and then Aquino himself escorted her to her quarters in Camp Crame. This gives us an idea of how important Napoles was to Aquino. But as Aquino returned to Malacañang, the press was waiting for him and he told the media that he neither knew Napoles nor met her before. It was a blatant lie! Three days later the Inquirer came up with a photo of Pres. Aquino with Napoles and her daughter at the Mactan Shangri-La!
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