Get Real
Obvious!
By Solita Collas-Monsod
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 02:40:00 02/09/2008
Filed Under: NBN deal, Graft & Corruption
MANILA, Philippines -- All those contradictory statements, all those press conferences and TV interviews -- I tried my best to listen to all of them, read all the news reports. And I must say that I swung from outrage at the police (for kidnapping Rodolfo Lozada Jr. and then coercing him and his sister into signing whatever affidavits); then swung to the other extreme, angry at the La Salle brothers for not announcing that Lozada had been brought to them on Tuesday night and angry that his wife had signed the petition for habeas corpus when she was already with him; only to swing back to anger at Philippine National Police chief Avelino Razon for hiding the fact that although Lozada was in La Salle, he was still under police custody until Wednesday night, and telling us that Lozada had met with his lawyer on Tuesday evening, when in fact the lawyer was Romy Neri’s lawyer and Lozada had never set eyes on him before.
In fact, I am sick of all the lies we have been fed by government officials. Lozada, despite the attempts of Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago to “test his credibility,” is indeed a very credible witness. I asked Sen. Mar Roxas what he thought of that “test” -- and he said that it actually increased the credibility of Lozada, because it was clear that only Malacañang had the power to collect that dossier against him in such a short time, which shows how badly it wants to destroy his reputation. What is clear is that Lozada never claimed to be a saint. In fact, quite the opposite: he never wanted to testify before the Senate; he was working willingly, under orders from then-director general Romulo Neri of the National Economic and Development Authority, to facilitate projects with powerful “political sponsors” and to “moderate their greed”; which meant that he was part of what he called a “dysfunctional” government procurement system. Until, as they say, he saw the light. I’m sure the priests and nuns praying over him helped him do the right thing.
It is also obvious that Malacañang was involved in this sorry affair, together with Environment and Natural Resources Secretary Lito Atienza and now Commission on Higher Education Chair Romy Neri. It was Deputy Executive Secretary Manny Gaite, after all (if Lozada is to be believed), who expedited Lozada’s travel papers, and was in contact with him while he was in Hong Kong. Atienza even said Lozada was in London, if I remember right. Gaite again, presumably sending a lawyer (Antonio Bautista) to Lozada at the Outback Restaurant to prepare an affidavit for Lozada to sign, exonerating Malacañang. And all this was done to hide Lozada from the Senate, all this was done by the executive branch to hoodwink the legislative branch of government.
It seems Malacañang never learns its lesson that the truth will eventually out, and insists on brazenly lying, but doing it with such ineptitude that, indeed, the truth comes out even more quickly.
Take Atienza at that press conference Friday, insisting that there were documents showing it was Lozada (and his sister) who asked for police protection. How could he say that when he knew how scared Lozada was, and must have known that the man was under duress?
Or Transportation and Communications Secretary Leandro Mendoza trying manfully, and woefully, to justify the national broadband network (NBN) project of ZTE Corp., forgetting (or choosing to ignore) that Senator Roxas had already torn the argument to bits at the previous Senate hearing. In Mendoza’s “layman” terms, the project would save the government P4 billion a year (the budget for telecommunications expenses) and it would cost a little over P1 billion a year in interest and amortization, with five years’ grace. This, despite the fact that Senator Roxas had already pointed out that the P4 billion included costs of cell phones, international calls, calls from government offices to private offices, which would continue even with the NBN-ZTE project completion -- since the broadband is only for government-to-government communication inside the country.
Or national police chief Razon who made it appear that it was the police that “secured” Lozada from the airport (it was the military, according to Lozada, and the police only came in at the Outback Restaurant); who made it appear that Lozada met with his attorney in that restaurant, and who made it appear as though the police delivered Lozada and his family to La Salle, and then left.
I reserve my bitterest criticism for Neri. If Mike Arroyo will forever be associated with “Back off!” Neri will be forever associated with “Moderate their greed,” if not with the instructions to accommodate projects with powerful “political sponsors.” How could the chief of the National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA) put his imprimatur on what he knew from the beginning were flawed, overpriced projects, simply because they had powerful political sponsors? Where was his (and the NEDA’s) obligation to make sure that only projects with the highest economic rates of return would be undertaken? And, despite what he knew about the overpricing, how did he manage to calculate a rate of return of 27 percent? Some kind of abracadabra had to be used, because if I remember correctly, the project’s rate of return was originally below the threshold 15 percent level. That really means the NEDA evaluation process has been prostituted.
But the question of the hour is: What is Benjamin Abalos’ hold over Malacañang that he was able to get President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo to overturn her own policy that telecommunications projects should be done on a build-operate-transfer basis, and to replace projects like police and military housing with a broadband project that economists criticized as not only overpriced, but unnecessary?
More Inquirer columns
Previous columns:
Forward planning? – 2/02/08
Two challenges – 1/26/08
‘Out of sight, out of mind’ – 1/19/08
A real gain in war vs poverty – 1/12/08
Silver linings – 01/05/08
Double shame – 12/22/07
Shameful! – 12/15/07
Injustice in snail-paced CARP implementation – 12/08/07
A look at CARP’s impact on poverty and growth – 12/01/07
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