Wouldn’t Duterte’s conscience bother him?

Unlike Vice President Jejomar Binay who has deluded himself and many others into believing that what he and his family did in Makati City can be replicated in the entire country (heaven help us!), Davao City Mayor Rodrigo Duterte was just being true to himself when he said no to the clamor for him to give Binay a run for his money. He cannot promise that he can spread the crime-free phenomenon in his city throughout the archipelago even with all the presidential power and resources laid at his disposal.

He has been in public service all his mature life.  He is no spring chicken anymore.  Incessantly running after crooks and small-time criminals in his city may have drained and exhausted him already.  And Davao City, with about 1.5 million residents, is just a small part of a nation choking with more than 100 million people needing to be taken care of.

Preferring the comfort of just resting on his local laurels to the very real peril of dealing with big-time criminal syndicates that lord it over the entire country, Duterte has every reason to slink away from an awesome and terrifying job.  It is simply too much for him.  Tingalig ako pa ang patyon nila! (They just might liquidate me!)   Though many of us may think he is the only hope there is to bring sanity and order back into our national life, give the old man a break!  Let him fade quietly into the sunset… if his conscience doesn’t bother him!

—STEPHEN L. MONSANTO, Monsanto Law Office, Loyola Heights, Quezon City, [email protected]