A4
Opinion
TUESDAY, JANUARY 17, 2017
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EDITORIAL
Presidential mindset
I
T IS difficult to imagine how anybody could deny a direct quote, but Palace officials did it anyway. It is not the first time they have made fools of themselves and the President they serve. Justice Secretary Vitaliano Aguirre II and Communications Secretary Martin Andanar on Monday scrambled to reverse the effects of President Rodrigo Duterte’s pronouncement that no one can stop him from declaring martial law so he could deal with the drug problem and protect the people. “I will declare martial
Adelle Chua, Editor
law to preserve my nation, period,” Mr. Duterte said before a group of Davao businessmen over the weekend. “My country transcends everything else, even the limitations.” These comments have revived speculation and fear that Mr. Duterte may resort to extreme measures in his zeal to rid the country of the
drug menace—as if the killing of at least 5,700 believed involved in the drug trade were not extreme enough. A recent survey said eight in 10 Filipinos feared they or somebody they knew might fall victim to the Duterte administration’s bloody crackdown against illegal drugs, whether or not the accusations have basis. Talk of martial law unnecessarily alarms Filipinos, who have either direct or vicarious experiences during those dark days. Mr. Duterte is either insensitive or toying
with the power he knows he has when he casually claims he would declare it, and then step back, only to say it again. But Secretary Aguirre says the President’s words were taken out of context because he is actually against martial law. It was just an expression of anger and exasperation at the drug problem. He urged the media not to make any fuss about the issue. Meanwhile, Andanar scored the media for reporting things that sow panic and confusion among many.
Aguirre added we should, by now, be accustomed to the mindset of the President. But what mindset, precisely? That he feels he can say anything when he feels passionate about an issue only to let his subordinates clean up, afterward? A senator described Mr. Duterte’s speech— and since speech is a reflection of the mind, his mind as well—as nothing but theatrical bombast. We applaud the apt description but lament that it appears true of the chief executive, who
must, in these extraordinary times, be the most dependable official. Alas, how can we rely on someone when we do not even know when to take his words for what they are? Martial law is a grave matter and must not be trifled with, just as we should not trifle with the lives of people and just as we should not underestimate the magnitude of the drug problem. We really cannot afford to waste time and energy figuring out what to make out of Mr. Duterte’s enigmatic words.
Human and animal rights
its new aid package to the Philippines, supposedly because of concerns about human rights violations committed by the Duterte administration. For the five-year period of 2010-2015, MCC gave out around P21 billion to fund three major projects of the Aquino administration. The sky was supposed to have fallen then, especially after Duterte again went on the warpath against the US, saying that the Philippines didn’t need any conditional American aid because other countries were offering the same (and a lot more) without telling us how to run our country. And besides, Duterte said—to much tongueclacking and head-shaking from his critics—that the Philippines can survive without anybody’s handouts, thank you very much. Now, it turns out that from just China and Japan alone and in just six months, Duterte’s government has already secured almost a trillion pesos in grants and aid
NOW that the facts are clearer, I thought it would be timely and helpful to weigh in on the controversy over the slaughter of a dog in one of the scenes in “Oro,” one of the entries in the recently concluded Metro Manila Film Festival. I feel strongly about the movie because it had the right message and was powerfully made and acted. But the decision of the filmmakers to film and, regardless of the actual circumstances of the killing, show the actual slaughter of a dog, was wrong. It should not happen again. Alvin Yapan, the director of “Oro,” said that he used a real animal as it “was within the bounds of culture in that area where dogs are eaten as food.” He also emphasized that no one from his production team, including the film’s cast, participated in the slaughter. The official story, stated belatedly, is that there was a wake and the Oro crew opportunistically took footage of a slaughter that was going to happen. This is however contradicted by a whistleblower, an actor in the film if I recall properly, who claims that two dogs were actually killed (one accidentally) and specifically for the film. From what I could gather, the whistleblower’s story does not seem to be a first hand account and could be considered hearsay. The Philippine Animal Welfare Society (PAWS), represented by an articulate and passionate Anna Cabrera, rightly and strongly protested this act of animal cruelty, eventually filing a case for violation of Republic Act No. 10631 or the Animal Welfare Act. The controversy also prompted the withdrawal by the MMFF executive committee of the Fernando Poe Jr. Memorial Award for Excellence it earlier granted to “Oro.” It is unfortunate that, in the early days of the controversy, the defenders of Oro juxtaposed the killing of the dogs with the massacre of the small-scale miners— the subject matter of the movie. They lamented that there was a lot of distress about the dogs but not about the human beings killed. Others also weighed in to complain that there were more protests against the killings of the dogs compared to the protests against the extrajudicial killings in the war against illegal drugs. These comparisons were uncalled for. First, it is not true that people were more outraged by what was done to the dogs than to the miners. The reason why I
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Selling the bad LOWDOWN
JOJO A. ROBLES BAD news is supposed to sell. But when speculative news trumps hard (but good) news, you have to wonder if some news organizations have not taken it upon themselves to see only the unflattering and to cast aside the uplifting in a strange attempt to peddle their wares. The bad news in question is a speech delivered by President Rodrigo Duterte in Davao City last Saturday, during which he said that if he wanted to, nothing could stop him from declaring Martial Law. His own personal preference aside, Duterte also qualified that he may reimpose military rule if the illegal drug menace gets “virulent.” Media should by now understand that Duterte was once again engaged in one of his usual anti-drug rantings. And also (and again), his threat to impose Martial Law
was surrounded by so many qualifiers and conditions that no one in his right mind could reasonably conclude that he is well on his way to bringing back military rule. To read into Duterte’s statement a declaration that Martial Law is in fact impending or inexorable—something that again leads to the non-news territory of speculation—is preposterous. But I will admit that if some other president not as passionate and insistent about ending the illegal drug trade had given that speech, it would be nothing short of earth-shaking. But we’re talking about Duterte here. And it’s not even the first time that he has gone off on a threatening rant to pursue his campaign against a situation that he really gets worked up over. And let’s not even get into the fact that the imposition of Martial Law has always been an option for any Philippine president, as prescribed in the various constitutions that we have had and as it is enshrined
in most constitutions governing democratic countries. If Martial Law were bad per se, the framers of our basic laws, going all the way back to the 1935 Charter, would not have written provisions allowing it. Even in the United States at
If media doesn’t get the message and get it pretty soon, bad news won’t even sell anymore. present, Martial Law is being discussed as an option of the government in order to protect itself under the incoming administration of one Donald J. Trump. And the US govern-
ment merely requires a “clear and present danger” to allow the unsheathing of this draconian option; current Philippine law requires the president to seek approval of Congress and to defend any such declaration before the Supreme Court. Martial Law is just not happening. And even if it were, I wouldn’t bet on the people not supporting Duterte, if he does decide to declare it. *** On the real news front, there’s the Malacañang report during the same weekend just past quoting Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez, to the effect that in a little over six months, the Duterte administration has secured P900 billion in grants and concessional loans from just two countries. There is just so much going for this story that it really pains me to see what little “play” it received, compared to the unreal Martial Law reports. The background, of course, is the deferment by the US-funded Millennium Challenge Corp. of
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