Stealth

If her heart bleeds for prisoners languishing in maximum security cells, why then did Doña Gloria virtually sneak out Claudio Teehankee Jr. in the dead of night? The guy is a convicted murderer, and compared to the case of Hubert Webb, where valid grounds exist for doubting his guilt over the gruesome Vizconde murders, hardly anyone questioned the certitude of Teehankee’s guilt in the murders of Maureen Hultman and Roland Chapman in 1991.

If there were reasonable grounds in law to release him, as her minister of injustice Raul Gonzalez now explains belatedly, then why did his and her government act in complete stealth, like a "thief in the night"? (Remember how the Malacañang Press Office lauded Gloria Arroyo’s sneaking in from Hainan after standing as witness to the signing of the NBN-ZTE deal?)
I was having coffee with a lawyer-friend the day after the shocking news came out. Calmly my lawyer-friend remarked, "Hindi kasi matatanggihan ni GMA si Dondi," referring to Manuel Teehankee, Doña Gloria’s emissary to the World Trade Organization in Geneva, a post that carries the rank of ambassador).

Asked to explain further, this lawyer-friend said, "Remember that he was justice undersecretary to Nani Perez prior to 2004. What "acts" did he have to clean up? What "missions" did he have to undertake?"

Ah…secrets! The kind that the people of the benighted land will have to ferret out after June 30, 2010, on the big assumption that the lady in the stinking palace beside the stinking river will leave her accustomed filthy environs.

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And if Claudio Teehankee Jr. is fit to join the ranks of society’s free, "having suffered enough", why not Rolito Go, who killed Eldon Maguan in a fit of road rage? And pray tell, why not Romy Jalosjos, who has not killed anyone, and is damned for life because he had a sexual relationship with a girl who appeared to be over the age that qualifies as statutory rape, a girl whose "services" were pimped by a dirty old lecher of a foster parent?

Surely their crimes pale in comparison to brain-eater Norberto Manero. Or the brains behind the murder of two young men in Mindoro Occidental, even if he happens to be the husband of the Dona’s chief mayordoma?

No wonder we have a culture of impunity. Rich boys fly; poor boys fry.

Well, poor boys no longer fry. They just wait and wait and wait, after the abolition of the death sentence. Their "betters," because richer or well-connected, are "confined" in air-conditioned cells with 42-inch plasma televisions and "personal" refrigerators, while they sleep in dank and fetid cells, suffering bad food and worse, the initiation of the "arse".

Life is so unfair, in a country where feudalism is the rule, where democracy is farce, and poverty sucks.

As Ping Lacson keeps saying, "hindi patas ang laban".

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Well, even in the Senate, hindi patas ang laban. The wagons of the lie keep circling to fortify the victim(s) of truth. They did it when they circled to protect the Doña and her esposo from the slings of Joey de Venecia and the arrows of an abducted Jun Lozada. Some did it openly, one or two others, stealthily. Kunwari after the truth, but truth to them and their unseen masters, means ensuring the shit does not hit the ceiling fan, only the table fan.

Now the wagons of the lie would seek to prevent the awesomely documented exposes of Senator Jamby Madrigal against their financial and political patron – the Senate President himself – from being exposed to the full light of day.

Madrigal the other day exposed in both a formal complaint and a recitation of legal and constitutional violations the stealthily-built financial base of Villar’s fabled billions. Sipag at tiyaga, or Singit at Taga? Better yet, as in the instant revelations of Madrigal, backed up by certified true copies supplied by the DPWH, mismo, C-5 at Taga.

Madrigal and Lacson had the basic decency to resign after being nominated by the minority as members of the Ethics Committee that should investigate. As they were Villar’s accusers, they deemed it improper that they should judge their Senate primus inter pares in the committee chaired by Senadora Pia Cayetano.

But the wagons of the lie possess neither decency nor shame. Joker Arroyo, who ten years ago accused Villar of basically the same violations of law and ethics that Madrigal and Lacson now accuse the same person of, will not budge. He will be judge and defense counsel. So too will the young but morally infirm Alan Peter Cayetano not resign his membership in the committee chaired by his elder sister. He will be Villar’s "attack dog," defense counsel and judge, all wrapped into one.

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And even in media, hindi patas ang laban. Interviews of Madrigal regarding her fully-documented bill of accusations against the over-generous, extremely wealthy billionaire-politician, were blanked out of television screens, save only for running board capsules. Ditto with print, but for a few "scantily" written stories (with the exception of one refreshingly good lady, a broadsheet reporter) and another tabloid writer.

Either they don’t like the singer or they were "persuaded" not to play her song?

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Meanwhile, again in stealth, a young dolt of a lawyer, Adam Jala, representing the benighted people of eastern Bohol, has filed a petition with the Supreme Court, questioning the rules of the House of trapos where he belongs.

His beef is, despite absence of a formal motion to convene both houses of Congress, that it is most unfair, nay, violative of the spirit of the Constitution, that a small House of 24 (minus two) can prevent a larger House of 236, from revising the Constitution to suit the hungry desires of their Boss Woman.

Jala claims he was not prodded by Malacañang or his speaker, to file the motion before the Supreme Court. He, he, he.

Since Congress will be in recess, his petition for certiorari is merely a case of laying the predicate for what the Dona’s minions will execute after the senators and congressmen end their month-long furlough.

Abangan. "Two things," as Manny Villar loves to predicate his rare interviews.

One, the stealth behind the Doña’s staying in power beyond 2010, which will unravel after Dia de los Muertos. And two, the truth behind C-5 at Taga, as documented by Jamby Madrigal, which we will publish in this space next week.