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Opinion

The attack dog of PNoy

SHOOTING STRAIGHT - Bobit S. Avila - The Freeman

Perhaps in their desperation, vice presidential candidate Antonio Trillanes accused presidential frontrunner Davao City Mayor Rodrigo "Digong" Duterte that he did not declare P211 Million in his Statement of Assets, Liabilities and Net Worth (SALN). But Mayor Duterte retorted back at Trillanes to prove his allegations. Since she could not get to interview Mayor Duterte, ABS-CBN's Karen Davila got hold of Peter La Viña, Duterte's spokesperson to appear on her show on HeadStart yesterday morning.

Mr. Laviña denied all the allegations thrown at Mayor Duterte and told Davila for Sen. Trillanes to prove his allegations that he has a secret bank account with Duterte's daughter. Liberal Party bet Mar Roxas who was in Cebu for a rally at the Provincial Capitol the other day also questioned the bank accounts of Mayor Duterte. He dared the mayor to open their bank accounts. But then this is the style of the Aquino regime, when they coaxed the poor Supreme Court Chief Justice Renato Corona to waive his bank secrecy rights and they convicted him for that, even if it was never proven that the money was illegally gotten.

Mind you, when Vice President Jejomar Binay was the frontrunner in this presidential race a couple of years ago, the Aquino regime used Trillanes as their attack dog to destroy him. Trillanes was successful to the point that he was able to expose his corruption. With Mayor Duterte still surging ahead of the other presidentiables, even after his "rape" remarks, the people backing the other presidentiables are showing signs of desperation and have once again used Trillanes as their attack dog to bring down Duterte.

But no matter how vicious their attacks against Duterte have gone, the stronger he gets. This is why I'm scared that desperate people might do desperate things like having the Davao City Mayor assassinated! Again, when the conjugal Marcos dictatorship was in trouble because then president Ferdinand Marcos was down with Lupus, this encouraged Senator Benigno "Ninoy" Aquino Jr. to return to the Philippines despite the threats to his life. To prepare himself, he surrounded himself with the foreign media on his return to the country. But then they spirited him out of the gangway and shot him as he went down the side door. Desperate people do desperate things!

My final word on Mar Roxas who told Cebuanos that he supports Freedom of Information bill: Gads! This fellow truly parrots his master, President PNoy who made the FOI bill as his campaign promise. Yet, nearly six years into his term, the FOI bill has not been approved. So now it is the turn of Mar Roxas to make this promise, which we know just, like his master before him, he would break anyway.

Another Mar Roxas promise is to turn Cebu into an economic hub. Comes now, aren't we already an economic hub in the south? How can we continue with our economic growth when we are stymied by the lack of infrastructure especially on the major roads leading to the Mactan Cebu International Airport? Now they are campaigning and making promises that they could not deliver under the Aquino regime!

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It couldn't have happened at the wrong time when we are in the midst of the election campaign. But the news that Canadian John Ridsdel was beheaded by his captors, the Abu Sayyaf, has outraged the people of Canada and confirmed by no less than Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. We have been made to believe by the Aquino regime that the Armed Forces of the Philippines have weakened the Abu Sayyaf. But apparently that is nothing but mere propaganda.

Last April 9, at least 18 soldiers were killed while six were wounded in a 10-hour battle between the Abu Sayyaf and the Armed Forces of the Philippines in Tipo-Tipo, Basilan. Supposedly, the AFP sent a huge military contingent on hot pursuit operations against the Abu Sayyaf. As we wrote this, they have been fighting a larger force called ISIS? Of course the AFP denies that ISIS doesn't exist in Mindanao. We get reports that terrorists were also killed in that encounter, except that we have not seen the dead bodies of the terrorists. What the nation saw are the flag draped coffins of the 18 soldiers killed in that encounter.

There is no doubt that the Aquino regime has spent a great amount of our tax money to improve the capability of the Armed Forces of the Philippines with new ships for the Philippine Navy, new fighter planes for the Philippine Air Force. Yet a rag tag band of allegedly weakened Abu Sayyaf can withstand a 10-hour firefight with our soldiers? Methinks, Aquino who is our Commander-in-Chief, has a lot of explaining to do.

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For email responses to this article, write to [email protected]. or [email protected].  His columns can be accessed through www.philstar.com.

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