An office in need of streamlining

Most quarters agree that President Estrada was right in firing his chief of staff, Aprodicio Laquian, for making jokes that the Chief Executive found insulting. Laquian, who renounced his Canadian citizenship to join the Estrada administration only last month, cracked jokes last Tuesday indicating that the President made crucial policy decisions while stone-drunk with his close circle of friends. The jokes pictured Laquian as the sober savior of Malacañang, at the expense of his boss.

Laquian has acknowledged his mistake, saying in a statement that he virtually shot himself in the mouth. In the statement made public by Malacañang yesterday, Laquian also said he never saw the President drinking with his "midnight Cabinet" -- the people who supposedly keep the Chief Executive company in his nocturnal habits. The President, for his part, has repeatedly said he stopped drinking whisky since he assumed power.

Malacañang can deny that the President is an alcoholic. But it can't deny that operations in the nation's seat of power badly need streamlining, as Laquian also indicated in his jokes. As Laquian prepares to return to Canada, the public should remember why he was summoned to Malacañang and the Office of the Chief of Staff created. Prior to Laquian's arrival, the President was fuming over his speeches announcing that the nation was in crisis, and proclaiming that there was "method in the seeming madness" of his management style. He was also trying to explain that he signed a conditional pardon for priest-killer Norberto Manero without realizing what he had done. Those were just the latest in a long list of near-comic disasters at Mala-cañang. The President was also hobbled by turf wars among his su-bordinates.

With Laquian gone, what happens to the effort to streamline operations in the Office of the President? Laquian had reportedly prepared a list of measures to improve staff support for better presidential decision-making. With his departure, however, his short-lived office has also been abolished. President Estrada got rid of an underling who has admitted hubris. But the President is still left with an office in disarray.