Pork barrel: The greatest corruption of all!

Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile (JPE) confirmed last Wednesday that he did give nearly P30 million in cash gifts to his fellow Senators last Christmas, even if he denied that this move was supposedly done to prevent a Senate coup against his Senate Presidency. This makes us ask: was he doing this every year? How much did he give from our taxpayer’s money in the previous years? Perhaps the bigger question to ask is, did this money come from JPE’s pockets or his private bank account? I guess you know by now that he used his “discretionary funds” from his pork barrel.

The fact alone that not all Senators got the same amount of P1.6 million, while Senators Trillanes, Miriam Santiago and Alan and Pia Cayetano only got P260,000 only showed that some Senators are more equal than others. Mind you, we are not questioning JPE’s legal right to disburse the funds that he controls, but that it was immoral for him to give out Christmas gifts from monies that we taxpayers work hard for.

To think just last May, Sen. Juan Ponce Enrile led his Senate to impeach a sitting Chief Justice Renato Corona for being truthful in his bank accounts, for a statement that could still have been “doctored” as many government officials would suggest. JPE got the accolades and basked in his Legislative triumph against the Judiciary, and even had a big bash launching his book. But now karma has set in.

I have already said before, JPE is part of the ghost of Martial Law where he cleverly switched sides at the right time. So instead of being sent to Hawaii like the rest of the Marcos cronies… he continued holding on to his political power… then the coups against Pres. Cory Aquino happened, yet nothing could pin him down.

Today JPE represents the new political order that benefited from the EDSA Revolt. The political elite has kept the pork barrel for their personal albeit selfish gains and benefit courtesy of Juan dela Cruz. The practice of having pork barrel is totally abhorrent to the Filipino people because this money is being “misused” by our politicians. Last Thursday morning during Anthony Taberna’s “Umaga Kay Ganda” he came out asking in a survey if anyone agreed with JPE’s actions and JPE only got 1% in that survey, while a whopping 99% disapproved of what he did.

The Aquino regime was elected on President Aquino’s slogan “Kung walang corrupt, walang mahirap!” Well, if you see so much poverty around, it means that slogan has totally failed because it failed to remove the pork barrel, which in my book is the greatest corrupt practice of all time. Where do you think the politicians get their guns, goons and gold if not from their pork barrels? Let’s get rid of the pork barrel and we will get right of ugly political dynasties that breed on the people’s money!

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Tomorrow is the start of the gun ban called by the Commission on Elections (Comelec) in preparation for the May 2013 elections. This would be the perfect time for the proponents of a total gun ban to check whether or not criminality would decrease or not. But we already know the record in this country… criminality will rise when elections are held because politicians always use their guns, goons and gold in order to get themselves elected or reelected into office… regardless of what the Comelec says.

I totally support President Aquino when he rejected calls for a total gun ban in this country. I even personally told Gunless Society advocate Nandy Pacheco that when

the citizenry is unarmed… the criminals who do not respect any government ban on guns would have a heyday. Tomorrow will be our experiment on whether having gun control would also mean a reduction in our crime rate.

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I was taking a nap when my text ringtone sounded and it was a text from a good friend, whose name I will not mention as he is a good source of information on some sensitive issues. But this text is dedicated to the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) that has been doing a highly commendable job in keeping our monetary matters stable. So here’s the text sent to me.

“Good afternoon companero…I’m also as busy as you, but I cannot help but try to ask you to call the attention of the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas thru your column to do something about the very poor quality of paper they are using in the 20 peso bills. While we are thankful to be blessed with these bills, still the irritation if not the yucky feeling holding such nearly rotten bills cannot be avoided. Thanks and more power!” When I looked into my wallet, I had two types of 20 peso bills. The older one, which was literally weathered away… and the new note, which should have been in pristine condition… but was starting to show signs of use. An investigation by the BSP is in order.

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