Wanted: Mercenaries

"This is a trend. You're going to see a lot more guys like us in these situations."
-- Blackwater USA mercenary


Reports said that SBMA has opened itself to the recruitment of mercenaries that will be deployed to Iraq. The reports, however, were described by National Security Adviser Norberto Gonzales as a product of a "fertile imagination".

Pero kung fertile imagination, bakit me movements ng ilang "tirador" mula probinsiya patungong Luzon? Mag-aaplay bilang pulis?

Gonzales also said that the presence of Blackwater and its recruits are an insult to the Armed Forces. Well, totoo naman. Una, mas malaki ang kita: $60,000 to $80,000 per year compared sa P60,000 sa AFP. Pangalawa, mas efficient din daw ang mga mersenaryo. Sabagay, paano mo nga naman masasabing efficient si PO4 Bundat eh halos 38 na ang waistline? Si General Tagay naman laging lasing. Paano mo siya patatakbuhin ng tatlong ikot sa oval? Si Lt. Dindo naman, na matagal ng nag-aantay sa resolusyon sa kaso ni Trillanes at sa isyu ng korupsyon sa militar, butas pa rin ang medyas at bulsa hanggang ngayon kaya paano niya maiisip na magtagal sa serbisyo?

Pero siyempre, worrisome din ang presensiya ng mga mersenaryo. The Nation narrates how Blackwater USA mercenaries acted during the times of hurricane Katrina. May pagka-brutal din. Sa karatig-probinsiya nga namin, mersenaryo din daw ang dumali sa bahay governor mga ilang eleksyon na ang nakakaraan. Special Ops, ba. Di nga lang galing sa Blackwater. Galing mismo kay governor! At bakit kanyo? Para makakuha ng simpatya sa mga botante at madiin sa kahihiyan ang kanyang kalaban. Galing, di ba?

Balik sa recruitment. Me basbas daw ito ng Malakanyang? Di ko pa natatanong si bubuyog pero malaki ang possibility. Sabi kasi ng isang ispiritu diyan sa loob ng puting palasyo noong huli kaming mag-usap, determinado daw kasi si Gloria na magpabango sa Amerika. Kaya nga tuloy pa rin ang Venable Contract kahit ito ay na-isyu na kamakailan. And to note: Ang Blackwater USA ay isa sa mga biggest donors ni George Bush at ng Republican Party noong mga nakaraang US Presidential elections. Dagdag pa ang pagiging atat ni Bush na giyerahin ang Iraq. At dahil siguro mahihirapan na na kumuha ng pondo sa gobyerno at suporta sa tao, nag-hire na lang ng mga mersenaryo. Which means, posible nga talagang me basbas galing sa Malakanyang ang patuloy na recruitment ng Blackwater sa SBMA.

Independence from whom?

Officials from the National Capital Region Command announced that there would be 6,000 policemen who will patrol Metro Manila on June 12 during the celebration of the Independence Day. In addition, there will be at least 300 augmentation forces from the military that will be placed on stand by should worse comes to worse.

Querol and the PSG, however, denied that the preparations are in line with the threats against the president with questionable legitimacy. If this is the case, then it follows that the preparations are aimed to control the organizations that will be staging protests against charter change in the same day. Which brings us to the fore: What Independence Day then are we going to celebrate if we cannot even stage protests freely?

Wais or makapal ang mukha?

Among the major items which budget were removed by the Senate include the Kilos Asenso Fund and the Kalayaan Barangay Fund.

According to Gloria Arroyo, the Kilos Asenso Fund is to be used as the counterpart fund of her office for agribusiness and micro-finance projects of local government units while the Kalayaan Barangay Fund is aimed to finance government services in far-flung areas to dissuade barangay residents from joining rebel groups like the CPP-NPA.

But though she is wiser than Lumen, her mind is full of potholes kaya problematic ang reasoning niya. If she just care to listen well, she doesn't need these funds to help the people at the grassroots or dissuade her constituents from rebelling against her.

First, local chief executives are complaining against the release of IRA, the internal revenue allotment which, according to the constitution, is the automatic share of local government units from the revenues generated by the government. Meron pa daw kasi silang sisingilin na IRA from the previous years. The problem is, if they will demand the national government to give them their share, babawasan daw ito ng 30%!

Inutangan na nga, babawasan pa? What kind of policy is that? The Constitution is very clear: Local government units shall have a just share, as determined by law, in the national taxes which shall be AUTOMATICALLY released to them. (1987 Constitution, Article 10 Section 6). This "just share" was clearly defined in the Local Government Code of 1991 (RA 7160) so why the delay? If the IRA will be released, and automatically as mandated by the Constitution, then there is no more need for Gloria's Kilos Asenso Fund. The LGUs will determine and finance their own projects based on the IRA.

Second, Gloria's administration is primarily in dire need of legitimacy. Because of the election cheating issues which remain un-resolved, people are becoming restless and restless hence forcing her to spend money to "cool off" the heads of her constituents. The problem, the focus of her efforts has become PR and Spin. By evading reality, she ignores the real problems and the concrete solutions. The result: more and more disgusted people and more and more rebels.

By becoming transparent, by allowing investigations to take root, her constituents could become more open. They might understand her. But by claiming that there is no classroom shortage when in fact in an elementary school in Taguig there is only 15 classrooms to serve 3,000 students, and in Batasan High School the ratio of classrooms to students is 1:140, she is rather forcing more and more people to hate her. And by pretending before international bodies that she is in control of the situation in the Philippines when in fact almost everyday at least two people are killed, she is inviting more and more critics and growing more and more oppositions to assail her. Worse, because the alleged payoff of P40 thousand pesos a week for local media practitioners cannot be sustained, and because the lives of journalists in the Philippines are in contiuous threat (as evidenced by her lack of action for solving the cases of 42 media practioners murdered), she is actually sowing hatred among journalists and those sympathizing with them. Proof is the growing number of media practitioners arming themselves whose potential to become vigilantes and/or rebels is not remote. As one media reporter pointed out: If the government cannot do its job to capture and prosecute our assailants, we have no recourse but to take the matter into our own hands.

These being so, why the fuss about the funds? And to threaten the Senate to veto the legislated budget should the cuts remain? Kapal naman. Or maybe Gloria Arroyo is just trying to be humurous?