“WOW! Again?”
The only thing I could muster to say after reading about the NBN fiasco. Seems like anything that Malacañang offers on the table, the opposition would grab it and throw it back together with a bomb attached to it… Don’t get me wrong, I am not pro-administration nor am I pro-opposition. I am just amused at reading about these things.
“I prefer a country run like hell by Filipinos to a country run like heaven by Americans. Because, however bad a Filipino government might be, we can always change it.” — Manuel L. Quezon
A famous quote by MLQ… and we took it literally. It had been more than 100 years and the direction we’re going is backwards. “Amusing,” I said? Well, I just got used to it. It was very annoying at first, then you get frustrated, then you just get used to seeing these things.
Look, we have a bigger number of turncoats in the government than the time the Japanese occupied us. Yet no lives are threatened just to turn to the other side. Just their positions, may it be elected or appointed. Our nation is not founded on principles anymore. Gone are the days of Quezon, Roxas and Magsaysay. Seems like the “kabataan” of their time did not fulfill being the good “kinabukasan ng bayan” that they planned for. Or is it that the “kinabukasan” will just get darker and darker as time will pass?
The government doesn’t live on principles anymore. Pardon for Erap? C’mon, after painstakingly ousting him and spending millions on his trial, they’re going to give absolute pardon, and with his own conditions, just like that? We would be the laughingstock of the TV-watching, news-reading world. All this just to save face and soften the blow of the opposition against her. Then you should have just asked the Sandiganbayan to acquit him then. At least our judicial system wouldn’t suffer the embarrassment.
Then we have the opposition. An opposition mostly consisting of the same people that called for Erap’s ouster. And it seems that their only purpose is go against anything that the government has planned.
Being an engineer working in the electronic communications field, I agree that the NBN and CyberEducation projects would be a milestone in the improvement on the education system of our country and the improvement of communications and data transfer between Malacañang, its departments until the littlest of barangays. Yup, the deal is tattered with graft, so continue your investigations but let the project continue as well. Then nail down the people who profited financially from this deal.
Hope this mockery of a government we have right now will change soon before a government will just cease to exist. As MLQ has said. “…however bad a Filipino government might be, we can always change it.”
Quo vadis, my Philippines?
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March 25th, 2008 at 12:19 am
“I prefer a country run like hell by Filipinos to a country run like heaven by Americans. Because, however bad a Filipino government might be, we can always change it.” — Manuel L. Quezon
I “love” this statement. It’s as if a creed was written declaring the destiny the nation would take through the following years. Everyone heard it. Everyone agreed. Now it’s happening and no one likes it.
October 13th, 2007 at 10:56 am
Telof Implemented Projects
I believe to fix these problems that we keep on hearing about corruption in the government we need to create some rules to follow and removed some loopholes. We do have some rules already but everybody is looking for the exceptions.
These projects started with the realization that we are spending 3 billion pesos per year on communication for the government. Instead of creating a thorough study on how to solve the problem and creating different alternatives (usually some independent consultants should be use) to removed the bias factor and figure out if it make sense and include the requirements of all government offices. Create an RFP ( request for proposal with detail requirements of the needs of all government offices) and then have companies bid on that. Since it is now more specific on what the needs are, the companies could actually create a more competitive price for the project.
I was wondering if these would end-up the same project that TelOf (Telecommunications Office) implemented during the 1990’s to create a backbone for a digital telephone system for the municipalities all over the Philippines which were undertaken with the loan and expertise from Japan, France and Italy that ended up being run by PLDT when it finally completed. These were loans that the government paid those three countries. Were these projects sold to PLDT? Why can’t we not upgrade that system? It uses fiber-optics and microware to create the main backbone.
I heard that they are planning to use TelOf to implement these projects since they hurriedly moved back TelOf from CICT to DOTC before these project came up.
Possible alternatives that the government could implement:
1. Have the national government bid as a group from the private companies for the different services for a longer period. Same as what the US government does and other countries. (Cell Phone, fixed line, fax line, internet connection) . So the government could concentrate on the application that runs through it that will ultimately help the constituent especially the students.
2. Upgrade the System that TelOf built during the 1990’s to be able to carry data and voip. If you intend to have TelOf manage the backbone, it has to be converted to a semi-government to be flexible in maintaining the system and continuously upgrading it to the latest technology every year which could be very costly.
3. Have all public schools (elementary, high school & college) have a free connection to the internet funded by a small percentage charged by the communications companies for each of their service. This has been done in the US with the Universal Service Fund.
I know these are just a few of the possible alternatives but Filipinos working or residing on the different part of the world are always willing to contribute some ideas that they noticed works on their location. We should start to learn from what already works on other countries and make some small changes to fit our countries specific needs.
How about using this web to asked Filipinos or friends who would like to give their ideas on how to solved the problems and have this sent to the government so they have something to start with and hopefully if this becomes successful, it will create a new kind of government where everybody contributes to better their service.
October 3rd, 2007 at 7:48 pm
Communism would be very much welcome. Or Marshal Law. Whatever.
Lastly, we don’t need another “leader” to rule this wretched hell-hole of a country (read: religion)
October 3rd, 2007 at 12:43 pm
And so, Abalos quit! And then what? Forget about the whole thing?
I suppose, Suplico and company would continue their pursuit of justice by filing the necessary criminal charges against Abalos! He may deny he did them but two people pointing at him as the bribe giver, for things not necessarily connected with his office, and one even told the president about it, only confirmed my beliefs that this is a person that must be prosecuted at the fullest extent of the law! Let this case be set as an example that commiting crimes against the people is no longer tolerated and succeeding in a system that is being eroded by the antics of unscrupolous people. Do not allow this person to escape from the hands of the law because he resigned. Let him feel the pain and consequencies of his acts so that it may become a good example to those would be crooks to think twice before going criminal when holding an important office in the government! Resigning would not absolved him from his crime. Better still, FORFEIT all the benefits and entitlement he is suppose to receive as commissioner.
I only pray that those people who can lodge the necessary charges will not stop and be cowed into discontinuing the pursuit of justice as most often happened in cases like this! We have to stop being so forgiving because a criminal was out and no longer holding office! That is why crooks are proliferating and rampant in our system of government because those in the know would not lift their fingers in pursuing justice at the full extent of the law. Give the people a break!
October 2nd, 2007 at 3:40 pm
I felt our senators stooped down to the level lower than those they are investigating when Pimentel asked a very personal question to Abalos. And he got his info from a text message (read: gossip). What kind of investigation is that?
October 2nd, 2007 at 2:40 am
Rod’s entry is more like it, on the dough.
I like to keep it simple: GMA AND HER ADMINISTRATION IS A LAWLESS ADMINISTRATION. IT IS A BOGUS ONE AND ALL ITS DEALING AND WHEELING ARE NULL AND VOID. SHE HAS NEVER BEEN ELECTED AS A PRESIDENT IN A CLEAN CONSTITUTIONALLY HELD ELECTION. AT LEAST ESTRADA WAS ELECTED accordingly. Gloria’s ascension to as a bogus president allows the public to know who are the corrupt, conniving equally lying bastards as this squatting lady in Malacanang. At least we get to see the media men, journalists, and commentators who readily obliged to call this madam as “president” when she is not. We know now who mentored them and now study how we can begin to dissect on a national scale why in spite of such credentials, graduates of Ateneo, UP, San Beda, and Harvard, they failed in one basic subject: integrity and their pagkatao. I like to zero in on that Philippine Military Academy….why on earth they continue to spew out graduates of the likes of FVR, and now these current military generals of the current bogus commander-in-cheap.
September 30th, 2007 at 1:37 pm
After all our Honorable Senators they are just asking questions repeatedly..and they are all not wise either cause we have a saying and maybe they dont know this ” One WORD is enough for a WISE GUY”…Honorable Senators?!!!!!
September 29th, 2007 at 11:07 pm
Our country will go nowhere unless we elect leaders who love their country so much that they are willing to sacrifice their personal and materialistic needs before anything else. When I heard about the NBN deal and the kickbacks involved (in a delayed Filipino news telecast here in the US), I was upset, frustrated and angry. I was wondering how could these people live their everyday lives passing through or witnessing other people barely able to survive poverty and hunger. Don’t they believe in God anymore! They might get away with it now but I don’t think they would be able to defend themselves on judgment day. I pity their souls.
September 29th, 2007 at 10:27 pm
“…we can always change it”? You can try that, if you want to end up as “destabilizer” in jail or already being mercilessly banged down by war-like armed SWATs if just you want to express your dislike publicly in a protest rally.
Did you suffer from not collected garbage in Manila? Do not woory, maybe it was only because the garbage trucks have been used to block protesters from reaching to Malacanang. So, do not rally and the trucks can be used for their real duty.
NBN and CyberEd? NBN should save the government billions of telephone fees. But there would be an immediate and easy way, too. Just make sure that all official phones are used for official matters only and that calls are clear enough to avoid endless back-asking. It would probably save already much more than half the expenses. It is the same than with cars “for official use only” but you can see many of them bringing kids to and fetching them from schools, parking at supermarkets and department stores etc. Hardly “official use”, it’s rather just “use by an official”. And a wireless network of a government, where senseless as well as very sensitive data will flow, being very accessible to anyone who is able to scan such traffic, which really is no any big problem. Hello Garci has been scanned and tapped, even if military and Telco’s say that they have no facilities to do so. The records then only fakes? How then Mr. Bunye got his “original and tampered” CD’s?
CyberEd, it looks nice and very useful. But with tenthousands of schools, very many in remote areas which would need it most, should not first made sure that they all have permanent electricity and that the thousands of service technicians with all needed spare parts are available to secure an uninterrupted teaching?
Lastly about pardon to Erap. Painstakingly ousting him does not automatically meanf fair and correct. After six years of investigation, the whole justice system did not know that plunder needs public money involved? Plunder and corruption, bribe taking, is not the same. Belle was private and jueteng money, if Estrada really got it, would be public money only if the government is running the illegal numbers game.
That Erap would only accept an absolute pardon is easy to understand. Otherwise, he would indirect agree to his crimes while always he stated that he did not do what he was accused for. That’s why he said absolute or nothing and better suffering, counting his age, lifelong jail.
The Sandigan has ruled that Erap did not get Singson’s tax millions, why there is no case to find out where then that money has gone? With Singson’s admitting that he took it from taxes, he admits plunder.
True, the government has not much principles, but on seems to be above all: What is in favor of the govrnment is always correct. What criticises the government is always wrong.
September 29th, 2007 at 9:01 pm
Well, your MPQ certainly is one heck of a president. Didn’t he NOT support agrarian reform that would’ve made the Filipino people claim their land back (which was theirs in the first place) from the “Hacienderos”, the Spanish and Mestizo landlords? Why didn’t he approve it? Just look at his beautiful, pontifical face. What? Do you see it?
He’s a mestizo after all, one who connived with Spanish friars. The friars appeared to have talked MPQ in to dealing that no reform should be done, in which the case that happens they lose their land (thus, complete control o’er the fates of the happless people).
Why be proud of the bastard? His quote was once procured for him to be famous to the other “intellectuals” and “revolutionaries” of that age. Said to impress, indeed. Now don’t you dare have Quezon and Magsaysay on one sentence because it is pure sacrilege of the man who was made a laughingstock just because he had a project about digging deepwells and provoding clean and safe water for the people who couldn’t get some (Basic necessities, amirite?).
But alas, I had just did.
“Quo Vadis”? Crappy.
September 29th, 2007 at 8:37 pm
Being an ECE also, I cannot help but feel sympathetic to your piece. Time and again, they just don’t realize the importance of having a broadband network that would interconnect the whole of RP. I only lament the fact that they should have opted the RP telcos to bid for the deal and not the Chinese only.
Anyway, I’ll do my part for the betterment of the Philippines by doing my research as an engineer in the company that I have been employed. With a small salary and a bigger TAX taken from me (I wonder where the heck is it being spent?), I can only watch in the background as the economy is strengthening despite the political noise. We are all tired of the turmoil happening again and again. What say you, business leaders?
September 29th, 2007 at 4:41 pm
To: acelemen
Hi, acelemen! I hope you are not a silly man with your entry here. At the start of your entry you are condemning the opposition for their investigation of this NBN fiasco. At the latter part of your same entry you are saying the deal is tattered with graft, so ‘continue with your invewstigation’, and ‘nail down the people who profited financially’….blah, blah… I guess you are trying to say something, but what?
September 29th, 2007 at 4:05 pm
This information age and this generation had seen how governments around the world are unreliable. Governments can twist the truth, hide the truth, silence the sources, and whatever the governments wishes to do.
It is a great task to help mold the next generation of government officials to be sincere, honest, and most of all God-fearing. I believe in Alexander Lacson’s “12 Little Things…” will slowly revolutionize the Philippines and we will once again be envied by our neighbors.
The objective of the NBN Project is good, but the means in which other politicians were squabbling here & there, made the whole thing a fiasco.
Changing the government may seemed easy for MLQ. He may be right, assuming that everyone who is elected or appointed is a patriot, and not super selfish like what we see now in most officials, may it pro-administration, opposition, leftist, rightist. The Filipinos have no more choice now among these groups.
Our only hope are the “12 Little Things Every Filipino Can Do to Help Our Country”. This is the only way to go and where we should all go.
September 29th, 2007 at 12:07 pm
You are nuts! Your Philippines, my Philippines, too.
September 29th, 2007 at 10:58 am
Poor Filipinos,
they seem to be condemned and doomed to poverty by venal politicians and illiterate voters, yet are helpless to do anything to top it.
you thought that a so-called “collegiala with breeding” would know better, yet there she is, as corrupt and scheming as the worst of them. she makes me puke!
sorry to see you suffer, but that is just what happens when a people choose not see the connection between action and results.
I say, just endure it, even the worst nightmares come to an end somehow.
September 29th, 2007 at 9:38 am
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