Column: DDS concert a denial of reality

This is my 610th column—and the seventh, this year alone, that our online affiliate, Inquirer.net, declined to run. Yet again, it contains direct criticism of President Duterte. Published in the Philippine Daily Inquirer, on INQ Plus, and on Inquirer Mobile, on August 25, 2020.

On Aug. 30, musicians and other entertainers who support President Duterte will mount an online concert for him. The singer-songwriter Jimmy Bondoc, who is apparently both the lead organizer of and the main attraction at the event, said the purpose of the concert, called “Singing for the President,” was exactly that: to sing for President Duterte.

“We just want to sing for you,” Bondoc said on a Facebook post, addressing the presidential candidate he campaigned for. “To be honest, you look very tired. Kami po ay nasasaktan para sa inyo (We are hurting for you). So we want to sing for you just like the good old days.”

There are a couple of reasons why this online concert—organized in haste but in earnest, we will not begrudge them that—sends the wrong signal to the Filipino people.

Rethinking freedom of expression

Happy to join the Friedrich Naumann Foundation as it starts its second Learning Series, with a reflection on freedom of expression: What, exactly, is under threat, and what, exactly, is the nature of that threat? TO REGISTER, please click here: https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_cgAqFfQwRPmlLN6Zzj5i5w

 

Column: Why Duterte is failing

Column No. 609. Again, for some reason, not carried by our online affiliate, Inquirer.net. But published in the Philippine Daily Inquirer, included in INQ Plus, and—good news!—carried by our popular Inquirer Mobile app. (Last I asked, the app has been downloaded more than 500,000 times. Last week, it added a new section: Opinion.) The column makes two arguments: That President Duterte’s response to the coronavirus pandemic is a failure. And that there are (at least) three reasons why this is so.

Let’s start with the simple fact of failure. Last week, the data scientist who studies COVID-19 statistics for ABS-CBN, the indispensable Edson Guido, presented the existing data from the Department of Health in a different way—and, for me and for many others, it seemed as though the fog of pandemic had lifted. The reality of failure was there for all to see.

He ran a short list: number of cases reported per month. It looked like this:

March – 2,078
April – 6,385
May – 9,546
June – 19,284
July – 55,594
Aug. 1 to 12 – 51,092

In other words, the coronavirus pandemic is anything but contained. Indeed, by Aug. 15, the total number of cases for August alone had reached 65,661; the total for the first two weeks of August was higher, by a staggering 10,000 cases, than the total for the whole month of July.

Yes, it could have been worse—BUT IT IS TERRIBLE AS IT IS.

Column: Which PhilHealth faction will attack Risa?

On four consecutive days in June 2019, the Inquirer ran banner stories on a PhilHealth scam—leading to the revamp of the health insurance agency’s board. Over a year later, in the middle of a global pandemic, another, bigger scandal has consumed PhilHealth. I see Duterte administration factions fighting over the spoils. Column published today, August 11, 2020, in the Philippine Daily Inquirer, on INQ Plus, and on Inquirer.net.

It was unusual, to say the least. In June, a couple of months after rejoining the Cabinet and reassuming his pre-2019-election position of presidential spokesperson, Secretary Harry Roque directly criticized the management of government-owned Philippine Health Insurance Corp.

Roque represents both the office and the person of the President, but his criticism was based on his former employment, during his year-long leave from government service, as private lawyer to two whistleblowers who revealed the workings of PhilHealth’s WellMed dialysis scam. The ghost payment scam, first exposed in the pages of this newspaper, led President Duterte to demand the resignation of the entire PhilHealth board and to appoint ex-general Ricardo Morales as agency CEO.

On June 17, Roque posted an extraordinary series of eight tweets criticizing Morales. He said Morales had enough time to clean the agency, he described Morales as playing deaf and dumb about corrupt practices in the agency, he called Morales’ claim that PhilHealth was running out of money itself proof of corruption, he compared the corrupt in PhilHealth to thriving crocodiles (“ang mga buwaya, buhay na buhay pa rin diyan sa PhilHealth”) and greedy pigs devouring the nation’s money (“Dami kasing baboy na nilalamon ang kaban ng bayan diyan sa loob ng PhilHealth”).

Column: Duterte heard, but did he listen?

The Duterte’ administration’s response to the doctors’ public appeal to rethink the country’s “losing battle” against the pandemic was a characteristic mix of surreal bluster and alternate-reality intimidation. Column No. 607, published today, August 4, 2020, in the Philippine Daily Inquirer and on INQ Plus, but not on Inquirer.net.

To the extraordinary “distress signal” sent last Saturday by the country’s medical societies, the Duterte administration responded in characteristic fashion: first, through a denial of reality; then with a grudging recognition of the real; then through the bureaucratic processing of reality (don’t get me wrong, this is the good part); then with a surreal announcement by the National Photobomber; then through the President’s own merging of the real and the imaginary; and then finally with a necessary return to the facts, through a statement of clarification.