"Why does Canada with its vast expanse of land, much of it still uninhabited, want to dump its garbage in a small faraway country like the Philippines?"
"Why does Canada with its vast expanse of land, much of it still uninhabited, want to dump its garbage in a small faraway country like the Philippines?"Like a misrouted letter, 69 containers of Canadian garbage was sent to the Philippines. But unlike a misguided letter you can simply give back to the postman to return to sender, the unwanted trash delivery stayed in the country nearly five years, some of them buried in a landfill in Tarlac. The garbage consisted of human and household refuse, toxic hospital waste including used adult diapers.
The Canadian garbage brought in from 2013 to 2014 was the subject of a heated trash talk exchange between Ottawa and Manila. It got to a point wherein President Rodrigo Duterte threatened to declare war on Canada. Secretary of Foreign Affairs Teodoro Locsin , Jr. added an extra measure of recalling Philippine diplomats from Canada to stress our disgust with the US neighbor up north.
Why does Canada with its vast expanse of land, much of it still uninhabited, want to dump its garbage in a small faraway country like the Philippines? A clean environment-conscious country, Canada found a willing Filipino firm to accept the trash to convert some of it into recyclable material. This, it seems to us, is more the fault of our flawed laws on the enforcement of allowing even imported and dangerous material. Importers like this Filipino firm must submit documents and seek permission to import such material. The Bureau of Customs should have also stopped and barred the containers from landing at the wharf and right there and then sent the vessel back to where it came from. It is the BOC, after all, which is the first line of defense against dangerous items from coming into the country.
But what do you expect? This is the same Customs bureau that allowed billions of pesos worth of shabu shipment to slip through.
The next question to ask is how the Filipino importer was able to get the unhealthy shipment from Canada out of the customs area. Your guess is as good as mine.
It is in instances like these when the government usually declares a lifestyle check on Customs officials. But as usual, after so much publicity about lifestyle checks, the crooks at Customs lie low for a while and then go back to business as usual to amass more wealth to buy real estate, luxury cars and maintain mistresses even more well kept than their real families.
Only in the Philippines and its benighted bureau!
A punitive policy of lengthy imprisonment is perhaps in order. The incoming elected members of the House and Senate should enact new laws to address this corruption at the Customs bureau. Senator-elect Ronald de la Rosa, a former Philippine National Police and Bureau of Corrections chief, could make this his introductory measure to make his mark.
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Meanwhile, the guessing game on who the next Speaker of the House will be continues among House members and the coffee shop wags.
The best bet, according to some self-proclaimed experts, is that it is Leyte Rep. Martin Romualdez who has the best chance of clinching it. Minority Leader Danny Suarez of Quezon says Romualdez, as of his head count of House members, already has 143 votes with support from party-list congressmen.
Others in the race are Lord Allan Velasco of Marinduque, Alan Peter Cayetano and former Speaker Prospero Nograles of Davao. Nograles , however, does not have the support of presidential daughter and Davao City Mayor Inday Sara Duterte whom he antagonized in local politics issues.
Senate race topnotcher Cynthia Villar claims she is not interested in the post of Senate President currently held by Tito Sotto. But if it is offered to her by her colleagues, will she consider being the first woman Senate president? Why not? It will add to her credentials in case she decides to go for the presidency in 2022—unless husband Manny also rethink a second stab at the highest post in the land to succeed President Duterte.
Senator-elect Imee Marcos told interviewer Karen Davila on CNN Philippines that she would vote for Cynthia because they belong to the same Nacionalista Party that the Villars took over from the Laurel family of Batangas.