Of late, a distressing trend has emerged among some of Duterte’s Cabinet members: Speaking out against each other in public.
Of course this isn’t the first time this has happened under any president. I can’t even say if it’s any better or worse than under previous presidencies. But that’s just a question of degree; and in any case it’s an alarming trend under a chief executive whose adulation by millions is matched by the vociferousness of the minority and the resources of their financial backers here and abroad.
The latest instance had Health Secretary Pincoy Duque criticizing the Energy Department for not bringing him into the loop when they decided to order the oil companies to start offering diesel fuel compliant with the 22-year-old Euro-2 standard, not just the current Euro-4 standard.
Duque’s concern is that the older standard will allow dirtier, albeit slightly cheaper (by only 30 centavos per liter) diesel into the country. Whichever side you believe, what’s for sure is that the environmental lobby will take up arms over this, causing another headache for Duterte that might have been avoided if his men had remembered to talk to each other first.
This whole trend really started with the President’s economic managers. Over at DBM, Secretary Ben Diokno put his foot down on the cash-based approach to replace the obligation-based approach to budgeting favored by the Lower House.
The House leadership has already offered a compromise: a 15-month obligation-based budget, instead of the traditional two years, that lets Diokno tighten up on spending while addressing the discrepancy between the calendar-based fiscal year and the school year starting June, which would leave most of the 2nd semester in public schools unfunded under a cash approach.
But as of writing, Diokno won’t even talk to the congressmen about their compromise. Which makes me wonder who in fact is supposed to enjoy the exclusive power of the public purse.
For his part, Finance Secretary Sonny Dominguez, after leading the charge against federalism based on unexamined numbers, is now questioning the decision to bring a third telco into the country. In his view, “the priority is to have a better regulatory environment,” evidently even more important than lining up behind a long-settled policy initiative like the third telco.
Well, I used to be the CFO of a well-known fixed-line telco some years back, and I can vouch for the outrageous offenses that the dominant telco got away with, up to and including outright defiance of the regulators at NTC. That’s what real market power means. And the only way to cut down that power is to force the telco market to be shared more equitably.
Nobody’s questioning the brains of the economic team. But perhaps it’s their braininess that makes them forget sometimes that being team players is their number one job description, in their capacity as no more than alter egos of the President (under a system that is neither federal nor parliamentary).
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One of the (many other) things going right under the economic team was government’s recent approval, under NEDA’s leadership, of the long-term rehabilitation and regular maintenance of the problem-plagued MRT-3 system, which will be financed by a 28-year, 38-billion yen Japanese loan charging annual interest of only 0.1 percent.
It may be recalled that MRT’s problems started when the previous administration replaced a first-class maintenance provider like Sumitomo with a third-rate local consortium, most likely to milk the system of funds for the LP’s 2016 campaign war chest. Thankfully that’s now behind us, though we’re still waiting for the scoundrels to be properly charged in court.
Over on the China end of things, Foreign Secretary Alan Cayetano will be visiting Beijing to firm up a joint submarine oil exploration deal with China, among other business prospects. Critics like Stratbase’s Dindo Manhit or UP maritime law expert Jay Batongbacal harrumphed that we should be ready to sue China abroad if they deviate from the deal, and make sure we’re not prevented later from doing exploration on our own.
To firm up the negotiating ground under us, we’d suggest holding the deal discussions in Manila, not Beijing. And to improve our negotiating strategy, our team might even solicit the advice of the lawyers who obtained that favorable UNCLOS ruling at The Hague. Even if it may have been ill-timed and ill-advised to run after that ruling, we might as well put it to good use now.
And going farther out to Russia, we’ve been politely advised by a senior US Defense Department official to “think very carefully” before buying submarines and other military goods from Russia. He warned about alleged Russian crimes in Crimea and the Ukraine, and reminded us that continuing to buy from the US ensures interoperability of systems (not to mention, I guess, availability of parts and upgrades down the road).
It’s tempting to tell this American official to stick his suggestion up where the sun don’t shine. But interoperability is in fact a valid concern since so much of our military hardware does come from the US. More importantly, if push comes to shove with the Chinese, it ain’t gonna be the Russians who’ll pull our nuts out of the fire. The special relationship we have with the adoptive home of so many Fil-Ams is worth looking after.
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Let’s close on an inspiring note: Duterte’s plan to visit Israel early next month, at the invitation of their Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. This will be the first visit there by a Philippine head of state since diplomatic ties were established between both countries in 1957. Agreements are expected to be signed on trade, labor, tourism, agriculture, counter-terrorism, and security.
As a matter of fact, Israeli-Philippine ties go back nearly two decades earlier than 1957, to the time of President Manuel Quezon, who gained a place on Israel’s Yad Vashem memorial to generous Gentiles by deciding to admit nearly 2,000 Jews fleeing the Nazi Holocaust. I’m proud to say that it was my grandfather Don Jorge Bocobo, then a senior member of Quezon’s Cabinet, who led this historic open-arms initiative.
This is one reason I’ve always been an Israel-phile, even before “Wonder Woman” Gal Gadot hit the silver screen. With so many Filipinos now working in that part of the world, it’s good to be on the sentimental good side of the Jewish state.
Readers can write me at gbolivar1952@yahoo.com.