I know that we Filipinos take politics three times a day and sometimes go on overdose or have indigestion.
I often ask myself why, when a new government comes to power, a persistent agenda is to oust all those appointed by the immediate predecessor.
That is exactly what is happening today with the impeachment cases brought against Supreme Court Chief Justice Maria Lourdes Sereno and Ombudsman Conchita Carpio- Morales.
No doubt, those who stole from our coffers during the past administration must be held accountable for their misdeeds. Look at the graft charges filed against former Transportation chief Joseph Emilio Abaya.
I also cannot understand why those who already ruled this country for six years would want to destabilize the Duterte administration.
What is peculiar to our country is that when you are not for the incumbent, you are against him. No wonder we are so divided as a nation.
Despite this, we don’t even have a credible opposition figure—not Vice President Leni Robredo, not Senator Antonio Trillanes, and not Senator Leila de Lima.
To me, this is the greatest tragedy in our politics.
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So many Filipinos go hungry every day. And yet we know that so much food goes to waste in restaurants and even in the kitchen of Filipino families.
Wastage of food also happens in food manufacturing and processing establishments and distribution outlets.
I am convinced we can use the discarded but still edible food stuff to help the poor.
A bill in the Senate may just create a mechanism for this. Filed by Senator Bam Aquino, Senate Bill 357 seeks to prevent or at least minimize food waste by providing for a system of redistributing and recycling food waste.
According to Aquino, the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization says that more than 40 percent of food loss in developing countries like the Philippines happens before consumption—or, during production, post-harvesting and processing.
Aquino also pointed to the research of the International Rice Research Institute that 15 percent of rice losses occur in the post-harvest stage alone. Have you seen palay on provincial roads, being dried?
It is estimated that another 296,000 metric tons of rice, valued at P7.3 billion, is wasted in the country.
The senator laments that these losses could have been saved to feed more than two million Filipinos.
Lest the bill is misinterpreted, Aquino’s proposal does not intend to turn the poor into pitiful recipients of leftover food. The food would still be fit for consumption.
With the Department of Social Welfare and Development as coordinating agency, the bill encourages food-related firms to enter into deal with food banks.
We may not be aware of it, but charitable food banks have existed in the country for some time now.
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Santa Banana, Vice President Leni Robredo wants the ruins of Marawi preserved as a monument tothose who sacrificed their lives to liberate Marawi.
I would advise Robredo to tell that to the hundred of thousands of Marawi residents who lost their homes.
I don’t know what she wants to prove, really. Is preserving ruins more important than having residents return to their homes? Robredo must think so.
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The problems of resigned Comelec chairman Andres Bautista are just beginning.
Despite the impeachment case against him being rendered moot and academic, he still faces graft, possibly plunder, charges brought against him by his estranged wife, Patricia.
At least he would still have his day in court.
I can only commiserate with the Bautista children. Their mother seems determined to put their father in jail.