| DIE HARD III |
 |
| Herman Tiu Laurel |
06/01/2012
The very day that the Senate impeachment hearings were to conclude,
the BS Aquino III government also tried to conclude its own P80 billion
loan for the Power Sector Assets and Liabilities Management (Psalm)
Corp.’s continued operations, thus ensuring that the agency will be able
to privatize the remaining 10 percent or so of the National Power Corp.
(Napocor)’s assets and the supply of coal and other fuel requirements
of independent power producers (IPPs).
Simultaneous to that, an
agreement between BS Aquino III and a foreign finance company, Macquarie
Group Ltd. of Australia, was reached to create the Philippine
Investment Alliance for Infrastructure (PInAI, like Pinay for Aussies)
that will set up an infrastructure fund, whereby the Government Service
Insurance System (GSIS) will contribute $300 million and the Australian
firm $50 million for so-called public-private partnership (PPP)
projects.
Going by the foreign financial agent’s negligible
contribution, the inexplicable thing is, why would anyone even go for
such a tie-up, especially when the Philippines has its own Special
Deposit Account (SDA) in the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) worth
around P1.7 trillion, or 12 times the amount of the P130 billion needed
to fund the projects this year?
On the afternoon of the
impeachment trial’s convoluted conclusion — which this space has
unwaveringly predicted would end in conviction — and with the
senator-judges hamming it up before the cameras, I compiled and later
read out on my radio program the more important issues, foremost of
which is the country’s debt service. In April of this year alone, our
country had already paid out P38.6 billion on principal and P16 billion
in interest, or a total drain of around P55 billion.
But more than
that, government even has a $2.5-billion borrowing program for the year
despite the fact we have P1.7 trillion lying idle in the BSP and
foreign reserves of up to $72 billion — as against a debt of $60
billion.
Sadly, the swindles don’t end there. The news that a
certain bigwig invited foreign partners for financial investments into
its MRT project — when it is an established fact that the MRT does not
lose money on its operations but only on its financial guarantees to
foreign investors — also makes our blood boil.
While it is true
that the P5.7 million reportedly spent by the House for the impeachment
trial is a measly amount, if we consider what other possible expenses it
has meant owing to what the Palace has had to promise congressmen,
senators, and other interested parties in exchange for a guilty verdict,
we’ll also be counting in the tens of billions of pesos.
Aside
from the usual pork barrel, what and how much more would it have cost,
for example, for the last-minute trip of BS Aquino III to the Iglesia ni
Cristo (INC) in obtaining the latter’s acquiescence to a Corona
conviction? Despite Malacañang’s pronouncements, the timing of the visit
renders its denials laughable. BS Aquino III was certainly in a
desperate situation. In order to avoid becoming a lame duck after the
ill-conceived impeachment case, he was most probably forced to pay
through his nose with the people’s resources.
I must admit that I
didn’t listen to the coverage of the final day of the Corona impeachment
as I just couldn’t stand the hypocrisy of the kettles and pots pointing
fingers and judging others. I did have one hard laugh though from the
day before, when the prosecution let out Speaker Sonny Belmonte to close
its case. The hard laugh was, of course, triggered by the comedic irony
of the chief culprit in what former party-list Rep. Rene Magtubo told
of the bribery of congressmen for the passage of the Electric Power
Industry Reform Act (Epira) in 2001.
Moreover, columnist Rod
Kapunan texted about Belmonte’s alleged role in one apparent Edsa I
scam, which we Googled and found in veteran writer Larry Henares’ 80s
column. It concerns “a real estate property at 212 Stockton Street, on
the corner of Geary Street, at San Francisco’s famed Union Square, known
as the Philippine Airlines Building since 1947… (which) had always been
a Filipino corner in a square that a San Francisco newspaper once
described as ‘an island of sunshine and greenery’… considered one of the
very best locations in the whole United States.” When Edsa took place,
the new dispensation “hurriedly and in near secrecy sold the property
for $10 million, in other words, at the original purchase price, without
recovering the substantial investments made further in the property…”
The
column then recounted the Senate blue ribbon committee investigation
that ensued, which told of “an intriguing tale… (where) everyone (was)
passing the buck and pointing to someone else… (and where) Speedy
Gonzalez (claimed that he)… turned the whole matter over to Sonny
Belmonte when the latter was appointed GSIS president,” with the current
Speaker being the one “who made the final decision in April 1986 on
whom to sell and at what price.”
According to the records, the
Philippine government only got $2,000 of what was valued by an
“independent, third-party appraiser, Haley-Leslie Appraisal Co. of San
Francisco… in a thorough study (of) the market value of the property at
the time of purchase on August 1982 (as) $12 million.” The appraisal
report was even more explicit in that “the property under consideration
(was) clearly a prime property.” Now why don’t we ever encounter such
reports in the Philippine Star?
Lastly, from one House Speaker to
another, we have this final point: Those who thought Sen. Manny Villar
and his group would vote for an acquittal were fooling themselves all
along. With the string of cases possibly awaiting him, Villar was
likely among the most ready to convict. Indeed, whether seasoned or
neophyte, whether young or old, what clowns and scammers these members
of the political ruling class are!
(Tune in to 1098AM, dwAD, Sulo
ng Pilipino/Radyo OpinYon, Monday to Friday, 5 to 6 p.m.; watch Destiny
Cable GNN’s HTL edition of Talk News TV, Saturdays, 8:15 to 9 p.m., with
replay at 11:15 p.m., on “The Corona conviction: Politics or rule of
law?” with Atty. Alan Paguia; visit http://newkatipunero.blogspot.com
for our articles plus TV and radio archives)
(Reprinted with permission from Mr. Herman Tiu-Laurel)
Source: The Daily Tribune
URL:
http://www.tribuneonline.org/commentary/20120601com6.html
