'In Between Columns'

On Pelaez' outburst

Mr. Efrain Pelaez seems to be a loss at the tirades he had been getting the past month against. Instead of meeting headon the issues raised, he merely dismisses these as irrelevant and proceeds to question my integrity for writing a critical column.

Aside from the letter to the editor published in Sun.Star Cebu today, he sent an email to my Sun.Star bosses railing against what he perceived as a “coordinated media campaign” and my alleged role because Lapu-Lapu Mayor Arturo Radaza’s supposed PR consultant Ahmed Cuizon may be a “brother in law.”

Because of space limitations and the time, I was not able to articulate all that was in mind in my brief reply published in Sun.Star Cebu today.

Thus, I wrote this blog entry.

I reviewed what came out in the local dailies after reading his diatribe and found out the following:

· Reputable writers in both Cebu Daily News and The Freeman had already been criticizing Mr. Pelaez before I typed my column “Business Friendly Cebu” on June 2, 2008.

· Early in May 2008, news reports on the affidavits of the widow and son of former mayor Ernest Weigel Jr. were published in Sun.Star Cebu, Sun.Star Superbalita and The Freeman.

· A day or two after the May 20 assassination of Atty. Richard Sison, the legal counsel of Mayor Radaza, reporter Nilda Gallo of the Cebu Daily News wrote about her last interview with the slain lawyer. She said Sison talked about gathering evidences against tax cheats in Lapu-Lapu City.

· The weekend after the assassination, news items in Sun.Star Cebu, Sun.Star Superbalita and Cebu Daily News detailed the official response of Mayor Radaza to the Gallo news item. He asked police investigators to also look into the tax cheats angle, ordered his remaining lawyer to take up what Sison left, and asked the local police to provide the lawyers with security. The Cebu Daily News even bannered this story.

· Days after this, news items on the AIM-IFC survey that said Lapu-Lapu city ranked second in being “business friendly” were published in Sun.Star Cebu, Cebu Daily News and The Freeman.

· The Freeman came out with a favorable editorial on the AIM-IFC survey.

· Only on June 2, 2008 did I write my column “Business Friendly Cebu” and based it on documents that were already reported in local dailies.

Contrary to the allegations of Mr. Pelaez, the points on “tax cheats” and “tax evader” were not based on “rumors and black propaganda” guided by a “script” but on documents and news reports available to opinion writers and the public.

In crying against what he perceived as a “coordinated media attack,” is Mr. Pelaez insinuating that Ahmed Cuizon, who he alleges as the PR consultant of Mayor Radaza, engineered all these reports and columns?

Are all the other journalists (reporters, editors and columnists) responsible for the news items and columns that came out for nearly a month “may” be also relatives of Cuizon?

The way I see it, Mr. Pelaez is practically accusing the whole of Cebu media of being stooges of Ahmed Cuizon and Mayor Radaza. His outburst against Anol Mongaya virtually attacks the Cebu media.

PASG Report

BAYAN Muna's Armand Perez gave Cebu reporters  copies of the PASG accomplishment report this morning. I got to read the report when I met Armand later at noon and realized that the report listed names of Customs officials who are least likely involved in smuggling. Moreover, they placed the wrong designations.

Thus, Radi Abarintos, the cash division chief, was listed as being the deputy collector for assessment.

I pity Radi because he only receives the payment from importers based on the assessment of the assessment division.

In Manila

One can do work and connect with friends while enjoying dinner, red wine and beer at the hotel lobby nowadays.  Thanks to free wifi here at Cafe Miranda in Mabini st. in Malate.

I'm here in Manila with colleague and friend Job Tabada for the National Press Club national convention. But we plan to attend the session this Saturday yet in time for the elections this Sunday upon the invitation my friend Roy Mabasa of Bulletin Today and the outgoing national president.

Aside from observing the convention and elections and connecting with colleagues at the National Capital Region (NCR), we intend to push for the recognition of chapters in the provinces to make the NPC truly national.

Last Monday, we were with a group of colleagues from CEbu for a plant tour at the Asia-Pacific Electric Corp. (APEC) power plant in Mabalacat, Pampanga.

Jonji Gonzales, the pr of Global Business Power Corp., brought us there to see for ourselves the operation of a power plant using the circulating fluidized bed technology or modern coal-fired power plants.

Indeed, we were impressed at the cleanliness of the 52-mw plant that powered TIPCO, a paper mill plant inside the industrial zone in Mabalacat.

Later, Global treated us to a night at Subic and a whole day tour of Zoobic -- where we were literally chased by Tigers while inside a caged jeep -- and Ocean Adventure with its dolphin show and sea lion show there. All I can think of is, why can't something like that be set up in Cebu.

I left Subic together with Job, Terry TUndag, the editor in chief of The Freeman, and John Rey Saavedra of Banat News for Manila late Tuesday night for Manila. Both Jerry and John Rey left for Cebu yesterday leaving Job and I to attend the NPC convention.

Till then for the update guys.

VSMMC YOuTube Controversy

Many now question the conduct of the medical personnel who operated on a male patient with a perfume spray cannister pushed up his anus during his New Year's Eve tryst with an unnamed male.

But who was that unnamed male who started the whole controversy in the first place? Why is the victim/patient also not going after this unnamed male?

How was it possible for them to have a date and the victim/patient forgot his identify after he got dead drunk and slept for three days? Was he a boyfriend that victim/patient is trying to protect?

Or was he simply ashamed of acknowledging that the guy was a cheap call boy?

Or is victim/patient just going after the doctors for the fund of it?

Pagpalansang sa miaging Biernes Santo

THOUSANDS came to see nails driving through Gilbert Bargayo's hands and feet that fateful Biernes Santo 2008 and he seemed to be enjoying the attention.

The cross where he hung for some 45 minutes at around 3 pm had a grand view of one side of the Cristo Rey Mountain Park filled with people from all walks of life.

The guy just suffered a bout with chicken pox. The marks all over his body just could not be hidden by the dye his followers painted on him a day before.

"Naayo na man ko," he told me when I arrived at the old Don Bosco Retreat House where the cast and production staff of the Pasyon sa Mantalongon stayed.

Mixed feelings met me when I arrived.

My family -- Doris and the kids -- were already there ahead. I worried about Bargayo's state of health. I thought about the threat posed by local and family politics in Mantalongon. The retreat house gave me a sense of deja vu after returning 30 years after my senior high school retreat that every Bosconian in Cebu experience.

The nailing at the Cristo Rey Mountain Park was actually my idea.

Joe Canton, a family friend, had just assumed the post as administrator of the property owned by his family -- the Almagros of Dalaguete. Over breakfast and some hot instant 3-in-1 coffee mix last December 2007, he asked for ideas on how to draw public attention to the 50-yeat-old park.

Looking at Bargayo on the cross that afternoon, I told myself, "That's one idea that took off and became reality."

MingaW NA sa BOC

The car smuggling syndicate is a resilient organism that survived the publicity onslaught waged by big car delaers and the protracted congressional inquiry. But one thing that totally destabilizes the syndicate is disagreement over money. Thus, when the CIIS learned that what they received as tara was small compared to what the PASG had been getting, they decided to just have all "trabaho" stopped. Why did the CIIS learned ab out it? The national leadership of PASG reportedly had two businessmen acting as collection agents in Cebu. The two turned out to be braggarts who teased CIIS officials how much they were collecting. So mingaw ang BOC karon.

Noli de Castro

The calls for GMA's resignation has earned Vice President Noli de Castro both a second look by political observers and pleyers as well as a demolition job by detractors.

The vice president himself has his men going around the country to feel the pulse and at the same time laying the grounds for a nationwide machinery.

Many in the middle class may not have a high regard for de Castro. But he is our vice president -- the man who rise into power if current efforts to unseat President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo succeeds.

Fortunately for GMA, I don't think the opposition is solidly behind the resignation call.

The presidentiables within the opposition camp surely don't want de Castro as sitting president when he runs for the same position in 2010.

Come to think of it. Since the time he was elected vice president, de Castro is already a contender for the presidency come 2010.

Lozada

My news editor Roger Vallena told me last night Fr. Diola and his Dilaab are wary of Rodolfo Noel "Jun" Lozada and his testimony because of his association with some opposition personalities.

It seems revelations on Jun Lozada's meetings with Sen. Panfilo Lacson and the senator's role in his eventual emergence as an NBN-ZTE witness has colored the "reluctant hero's" image with somekey sectors in Cebu.

If I were Lozada, I should stick more with the religious sector than with Lacson and his camp.

Already, Lacson's publicity man Lito Banayo has been bragging in his Malaya column about his knowledge of the Ping-Jun relationship.

Incidentally, (let me digress a little on Lito Banayo) Tonton Antogop is being teased for having beaten Banayo in te 2004 election. Tonton was with the camp of Rep. Nerry  Soon-Ruiz while Banayo came to Cebu to help Luigi Quisumbing.

While Tonton is taking the credit however, only a few knew I was the one who told him about the arrival of the Banayo group. Tayming lang that I was having beer with Rey Bajenting that night at Da Vinci's at Osmena blvd. when Tonton suddenly emerged from the adjoining Internet cafe.

Will Lozada unlease wrath of people power v. GMA

Mobilizing hundreds of thousands to more than a million was easier against the Marcos and Estrada administrations than against Arroyo after she hurdled her first difficult year.

I can cite many reasons for this difficulty. Internally, the broad people power movement has so failed to put its act together. Even during crucial mass actions, it could only muster a little more than 50,000 in Metro Manila from its organized mass base. Worse, it  failed to excite and spark spontaneous public participation that should have swelled their ranks during demonstrations.

The dramatic emergence of NBN-ZTE scam witness Jun Lozada has attracted the attention of the public nationwide.

Members of the various civil society and militant groups, active members of the religious, and the opposition are reportedly coordinating to get their acts together so as not to fail Lozada's "heroism."

Will Lozada's heroism then finally unleash the wrath of people power against the administration of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo?

I'm still skeptical.

Toledo

How clean is Taiwanese coal-fired plant technology than that of the Koreans? Im asking this question in the light of the competition between the Taiwanese-backed group that plants to construct three power plants in Toledo City and the Korean Electric Power Corp. (KEPCO)-Salcon that still has to construct its promised two 100 megawatts coal-fired plants in Naga City.