P-Noy’s performance in that first ever town hall meeting of a sitting President with overseas Filipinos over live television (ABS-CBN’s TFC) gave me a good boost of confidence that all is not lost. The series of blunders over the last two months thanks to the unimpressive inner circle of P-Noy have made me and thousands or even millions of other P-Noy voters wonder if we did the right thing in foisting him on this country.
But P-Noy did well in that televised dialogue and made me think that it is perhaps a good communications strategy to expose him at regular intervals in such public interaction. He is his best spokesman. He exudes honesty, sincerity and perhaps, a hint of decisiveness. None of his people are as eloquent in presenting his government’s agenda as he is.
As Winnie Monsod once wrote, there is a large segment of critics and criticisms directed at P-Noy that may be considered friendly. Because we supported him in the campaign, we are more concerned that he stays true to his promise of staying on the straight and narrow path… yung matuwid na landas… specially now that close associates are being linked to scandals here and there.
One other thing we are concerned about is the capability of his staff to handle the challenges that face this administration. So far, outside of Justice Secretary de Lima and the economic team led by Finance Secretary Purisima and Energy Secretary Almendras, the other members of his Cabinet have given us little reason to think they have what it takes to get the job done.
There had been a series of failures, big and small, since they took office. There is the hostage crisis, the first test of this administration that it miserably failed. The bureaucratic failures are also there like the miscues between the three spokesmen of the President. There is also the snafu on Memorandum Order 1 which should have been totally avoidable.
I realize that the US embassy already apologized for the Philippine flag incident in New York. But I cannot understand why none of the protocol and security officers noticed the problem when they are all required to check the venue of any meeting involving P-Noy way ahead of time.
It is time for P-Noy to initiate a tough zero-defects program at the Palace. This means, there should be no tolerance for even the simplest mistakes. This is the only way he can regain the trust of a public that is already starting to share Joker Arroyo’s description of his team as a “student council”.
I can understand P-Noy’s stance about no one being perfect. But an organization that is prone to snafus, no matter how small, loses credibility over time. We have too much tolerance for the “puede na yan”. This explains the mediocrity in our midst. That is why we are in this hole. We cannot afford this business as usual mindset. I am sure many of us now want a leader who can indeed, lead.
This is why the President must have the best and the brightest of our people helping him out. He cannot limit his inner circle to his kabarkadas. He needs to step out of his comfort zone and even do a deep search of who are really best qualified to do the work of leading this country with him, whether he personally knows them or not.
Even someone like Erap managed to assemble a Cabinet with very respectable people. Sorry to say, but based on the record of almost three months, P-Noy’s Cabinet is like the SWAT team of the MPD armed with sledgehammers and clueless on how to accomplish their objective. He needs a Cabinet like the SAF, trained and equipped to get the job done.
And because there is no time for mistakes, it makes absolutely no sense to keep people around him who are no longer credible to the public. He will just be losing precious political capital for nothing. It isn’t even a question of being fair to someone like Usec Rico Puno and giving him the presumption of innocence. He is obviously a barnacle who will slow P-Noy down. Let him go and if he wants to truly help, that can be done without an official appointment.
Now that he is back from his first foreign trip, P-Noy must once again face the hard decisions he must make back home. Get that hostage case out of the way already. And institute a zero-defects program for his team or all that promise of a new day under a new leader will end up as so much hope down the drain.
TFC
That town hall meeting hosted by ABS-CBN at its Redwood City studio was a first of its kind. It was the first ever direct conversation of a President with overseas Filipinos, not just in America but in the Middle East, Japan and Europe as well.
It was also the first special live news show fully produced out of Manila in record time. ABS-CBN’s North America News Bureau Chief Ging Reyes had supervised as well as co-anchored the show with Gel Santos-Relos. It was produced by Vivian Zalvidea-Araullo.
What made me quite proud of that team’s accomplishments is that I have had the pleasure of working with all of them during my watch as VP News of ABS-CBN. Ging was producer of World Tonight. Gel was one of our anchors for TV Patrol.
Vivian was one of the best reporters I had at that time, who managed to provide depth to her Malacañang coverage despite the limitations of the broadcast media for this treatment. I am glad Ging, Gel and Viv are all working together at TFC and doing great work keeping all Filipinos connected.
Mea culpa
I made a mistake in my Monday column. The The MCC Compact signed in NYC is a grant not a loan, meaning no repayment, no interest, no financial burden.
But we still have to use it well and make sure it doesn’t line pockets of the usual suspects.
Top taxpayers
We played a new game at the Tuesday Club yesterday. It is called Can You Believe What Your Favorite Tycoon Paid in Taxes? Tony Lopez brought the latest issue of his magazine, Biz News Asia, whose cover story is entitled Heroes, or the list of the top 500 taxpayers based on 2008. Tony said he was being ironic, maybe sarcastic with his title and we all found out why.
Of course the top taxpayer is Manny Pacquiao who paid P125 million. Willie Revillame is second at P58.6 million. Piolo Pascual is third with P55.8 million. Kris Aquino is 8th at P25.4 million.
Walter Brown, Manny Zamora, Danding Cojuangco, Manny Pangilinan and Manolo Lopez are from nine to 16. Ramon Ang is at 20th at P14.8 million. Joey Cuisia is at 29th with P11.2 million. Henry Sy Jr is at 34th with P10.2 million.
Jollibee’s Tony Tan Caktiong is 60th at P7.9 million. Henry Sy Sr. is 73rd at P7.2 million. McDonald’s George Yang is 74th at P7.8 million. Dolphy is 113th at P5.5 million.
What the coffee shop found interesting was Bobby Ongpin who was only at 306th with a mere P2.8 million in income taxes. That’s the Bobby Ongpin who controls Petron and San Miguel shares through Ashmore and a new shopping mall in Makati and a listed gaming issue. Movie starlet Rufa Mae Quinto, 133rd, paid more than Bobby at P4.8 million. I wonder if the real estate taxes on his Italian villa is more. Eric Recto, Ongpin’s nephew who works with him, paid more, at P3.8 million.
Robert Coyiuto Jr, of PGA Cars at 352nd, paid P2.6 million, barely enough to buy an entry level Audi from his dealership.
We didn’t see any of the Zobels in the list. Nor did we see Ricky Razon. Maybe they have a different way of computing their income tax and are in a different list.
Tony Lopez just did a great public service in publishing the top 500 list. It is a good way of finding out who our real heroes are. It also reveals who are those who just talk why everyone else has to be a hero instead.
Ma ala-ala mo kaya
From the blogsite, The Professional Heckler:
BREAKING NEWS: Charo Santos has canceled her plan to feature the life story of DILG Undersecretary Enrico Puno on the next episode of “Maalaala Mo Kaya.”
The creative team is having a hard time drafting the script because, apparently, walang maalaala si Usec Puno.
Boo Chanco’s e-mail address is bchanco@gmail.com. Past columns may be accessed at www.boochanco.net <http://www.boochanco.net/