Too many fakes, bullies and poseurs in our sick society

If Stanley Ho can't take the sort of criticism and understand the alarm the prospect of his "coming" in full force to the Philippines is stirring up, then he'd better weigh anchor and sail away -- Jumbo Floating Res-taurant and all -- to safer waters.

Mind you, Mr. Ho, as a business mogul is super-rich, there's no quarreling with that. And he's even been awarded a Papal Knighthood, receiving the "Order of St. Gregory III" -- noble regalia, sword and all (as yesterday's STAR photo on page one portrayed) -- from no less than the reigning Pontiff, the Holy Father Pope John Paul II. In this light, despite the attacks of the Cardinal, the Bishops, and the local hierarchy on the prospect of his setting up "casinos" here and expanding gambling, etc. in our land, the Vatican has pronounced Mr. Ho a Pillar of the Church.

Since my late father was a Papal Knight, I won't inquire into how the Honorable Stanley Ho merited this blessing, since it is the prerogative of the Holy Father in Rome to confer such knighthoods -- usually for outstanding services to the Faith, and, more so, the Church.

That having been said, how can "Sir" Ho blame people in these parts for being apprehensive? Since he never hides the fact that he's the Casino King in Macau (even after the Portuguese colonial writ ran out and that enclave was returned to China last December), he mustn't sound surprised that Filipinos believe and fear that he'll be transplanting Macau-style gambling activities here. After all, he previously ran nine casinos in Manila from 1975 to 1986, in virtual partnership with the Marcoses and their crowd during the martial law years until, apparently, there was a falling out -- and he was constrained to withdraw and leave.

Naturally, the first exclamation his high-profile and "triumphant" coming to Manila provoked, particularly after that well-publicized meeting he had with President Estrada in Malacañang, was: "Ho is back -- with his casinos!"

If Mr. Ho isn't going to involve himself in gambling enterprises and casinos in any way, we see no reason why his other investments in hotels, in the telephone company, in mass housing, and other unrelated projects wouldn't be welcome. On the other hand, that press conference he held the other day in Hong Kong sounds like a Popeye-type "ultimatum," such as: "I am what I am -- take me, or I'll leave."

As you are? Ho cannot deny that he owns and operates the majority of the casinos in Macau. He doesn't deny that there is much Triad, Chinese criminal society, activity in and around those gambling centers. In fact, Macau's half a million residents welcomed China's People's Liberation Army (PLA) and armed militia to take over the place with open arms, because they were confident that a Chinese police and military crackdown would stop the Triads from making Macau's streets a daily shooting gallery, with a few bombs thrown in from time to time. That's the violence and mayhem we're all trying to prevent from being "transplanted" here. Setting up a casino is one thing (although the public is worried that so many casinos have been sprouting like mushrooms that "gambling" and games of chance, not industry and hard work, might become the Filipino way of life). The idea that Macau-style casinos could be set up here is what's terrifying people. The fact is that Triad gangs are drawn to Macau-style casinos and gaming clubs like flies are attracted to sugar and molasses, or bees to honey.

Mr. Ho says he feels "insulted" by allegations that he belongs to a Triad or heads a Triad. Nobody accuses him of such direct links. It's that somehow, where his enterprises flourish, there are usually Triad hijinks and Triad "wars" in the vicinity. Coincidence? We're not eager to take our chances on such "coincidences" occurring here. That's why Ho's "second coming" worries everyone.

He can stay or he can go, as he wishes. He's committed no crime here. But if he expects to get the "red carpet" treatment because he's got billions of dollars to wave around, he'd better disabuse himself of that thought.

Mr. Ho is on probation here. He's in the spotlight. If he doesn't like that, and can't take it -- I guess the only thing to say is "goodbye."

I was going to hold my peace and not mention it in this space, although publisher and chairman of this newspaper, but what the heck. When some people start throwing stones at your wife and your friends, then it's time to give it back to them, with both barrels.

An upstart group, which is trying to claim it was "elected" the new board of directors of the North Greenhills Assn. Inc., has been attempting to hastily collect "dues" from the 319 residents, and thus stampede the residents into "accepting" their ridiculous nonsense.

They even "convinced" Supreme Court Justice Bernardo Pardo who lives in the village to "swear" them in -- although San Juan Mayor "Jinggoy" Estrada, who is also a resident of North Greenhills, did not do so. In fact, the proxy of the First Lady, Dr. Loi Ejercito Estrada (since the President is a longtime resident of Polk Street in North Greenhills) is in the hands of her nephew, Mr. Ricky de Guzman who belongs to our group, which declares a real election never took place.

That shows you the kind of pretension and sham that is being undertaken by the so-called "North Greenhills" board, self-styled, who didn't muster enough votes because there was a boycott of their alleged exercise by two-thirds of the village residents.

That, in simplest terms, is what has been happening. This bunch got away with it for several years -- but no longer. This time the North Greenhills residents are demanding a new, fair, above-board, COMELEC-supervised, and honest election.

In a memorandum circulated among North Greenhills residents by this guy Francisco G. Antonio, who calls himself "President and Chairman of the Board" kuno, the upstart group took direct aim at Mrs. Preciosa S. Soliven and her fellow reformers. Lest they later allege that they were misquoted, or quoted out of context, let me quote that "24 January 2000" memorandum: "Yesterday (wrote Antonio), January 23 (Sunday), the Detachment Commander of our security force, Mr. Gualberto Sanchez, reported that he saw the driver of Mrs. Preciosa Soliven put streamers in front of 3 houses along Madison Street and 1 streamer along Buchanan Street."

"By now (the fellow continued) you may have already noticed these streamers put up by the group who obviously wants to take over the present Board of Directors. This group is urging members not to pay membership dues. The group believes it has the right to ask our residents to do what it wishes to impose. The group thinks that to achieve its ambition, the non-payment of annual dues would catapult it to the directorship of the Board and thus occupy the position of 12 people who were already duly elected last January 8, were sworn into office by an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, and, are now already performing their functions as elected directors."

My comment is that Antonio and company did not win any "elections."

They held what looked like elections, with their own rules, their own handpicked "commission" to receive and count the ballots they say were cast, and then they proclaimed themselves winners. How can an election be held when there was no "opposing ticket", and everybody else had withdrawn and declared a boycott of those one-sided self-perpetuating gymnastics since, all too apparently, the dice were loaded?

Even five of that group's own declared "candidates" withdrew, too. I won't try to interpret WHY, but when your own companions withdraw, that's very interesting.

In other words, they counted their own ballots and called themselves the "new Board" of the year 2000. Give us a break!

Antonio concludes his annoyed letter with the following threat. He wrote: "We urge members not to heed the usual propaganda. Vital services like garbage collection and security of the village would be affected should payment of annual dues be delayed."

Wow! They're broke? Where did last year's dues go -- they were already fantastic, jumping by 80 percent since the year 1998. That palsy-walsy crowd had been in "power" for ten years, and we haven't received an audit report or financial statement for four years, we dues-paying, long-suffering residents.

The North Greenhills Assn. has incurred a deficit of P4.9 million -- yes, four million nine hundred thousand pesos -- why, oh why? We held a residents' meeting in the North Greenhills gym when homeowners were worried that the group planned to build a super-expensive Club House, complete with chandeliers, and they swore that the cost would not be passed on to the residents. What then have we been paying for -- through the nose? The previous board which is the same gang even passed "amendments" to the by-laws twice (so they could be re-elected indefinitely) without submitting these self-serving amendments to a referendum of the residents.

This writer knows all about the promise that the "Club House" would be self-financing and would not "cost" the villagers, since all sides -- including them -- invited me to act as Chairman of that "town hall" style meeting for I had been founding President in 1973-75 of the Association, and served two terms until I called a referendum to amend the by-laws to restrict the "presidency" to one single term. (It was Marcos martial law at that time, and I said I wanted everyone to know that no "president" is indispensable, and "there was at least one Ilocano who didn't want to be president forever.")

This guy Antonio concludes his piece condemning my wife and the reformers with the following snide remarks: "A cheap move, such as display of streamers encouraging residents not to pay annual dues based on unfounded and baseless accusations, should not be a reason for depriving the general membership of vital services they deserve. Do not allow the personal ambitions of those who lost in the election to divide and destroy our community."

Excuse me. What elections? How can anybody "lose" if there was a boycott and there were no "opposing" candidates? Ambition? Who are those in their board who have been "in power" for so many years? Why can't they let go? Because they might be audited and the finances investigated? Just asking.

Let's face the facts. The boycott succeeded because, out of a total membership of 319 residents, only 114 (meaning 34.9 percent) "participated" and "voted" in the alleged "election.") That 114 who were said to have voted for the alleged new board comes from their own published figures. Even a non-lawyer knows that in an election, you've got to have a majority of ALL the members, but Section 24 of the Corporation Code of the Philippines is clear and specific enough.

Section 24 governing the "Election of Directors or Trustees" asserts: "At all elections of Directors or Trustees, there must be present, either in person or representation authorized to act by written proxy, the owners of the majority of the outstanding capital stock or if there be no capital stock, a majority of the members entitled to vote."

How can 114 persons then be a majority? What happened to the other 200 or more resident-voters? They did not participate, they did not vote, they did not recognize there was an election.

The awful aspect of this farce was that those very North Greenhills Assn. board members and their group, seeking reelection, had "amended" kuno the NGA by-laws to aver that a 30 percent attendance of the general membership constituted a quorum. Sorry, but the law states that no provisions of any by-laws can prevail over a clear provision of the Corporation Code. In short, the Corporation Code is the law of the land. How can a small bunch upset and reverse the law -- so they can enjoy being officers forever? Now, who's ambitious?

May I have the temerity to suggest that Justice Pardo please go back to law school? If a case goes up to the Supreme Court, he will even have prejudged it and fallen prey to "conflict of interest." (What would the other Justices say?)

There is, in fact, already a "Manifesto" signed and distributed by more than 25 percent of the total membership of the North Greenhills Assn. (clearly more than the ten percent required by the NGA's by-laws for the convening of a special meeting by the members) calling for a real election "as soon as possible."

This means that the present cabal which claims to have been "elected" (they elected themselves) can campaign and run -- and genuinely win if they amass the proper majority. What are they afraid of? That on a level playing field, not subject to their self-made rules, and handled by a secretariat which is in their employ, they might be repudiated?

The signed "Manifesto" openly distributed, clearly dated January 17, 2000, has already asked the members of the NGA (not just in streamers) "not to pay the association dues and other charges for the year 2000 until after the special election as mentioned above."

An NGA "oversight committee" has been formed, duly elected, to handle arrangements for the special meeting and the real election of a genuine NGA board of directors.

You'll recognize those names as belonging to individuals of integrity and prominence. The chairman is Mrs. Pat de Guzman, a sister of the president and, from the beginning, with her husband Dr. Raul de Guzman, among the first residents of the village. The vice chairman is Dr. Efren de los Santos, head of the De Los Santos Orthopedic Hospital, and village father. Mrs. Helen Espino, wife of the former Armed Forces chief of staff, Gen. Romeo Espino. General Edon Yap, former president of the NGA. Mr. Eduardo Carrascoso, two-term former president of the NGA, and former NAIA airport general manager. Mr. Jesus P. Disini, businessman.

Why are Antonio's confederates -- Messrs. Arsenio V. Santos, Jr., Alfredo V. Lagman, Jr., Edilberto S. Lingad, Jose J. Duran, etc. -- so bent on staying on and on, and on? Why do they ignore the people's voice? C'mon, fight fair. Fight right. Run in a free and open election!

According to one of Antonio's many memos, 242 residents voted in 1997, 243 in 1998, and only 101 in 1999. Those are his own statistics. Now, you can see that fewer and fewer voted. What about that? As for the "proxies" they put in the box in those elections, did any independent, outside inspector or "invited" auditor vet and inspect them? We all, I confess, were too busy grappling with the problems and the politics of life outside our village over the past few years to ask such questions -- we let them have their way, alas. Now, it's time for us to wake up. The jig is up.

I don't think I bored you, Dear Readers, with this narration. The same thing is happening in many villages, communities, and municipalities. This is a wake-up call.