Changes

The new chief of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR), Elisea Gozun, said yesterday there would be no sacred cows in her jurisdiction during her watch. I wish her luck. With the campaign period approaching, she will soon hear loud mooing outside her window, and she will be told that, yes, Elisea, there are sacred cows in this administration.

Gozun has probably learned a thing or two about President Arroyo’s way of dealing with members of her official family. When some Palace factotum mistakenly announces that a Cabinet member or agency head has offered to quit or will soon be replaced, we can be sure it’s a calculated mistake. It’s a gentle nudge to the poor sap who can’t sense that he’s headed for the chopping block.

In the case of Heherson Alvarez, Malacañang had dropped so many hints and sent out so many trial balloons about his departure from the DENR. There were stories about his post being offered to Vice President Teofisto Guingona Jr. There were stories about the President wanting to appoint Alvarez instead as ambassador to the United Nations. No deal, Alvarez said. He was probably counting on his long friendship with the Macapagals. After he was bypassed several times by the Commission on Appointments, Malacañang even announced that the President was ready to let him go. Alvarez hung on, and was finally rewarded with the CA’s nod.

Now he will always have on his resumé that he was fired as environment chief.

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As for Leonardo Montemayor, he should have gotten the hint ages ago, when the President started taking away from the Department of Agriculture its attached agencies. It’s no secret that in agricultural matters, the President has always listened to Luis "Cito" Lorenzo, for whom she has only high praise. And it was clear to many that Cito was willing to accept the agriculture portfolio. The President should have appointed Cito as her agriculture secretary from the start, but she probably had to honor some debt of gratitude.

After the unceremonious departure of Alvarez and Montemayor, Cabinet members should have learned their lesson: If you don’t want the ignominy of being sacked, learn to take a hint. You’ll know when the ax is about to fall when the President gives you fulsome praise after all those "mistaken" announcements about your departure from the Cabinet.

For his part, Justice Secretary Hernando Perez (I won’t call him secretary on leave since I think he’s still the one running his department) feels reassured – and with good reason — about keeping his post. That public buss from the President was meant to send a message.

Then again, it could have been her way of easing the pain of the looming decapitation. The persistent buzz is that Perez will eventually have to go – perhaps by January, or sometime after his accuser Mark Jimenez has been extradited to the United States.

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No matter how impeccable the credentials of the new Cabinet members, people have become so disillusioned with government that only the most optimistic expect major reforms as a result of the latest changes.

Remember Bayani "the hero" Fernando? My fears were right – he has so far proved to be no match for the mayors of the independent republics of Metro Manila. The cities that were filthy before Fernando came along are growing filthier from the Christmas trash. Commuter buses are still king of the road, violating every traffic sign, hogging three lanes on a four-lane boulevard.

And traffic grows more horrible by the day. Last week was particularly terrible. The Christmas lights are finally on display, but now it’s the traffic lights that are missing. I don’t know how you can build a strong republic when you can’t even install durable traffic lights in the nation’s capital. The lights last about two months, then blink out, snarling traffic. It takes another two months to replace them with more cheap light bulbs. When new ones are installed, programming of the lights goes haywire, as if the job was done by some monkey in the Department of Public Works and Highways.

We can’t even determine who’s responsible for replacing the light bulbs. The DPWH and the Metro Manila Development Authority keep pointing to each other.

No wonder the prime minister of Australia wants authority to launch a unilateral pre-emptive strike against terrorists in Asia. John Howard did not specifically mention the Philippines, but we’re smarting from the shutdown of the Australian Embassy here. Howard has lessons to learn in international PR, but I can’t blame him entirely for his lack of confidence in our government. If we can’t even install the proper light bulbs to keep our "smart" traffic lights functioning smartly, how can we catch terrorists?

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ROBBERS’ CHRISTMAS: And don’t forget the thugs who have terrorized the public long before Osama bin Laden became a household name. President Arroyo should order the Philippine National Police to protect the public from robbers, whose activities increase during the Christmas season. Residents of Barangay Onse in San Juan are worried about robberies in their neighborhood. On the night of Nov. 19 several men barged into the G-Net computer and video game shop, robbed customers of their cash and cell phones and the store of its earnings for the day. The robbers fled on a Toyota FX van without license plates.

In the weeks since September residents of Montoya street in the same barangay reported at least two cases of taxi drivers being robbed. A taxicab with drops of blood in the driver’s seat was also found abandoned.

Over in Antipolo City, a school nurse was also robbed by six men near the gate of Cogeo Village on the night of Nov. 12. The robbers took even the lettuce in the terrified nurse’s shopping bag, but in the dark missed her cell phone and bracelet which had fallen to the ground.

Another woman reported that a doctor and her friend were driving to Baguio City in a sport utility vehicle when they were waylaid by six men in a van. The two victims were blindfolded, hogtied and ordered to lie face down on the floor of their SUV as they were stripped of their valuables. They were then driven around Central Luzon for several hours, and were freed only when the robbers spotted new victims: two more women in an SUV. Women drivers, beware.