Another silly stop jueteng ‘deadline’

We keep on saying President GMA can only disprove the allegations that members of her family are involved in jueteng, either by sponsorship or payola, by actually crushing jueteng as a priority in her administration’s crackdown on crime. She also has to disprove, this writer and other critics have insisted that her home province of Pampanga, particularly her hometown of Lubao, is The Vatican of jueteng.

What nobody needs or wants is that the President order the so-called eradication of jueteng by press release. Once more comes the announcement of a silly "deadline" by which the newly-appointed anti-jueteng "czar" (by gosh, that over-used term), Mayor Edward Hagedorn of Puerto Princesa (Palawan) must accomplish zero-jueteng by September 15. Hagedorn, who’s also chairman of the League of Cities, went along with the charade by cheerfully promising, "Yeh, sure . . ." or something like that.

Since our friend, Philippine National Police Director General Arturo C. Lomibao (we thank him for visiting The STAR with a star-studded pangkat of top Police generals last Monday night) already stated that jueteng is also 90-percent kaput more than a month and a half ago, based on reports from his PNP district chiefs abetted by, can you believe, many local parish priests kuno, I guess Mayor Hagedorn – who’s respected for having cleaned up his own city of many kinds of rackets as well as of garbage – can join the Anvil Chorus with gusto. But does he himself believe what he’s dishing out? For instance, he was quoted yesterday as pointing to Central Luzon and Southern Luzon as places where jueteng still exists but Pampanga, "the President’s home province" is not one of them! Excuse me, but that sounds like the biggest windy of them all.

The semblance of jueteng having been "stopped" can easily be created by the illegal gambling godfathers, the Dons of the racket, decreeing a "recess" or temporary halt of jueteng activities for the period of a month or two. But crushing jueteng must, if it is to be credible, include a number of high-profile arrests. This doesn’t seem to be the plan.

Does the Palace believe the public to be so gullible? I suppose so.

Methinks La Presidenta ought to beware. She’s beginning to look and sound like the Old Glo, not the one rattled by the "Hyatt 10" bomba – which fizzled, however – or the Opposition cum Leftwing attempts to shout her out of office. Even her insincere stabs at "reconciliation" which contrive to make her appear like some dizzy socialite rather than a determined Chief Executive are vintage Ate Glo, all glow but no substance.

We’d rather have a President, besieged on all sides, standing up and fighting, rather than one who’s running scared – scared of losing more of her already close to sub-zero popularity – but strangely cocksure in manner and stride.

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My old friend Cerge Remonde, the Secretary for Media Affairs of the Office of the President and former president of the Kapisanan ng mga Brodkaster ng Pilipinas (KBP), came to join us at the Tuesday Club in the EDSA Plaza Shangri-la yesterday morning. I’ve always had a soft spot for Cerge, who has always claimed to be my protegé dating back to our days in Cebu when he was a hard-hitting broadcaster for Radio DYLA.

Cerge sat across from me at the Club’s breakfast table then suddenly handed his cellphone to me. "Sir Max," he announced, "it’s the President!"

Startled, I took it, and, indeed, it was GMA herself on the line, her voice clearer than on those controversial "Hello Garci" ringtones. What puzzled me was that the President didn’t seem too sure it was me on the line, until it dawned on her, and we began chatting, et cetera, until she rang off with the exit line, "Thank you for your support!"

I handed the cellphone back to Cerge and asked him: "Did the President really call me, or did you call the President and surprise her by saying it was me calling her?" It turned out that she had nothing to talk about, even by way of complaint.

Piously, Cerge put on that smilingly innocent look and replied that the President had called on his cellphone. Since GMA and her staffers know my cellphone number, I’m not too sure that this was what happened. She’s called me, since she resumed using cellphones (post wiretapping shokku, as the Japanese would say), twice already. Okay, Cerge. As one adopted Cebuano to a genuine Cebuano, I’ll have to say I believe you.

* * *

La Presidenta is going on her travels again, it seems. As much earlier predicted by Foreign Affairs Secretary Bert Romulo (at our MOPC Diplomatic Night Dinner), she’ll be in New York City on September 14 to go to the United Nations, among other schedules to preside at the meeting of the UN Security Council since it is the Philippines’ turn to chair it.

Before that, though, she’ll be making an official visit to Saudi Arabia to discuss, as already reported in yesterday’s STAR, the three O’s – oil, our Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs) and our bid for observer status in the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC).

Since Saudi Arabia employs more than 900,000 Filipino workers, many of them in Saudi ARAMCO, a visit to Riyadh might be useful, even if only ceremonial, since it will be the first time a Philippine Chief of State pays a call on the newly-installed King Abdullah who assumed the crown after his ailing half-brother, King Fahd, finally died of the illness which had incapacitated him for more than five years anyway. In effect, Crown Prince Abdullah had been virtually running the Kingdom, so he assumed the kingship without a break in stride.

What’s really important is the fact that Saudi Arabia has a quarter of the world’s proven oil reserves, and is pumping oil like mad to take advantage of the oil boom. We are in the grip of an energy crunch, with the price of oil and gas soaring not only on the world markets, but at our corner gasoline and diesel pumps. Can or, more importantly will Saudi Arabia be inclined to "save" us, by giving the Philippines a boost in the form of concessionary oil prices when we import oil from the Kingdom? This question is particularly urgent since Saudi ARAMCO owns half, indeed the controlling shares, of the stock of our local Petron.

* * *

If you ask me, Secretary Romulo has already done his effective best some weeks ago when he visited Crown Prince, now King Abdullah in Riyadh to discuss this matter. The visit of GMA will be largely ritual, but it can’t hurt. However, a caveat. The status of women in Saudi Arabia, whether visiting dignitaries or wives, is not very . . . well, high. In Saudi, women are not even permitted to drive a car. They are swathed neck to toe in black abayas, and must wear black veils, and must never be seen in public with men other than their husbands or brothers or close male relatives, et cetera. You gotta see it to believe it.

It used to be a joke in Saudi that even the camel has higher status – but this is no longer politically correct. It jibes with the old Arab proverb that God (Allah) has 100 names, but man knows only 99 of them. "The camel knows the 100th name of God. Therefore the camel is superior to man."

Notably, the camel is not very much in evidence any longer in Saudi Arabia. Everybody’s using slick high-powered cars, humvees, modern SUVs, and gas guzzlers since there’s plenty of gasoline (benzin).

Indeed, thanks to the oil bonanza, King Abdullah just decreed a 15 percent increase in the salaries of all public servants and employees. According to wire reports, Samba, the big Saudi bank, Saudi Arabia’s export oil earnings will attain $157 billion (euros 128 billion) this year, an astonishing 48 percent over last year. Why, the 6,000 royals on pension may even get a boost in their rich allowances.

I’m not too sure in the light of these facts that Saudi Arabia will be in a mood to dispense charity, especially not to a country which is, in contrast to our huge Islamic neighbors, still predominantly Christian.