Are we a nation of laws? Hahahaha!

A dear friend, Mr. Eduardo Go Ching Hai, have passed on to eternal life. He was a self-made man who used his engineering knowledge to build the Hayco Engineering Co. He was a regular figure with the Sunrisers group at the Cebu Country Club and every now and then we would have lunches together with his wife Martina “Beling.” His remains are at the Sacred Heart Chapel. May we request the pious reader to please pray for the repose of his soul.

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 Perhaps we Filipinos have gotten so used to it we have been so callused when our laws are broken with impunity. Not many of you realize that when America gave us our democracy, we turned it into demo-cracy! Just take a good look at how we violate our traffic rules in total disregard of our laws. How many times did you make an illegal U-turn in areas where no U-turns are allowed? How many times have you overtaken a vehicle on a double yellow line or parked illegally? In the United States of America, you’ll get arrested for that?

 You want more? Are you happy with a political leadership that allows our roads to be blocked because of a funeral vigil? How many tents with the names of our politicians are on a roadway because the mourners are playing mahjong? Yet, not one from those so-called revolutionaries of my good friend Atty. Tony Oposa find this utterly unacceptable. If you ask me, the Road Revolution should begin with clearing what little space we have for our sidewalks for pedestrians to use, and not shut down the entire wide stretch of Osmeña Blvd. so that a few cyclists can have their fun!

 Perhaps we ought to ask the Catholic hierarchy to transfer all the chapels far and away from the roadside so that our roads would no longer be used for vigils. Mind you, this is happening in almost all our barangays and yes, CITOM totally tolerates this practice simply because their political bosses succumb to the pressure of the electorate.

 You want more? How about the loud discorral music that totally disturbs our sleep even if we live far from the discorral? Don’t we have laws against having loud music? Then there is the ever present “yabag” karaoke singer who, even early in the morning, belts out his favorite song in the most horrible tune and that person gets away with impunity because no one cares to uphold our laws against public disturbance.

 This is the kind of environment we Filipinos live in today. Our country has truly become a nation of men and not of laws. You want more proof? Go to Mindanao where elements of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) or the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) man checkpoints. You cannot even tell if they are Philippine Army soldiers until you see the green patch on their uniforms. In Cebu City, if you are caught carrying a firearm without a permit, you can go to jail, but in Mindanao, if you are carrying a high-powered firearm, even the military backs off! So much for our nation of laws!

 Then it gets worse! The Freeman headline yesterday was quite telling when it blared, “Mike to 4 Banks: Defy Court Order!” Mayor Mike Rama is a lawyer, I don’t know if he realizes the consequence of his actions when he tells the banks to defy a court order? I hope Mayor Mike was misquoted (this is a popular way out for those caught with their foot in their mouth) because no one and I mean no one should be disobeying a court order because when that happens, then anarchy would reign in our sick nation.

 While I sympathize with the City of Cebu on this case because I think they were had on this deal, but the Mayor has no business telling the banks to defy a court order. This is a contemptible behaviour on the part of the Mayor, more so that in our kind of democracy, there is a clear separation of the three branches of the government, the Executive where Mayor Mike belongs, the Legislative and the Judiciary. This is a constitutional crisis in the making and let’s stop it before it gets worse!

 What is happening in our country today is clear and visible proof that the Philippines, under a centralized form of government that has been in place since the 1935 Commonwealth, has not given us the right form of governance where the rule of law is paramount. What we have is a situation where we are ruled by powerful men, mostly men in arms.

 The other day, I saw a special report in Al Jazzera by Veronica Pedrosa, (daughter of Philippine Star columnist Chit Pedrosa) who interviewed Imelda Marcos and the Ampatuan family. In the end, she realized that since Martial Law, nothing much has changed in this country as our laws are trampled by those who dare defy the laws and many of these people are lawmakers or small town warlords. Let’s bring back the rule of law before it is too late!

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