Duterte: A strongman who respects democracy
For our special presentation on our talkshow Straight from the Sky, once more we bring you a very important topic on the infrastructure development in Metro Cebu, but this time from the perspective of the Metro Cebu Development Coordinating Board (MCDCB) and the MEGA Cebu Project of the Ramon Aboitiz Foundation, Inc. (RAFI). Actually this is the first time I had the MEGA Cebu project on this show after the passing of RAFI chairman Roberto "Bobby" Aboitiz last year, so I felt it was time to bring back MEGA Cebu on your TV screens.
With us tonight are our dear friends, Mr. Gordon "Dondi" Joseph, executive committee chairman for Research, Program and Organizational Development of MEGA Cebu, and Ms. Evelyn Nacario-Castro, executive director of the Eduardo Aboitiz Development Studies Center of RAFI and Director of the Program Management Office of the Research, Program and Organization Development of MDCDB and we talk on how are things with the MCDCB, Mega Cebu, about the need for Cebu's mass transit system and what is in store for Metro Cebu in the years to come. We also discuss what the Department of Public Works and Highways has planned for our roads in Cebu and what they have failed to do.
We are not going to debate on the need for a Bus Rapid Transit or Light Rail Transit but discuss the pros and cons of these systems. So watch this interesting discussion tonight on SkyCable's channel 53 at 8 p.m. with replays on Wednesday and Saturday same time and channel. We also have replays on MyTV's channel 30 at 9 p.m. Monday and at 7 a.m. and 9 p.m. on Wednesday and Friday.
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I wasn't entirely surprised to see on Time Magazine's May 14 International edition Pres. Rodrigo "Digong" Duterte on the cover with Russia President Vladimir Putin, Turkey President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Hungary Prime Minister Viktor Orban entitled "Rise of the Strongman." Like a glass half-full, one can take this issue as a complement or an insult depending on one's point of view.
The article was written by US political scientist Ian Bremmer who wrote that "Pres. Duterte was a former mayor who talked more like a mob boss than a President and was elected into power in response to rising street crime because of his promise to wipe out the drug trade." Hmmm, Bremmer apparently wants our presidents to talk nice and isn't that what former president Benigno "PNoy" Aquino III was all about? Yet PNoy did more damage talking nicely to our democratic institutions than Duterte!
If talking tough landed Duterte the presidency, then perhaps it is time that anyone who plans to replace Duterte learned to talk tough like him. Of course, Duterte disputed Time Magazine's portrayal of him as a "strongman" saying that he respects democratic freedoms and never sent his critics to jail.
Duterte said: "They said that I am one of the strongmen. I am not a strongman. I have never sent anyone to jail who criticized me. You can criticize me and bull**t me to no end. I can take that because you are my employer. I am just a government worker." Indeed while he may talk tough, but no Philippine president ever said what Duterte just said that he is just a government worker.
Unfortunately Bremmer did not see that last Monday Duterte signed Executive Order to end endo or contractualization, Duterte honestly admitted that an EO couldn't amend or repeal our labor laws. If Duterte was a strongman that EO should have repealed our labor laws. This is why labor organizations were unhappy with the EO that Duterte signed. But just imagine if he signed an EO that amended or repealed our Labor Code, those labor groups would have tagged him a dictator!
I find it strange that Time Magazine labeled Duterte as a "strongman" yet he did not qualify to be in the top 100 Most Influential People of 2018. If Duterte is a strongman, he must have influence over the 100 million or so Filipinos, which beats many of the people in Time Magazine's list of influential people for 2018. This only shows that Time Magazine editors do not know what the left and the right pockets are doing! What a shame!
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