PNOY’s DEPENDENCE ON SUB-ALTERNS’ MINDS GIVES HIM LEGAL TROUBLES, EMBARRASSMENT

By Manny Pinol

The road to hell is paved with good intentions, so goes an old adage.

Nowhere is this being illustrated now that in the legal troubles and embarrassing fixes President Noynoy Aquino is going through today.

There is no argument on the sincerity of the President in bringing about reforms and in stamping out corruption in government.

But his lack of executive experience and intellectual profundity have resulted in his dependence on the advices of those around him in addressing very critical problems.

Right at the start of his administration and shortly after he appointed his congressional buddy former representative Proceso Alcala as secretary of agriculture, the Aquino administration made a bold pronouncement.

The Philippines will be rice sufficient by the year 2013, said the President in his State of the Nation Address three years ago.

Knowing that the President has no background in agriculture, this pronouncement was not based on his assessment and analysis of the country’s rice production statistics vis a vis population growth.

This was the idea of Alcala whose claim to ascendancy in the agriculture department was anchored mainly on his stint as a congressman who authored the Organic Farming act.

People who knew better were snickering in the sidelines knowing that Alcala’s bold prediction was bum and that the country will never get near its rice sufficiency target unless additional areas are provided with irrigation facilities and farmers are given bigger incentives through higher buying price for their palay.

But the President took Alcala’s input hook, line and sinker.

With 2013 well behind us and the rice sufficiency bold prediction just wishful thought, Malacanang issued a statement admitting that while the rice sufficiency target may not have been realized, there have been great improvements in rice production.

In fact, Alcala and his minions in the agriculture department, frantic in their search for good news for the President, gloated on the organic rice exportation of North Cotabato and again included this in the SONA of President Aquino as a great accomplishment..

They did not even clarify that the organic rice production in North Cotabato initiated by a private group, the Don Bosco Foundation based in Makilala, started many years ago, long before Noynoy Aquino even entered politics.

But the unsuspecting and trusting President again took Alcala’s intput hook, line and sinker.

That’s a double whammy and the President should have known that relying too much on his sub-alterns could get him into trouble.

That’s not the end of it though.

Relying on the advice of his budgeting professor, former congressman Butch Abad who is a lawyer and former chairman of the House Committee on Appropriations, the President approved and implemented the Development Acceleration Program which was aimed at stimulating economic growth by using unused government funds to implement much needed infrastructure projects.

The intention was noble and nobody questioned the DAP until the day a beleaguered Senator Jinggoy Estrada exposed that after the impeachment trial of former Supreme Court Chief Justice Renato Corona, the senators who voted for the impeachment were given P50-M each. (It was known later that some actually got more, up to P100-M for Senator Franklin Drilon.)

That was when the DAP was placed under the microscope where it was found out that Malacanang was actually gathering all dormant funds, or even those already earmarked for projects considered less important by Abad, and pooling these funds in what was virtually the Presidential Pork Barrel.

Then the constitutional question was raised: Can funds of Government be expended without the benefit of a General Appropriations Act?

This was what the DAP was all about, government funds allocated for other purposes as outlined in the GAA but which were hijacked and spent for other projects.

This was not only technical malversation but a gross and blatant violation of the Constitution where the separation of powers, with Congress owning the power to appropriate funds, is clearly stated.

When the Supreme Court voted 13-1-0 to declare the DAP unconstitutional, Malacanang scurried to come up with its twisted defense.

“We acted in good faith,” said Press Secretary Sonny Coloma.

But the most ridiculous justification came from Spokesperson Edwin Lacierda who said: “Unconstitutional does not mean criminal.”

Somebody should have told Lacierda that any transgression on laws is a crime.

Violating the Constitution from which all laws of the Republic spring from is a far worse crime.

The President should start decapitating his errant advisers.

But then again, he needs somebody close to him, somebody who he is comfortable with to tell him that.

(Photo caption:Workers unload sacks of rice from a Vietnam cargo ship carrying some 12,700 tons of rice, at the port in Manila on Saturday. The Philippines will import an additional 200,000 tons of rice from Vietnam this year to boost local supply and stabilize retail prices that have risen to record levels, fanning inflation pressures, a senior agriculture official said. Inquirer photo)