Kiko Pangilinan and his stupid law
Credit to Author: RAMON T. TULFO| Date: Mon, 25 Mar 2019 16:42:51 +0000
THE Philippine Air Force (PAF) has been replenished with new UH-1H “Huey” helicopter parts and maintenance equipment from Japan.
The fresh arrivals, which are a donation from the Japanese government, are worth P5 billion.
Lt. Gen. Rozzano Briguez, PAF chief, said the donation was “of great help to our combat utility fleet.”
Let’s hope there’s no hanky-panky in the PAF’s new helicopter deal.
During the administration of President Noynoy abnoy kuyakoy, the PAF was given 21 Huey choppers bought for P1.2 billion by the Department of National Defense.
Then Defense Secretary Voltaire Gazmin signed the contract for the purchase of the combat helicopters that turned out to be chopper scraps harvested from a German military junkyard, pieced together and made into choppers.
The choppers, assembled in a private yard in the US, were passed off as “combat-capable” with “night vision.”
Two helicopters from this batch have crashed since they were acquired in 2015.
A Senate investigation was conducted on the highly irregular purchase as a result of the twin crashes.
Nothing came of the probe.
Gazmin and his cohorts are laughing their way to the bank.
* * *
The whistleblower in the irregular PAF helicopter purchase, Rhodora Alvarez, an employee of the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR), has been harassed by Gazmin et al with libel suits.
Alvarez has testified before the Senate that Gazmin received a 7 percent kickback from the P1.2-billion deal.
For a while, Alvarez was placed under the Witness Protection Program, but the protective custody was lifted by the Department of Justice for unknown reasons.
Now, the poor woman is running scared.
* * *
The water shortage in large parts of Metro Manila is being blamed on the mismanagement of the Metropolitan Waterworks and Sewerage System or MWSS.
How in heaven’s name did a retired police general, Reynaldo Velasco, get to be the MWSS administrator?
Why wasn’t a career engineer with experience in water infrastructure projects appointed as MWSS head instead?
* * *
Manila Water, one of two concessionaires of MWSS — the other being Maynilad — to distribute water in Metro Manila and some parts of Rizal, is taking the rap for the water shortage.
Manila Water is owned by the Zobel de Ayala.
It’s high time the government take back its contract with Manila Water and award it to another group.
The Zobel de Ayala, who are into real estate development, have been greatly remiss in their job as water distributor.
They should just concentrate on real estate development.
* * *
The 17-year-old suspect in the grisly murder of 16-year-old Christine Silawan is not being identified in the press because he’s a minor.
Blame Sen. Kiko Pangilinan for protecting young criminals like the 17-year-old suspect.
Under the stupid Pangilinan Law, the court that will try the suspect will have to determine whether the boy acted with discernment when he committed the heinous crime.
Teenagers today are far more advanced in thinking than their grandfathers when they were their age. Today’s youths have access to all kinds of information through the internet.
Because of the stupid Pangilinan Law, many minor offenders have committed murder and rape with impunity.
A 14-year-old boy who raped a restaurant cashier after robbing the establishment years ago went scot-free, thanks but no thanks to that stupid law.
Filipino voters must be so stupid as to have voted for Senator Pangilinan when he ran for reelection in 2013.
Kiko Pangilinan, whose term as senator expired in 2016, is now Liberal Party president.
* * *
If memory serves, in Davao City during the time of then-Mayor Rody Duterte, a 13-year-old boy stabbed to death a 20-year-old college student after the latter refused to part with his watch.
The victim was a PWD or person with disability.
The 13-year-old suspect was not held in custody, but his body was found in a deserted spot in the city with many stab wounds days later.
His assailant or assailants have not been known up to this day.
* * *
Here in my “Isumbong mo kay Tulfo” offices, we have on record at least 10 cases of women who were gang-raped.
It’s a heinous crime, and one that requires that all rapists involved to get their just desserts.
However, if I may be so forward, I do have something to say to all our women, too.
Stop putting yourselves in situations where it can happen.
If a woman goes to a drinking session with many men whom she hardly knows, she’s courting trouble.
At “Isumbong,” we’ve learned about cases of women getting drunk with men they hardly knew and were gang-raped.
In a perfect world, women should feel safe in the company of strange men.
But ours is not a perfect world.
Just because one or two of the men in the drinking session are people you know or trust does not make you safe.
In Puerto Princesa City, a 16-year-old girl was raped by the uncle of her classmate with whom she drank a few bottles of beer in the classmate’s home.
Unless a woman wants to get laid, she should never drink with a man she hardly knows.
Date rapes happen that way.
The woman in that Subic Freeport rape case a few years ago had willingly gone with the American accused of raping her.
She met the US serviceman that night and got so drunk she forced him and his companions into allowing her to get in the van that was to take the sailors back to their ship.
She got laid at the back of the van while it was moving.
The poor seaman got convicted of rape and served time in our prisons.
I was bashed by legions of people for siding with the American in my column then at the Inquirer because I was told the whole story by an objective source.
I was exonerated in the end after the woman recanted her accusation before the Court of Appeals which ordered the American serviceman released.
P.S. The woman, who I was told was considered asawa ng bayan (woman of loose morals) in her city, was made a US citizen for retracting her charges.
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