Honorable January 9, 2007
SENATORS Joker Arroyo and Miriam Defensor-Santiago are all praises for Undersecretary Zosimo Paredes who has just said he will resign from government.
Says Joker: "He resigns, it's accepted because he could not agree with Malacañang. That's an honorable course for him to take. That should serve as an example to officialdom."
Says Miriam: "That's good. That's the honorable thing to do. If his conscience does not allow him to toe the administration line, he will simply be able to get out of government because he's an appointive government official."
What's wrong with all that?
It's faint praise.
None of it draws any attention to why Paredes resigned. It draws attention only to form and not to content. And form in its good-manners-and-right-conduct sense: It's good form to resign when you're in disagreement with your boss. Other officials should emulate the example because it is good etiquette and not because it is righteous conduct.
At the very least, I don't know why Santiago should be pontificating about anything that has to do with the Visiting Forces Agreement. If I recall right, she was the one who argued for its being deemed a treaty notwithstanding that it was approved only by our Senate but not the United States. All this while in servitude to Erap who was under pressure to have it passed. She seems to have found a new master. Frankly, I don't know how Santiago has managed to pass herself off as an expert in international law, which is neither borne out by her academic credentials nor her pronouncements on pretty much anything, let alone the law. Certainly her grade in the bar exam does not commend it.
If it were merely a question of changing the color of the curtains in a room in the presidential palace, which currently houses a squatter, I can believe that it is good form to resign when an undersecretary prefers it to be restful green while his boss wants it to be flaming red. Aesthetic outrage is as much a good reason to resign as anything else, probably more so. Indeed, even if it were a question of deciding whether relief goods should be sent to Bicol or the Visayas first, I can believe that it is good form to resign when the undersecretary favors Bicol because he is a Bicolano and his boss wants the Visayas because it is more voter-friendly. Having differences in priorities qualifies as a reason to resign, even if their warped premises in this case suck.
Paredes' resignation is not of that middling order. This is not just a case of an official resigning because he disagrees with his boss, this is a case of an official resigning because he discovers his boss is a crook. Though why it took Paredes this long to discover his boss was one--metaphorically and "Garcistically"--only he can say. No matter, let us give credit where credit is due. Paredes resigned because he took violent exception to Lance Cpl. Daniel Smith being whisked out of Jejomar Binay's favorite jail, charging the executive--read, GMA--with taking the law into its own hands. That is not a difference in opinion between an official and his boss, that is a difference between right and wrong.
Paredes' resignation is worthy of emulation by other officials not just because it shows good form but because it shows good judgment; not just because it shows good manners but because it shows basic decency. It is not an act of protocol, it is an act of protest. It indicts wrongdoing to high heavens, notably this occupation government's predilection not just for abusing power but for taking power that does not belong to it. It demands to know: Where is GMA's right to defy the courts? Indeed it reminds us of what we've always demanded to know: Where is GMA's right to call up Garci?
I am glad, quite incidentally, that "Nicole" has called for the abolition of the VFA. If the VFA allows convicted American rapists in the Philippines to be rescued by America, then the solution is to scrap the VFA. It has no right to exist. Justifying Smith's departure as called for by the VFA is not unlike justifying molesting a female co-worker during office hours because one was drunk at the time. The justification is totally unjustifiable. Review the VFA? What for? Here and now we have all the proof we need that we need it like a hole in the head, or like an exercise in self-flagellation outside of Good Friday.
But to go back: It is a brave thing Paredes has done. I can imagine how hard it must have been for him to have made that decision given that times are hard and jobs do not come as plentifully as rain in July. Particularly for people with principle. Easy enough for those without one, they can always join government, or refuse to resign even when the world calls upon them to. Santiago should really stop talking about the honorableness of public officials resigning when they have differences with their bosses. That she once served Erap and is now serving Gloria suggests the concept escapes her completely. But then one must wonder if she sees differences at all in what people stand for, or is bothered by it. There's a term for it, but I leave her to discover it.
I agree: Other officials would do well to emulate Paredes' honorableness. Even now I don't know why they shouldn't resign en masse to show a profound disgust with wrongdoing, which is serving a government that shouldn't be there. Or there is another way to look at it, which is to agree entirely with Joker and Miriam when they say that public officials who disagree with their boss should resign posthaste. They should address it to their boss. GMA should resign because she has a fundamental difference of opinion with her own boss, who is the People of the Philippines.
She thinks she is the President, they just think she is the anti-Christ.
http://opinion.inquirer.net/inquireropinion/columns/view_article.php?article_id=42499
Says Joker: "He resigns, it's accepted because he could not agree with Malacañang. That's an honorable course for him to take. That should serve as an example to officialdom."
Says Miriam: "That's good. That's the honorable thing to do. If his conscience does not allow him to toe the administration line, he will simply be able to get out of government because he's an appointive government official."
What's wrong with all that?
It's faint praise.
None of it draws any attention to why Paredes resigned. It draws attention only to form and not to content. And form in its good-manners-and-right-conduct sense: It's good form to resign when you're in disagreement with your boss. Other officials should emulate the example because it is good etiquette and not because it is righteous conduct.
At the very least, I don't know why Santiago should be pontificating about anything that has to do with the Visiting Forces Agreement. If I recall right, she was the one who argued for its being deemed a treaty notwithstanding that it was approved only by our Senate but not the United States. All this while in servitude to Erap who was under pressure to have it passed. She seems to have found a new master. Frankly, I don't know how Santiago has managed to pass herself off as an expert in international law, which is neither borne out by her academic credentials nor her pronouncements on pretty much anything, let alone the law. Certainly her grade in the bar exam does not commend it.
If it were merely a question of changing the color of the curtains in a room in the presidential palace, which currently houses a squatter, I can believe that it is good form to resign when an undersecretary prefers it to be restful green while his boss wants it to be flaming red. Aesthetic outrage is as much a good reason to resign as anything else, probably more so. Indeed, even if it were a question of deciding whether relief goods should be sent to Bicol or the Visayas first, I can believe that it is good form to resign when the undersecretary favors Bicol because he is a Bicolano and his boss wants the Visayas because it is more voter-friendly. Having differences in priorities qualifies as a reason to resign, even if their warped premises in this case suck.
Paredes' resignation is not of that middling order. This is not just a case of an official resigning because he disagrees with his boss, this is a case of an official resigning because he discovers his boss is a crook. Though why it took Paredes this long to discover his boss was one--metaphorically and "Garcistically"--only he can say. No matter, let us give credit where credit is due. Paredes resigned because he took violent exception to Lance Cpl. Daniel Smith being whisked out of Jejomar Binay's favorite jail, charging the executive--read, GMA--with taking the law into its own hands. That is not a difference in opinion between an official and his boss, that is a difference between right and wrong.
Paredes' resignation is worthy of emulation by other officials not just because it shows good form but because it shows good judgment; not just because it shows good manners but because it shows basic decency. It is not an act of protocol, it is an act of protest. It indicts wrongdoing to high heavens, notably this occupation government's predilection not just for abusing power but for taking power that does not belong to it. It demands to know: Where is GMA's right to defy the courts? Indeed it reminds us of what we've always demanded to know: Where is GMA's right to call up Garci?
I am glad, quite incidentally, that "Nicole" has called for the abolition of the VFA. If the VFA allows convicted American rapists in the Philippines to be rescued by America, then the solution is to scrap the VFA. It has no right to exist. Justifying Smith's departure as called for by the VFA is not unlike justifying molesting a female co-worker during office hours because one was drunk at the time. The justification is totally unjustifiable. Review the VFA? What for? Here and now we have all the proof we need that we need it like a hole in the head, or like an exercise in self-flagellation outside of Good Friday.
But to go back: It is a brave thing Paredes has done. I can imagine how hard it must have been for him to have made that decision given that times are hard and jobs do not come as plentifully as rain in July. Particularly for people with principle. Easy enough for those without one, they can always join government, or refuse to resign even when the world calls upon them to. Santiago should really stop talking about the honorableness of public officials resigning when they have differences with their bosses. That she once served Erap and is now serving Gloria suggests the concept escapes her completely. But then one must wonder if she sees differences at all in what people stand for, or is bothered by it. There's a term for it, but I leave her to discover it.
I agree: Other officials would do well to emulate Paredes' honorableness. Even now I don't know why they shouldn't resign en masse to show a profound disgust with wrongdoing, which is serving a government that shouldn't be there. Or there is another way to look at it, which is to agree entirely with Joker and Miriam when they say that public officials who disagree with their boss should resign posthaste. They should address it to their boss. GMA should resign because she has a fundamental difference of opinion with her own boss, who is the People of the Philippines.
She thinks she is the President, they just think she is the anti-Christ.
http://opinion.inquirer.net/inquireropinion/columns/view_article.php?article_id=42499
posted by dqfan06 @ 9:56 AM
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