Postscript to Valentine's Day

Yesterday was St. Valentine's Day, a day celebrated the world over not only by lovers, but by everyone who wants to express love for kin, friends and fellowmen. Today we expect to see rallies, demonstrations, and marchers in protest and indignation in our country. What a postscript to the day of hearts and flowers!

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Is it true that Romy Neri, the man who could be tagged as the original whistleblower in the NBN-ZTE scandal, is now meeting with opposition senators? If that is true, what is his agenda? Does he also fear for his life, or does he only fear to tell the truth? If it is the latter, he should feel safer after he has told all, as Jun Lozada has done. True, there may be a lot of people who want to cut Lozada's tongue, but now they will not dare to do it, knowing who will be blamed. As it is, Neri could be in greater danger than Lozada now. Well, it his choice.

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When you come to think of it, Neri has blown up so much in his record that he may never be able to recover. Now he is like a hunted man, despite being saved from Senate interrogation by the Supreme Court. All around him, people who used to admire him, and who believe there is still some hope in him, are pressing him to “tell the truth”. Is the truth really so abominable that he cannot speak about it? Now his old friends are bringing out, and lamenting, the fact that he had been so talented, being valedictorian of his class, and being a magna cum laude graduate from the University of the Philippines .

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Even his friends at the U.P. are pressing him to talk, or resign his prestigious position. How can the teachers, the school administrators, and even the students under him at the Commission on Higher Education retain any respect for him? Alas, he could only hedge and look poker-faced when confronted about this, lamely saying, “I respect your opinion”. Does he respect even that of the ones slamming him and calling him a weakling? How long can he told out? I wonder. And isn't he doing more damage to the President and the first gentleman by refusing to talk? Isn't there any possibility that what he refuses to divulge could even defend or clear them?

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In their exchange of tirades, Camarines Sur Rep. Luis Villafuerte, who is president of the president's KAMPI party, said that they ousted Jose de Venecia as speaker of the House of Representatives because of his “crimes against his colleagues”, and for being “the father of corruption”. To think that most of whose who voted to declare De Venecia post vacant, had all sorts of beautiful reasons for having to stab him, with some even trying to look sad because of what they “owed” him.

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Now the daggers are unleashed and drawn, and JdV himself is firing broadside from his own corner. But, as I read the statement of Villafuerte, who also called the former speaker a hypocrite for trying to call for moral revolution, I recalled that during their open voting, one of his cohorts actually gave out, wittingly or unwittingly the true reasons for making De Venecia a Julius Caesar. The colleague, right there, told De Venecia that he did not listen when he was warned about the revelations of his son, and told to make him stop. It looks as if the “corruption” and “hypocrisy” bits were only afterthoughts. But we, the people, do not mind, do we? The more they strip themselves, the more the chances for reforms in this country.

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Meanwhile, engineer Jun Lozada, the Man of the Moment, was not pulling anybody's leg when he referred to himself as a “provinsyanong instsik lang”. A TV group who sought out his family in Tiango, Albay, found out, and produced footages of his brother, a sari-sari store owner, who also doubles as a tricycle driver. But Jun must have worked hard to get where he was, and the University of Sto . Tomas would not have picked him as one of its Centennial Engineers during its anniversary celebration, if he had been an ordinary student and practitioner.*

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