Pet Melliza

The Beekeeper BY Pet Melliza (Iloilo City, Philippines)--The way Iloilo City mayor Jedd Patrick Mabilog stacks the Anti-Prostitution Task Force with nitwits, it is already a foregone conclusion that it will solve everything particularly the empty pockets of its operatives, except, well, prostitution. Yours truly would rather suggest that the enforcement of the anti-prostitution task force be vested on the PNP or the social welfare office. At the very least, PNP members are trained in basic criminal procedures, are accountable public officers, and many of them have undergone gender sensitivity seminars. The task force of Mabilog is dominated by casuals and project-hires (those whose term depends on the duration of a certain project or program) who are not accountable officers. Most are non-civil service eligible and posted on the job not by their education qualification but only by their proximity with the appointing authority. Last Monday, November 15, we were on the road for home...

Onli in Irong-Irong, da Pilipins by Pet Melliza Irong-irong indeed is blessed with the Traffic Mismanagement and Mis-engineering Unit which solves everything except traffic snarls. The campaign of the city against jaywalking is all for show. The task force anti-jaywalking si stacked with casuals and "job hires" (those whose term of employment is during the duration of the project implementation) untrained and unschooled. They wear no ID nor uniform and nothing to identify them. They don't even show proof that they are authorized to enforce the ordinance penalizing jaywalking. But they turn a blind eye, just like their counterparts in the Traffic Mismanagement and Mis-Engineering Unit which is stacked by casuals who are political appointees -- members of the task force anti-jaywalking turn a blind eye on the real culprits of gridlocks on roads: private vehicles parked on either side of the road, some diagonally, even vertically. Big businesses which convert roads into t...

By Pet Melliza, The Beekeeper Fair and objective reporting, oh, Kara! Lawyer Harry Roque hit the nail on the head in his criticism of the incident investigation report (IIR) of the committee that P-Noy tasked to get to the bottom of the botched hostage rescue at Quirino Grandstand, Manila, the Philippines. The committee, chaired by justice secretary Leila De Lima, recommended among others, charging certain broadcast journalists who "obstructed" government negotiators working for the release of foreign tourists taken hostage August 23 by a former police major distraught by a questionable order of the Ombudsman dismissing him from service with all benefits due him forfeited. The media were only doing their job of informing the public on the unfolding drama that eventually led to the carnage – five Chinese and three Canadian nationals and the hostage taker Rolando Mendoza killed. Roque, director of the Center for International Law (Center Law) based at UP Law Center, bewailed...

The Beekeeper By Pet Melliza Uniform or “anyform” P4,000 is P4,000 and that’s the reason why employees at the Iloilo Provincial Capitol are baffled at the way two officials there are ramming down their throats the exclusive procurement of their uniform for next year. This early, the pair is itching to persuade Iloilo Province’s 2,200 employees to cough up the P4,000 even before the uniform allowance of the same amount is released in January or February next year. Official "A" has its own set of designs from one supplier or tailoring shop in Manila. Official "B" has its own, too, also in Manila but a different contractor. Fellow officials and the rank and file are just baffled because the duo’s technique of hard selling is just too radical, revolutionary even. During the early three straight terms of Gov. Arthur D. Defensor, Sr. 1992 - 2001, employees had the option whether or not to wear uniform. They might spend their P2,000 uniform allow...

T he Beekeeper BY PET MELLIZA SC can redeem self The Supreme Court can still redeem its reputation by reconsidering its status quo ante order on the Congress, virtually stopping it in its initiatory tracks of impeaching Ombudsman Ma. Merceditas Gutierrez. With that controversial order for the Lower House to turn back the clock before Rep. Niel C. Tupas, Jr. (LP, 5th district, Iloilo), chair of the committee on justice, threw the monkey wrench on Madame Gutierrez, the High Tribunal forfeited a very rare opportunity to redeem its tarnished reputation as an “Arroyo Court”. Fr. Joaquin Bernas, SJ who holds a master of law degree and a professor at the Ateneo College of Law called the highest court of the land the “Arroyo Court”. Yours truly can’t add to that. Fr. Bernas is among the few legal luminaries who don’t hesitate to chide anybody in his column at the PDI, like Madame Gutierrez, his student in Ateneo Law and the members of the judiciary, many of them also his former students. ...

Virginia Palanca-Santiago’s exercise of raw power (8) Posted on September 6th, 2009 Author: Pet Melliza, The Beekeeper, ☼ IloiloViews Libat Dos had some misgivings against Libat Uno and was compelled to express it during the meeting of their group in a house just across the PNP station at Igbaras, Iloilo. He was aggrieved with the latter for skimming off a substantial amount from his share in the operation to kick out the municipal treasurer and the private secretary to the mayor. The latter was all denial but Libat Dos countered that the source of the fat mullah herself told him of the specific amount he was entitled to. Libat Uno muttered back that he needed the amount and anyway, it was him who took the pain of contacting the benefactor who sent the largesse with the instruction to deliver five-digit amounts respectively to contacts in the Office of the Ombudsman – Region 6 and the Bureau of Local Government Finance to execute the order of dismissal on the two employees...

The Beekeeper BY PET MELLIZA It's not the ideal time to get sick and be hospitalized nowadays with private and public medical facilities filled beyond capacity. The district hospital at Guimbal, Iloilo had to erect a tent; even its corridors can't accommodate additional patients. So far, the accumulated figure of dengue cases since january in Iloilo Province alone, excluding Iloilo City, went above 2,500 with 13 deaths, which is still better than 1996 when the death toll shot above 50, mostly children. This year, the Philippine Science High School at Jaro, Iloilo City, shut down for a week for fogging operation after a dozen of its students were infected by dengue. We don't know how successful the procedur was. The Department of Health scorns fogging because it does more harm than good; while it may help eliminate a generation of mosquitos, it does not the eggs which will hatch and spread the terror anew. Fogging contains chemicals toxic not only to Aege...