Costly Mistake

The buck stops at the helm of the country’s leadership. It stops where Aquino sits.

Candidate Aquino, during the May 2010 campaign, said that P280 billion has been lost to corruption in 2009 alone.

Transparency International estimates the figures correspond to more than 20% of the national budget of P.1.45 trillion on the same year.

This is more than double the 167.94 billion allotted for education in 2009; five times the 56 billion “stimulus fund” (P17 billion for infrastructure projects, P10 billion for education, P1 billion to the environment, P2 billion for health and P3.15 billion for agriculture), designed to cushion the country from the impact of a global economic crisis; and nearly equivalent to the current budget deficit which stands close to P300 billion.

Forget about everything else – that Noynoy would not even have become a viable presidential candidate, much less a president, had not his mother’s death spawned the formidable Ninoy-Cory-EDSA three-wave nostalgia – at its face, Benigno Aquino III’s anti-corruption platform won him the presidency. And the Filipino people could not have been faulted. Arroyo’s 9-year term had become synonymous with corruption, that the promise of integrity in public service became too good an offer to refuse. 

Playing Along

“All you can do is play along at life and hope that sometimes you get it right" -Dexter Morgan

What I do now is making me dumber by the day.

Where I'm at people walk around like giants, yet I've to be careful not to step on anyone. No, not feet but egos - that exaggerated but fragile sense of self-worth that can neither be pricked nor slighted.

Everyday I wake up having to resist the urge to be myself, to dispose of the halo and just bare the fangs. But I couldn't. I shouldn't. I have to blend in, never stand out, keep up (or down) and never break pace.

It's like riding on 12 cylinders in a go kart arena, nudge the pedal and you're bound to give somebody the whiplash. Movement, any if at all, is a little faster than idle, but already, breakneck for many.

And because "attack" is not an option, here, now, I retreat - to this obscure corner of cyberspace - hoping to retard retardation itself, writing for the first time without the promise of reward, renown, or remuneration. Now, here only to keep my sanity, assuming I haven't yet lost it.

This is therapy and this blog is the first of many sessions. The next ones will make more sense. This however is just for me - a stream of consciousness from an unguarded moment, the truth as it comes only through anonymity - from the poet who has long buried his poetry, but whose words are sold as voice for others. (DPG)