Tic-tac-toe

By Rolo B. Cena
Hushed Poppies
Dumaguete Star Informer
16 October 2011

Last Wednesday, President Benigno Aquino III announced that charges would be filed against former President now Pampanga Second District Representative Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo next month amidst report that the latter would seek medical treatment in Germany due to a life-threatening and very “rare disease.”

On the other hand, Justice Sec. Leila de Lima pronounced that the cases are going on through the process and that her team is yet to finish before December. In addition, she does not give any commitment as to the date of filing these charges. In relation to the former president’s ailment, her husband disclosed that she is suffering from hyperparathyroidism, a non-life-threatening disease, contrary to the announcement made by Arroyo’s spokesperson.

Surely, the optimism of Pres. Aquino is just hard to suppress, one that his mother Cory had exhibited and executed against her predecessor, Ferdinand Marcos and his cohorts. Very fortunately though, the Marcoses are still free and continue to enjoy the same freedom victims of Martial Law enjoy; worse, they still enjoy the fruits of their plunder, if at all it was the most plausible, or to say the least, the decided case against them.

Arguably, De Lima wouldn’t prematurely announce any development her investigating team has raked in; an accuracy she needs to calculate precisely in defense of the Palace. While the President marks the first square based on the mark indicated by the investigating Team, the last square in a row cannot be marked until December comes in.

On the other hand, Arroyo and his cohorts are more ready than Leila de Lima, et al. Whether or not the ailment is “life-threatening,” their defenses are tactically calculative of their state; supporters are playing their own hullabaloos in counterstrike. With the number of cases under the chair of de Lima still undecided, the target of filing plunder charges next month against the petite lady, et al is“water under the bridge.” It is me-and-my-big-mouth syndrome plaguing the Palace Court once again.

At the rate our system is going, any offender can go loosely unnoticed even before the search operation begins. This is a very classic phenomenon in the country especially when political power converges with the colors of the money the offender has in his vault.

Synchronicity is one hell of a game; most cases fail because witnesses and statements are not in synch with each other; worse, people and events, if ever glossily fabricated, are not coordinated according to the flow.

Tact is another.

Clearly, we can see the game played by two players who alternately mark squares in a grid with X’s , with one of them trying to capture the last square in a row they both know cannot be drawn with final “oops.”

When Speaker Belmonte granted Congressman Arroyo with three travel authorities, the former deliberately marks the first square in the latter’s favor. When she finally leaves for Germany for medical treatment, the government, in the guise of the Speaker, marks the second square, again, in her favor. Unless the administration bars the next square, then the game is over.

Tic-tac-toe: Arroyo in self-exile and political asylum! And what could her defense be? – Politically motivated!

Plunder cases are nonbailable; the same are not covered in the Extradition treaty we signed with several countries, including Germany where Arroyo is seeking medical treatment. Loosely, this is one matter the government has to look into without giving them the benefit of the doubt.

Series of inconsistencies from Aquino and his team are clearly happening from day one. Ronaldo Llamas, Presidential Adviser for Political affairs, has recently captured the sixty-second spotlight. His rhetoric: self-defense. Aquino has advocated a “wang-wang-less” administration as one of the engines of “tuwid na daan.” But what surprises the public now is the introduction of a more complicated and edgy program: the bang-bang!

Tic-tac-toe, give me my last square, else: Doesn’t’ “history repeat itself?”