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William Adan

NAAWAN, Misamis Oriental – There is no quarrel that the President is sick. He himself admitted that he is long time ago. So, why should this issue on transparency persist? He has given his word. More than that, isn’t it that action speaks louder than word?

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Our president is sick.

Headache, face ache, throat ache, stomach ache, name it you have ache. What really ails the President? The Palace is still mum on this despite the constitutional mandate on disclosure anent the state of the health of the CEO of the land. Whatever, we can surmise that he is in grave pain now and then because he admittedly is taking Fentanyl, an addictive opioid strong painelieving drug for quite some time now.

When the prime leader is sick governance is also sick.

This explains why officials are contradicting each other and accusing or blaming this and that agency for this and that problem instead of working together to solve the many problems that plague the country. Patronage politics continues to rear its ugly face and corruption remains rampant in top echelon. Meanwhile, the drug menace has not abated a bit. Drug addicts and pushers that stupidly carry some sachets of shabu wherever they go are silenced forever for good. The jails are bursting with inmates of petty crimes but big super drug lords and other big time criminals – plunderers, rice smugglers and hoarders remain scot free, never mind if the top crime fighter knows who they are and their whereabouts.

The economy is very sick.  Prices of everything are skyrocketing while incomes are plummeting. A bullet train is fast spewing contagion across the archipelago making everyone along its path poor, hungry and sick. Forcing them to eat bukbok-infested rice to quell their hunger makes them sicker.

The government, by sheer negligence, has yielded chip by chip our sovereign territory to expansionist China. To top it all, thousands of local jobs are given by DOLE to highly favored communist Chinese migrant workers. And, nuts, the dissenters and critics of the regime, students and workers are being accused of playing cozy with the communists in planning to overthrow the regime!

Our state security forces ought to think hard and deep as to who are really conniving with the communists in overthrowing the republic and in destroying our democratic traditions.

Our environment is awfully sick. Mine tailings poison rivers and seas. Muds and silts smoother corrals and seagrass and suffocate fish. Landslides from hills weakened by mine holes and quarries are killings scores of miners and villagers.

Sickness stalks the land. While the President has Fentanyl, the country has none to alleviate her pain. The President last week hinted he has the big C, but later said he was just fooling the media. The palace jester Roque keeps reminding us that we should not take DU30’s words seriously.

The President and the nation’s health is no joking matter. So, the clown should shut up.

Mr. Rodrigo Roa Duterte, whether we like him or not is our president. We elected him to lead us. We sincerely want our leader to be always in the pink of health. As believers, we are supposed to pray for him. But ought we when he can’t tell us the truth and he had called the God of creation and petitions stupid? President Duterte has made this country a big joke, a laughingstock of all nations. The good Lord might yet consider our prayers a fantastic joke. Whatever, we must still pray for the healing of everyone, of the nation. We must also pray that we be forgiven for our collective sin in putting DU30 on the dizzying pedestal of power that made him sicker every day. 

(William R. Adan, Ph.D., is retired professor and former chancellor of Mindanao State University at Naawan, Misamis Oriental. -Mindanews)

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