Useless annual evil talk

Batas Mauricio .

THE unending throwing of flak against the declaration of martial law by former President Marcos every time Sept. 21 of every year comes around is to me an egregious waste of time. Indeed, it could not be denied that there were politicians and oligarchs who suffered under the martial law of Marcos. It could not be denied on the other hand, however, that many ordinary citizens managed to have their lives better because of that martial law.

Actually, the same thing happened during the time of Corazon Aquino, of her son Noynoy, and during the presidencies of all those who occupied Malacanang after Marcos was ousted in 1986. Many truly suffered during their respective terms, many huge anomalies were committed under their watch, but ultimately many people derived one benefit or two somehow when they were the leaders of this country.

My message to those who are making a living by yearly criticizing the past leaders of our country is simple: there are more important matters that should occupy our time, all for the sake of bringing about true prosperity and development of Filipinos and of the nation. These are the things that we should be focusing on. Marcos is long finished, and so are the Aquinos and the leaders after them.

We should be talking about our present now!

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The disclosure by House Minority Leader and Quezon Province Rep. Danilo Suarez on the diversion by some congressmen of hundreds of millions of pesos from the 2019 national budget to the congressional districts of other lawmakers constitutes a compelling and urgent reason for the abolition and immediate closure of the House of Representatives and the Senate.

Imagine this: many lawmakers from the upper and lower chambers of Congress have already proven themselves unable to do anything for the greater good for the greater number of our people even if they have been serving as such lawmakers for long periods of time already, yet, they still have the temerity to divert hundreds and hundreds of millions of pesos from the country’s annual budget, all for their own personal benefit.

As of now, I pose this challenge to Suarez: he must name the congressman, or congressmen if there is more than one of them, who, he said, “parked” some P500 million from the national budget of 2019 to other lawmakers’ congressional districts which, however, would be ultimately used by the unscrupulous lawmakers for their own purposes. This is a clear case of corruption, and if Suarez clams up on this for any reason, he is as guilty as the perpetrators of this congressional scam.

E-mail: batasmauricio@yahoo.com