News, Rumors, Innuendos

Herewith were some of the topics I overheard in the past week from my neighbor as I washed my car in front of our house, from fellow passengers in the PUJ to the city, from sikad drivers, and from the radio as I waited for my kids in their school.

Slay of Training Officer Solved

Remember Epi R of Cabatuan, a chief executive officer of Field Epidemiology Training Program Alumni Foundation Inc., whose stab-riddled body was found inside Room 404 of Eon Centennial Plaza Hotel on Jalandoni Street, Iloilo City proper last January 27? It seemed his assailants were identified and charged.

As recalled, Epi was conducting a live-in seminar at the Centennial Plaza Hotel were he was billeted. The day he was found dead, seminar participants were complaining that he was late and that organizers were texting him, demanding that he just present the laptop which supposedly contained inputs to the seminar. Hotel staff then forced open his room where his body was found bathed in blood. Autopsy report showed that he succumbed to 26 stab wounds. His two laptop computers, two cellphones and undetermined amount of cash were missing from his room.

Charged for the robbery and death of Epi were a certain Chris Alden T of Brgy. Tabuc Suba, Jaro, Iloilo City and a certain Jude V of Brgy. Sto. Rosario-Duran, Iloilo City proper. The two are in hiding. Hotel personnel confirmed seeing the suspects visit Room 404 prior to Epi’s death.

Police Regional Office-6 director Isagani Cuevas earlier claimed a group of callboys preying on gay men was behind the robbery and death. Cuevas ordered the ICPO to round up callboys in the city to resolve the case even as he advised hotels to implement stricter security measures.

Taxi Operators Protest Against LTFRB Officials

Taxi cabs in Iloilo are sporting black and yellow ribbons. No, this is not a show of continued mourning over former President Corazon Aquino’s death. The taxi operators and drivers are on protest mode, denouncing the corruption in the Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board-6 (LTFRB-6). Led by the Association of Taxi Operators in Panay (Atop) and the Alliance of Panay Taxi Operators and Drivers Associations (Aptoda), they are demanding the immediate removal or resignation of Atty. Rommel Duron, chief of the LTFRB-6’s Technical and Evaluation Division.

Atty. Duron was accused by a taxi operator of graft after the operator was asked by Atty. Duron to pay Php 35,000 for a franchise to operate a taxi unit. However, after actually paying Php 33,000 as Duron gave her a discount, the operator was given an LTFRB official receipt showing only Php 810 as processing fee for the franchise application.

Other taxi operators surfaced out to voice out similar complaints, and other LTFRB-6 personnel, including Regional Director Atty. Porfirio Clavel, were dragged into the controversy. Local radio stations and newspapers had a field day reporting the arrogance and abuses committed in the LTFRB-6 offices and the unwarranted lifestyles of some employees.

The LTFRB central office, through Chairman Alberto Suansing, said that they are making an investigation which includes not just Clavel and Duron, but everybody in the LTFRB-6 including the utility workers who might be also part of the of mulcting syndicate.

Meantime, the Catholic Church through Jaro Archbishop and CBCP President Angel Lagdameo entered the picture with a stinging homily against the abuses in the said office. Lagdameo’s taped homily is being replayed for the whole of Iloilo to hear, in front of LTFRB-6 offices during the periodic pickets of the taxi drivers and operators.

And the latest in this saga is that, the New People’s Army (NPA) in Panay is readying its “revolutionary people’s court” to try Atty. Rommel Duron. According to reports, an NPA-Panay statement signed by Julian Paisano, spokesperson of the Coronacion Chiva “Waling-waling” Command is “inviting Atty. Duron to voluntarily face the revolutionary people’s court and explain his side on this case”.

18-year Old Charged Of Malicious Mischief Even If He Committed Rape

An 18-year-old farm boy from Sitio Tacas, Bgy. Talacauan, Leon, Iloilo got his 15 minutes of fame after he hugged headlines on national TV, radio, and newspapers.

The boy, after a drinking spree, sexually assaulted and killed his victim, a 2-year-old. For these acts, he was charged only with malicious mischief, and elicited lots of laughs and sarcastic high-fives from those who have heard the news.

And how about the victim? Well, my avid readers and voyeurs, the victim was a goat. And the owner didn’t know of whether to laugh or to cry as he reported the death of his goat to the equally amused policemen. Everybody had a hard time thinking of whether to call the assault rape or pedophilia but they could not translate 2 years into caprine years. Lawyers in Iloilo debated that having sex with an animal is not illegal in the Philippines, unlike in other countries like Lebanon, and for a charge of malicious mischief the act must be accompanied with malice which, according to the lawyers, in the case of the farm boy, had none.

Many rumors pertaining to the incident also floated. And after some sleuthing I confirm that there is no truth to the rumors that:

1. Video pirates were hounding the owner of the goat, who witnessed the event, asking whether he had videotaped the act so they can create another sex video or scandal in the internet.

2. Vicky Belo had surreptitiously descended on Sitio Tacas to take pictures of all angles of the goat’s face as her latest beauty prototype for Madame Auring.

3. Madame Auring hied off to Sitio Tacas to offer the farm boy an astounding monthly stipend to be her latest boy toy.

4. Liquor and health products companies flocked to Leon to record and study the food and lifestyle of the menfolk and especially their ability to spring instant penile erection and rocketing libido at the sight of a lowly kambing or mukhang kambing.

But there is truth to the rumor that the once unknown farm boy became an instant celebrity in Leon as neighbors keep watchful eyes on their pets – chickens, cats, cows, pigs, etc., and…. yes, goats – to ward off similarly libidinous boys from taking their egregious chance at instant fame.

Think of what shots of cheap liquor and a supine goat can do.

Outstanding Teachers of the Philippines

Two teachers from Iloilo and eight other teachers were proclaimed winners in this year’s Metrobank Foundation Search for Outstanding Teachers of the Philippines.

The teachers were Ms. Shena Faith M. Ganela of Philippine Science High School-Western Visayas Campus in Iloilo City and Mr. Zoilo J. Pinongcos, Jr. of Leganes National High School in Leganes, Iloilo.

The awardees received gold medallions from the President of the Philippines at Malacañan Palace and were also presented with plaques and cash amounting to Php 300,000 each during the formal awarding ceremonies at Metrobank Plaza in Makati.

Now on its 25th year, the Search “bestows honor upon the teaching profession by according special recognition to teachers who manifest profound commitment to the development of the youth through exemplary competence, remarkable dedication to their work, and an effective educational leadership.”

The Metrobank Foundation is the corporate social responsibility arm of the Metrobank Group of Companies chaired by Dr. George S.K. Ty.

Quadruplets

My neighbor who used to brag about her sow which had a very big pregnant tummy and eight pairs of tits, was now complaining about the same sow which gave birth to only 2 piglets. One of the piglets died after only a few hours. ‘Grabe magkaon, tapos amo lang ni? Kamahal pa feeds!’.

Then she went into a tirade about the news on local TV. It was about a woman from San Enrique, Iloilo who gave birth to quadruplets – all girls - at the Western Visayas Medical Center. Doctors said the girls were all born healthy and weighed a kilogram each. The father is a farmer and regards the quadruplets as a blessing to their family.

‘Mayad pa ang tawo nga darwa lang ang titi, apat ang bata. Baw, ang baboy ko nga magastos mag-kaon kag desi-sais ang titi, isa lang ang bata. Baw, purya usog!’, my neighbor exclaimed with regret.

‘Baw ano na lang natabo sa kalibutan? Nag-lain na gid. Ang tawo daw baboy mag-bata. Kag ang baboy, daw tawo mag-bata. Baw, purya usog!’, she added.

I was amazed by the near reality of my unschooled neighbor’s commentaries. With the Darwinian process of evolution in mind, as time goes by, can humans develop additional tits to naturally feed the extra litter of babies? When that time comes, will Triumph, Soen, and Victoria Secrets vie for the top slot in the Forbes List of Top Companies?

Beats me.


The Arroyo Scandals

You think that Gloria Arroyo’s scandalous million-pesos dinner in New York has died down? No, Marilene. The issue is still alive and has mutated into a common topic to mean other arrogant acts and not necessarily a scandalous dinner.

My neighbor who was before apathetic to political issues because she seemed happy and pre-occupied with her five-six business, now talked of the Le Cirque dinner as if she was in the nearby table when Gloria Arroyo ordered lamb chop and expensive wine. Before, my neighbor took her morning coffee with stories of the stinginess of her customers in paying their loans, and how her customers - who were mostly wives of seamen and OFWs – would brag about their good lives even if actually they are mired in debt. Now, she takes her coffee and puto with swipes on the excesses of Arroyo. ‘Ay, grabe gid siya!’ she would punctuate her revelations, as if she was really privy to the secret dealings of Gloria Arroyo. ‘Wala gid siya patawad!’, she says of Arroyo’s greed and corruption. Even the houses of Arroyo’s children abroad and the vast Arroyo landholdings in Negros were not spared. She talked about these properties as if she really had been inside the properties; as if these properties were just behind her 75-square-meters residence tucked in the suburbs of Iloilo, and that she could see the goings on in these properties as she hang her laundry outside her window. ‘Ay, wala gid sila huya!’ she would close each expose.

On other unrelated topics, the same neighbor would talk of how she and her niece enjoyed Lapaz batchoy at Deco’s. ‘Baw, daw sa Le Cirque lang kami!’ she cooed. And when she watched on TV the news about Sitio Simabang in Fuga Island, in the town of Calayan, Cagayan, becoming a virtual ghost town when more than a hundred impoverished residents were hospitalized, some even died, after eating pawikan meat, she seethed with rage. ‘Kag si Gloria Arroyo, panyapon lang isa na ka milyon. Ngaa si sin-o gid bala ang nagapasweldo sa iya?’, she would asked.


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Since 2004, I have always wondered how Arroyo won in the elections. I never had heard anybody liking her. Even the elective officials in Cabatuan are tight-lipped about her. But of course, they gushed about her when she visited the place. And her face and mole are present in the many roadside billboards. But even Noynoy Aquino, who publicly said that Gloria Arroyo is not welcome to his family, was civil to her when she visited Cory Aquino’s wake, right?

Yes, Marilene. As regards Gloria Arroyo’s situation, do I hear you say “Hello, Garci?”?