Harapan: The Jun Lozada Expose

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Since Joey and his wispy, side-swept do appeared in the Senate and uttered his famous line, “Back off!”, the ZTE-NBN scandal has never left the minds of this nation. Everyday, I sit in front of the t.v. and wait for all sorts of updates on the Senate Inquiry, Jun Lozada, Romy Neri, heck, even the latest on Abalos’ cry for libel. In the minds of the Pinoy, catching the news is tantamount to the holy observance of slapstick primetime soaps. But then again, gossip and political blunder are what moves people like me.

Around campus, every corner, is filled with students exchanging their views on whether Lozada is consistent with his sworn statements or he’s  lying or if he’s just being manipulated to indeed destroy what is left of, if there is any, the Arroyo administration’s reputation. I find it amusing when I see and hear people arguing over  political issues than, say, Gretchen Barreto’s  pagwawala on the dancefloor or Say Alonzo’s supposed kiss mark. It’s so irritating whenever T.V. Patrol puts out the showbiz chika-minute  in place of THE headlines.  [Note: Stop it with the network war. It's annoying!]

I watched ABS-CBN’s HARAPAN: THE JUN LOZADA EXPOSE last Saturday and wow, I must say it almost felt like a total waste. For one thing, the word HARAPAN to me meant ONE ON ONE. The channel advertised the show as having Lozada go head to head with Abalos but what the heck were all the other administration people doing there? I was really surprised that there was a certain twist to that show and Lozada, I think, wasn’t aware of that arrangement.

I felt terrible watching them have a go at each other. It felt like I was watching PBB. The ‘men’ acted viciously; so unlike the behavior I expected from them:

(1)  Lozada’s comment on how the admin people dressed. Really, the issue here isn’t about clothes and I must admit, I was a bit irritated as to why Lozada had to comment on something so trivial and superficial (Lozada was wearing a Kamisa de Chino while the admin guys wore Barong Tagalog and Amerikana). Besides, I have to agree with the admin secretary (sorry I forgot his name but he says he’s from Ilocos) that sometimes, Lozada puts up a front that he’s poor when in fact he’s not. He was an IT executive before working for the government plus, according to Ben Abalos who is president of the Wackwack Country Club, he was able to pay 500,000+Php of his membership fees in the club. I couldn’t shake the feeling that Lozada might be using his ‘probinsyanong intsik‘ image to get sympathy. But he doesn’t have to.

(2) Lozada’s supposed humor. I appreciate Lozada’s sense of humor in the Senate inquiries but somehow, he exceeded the needed amount of comic relief when he didn’t stop at giving jokes one after the other. He gave the impression that he was sort of drunk. Though I understand it must be from stress and stuff, but still, a forum such as that calls for seriousness. I don’t know; he looked high to me.

(3) Loazada’s Para sa Bayan remark. I know he’s doing it for us, for the whole country and above all, for truth. But anything in excess is bad. In his case, his repetitive remarks of ‘para sa bayan‘  and ‘para sa katotohanan‘ may end up sounding too plastic.

(4) Abalos and his lawyer. I pity Lozada for facing the ‘mob’ last Saturday. Abalos had lot of documents to present as his evidence but Lozada had none. Abalos had his lawyer, who even gave an unnecessary opening speech, while Lozada had only the channel’s crew to assist on technical stuff. Abalos even bragged about his daughter’s canteen inside Wackwack Country Club, Ben’s Diner. The former Comelec Chair even announced his famous ‘berger‘ (burger) recipe for Ben’s Diner. The lawyer, the photocopied documents and his excess information on his being the Wackwack Country Club President is a annoying. If truth be told, as shown by the PNP when they forced Carmen Lozada to sign the papers seeking security for Jun, the documents could be made up as well. There’s something about Abalos that makes me want to smash his face in whenever he talks. He talks bullsh*t.

(5) The 5 Admin People. Again, I was surprised to find Lozada answering queries from 5 admin people all at the same time. Each of the admin guys took their time in explaining tons of things (mostly unbelievable and probably falsehoods) and Lozada was only given a good 20 or so seconds to explain his side. To me, it didn’t look fair: Lozada wasn’t given time to answer every question and in turn, Lozada looked like he couldn’t defend his ‘truth’.

Its shows like this that makes you think that politics is indeed a good and integral part of entertainment. To me, the show presented basically the same questions from Senate. Few, if not, little new facts were ever extracted from the witness or from the accused. The admin people basically denied everything and made Lozada look like a liar. On the other hand, Lozada cried out foul and to some extent, used his ‘probinsyanong intsik‘ image to make himself look more distressed and kawawa. But he was ganged up, only he didn’t need to use any maka-masa ploy to get sympathy because that move, I’m afraid, might make other people see him as a fake.

Let’s just get it on in the Senate. Though the case should be filed in the court, I feel that because of the Senate’s divided composition e.g. opposition, independents or the liberal parties and the administration, this scandal is less prone to a biased investigation. It’s not the ideal place for it, but for now the Senate is the next best place to confine this scandal. I mean, would you rather have DOJ c/o Sec. Raul Gonzales or The Office of the Ombusman c/o Merceditas Guttierez take care of it?

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Filed under 14th Congress, 2010 elections, AFP, DOJ, First Gentleman, GO, JDV, National Broadband Network, PBB, TU, ZTE Corp, ben abalos, impeachment complaint, joey de venecia III, jun lozada, moderate greed, mumblings, pgma, pinoy jedi knight, pinoy stuff, pnp, politica et.al, raul gonzales, rodolfo lozada, romy neri