How thieves in the gov’t divide loot

By Mortz C. Ortigoza

Kalabaw na kasali sa fiesta sa Ozamiz City pinagbabaril ng mga pulis.

Kasalukuyang iniimbestigahan pa ng joint teams ng National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) at Criminal Investigation Detection Group (CIDG) kung nang-agaw din ng baril ang kalabaw gaya ng mga drug pushers na pinagpapatay ng mga alagad ng batas.

Here’s an excerpt of the news:

 “CAGAYAN DE ORO CITY – A carabao that was part of the activities of Ozamiz City’s annual fiesta ran amok on Saturday.

Witnesses said the carabao, a full grown male bull, lost its temper when it was paraded around the Birhen sa Cotta grounds where the final judging of street dancing also took place.

The street dancing competition was one of the highlights of the Subayen Keg Subanen Festival”.

***

A big time private contractor with the government told me how he and public officials earn in a, say, ten million pesos farm-to-market road in a town.

“15 percent lang ang tubo ko diyan. 15 percent bigay ko sa congressman, 5 percent sa DPWH (Department of Public Works & Highway) for the boys nila to divide, and 10 percent kay mayor,” he enumerated.

He cited that before he wins the bidding for the project at the DPWH, he first get the nod of the other two bidders (required by law) who would quote the first two highest bid to make the project so they would lose while my source, who bids the lowest ten million project wins.

“I will give them P300 thousand to divide among them or to those other bidders who are interested to the project”.

When I asked him how much he shell-out to the village chief that host the farm-to-market road, he told me he gives the “kapitan” P5000 as token of appreciation in signing the document to attest the program of works in his barangay had already been done by his construction firm.

MY POLITICAL CARTOONS

RICH SUBDIVISIONS IN THE PHILIPPINES

 

Narco War in the Philippines

CARTOON: PH "NARCO-GENERALS"

Solon to 5 Generals: Face Narco Charges!

By Mortz C. Ortigoza

DAGUPAN CITY – The five active and retired police generals incriminated by President Rodrigo Duterte who coddle illegal drug lords should be braved enough to face their accuser, Pangasinan Congressman Leopoldo Bataoil said.

5 GENERALS. House Representative Leopoldo Bataoil (2^nd District, Pangasinan) gives his takes to Mortz C. Ortigoza, co-anchor of Sonshine Radio 9:00 to 10:00 Am weekdays program, on the five active and retired police generals incriminated by President Rodrigo Duterte to be in cahoots with illegal drug lords.

Bataoil is a retired two-star police general before he became a congressman in 2010. He is on his last term in Congress.

“If they are truly involved they have to face the consequences of their actions, they have to be braved enough to involve themselves on the illegal activity they should be braved enough to face the consequences of their actions. But if they are not involved they have to defend themselves even in Plaza Miranda,” the solon stressed.

Bataoil, a former two-star police general, said since the president has implicated the alleged involvement of former Region 6 Director Bernardo Diaz, former National Capital Region Police Office (NCRPO) Director Joel Pagdilao and former Quezon City’s Police Office’s Director Edgardo Tinio and retired generals Vicente Loot, who is now mayor of Daan Bantayan, and Marcelo Garbo.

In his speech during the 69th anniversary  of the Philippine Air Force, the President jolted the nation through television when he announced the names of these generals and their involvement in dangerous drugs.

U.S War Jets Frequent Fly-By near Scarborough

By Mortz C. Ortigoza

INFANTA, Pangasinan – United States war jets have been seen making regular flyby in this coastal town, according to a village official of Barangay Cato here.

Jowe Legaspi, a village councilor, said that every week he saw thundering American jets flying low here as they proceeded to the location of Scarborough Shoal.

WARTHOGS. The five A-10 Thunderbolt attack aircraft left by
the Americans after the April 2016’s Balikatan (Military Exercise).

Legaspi was one of the 16 of this rustic town's fishermen who asked the United Nations' Commissioner for Human Rights last September 2015 to direct China to respect their rights to their traditional fishing grounds at the Scarborough or Panatag Shoal in the West Philippine Sea.
He said the personnel of the Chinese Coast Guard barred him and fellow fishermen to fish at the Scarborough Shoal, 260 kilometers from here.

The jets Legaspi has been seeing with regularity here were probably the five A-10 Thunderbolt attack aircraft left by the Americans after the April 2016’s Balikatan (Military Exercise).

The pugnacious twin engines’ A-10s passed by at the Shoal in April 19 to send a message to China that the area was for free aerial and maritime navigations.

The U.S used the airports at Subic, 204 kilometers from here, and the one at Clark Field in the nearby Pampanga province.

The Americans left Subic, Clark, and other U.S Bases in the Philippines after the Philippine Senate did not ratify in 1991 the treaty extending their stay in the country.

The Chinese took the Shoal in 2012 as part of her Nine-Dash Doctrine. But the Philippine government filed a case at the U.N Arbitral Tribunal in The Hague in early of 2013.
The Tribunal ruled in favor of the Philippines in July 12 this year.

Legaspi, in his middle of 40s, recalls the when he was a kid he and his older brother would fish near the firing range of the Americans in the Shoal.

“Pag nandiyan na iyang eroplano aalis na kami, lilipad ng mababa sa amin na nag wawarning na alis na kami sa Karboro,” he chuckled.

The mostly Visaya speaking Fishermen, from this town, Sta. Cruz, Masinloc, and Subic, Zambales who fish at Scarborough call the Shoal for brevity as “Karboro”.

The U.S. Navy used Bajo de Masinloc, another name of the Shoal, as an impact or bombing range. The concrete slabs were needed as “sinkers” to keep the balance of the old decrepit ships which were placed in the shoal for the U.S. Navy’s shooting and bombing runs.

“Pakpak niya, parang twin bodies,” Legaspi described the plane which could be the turbo powered OV-10 Bronco manufactured by North American Rockwell.

Narco Pushers: DEAD MEN WALKING

By Mortz C. Ortigoza

Last Monday I told a town’s chief of police (COP) about ”netizens” ridiculed him in social media Face Book of his soft approach to illegal drug pushers.

“Iyong ibang bayan at siyudad, andami ng sumuko at namamatay, pero dito sa area ninyo wala pa. Kelan daw may mang-aagaw din na pushers ng baril, tanong nila?” I posed.

Photo Credit: cafepress.com

The police official smiled on the dare. He said, the mockers should give him a week and he will show them he meant business.

Four days later, a top drug personality in the town was pumped in with bullets by the policemen after he grabbed the guns of the latter.

“Boss, may nang-agaw na ng baril sa area ko,” he called me.

“Send me the photo of the dead pusher, i- post natin doon sa Face Book ng mga nanga-ngantiyaw, “ I retorted.

He said aside from the deceased, he was targeting, Mr. XYZ, another Top 5 drug personality.

“Matagal na kaming may gustong tumbahin dito. Top 5 sa drug list namin. Problema doon siya nagtatago sa isang siyudad,” he confided to me.

He said he even plan to “sell” (or “benta” in vernacular) him to the chief of police there to get rid of the peddler.

He told me his men want to kill the habitual delinquent.

Cong on 5 Police Generals Accused to Coddle Drug Lords

I asked in our 9 to 10 am DZRD SONSHINE RADIO  program today Congressman Pol Bataoil, a former two-star police general, on his take on the 5 police generals implicated by President Duterte to be alleged protectors of illegal drug lords in the Philippines.
We discussed too the spate of killings of suspected drug pushers by the police who justified that the former try to grab their weapons.
Bataoil recalled in this interview his impression of Philippine National Police’s chief Director General Ronald “Bato” dela Rosa.


WATCH VIDEO BELOW

VIDEO: Solon explains ditch P50K cop's monthly pay

Congressman Leopoldo Bataoil (2nd District, Pangasinan) explains why the present government could not give the P50,000 a month salary next year of the member of the Philippine National Police despite it was a campaign promised of President Rodrigo Duterte. Bataoil, a former two-star police general, cited the ceiling of the P3.35 Trillion for next year's budget as based on tax , custom, and other government collections. INTERVIEWER: Political Columnist Mortz C. Ortigoza of themortzortigoza.blogspot.com (CLICK TO READ BLOG)

PART 1

PART 2

Mga Drug Adik na Media Men, Mayors

By MORTZ C. ORTIGOZA

One of the readers of my blog posted at Face Book about a poster titled: “Mga miyembro ng media na nasa drugs papangalanan na ni Duterte”.
I knew it was teaser but I have experienced about the bravados of some members of the Fourth Estate crowing to me when my ears were still wet on the profession.

DRUG ADDICTS. Illegal substance shabu (methamphetamine hydrochloride)
users in the Philippines. PHOTO CREDIT: Starmometer.com

Ito tatagalugin ko na lang kasi pati pala sa funeraria binabasa na iyong blog ko ng mga imbalsamador I met on the crime scenes where policemen  and drug pushers encountered that caused the demise of the latter.
“Sabi sa akin ni Media Man X noong chief of police pa si General Y, may nahuli si hepe na isang sakong high end na marijuana from Baguio City called “Buntot Pusa”.
When the pushers, who were Igorots, were being processed for filling of cases by the chief of police, Media Men X and Z were busy ransacking the content of the sack and putting some of them in their knapsacks.
When the colonel appeared at the door he saw them stealing some marijuana leaves.
“Ano iyang ginagawa niyo?” the colonel barked.
“A wala ito idol, kumukuha lang kami ng mga Exibits A, B, C, and D para magamit namin,” X said.
“Bakit mga abugado ba kayo at kelangan ninyo ng Exibits?” the chief posed and laughed.
Those media men were “sui generis” or “unique”, they have immunity from arrest not only for stealing some narcotics but even using them while they interview politicians and police officials.

***

“Mga 80 percent ng kaso dito sala ko puro drugs (Roughly 80 percent of the cases in my watch is drug related),“ a judge of the Regional Trial Court (RTC) told me in Lingayen when I asked him about the influx of drug pushers being charged at his sala.

“Since drug selling of shabu is non-bailable, do you have any experiences about a suspect given bail because evidence was weak as what the Constitution provides as exemption to the no-bail provision?” I posed.

He told me the entire drug selling cases he litigates he did not give bail to the accused.

“Don’t tell anybody, I rooted for Duterte for the presidency in the last election because I want to see an end to the unabated proliferation of illegal drugs in the country,” he whispered to me.

The 80 percent litigants who were charged with the Comprehensive Dangerous Drugs Act of 2002 or Republic Act No. 9165  at the sala of this judge, a former practicing lawyer, a law professor, and alumnus of the elite Ateneo de Manila’s law school, are endemic in all RTC’s all over the country.

You go to the detention cells of the Bureau of Jail & Penology in the country and you will see that most of the detainees there are charged with illegal drugs.

President Rodrigo Duterte was correct when he said that without a knuckled duster approached to drug, pushers become emboldened and the Philippines would become a narco-state like Colombia and Mexico in the next four to six years.

I saw a documentary at YouTube about a proud new chief of police in Mexico telling the public in his inauguration one morning that he would not be likened with his predecessors who were under the payroll of drug lords.

 Just hour after he partook his lunch, he was ambushed to death by pickup trucks riding gunmen when he was bound to his police office.

Another incident about how long  and powerful the tentacles of drug lords like that of the Los Zetas, Guadalajara, and Sinaloa in Mexico were when the U.S Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA)  helped the corruption tainted Mexican security forces for the entrapment of the equivalent of our Secretary of the Department of Interior &  Local Government.

That head of a cabinet told authorities that he received almost U.S $500,000 every month from the cartels.

PH "NARCO GENERALS: DUE PROCESS OR ASSASSINATION?

Corrupt Generals should watch for Ambush, Assassination

By Mortz C. Ortigoza

It was not true that two of the five police generals who coddled drug lords in the country were publicly implicated recently by President Rodrigo Duterte because of their surnames that incriminate them.

Police Generals implicated by President Rodrigo Duterte to coddle drug lords.
 From left Diaz, Garbo, Loot, Pagdilao, and Tinio. PHOTO CREDIT:
Manila Bulletin

One of them is General Loot who is now a mayor of one of the towns in Cebu.

 "Loot" in English is stolen money or valuables.

The other one is General Joel “Pagdilao”. Pagdilao is near the Filipino word “Dilaw” or Yellow” the official dress color of Duterte’s presidential rival Mar Roxas of the Liberal Party.

Pagdilao, by the way, was recently the chief of the most lucrative post of the regional offices of the police in country – the National Capital Regional Police Office (NCRPO). It was a two-star post.

If a one- star general in Luzon could earned five to seven million pesos a month at a regional police office from illegal number game jueteng, drop ball or colored games, video karera and whatchamacallit, what more if the regional chief is assigned at the NCRPO where these number games did not only thrive there but illegal drugs?

Thanks to the tens of millions of the country’s population who shoved and jostled themselves for economic gains in a hell hole called Metro Manila.

Bad cops and their cut on drugs

By Mortz C. Ortigoza

“It seems the cops from the NCRPO who were busted with 10 kilos of shabu were the pushers since they could not show the real pushers they entrapped on the ten million pesos drugs?” I posed recently to a middle ranking official of the Philippine National Police who was formerly assigned at the NCRPO or National Capital Region Police Office.

My question was in reference on the two arrested civilian agents of the anti-drug unit of the NCRPO in Baliuag, Bulacan last June 21 by the cops under the command of Police Provincial Director Romeo Caramat ( a PMAyer and my former classmate at a university in Pangasinan).

News report cited that after the arrest of the two civilian agents who were found to possess 10 kilos of illegal drugs’ shabu inside a Montero’s SUV, 12 NCRPO’s operatives immediately appeared from nowhere and interceded that the two agents worked with them for an on-going operation to arrest a bigger drug hoarders.

“I agree with your observation. The NCRPO operatives would be in hot water especially from the no-nonsense Duterte administration,” he said.