Corruptibility, comedy, and stupidity of Filipinos

A chief of police of a town in Pangasinan is sad despite the daily dole-out of P500 a day from the operator of a gambling game Jai-Alai to his station.
During the proliferation of illegal number game Jueteng, this game’s operator did not only give meal money to policemen but gave a bigger amount to the chief, and a much bigger sum to the mayor for his personal expenses.

My other source said some police chiefs received more or less P100 thousand a month while each member of the Provincial Board received P45 thousand to P60 thousand a month. Many mayors averagely received P300 thousand a month. This not to mention some town and city mayors who received P1.2 million each as an average a month.

Recently, Mayor Gregorio “Bobom” Perez of the burgeoning Urdaneta City unveiled a P3 million huge black granite statute of a seemingly angry carabao located at the intersection of the city’s busy swanky highway that accommodates travelers to the North, South, East, and West of major cities in Luzon

The water buffalo, with a backdrop of comforting electronically operated springs of water at the foreground of a wall made of imposing black granite
too, show the bullishness of the city.
But what worries me every time I passed in that intersection is the possibility of the carabao jumping from its more that ten feet perch and run berserk and “horning” scampering and screaming travelers and commuters.
It’s my prayer that Mayor Bobom and the officials of Urdaneta leash (tali-an) that menacing animal before it could hurt unwary human beings.

Pacquiao – Mosley: Analysis

by Mortz C. Ortigoza
"Pacquiao emulates Southpaw Winky Wright who defeated Mosley twice. Sand bagged with the gloves and steamroller Mosley with those lethal left and right hooks"
This tiff is the toughest Filipino pug Manny Pacquaio faces in May, 7, 2011.
But explosive Manny is a 6-1 favorite as the fight nears
Aside from the ear-drum beating “punishment” pop music buffs all over the world have endured to this Justin Bieber-Bruce Lee’s look a-like newly released rendition of Dan Hill’s “Sometimes When We Torch, er,Touch”, can he also punished Mosley the way he bludgeoned awkward- moving- slow punching Antonio Margarito on this awaited tiff?
The following assessment could probably answer our question:

Advantages of Mosley against Pacquiao

-Bigger, stronger, and most dangerous opponent who has been put in front of Manny by BobFather Arum;
-Has 72.22% Knocked-Out ratio in his 54 fights against Manny’s 66.67% KO in his 57 tussles;
- Although paces like a duck in the ring, he is not a sitting duck as he has an excellent slick lateral foot movement. He could dart in-and-out the way he victoriously did to Oscar dela Hoya in their two epic battles in the early 2000s when the Golden boy was at his peak;
-Has an unpredictable left jab he converts to power left hook that either TKO or KO Fernando Vargas, Ricardo Mayorga, and Antonio Margarito;
-Has looping right hook he converts to the Beatles’ bang-bang “Maxwell Silver Hammer” that nearly knock down Floyd Mayweather in their 2nd Round outing and zapped-out the durability out of Margarito’s chin;
- Has a chin as thick as the callousness on the faces of Filipino government officials who malversed scarce public funds just to watch solon Pacquiao in Vegas;
-Never experienced how to be in the dreamland on the dais unlike Manny who experienced how it felt to be KO or TKO thrice at the platform.

-Has 74-inch reach against Pacquiao’s 67.

Advantages of Pacquiao against Mosley
- Every time he fights, survivors of Nagasaki atomic bombed blast are either traumatized or have nightmare as they remembered how that more than four tons “Fat Man" bomb born by a B-29 bomber wrought havoc to them in that fateful August of 1945.
-His hands speed would look Jason Statham knife-stabbing prowess a child’s play in the flick “Expendable”.
-You ask Democrats Senator Harry Reid of Nevada how violently explosive Congressman Pacquiao is?

What Mosley should do in this fight?

-As he backpedals as Manny chases him, he fires his Hellfire missile-likes right or left hook to the Filipino’s chin;
-He should always raise his right or left lower arm to deflect Manny left or right hook before he counters him;
- Incessantly left jabs Manny’s face and moves clock-wise to frustrate Pacquiao’s setting his lethal left cross and hook;
-He shot a power left hook or cross at Manny’s right chin as the latter has the propensity to lower his right hand;
-Fire 1-2 combination to Manny and then clinch or crowd him to prevent his hay maker. If fellow African-American Bernard Hopkin can do this with gusto by defeating his difficult foes, why not Shane to Manny ;
- After he hits the left face of Manny with his signature flush looping right hand, follow it up with power left upper cut or left hook;
- Hit Pacquiao with a right hook then immediately bend and weave his head to his right to avoid Manny’s dangerous counter left hook. He can back pedal, too, to frustrate the Filipino in hitting him;
- In a clinch position, he can sneak a right hook to Manny’s chin;
- After Manny lower his hand to pause, Mosley attacks him;
- He moved laterally to the right or left by complementing it with sneaky right stiff jabs. Then set and fired that killing right overhand hook;
- Body punch Manny

What Pacquiao should do in this fight?

-Make Shane busy the entire round. He tired and decreased the rates of his punches in the second half as shown in his fight with Miguel Cotto and Mayweather;
- Shane’s propensity to double left jabs only makes him open to Pacquiao's flushing signature hit left hook to the chin of the Pomona, California native;
- Emulates Mayweather who waited for Mosley’s left jab by either blocking it or bobbling his head, then counter it with a power left cross at Shane’s right face;
- After Shane’s launched his right cross, Manny backtracks just like Mayweather to avoid being hit from that right hand and Mosley’s smoking left hook;
-Mosley has difficulty setting his bunches of punches after an out-of- angle flurries Mayorga’s brought to him;
-He emulates Southpaw Winky Wright who defeated Mosley twice. Sand bagged with the gloves and steamroller Mosley with those lethal left and right hooks;
- Just like in dela Hoya and Margarito’s fights,Manny stick, slip-out and throw punches again before Mosley is able to regain his defense;
-- After Shane’s lower his hand to pause, Pacquiao attacks him just like what Mayweather has effectively done;
- Manny treats Shane with a 1-2 body combo, and 1-2 chin combo. Just like the oil riched Philippine claimed Spratly –Islands, Mosley’s body remains unexplored to hard drilling.The late VernonForrest, who floored him twice, and defeated him twice, showed that Mosley is vulnerable to a body assault. “Nobody ever went to Shane’s body before because they were intimidated by his hand-speed,” said Forrest’s trainer Ronnie Shields.

Every time Mosley fires his left jabs, Manny preemptively unleash his left whack-whack guns that has damaged Morales and Cotto, Mosley is hittable at his right face as he sets his right hand;

-As Shane’s stick and dance, Pacman attacks as if there is no tomorrow.Forrest showed that a flat-footed moving Mosley is vulnerable to a determined attacker;
- Mosley is vulnerable with left hook as he lowered his guard to his right chin;
- Watch Mosley’s upper cut as he fired it, then he pauses or backpedal. That’s the time Manny lunged a right straight or fires his right hook;
-Manny should see to it that a disturbed Mosley could not set an angle to unleash his signature right hand;

Pacquiao vs. Mosley: My interviews with Philippine Giant TV Networks

Author Ortigoza (right) was interviewed this morning at GMA-7 TV (April 6) on his analysis of the Pacquiao-Mosley tussle

Filipino Superman's Wonder Woman Mother Dionesia. Shane Mosley said he did not experience to be Knocked-Out, but Manny experienced it thrice, while Mom Dionesia once -- when Antonio Margarito hits Manny with a flushing left hook at the right kidney's area in the 7th round of their fight that caused his mom's collapsed at the front seat of the Cowboy's Stadium in Texas, USA.

ANALYZING THE PACQUIAO-MOSLEY TIFF AT ABS-CBN TV. At right is author Mortz Ortigoza. Photo was taken in May 5, 2011 at the Capitol Ground in Lingayen, Pangasinan.

Filipino Superman Except Superman's Handsome Face

ANALYZING THE PACQUIAO-MOSLEY TIFF  with GMA-7 last May 4, 2011 at our house. Extreme left is Northern Luzon GMA-7 reporter Sheila Finuliar. She covers Pacquiao with an almost daily regularity in his training in Baguio City.

Corruptions at the Philippine Education Department

By Mortz C. Ortigoza
This is a story told to me by a public school teacher. This story can be better re-told in the vernacular:
Girl: Manong Bayad (Big brother, my jeepney fare)
Driver: Saan galing? (Where did you come from?)
Girl: Student, Nursing, St. Paul, bagung sakay (I just rode your jeep).
Boy: (Affronted by the air of the girl, paid P500)
Manong Bayad (Big brother, my fare)
Driver Angry) Ilan sa P500? (How many passengers for the P500?)!
Boy: Isa lang, Kip d change, seaman, bagong baba! (Only one, but you keep the change of my money, . I am a seaman who just disembarked from my ship).
Woman: (Feeling affronted by the arrogance of the boy, paid P1000!) Bayad, paki-abot! (My fare, please give to the driver).
Driver: Anak ng … Wala bang barya? (Son of Bi___, you don’t have loose change?)
Woman: Sa inyo na lang iyung sukli manong, teacher po bagong loan!
(The loose change yours, Mr. Driver. I am a public school teacher. I just received my loan.)
***
Why do some lending institutions that cater to teachers thrive at the Department of Education?
They are in cahoots with the public school’s Regional Director and the paymaster.
A lowest ranked teacher who receives P18 thousand a month but who borrows P50 thousand has to pay it for two years in a monthly amortization of P 2,521 -inclusive of the P438 interest- a month
He/she would find himself/herself receiving a monthly check of P15, 479. The same situation if he/she borrows using the P15, 479.
It’s a windfall for these lucky-as-Lotto-winner financial institutions that earned up to 21.024% interest for a P50 thousand loan.
Interest per month is efficiently collected because somebody in the regional office like the laughing- to –the- bank regional director, and other conspiring bigwig-malefactors give the imprimatur to the paymaster to deduct the loan payment before they would be released to the provinces.
***
Why are some public school supervisors and principals bullish every graduation day?
Because they get a financial cut from every rented toga and cap, and graduation picture from the captive impoverished parents and students who join the commencement exercise in the kindergarten, elementary, and high school levels.
A toga and cap for a graduate in the three levels are rented for P40. But unwitting graduate and parent do not know about the fast one done to them after they paid P100 for the package, as corrupt school officials pocketed P60 from each of the graduates.
“Sometime it is the principal only who pockets the overprice,” my source told me.
It is the same situation with those graft-ridden pictures that cost P100 for each graduate.
“The jacked-up price reached up to P25, where the student pays P125,” my source told me.
****
A former implementer of government-owned Land Bank of the Philippines told me he has read my “How Philippine officials pocketed some loans from gov’t banks” in my Blog that saw some thousands of hits,ahem, already because of the “intrigued” I sowed.
He said that mayors and councilors could easily pocket some portions of the loan, say P7 million for the P50 million loan vis-à-vis the “progress-building” policy of the LBP of how much loan it releases to its funded town hall , market building, and other public infrastructure.
He said progress building means LBP inspector go to the work site and check how much of the building is finished as based on the cost of the loan before the bank releases the money.
“Usually the cost of the project is jacked-up by those municipal officials,”
He said these officials already earned from the cut the mayor’s gave them.
He told me officials of the LBP do not check the priced-up invoices of the materials as it is the work of Commission of Audit.
He said some mayors use dummy to construct a municipal project.
He said aside from the portion of the loan illegally pocketed by the mayor, he gets another 10% from the Overhead Contingency not to mention his 10% as Contractor’s Profit .All of these percentages are sanctioned by law.
( You can send comments at totomortz@yahoo.com)

Pacquiao vs. Mosley: One Big Swing

By Mortz Ortigoza

If Manny Pacquiao blitzed- out to oblivion Eric Morales, Ricky Hatton, and Oscar de la Hoya, Could he Panzer-run multi-divisions champ Shane Mosley just like what those Krauts have done to Poland and other Eastern European Countries? Or would the bigger Pomona, California native would be his Dien Bien Phu?

To those who went to the johns when their teacher in World History discussed this scintillating topic, the Battle of Dien Bien Phu ensued in 1954 in a province that is part of the name of the battle in Vietnam. In that war, a colonial master –the French- were humiliated as they were defeated by a rag-tag impoverished pajama clad Viet Minh but fought like there was no tomorrow under the tutelage of consummate Vietnamese General Vo Nguyen Giap- the same general who dealt the Americans their first “defeat” in the Cold War Era.

“Is Shane’s tough as Gibraltar?” My half-Czech, half-Orangutan errand boy Procopio Matulis posed to me after we downed a case of Red Horse Beer.

"Probably yes because he doesn’t taste how to be TKOed or KOed," I retorted.

I told my half human pal that Shane is the bigger and stronger pug.

A tipsy Procopio, in between his bite of Kinigtot (sumptuous finger food composed of goat’s meat, innards, and half digested dung – you ask Manny, he eats this delicacy too we call also on its soupy version “Pinapaitan” ), kept pestering me that he wants more answers to this coming May 7 fight at MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada.

“You want answers?” I emphatically mimicked actor Jack Nicholson in “A Few Good Men”

The answer is Manny should watch cautiously Shane’s lethal as tsunami right overhand and left hook that have TKOd big time in the 9th round Plastic of Paris endorser Antonio Margarito.

"It was my strategy, my focus, my game plan," Mosley said when asked what won the fight. "It was a tough fight, but it was a great plan. It was my left hook. I caught [Fernando] Vargas with it, I caught [Ricardo] Mayorga with it."

And he would catch Manny man with it if the latter is careless on this fight that Pacquiao would find the hardest of all his matches.

I told my errand boy that Manny, like a cosmetologist, grotesquely re-arranged only the Mexican face for him to look as a run-away winner in a mortician’s contest among employees of some funeral parlors in Vegas.

"But Manny did not TKOd or KOd Antonio, my dear Procopio."

Margarito has shown how tough he was in that fight.

Imagine, after he hit Pacquaio with that flushing left hook at his right kidney, it back lashed like nuclear fall-out  to the front seat of the Cowboy’s Stadium in Texas that knocked out big time Aling Dionesia (Filipino superman’s funny"mi Asim pa ito" mom who is now a famous model of a vinegar  in the Philippines)

If the awkward punching and slow moving Mexican can hit and hurt Manny (and his mom, if you still insist you nincompoop), how much more Shane can do it? Mosley’s hand and foot speed is five times faster than Margarito. It overpowered de la Hoya during his peak in 2000. And I ain't talkin' here about a washed-up and drained Golden Boy when Manny stopped him at the 8th Round last December 6, 2008?

Despite the nostril breathing problem, Shane still knocked down and knocked out the brash garbage trashing Ricardo Mayorga-- a grasped of a second before the end of the 12th round. He also TKOed Fernando Vargas in Round 6 of their re-match in 2006.

His loss to the then undefeated dangerous Miguel Cotto, in their competitive fight in 2007 was hotly contested.

His trainer-father Jack blamed that nostril problem, which zapped his stamina, as the culprit why he did not dominate Miguel.

But after that nose-job he TKOed Margarito in that 2009 blow-out.

If Shane’s lackluster performance with Floyd Mayweather and Sergio Mora’s defensive-bicycle riding style could be likened to the tranquil easy feeling Earl Klugh, his upcoming tussle with a smoking whirling dervish Manny could be likened to the adrenalin powered Scorpion’s or AC/DC’s rock music.

"Holly Molly, we should brace ourselves for this war," a wide eyed Procopio cried.

 “Bloods would be everywhere on the dais in this fight. Manny loves to come. Shane loves to come, too! My friend”

Mosley declared recently that the propensity of Pacman to come would be his Waterloo.

He is polishing his big guns for the kill for the Filipino’s homecoming in the ring.

Geez man, he confidently said he would not be contented with a decision. He would KO Manny man in the 7th Round.

I’m still ambivalent about the prognosis of my errand boy's cousin Boy Ponobre (Hearse in English). He told me that if Pacquiao-Marquez II and Pacquio-Clottey are dubbed "Clash of the Titans" and "The Event", this forthcoming fight with Mosley can be appropriately called: “I’m Coming, to dare Shane's One Big Swing!”.

“Well, I just take a swig until May 7^th”

Remember, my compatriot absentee solon Manny has all the uranium now that have emitted in Fukushima, Japan in his hands for Mosley to taste how to be KOed in  a big swing for a living.

((You can read my selected intriguing but thought-provoking columns at http://mortzortigoza.blogspot.com. You can send comments too at totomortz@yahoo.com)

Pacquiao’s politically (in) correct No. 8 car plate

By Mortz C. Ortigoza

Media colleagues in Dagupan City who covered the training of pound-for-pound king Manny Pacquiao in nearby Baguio City told me their stalking experiences before he goes to jog and train.

With national and local media men shoving and jostling to take a peek in a place outside the entrance of the Cooyeesan Hotel on who among them see first the convoy that includes a black SUV and a gold van of the Filipino superman that would emerge from the hotel’s car park.

As they scamper to their vehicles to give chase to the convoy’s  whose speed could be mistaken to ferry VIPs  like US Ambassador Harry Thomas (who looks like Light Heavyweight boxer James “Fat Man” Toney)” being rushed to Baguio General Hospital because of a vowel disorder, they would later found out that the SUV and the van turtle paced as they patiently followed Manny and his company who jog the hills and valleys of the cloud kissed Pines City.

‘So what intrigue you is the convoy could not overtake the speed of Manny and his company as they hit the road?,” I posed to  this pal who accidentally became a media man after he ran an errand to buy Datu Puti Vinegar and return home as newly minted member of the Fourth Estate in my city dubbed as the Bangus (Milkfish) Capital of the World.

“No my man, what intrigue me those dudes were being followed by an SUV with a plate number 8. What I know is a car plate in the Philippines is marked by three letters and three numbers, what this No. 8? “He posed to me wide-eyed.

“My man, you’re a nincompoop! Plate no. 8 is used by members of the House of Thieves, er, Representatives or congressmen in our country. We call it as protocol plate. It is issued for people to recognize important government functionaries".
According to a bigwig of the land transportation office, these plates are so sacred that it is No. 8 below in rank after Jesus Christ. President of the Philippines uses No. 1, Senators use No. 7, and Judges of the Regional Trial Court use No.16. 
"Some of these luminaries abuse these by whimsically cutting a two way lanes, and sometime overran anti-Pacquiao critics like you," I lectured my media pal over mugs of San Miguel draft beer at Shakey’s CSI Warehouse in Dagupan – the favourite hang-out of prolific boxing scribe Hermie Rivera.

My now bewildered but enlightened pal still wondered why Pacquiao used it to jog and not uses it to attend his duty as congressman at the August Chamber in Manila.

He wondered why the almost 283-strong members of the House used their plate numbered 8 SUVs as vehicles so they could vote recently for the Article of Impeachment of an allegedly corrupt and incompetent Ombudsperson (government chief prosecutor) who was identified with the likewise alleged corrupt former president Gloria Arroyo, while Manny used his plate numbered 8 SUV to relax at some coffee houses at either SM Mall or Camp John Hay while Congress (a four-hour drive only to his place in Baguio) was in session up to the wee hours during that time?   

He poses to me: “Would the Filipino superman still uses the same plate numbered big car to drink coffee, while his colleague vote in favour or against anytime from now to a Reproductive Health (RH) Bill  that could solve or aggravate the gnawing hardships our people suffer to our population that breed like rabbits?

 “But Manny was against condom and other contraceptives. He even quoted the Lord’s edict in the Bible to go and multiply?” I asked him.

“Would it be commonsensical and popular for the part of the pro-RH bill that Manny rides in his number 8 SUV and just drink coffee till Kingdom Come at some coffee houses there instead of casting his “No” vote in congress,” he retorted to my question with a query.

I told him that I could forgive Manny for that! But no Twitter for him, please!

(Send comments to totomortz@yahoo.com)

THE OVER ABUSED PROTOCOL PLATE. This is sample of a Philippine congressman's SUV with plate number 8. SUV like this sometimes lorded the city streets of the Philippines by crossing the flow of traffic with its own sirens,  armed body guards inside it, and its convoy of cars.
A moneyed "idiot" in the Philippines can win an election despite his low education or low intelligence like Senators Lito Lapid and Bong Revilla and the soon to be Senator Manny Pacquiao. The Philippine Constitution only asks that one of the few qualifications of a Philippine congressman is he/she knows how to read and write in English or the vernacular of his/her tribe. One's employment for clerkship in a government office in the Philippines is more intricate as the applicant needs to wave a college diploma and passed a barrage of tests that includes the tough Civil Service Examination that was bequeathed to the country by her American colonizers in the 1900s.

How Philippine officials pocketed some loans from gov’t banks

The press conference called recently by the leadership of the Land Bank of the Philippines (LBP) in Region 1 and western Cordillera Autonomous Region was a treat.
I asked its beauteous Vice President, Filipina B. Monje, if they have measures to prevent inherently corrupt local government officials in the province, cities, and towns who embezzle some of the loaned monies lent by the bank to them.
“It is common knowledge among few members of the media that a portion of the monies lent by your bank for government projects were divided and pocketed by the chief executives and their cohorts at the lawmaking bodies,” I declared.
Monje said that LBP has a measure to discourage this shenanigan. She called this as”progress billing.” It means the bank releases the sum by tranches on the length of constructions of an infrastructure (government building, plaza, and others) as it progresses.
“So, pag nag submit iyung contractor, at nag-request iyung Local Government Unit ito ay pinupuntahan ng ating project appraisers,” she stressed.
Monje explained that the appraisers look for the completion of work the LGUs have submitted to them. She said the bank estimates the range of the cost of the construction then the head office of LBP in the area gives the cost of the project.
When I asked her if this “project billing” is tight proof to stave-out any misdemeanors by public officials, Monje told me that they complied with what Republic Act 9184(The Government Procurement Reform Act) mandates them to do.
In a huddle after the conference, she agreed to the observations that the other deterrence for government officials to commit graft and corruption were the laws on Commission on Audit, the Revised Penal Code and the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act (R.A 3019).
***
Despite these measures, I still wonder why our politicians can still do their sleight of hands by pocketing millions of precious government funds for their aggrandizement.
Take what a councilor in a town in Region 1 divulged to me.
He told me that a P70 million loan was eventually unanimously passed by his drooling colleague at the August Chamber. This after the opposition who composed the majority (six of them out of the ten members) successfully lobbied with the mayor to part each of the ten members a half-a-million pesos.
The P70 million loan were used to fund a public market.
With the P5 million cut diverted to these vultures at the Sangguninang Bayan and the conservatively P1 million “S.O.P (Standard Operational Procedure)” withheld by the hizzoner, the taxpayers in that local government unit are short changed by P6 million from the more than P70 million loan their constituents will pay yearly through the loan’s amortization’s that include of course the interest that made the Land Bank as the biggest lender of LGU’s in Pinoy Land.
Now for a perceptive reader like you, you would probably pose:” How the heck would these SOB thieves in the public service justify their project that cost less than P70 million to the supposedly meticulous eyes of the bank, the COA, and the media?
This after they construct a substandard public market that probably saw some cast irons (bituka) inside of its concrete walls made of cheaper bamboos as what a cemented drainage’s cover that was discovered in a town in Eastern Pangasinan after a hauler truck overran it?
This stealth thrown by our shrewd government officials to us are worth contemplating.
Susmariosep, this is world class! Was this the reason our pathetic government was included by Transparency International as one of the most corrupt countries in the Far East lately?
Does it mean some of the vanguards in those government bodies I mentioned have something to do why corruptions thrive in our midst?
(You can read my other columns at http://northwatch.wordpress.com/)  You can send comments too at totomortz@yahoo.com)