For public good or personal gain

Time was when only the press, rather a wee sector of it, reported the jockeying for positions in new administrations. Today, judging from wildly spreading texts, just about everybody knows, or thinks so, what’s going on. Latest SMS are about what Cabinet posts are being bagged by which faction in the incoming Noynoy Aquino government. Most circulations are purely speculative; some, planted intrigues. Filipinos pass on even unverified info in a frenzy to be somehow part of sensational political events.

One recent transmission is against the infamous Kamag-anak Inc. Supposedly two Noynoy aunts, Tessie Oreta on his father’s side and Tingting Cojuangco on his mother’s, will be the secretaries of education and of interior. It’s unbelievable. Surely Noynoy has many sharp lawyers around him to caution about a constitutional bar. No presidential kin up to the fourth degree of consanguinity or affinity may, during his term, be appointed to the Cabinet or constitutional commissions, or as heads of bureaus and state corporations.

Another item is that Avelino Cruz has been promised the justice secretaryship. Law partner Simeon Marcelo allegedly is angling for a seat in the Judicial and Bar Council, so that together they can place justices to favor their firm. Marcelo is inserting old pal Dennis Villa-Ignacio as Ombudsman moreover. What a scoop! Problem is, Cruz, once a presidential chief legal counsel and defense head, prefers to stay in private practice. Marcelo, for his part, considers having once been Ombudsman as the second mightiest man in RP next only to the President, and so is disinterested in any lower post. Too, for months he has been pushing for Ombudsman not Villa-Ignacio but venerable ex-senator Bobby Tañada.

Yet another text scores a so-called Kaklase Inc. Allegedly Noynoy’s old school chums Atty. Jojo Ochoa and Bong Naguiat will be executive secretary and Pagcor boss. Many messages are against the Hyatt-10 Cabinet members who resigned from Gloria Arroyo at the height of the 2005 Hello Garci affair. To be recycled supposedly are: Dinky Soliman, Juan Santos, and Cesar Purisima. Still other items twit “job-hunting” Liberal Party mates former agrarian reform chief Butch Abad and ex-mayor Jesse Robredo. But then, so what? Appointments are the President’s prerogative. He naturally will name to key positions persons he knows and can work with, from childhood and campaign. For other appointments, he will depend as well on friends’ advice and professional vetting. Carping against Kaklase Inc. or Hyatt-10, Kamag-Anak Inc. or The Firm or LP smacks of pure envy.

Two issues to consider about Noynoy’s appointments are credentials and performance. Unlike Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, he is not about to post a personal manicurist or a threatening general to tenured offices way above their heads. All the names mentioned above are professionals.

The scare about Kamag-Anak Inc. is potential graft. The issue there is not appointments, but theft of public coffers and influence peddling, which every citizen must oppose. It will certainly be wrong for a presidential kin to broker government deals. Or to accept sinecures in private firms that transact big with the government. But picking on presidential sister Kris just because she’s volubly everywhere — she’s an entertainment celeb, that’s why — is the height of pettiness.

If Noynoy has anything to distrust these early days, it’s Malacañang chatter that he must retain “good” Arroyo Cabinet men. Foremost so they say is cousin and presidential rival Gilbert Teodoro, as defense secretary. That’s a trap. Apart from the constitutional bar on presidential kin, there’s also a yearlong ban against posting election losers. Also being lobbied are Health Sec. Esperanza Cabral and Energy Sec. Jose Ibazeta, but they’re very long shots.

The problem with intriguers for position is if they’re at it not so much for the public good than personal gain. Like, have they considered the woes of an LP president having a non-party mate VP, a presidential contender for Senate President, and enemy Arroyo for Speaker? Have they studied enough to assist Noynoy confront the earliest conundrum for any new President: how to organize for analysis, for policy development, for interagency coordination, for decision, for public communication, and for multi-sectoral, multi-partisan and multi-level action? Or are they just counting the potential earnings and perks of their posts?

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At War’s End — the first novel by Palanca multi-awardee Rony V. Diaz — will be launched tomorrow, 5 p.m., at the Solidaridad Bookshop on Padre Faura, Ermita, Manila.

The book launching will be a Philippine PEN (Poets, Essayists and Novelists) affair. Published by the Manila Times book division, it is the first of a trilogy that, via true stories, traces Philippine history and development from the Second World War to the present.

Diaz became famous for his prize-winning short stories, collected in the book Death in a Sawmill and Other Stories (which I hope will be reprinted soon for the new generation to savor). He went to the University of the Philippines and the Indiana University, and received literature grants from Fulbright-Smith-Mundt and the Rockefeller Foundation. He is working on the two other novels in the trilogy, Elegy for Candida and Quita y Pone. –Jarius Bondoc (The Philippine Star)