Like Andanar, I cried listening to the President’s speech

Press Secretary Martin Andanar, who said he cried when he read the draft of President Duterte’s first State of the Nation Address, was not being melodramatic.

I, too, cried listening to the President’s speech.

I don’t know which part made Andanar cry. As for me, it was the part when he lambasted media for likening to Michaelangelo’s “The Pieta”, the heart-wrenching photo of Jennelyn Olaires cradling the dead body of Michael Siaron, a 30-year-old pedicab driver, who was shot dead by motorcycle-riding men while he was waiting for passengers past midnight last Friday in Pasay City.

The unidentified gunmen left a cardboard sign, “I’m a drug pusher, do not emulate me.”

Inquirer captioned the powerful photograph which was splashed on the front page, “La Pieta.”

The Pieta (pity in Italian) is a classic sculpture by Michelangelo Buonarroti which shows the sorrowful Mary holding the dead body of Jesus.

This was the part of Duterte’s SONA that frightened me to tears:

“Let us be clear with each other. I am for the comfort and the welfare of the Filipino. Kayo namang hindi pa bungog diyan, hindi pa pumasok yang mga droga, eh kung ayaw ninyong mamatay, ayaw ninyong masaktan, huwag kayong umasa diyan sa mga pari pati Human Rights, hindi nakakapigil yan ng kamatayan. So huwag ninyong gawin.

“Eh tapos nandiyan ka nakabulagta and you are portrayed in a broadsheet na parang Mother Mary cradling the dead cadaver of Jesus Christ. Eh yan yang mga yan magda-dramahan tayo dito.

“Alam mo, ilang beses ko na sinasabi, sa Davao, ‘Huwag mong gawin kasi magkaka-problema tayo.’ He who is the cause of the cause is the cause of them all. [applause]. Ikaw yung nag umpisa, you swallow —

“Ulitin ko ha: He who is the cause of the cause is the cause of them all. Kami nagta-trabaho lang. We have a mission to God.
“We have millions of people to see that they are healthy. It’s a question of drug, it’s a question of public interest, public order. Kita mo, lesser crime. Wala na kasing magnanakaw, wala nang naghoholdap. Kasi para —Bakit tapos sabi nila eh, ‘maliliit lang ‘ yan’. Gamitin mo utak mo.

“If you are able to contaminate, kagaya ng negosyo ng mga Chinese, wholesale yan sila. Maski konti-konti kung the whole of Tondo contaminated, pera ‘yan.

“I am not saying it’s the Chinese. Practice of nitong wholesale, retail. They go for wholesale. Maski na kumita lang ng isang piso diyan sa isang… Okay na yan. Kasi paramihan eh. Iyan ang ibig kong sabihin.

“Now, let… I hope the military and the police will not react on this. It is part of the deep intelligence that we have gathered. I am forced to come in public, kasi pati yung mga pari nag-aano…Alam mo kayong mga media, naghahanap kayo ng, “Where’s the big fish?” “Saan yung bilyonaryo na mayaman, yung may kotse, yung may mga Mercedez na yan?” Ma’am, nandoon yan sila sa labas, wala dito. Maghanap ka ng isang batalyon na pulis para hulihin natin doon. Kung kaya natin.

“They direct the traffic of drugs sa kanila. Meron silang ganito, malaki. Real time. Nakikinig sila ngayon dito. I am very — 101 percent, nakikinig yan. Nandoon. Doon lang. Izo-zoom in nila sa Tondo. ‘O, itapon mo diyan. Tapos umalis ka, kunin mo doon sa tindahan yung bag o package.’

“Nasaan yung mga nakikita ng media na… Kayo lang ang naba-brand niyan na “drug lord” eh. Those are not the drug lords. Mga lieutenant, delivery boy yan. Kumbaga LBC lang yan pati DHL pwede rin.

Pati yung tawag nilang ‘basura’, yun yung street ano. Huwag kayong maghahanap. Gusto niyo, sabihin niyo, puntahan natin, I’ll give you the names. I’ll show you the intelligence paper pero give me the guarantee na may magawain ka. Because I’ll give you the name, I’ll give you the country. Kung wala ka ring magagawa, mag-shut up ka. “

So the killing of Siaron and all other vigilante killings are sanctioned by the government? If those killed were suspected to be involved in drugs, why were they not accused in court?

The President once again conveyed his grudging attitude about human rights: “Human rights must work to uplift human dignity. But human rights cannot be used as a shield or an excuse to destroy the country — your country and my country.”

This comment by Atty Ted Te should remind us what’s human rights in our life and in nation building: “Excuse me? The statement should have ended after ‘human dignity.’

“It is the first time I have heard ‘human rights’ being characterized as a means of destroying the country. That the Constitution itself declares, as a principle and State policy, that ‘(t)he State values the dignity of every human person and guarantees full respect for human rights’ (Article II, sec. 11) should be enough basis to consider the second sentence as misplaced. It is, by the way, the same Constitution he swore to “preserve and defend.”