‘…after the PhilHealth brouhaha involving P15 billion that was unaccounted for — and the Health Secretary is the chair of the PhilHealth board — we now have this COA report speaking of disbursements amounting to P67 billion that are problematic.’
IT should be no surprise to those who have known my comments since March of 2020 that I have no love lost for the Secretary of Health, that from his earliest comments about our “preparedness” for the virus I have expressed my belief that the President would be better off sending Francisco Duque to pasture, and that this belief of mine has never wavered over the last 500 plus days since we went into lockdown, during which period of time I myself became a COVID survivor.
If COVID is the single biggest health threat facing the Filipino people, I worry that Secretary Duque is its single biggest enabler.
Just so we never forget: remember his response to the Senate inquiry on our preparedness for COVID held (I think) in February of 2020? He claimed we had “enough test kits” and “enough PPEs” to supply our healthcare workers who needed to be at the forefront to battle this pandemic. Well, he was wrong. Dead wrong, in fact. How many people — many of them healthcare workers in the early days — died because he was wrong?
When people began urging the government to ban flights from China, what did he say?
There were other considerations, he hinted, maybe referring to China not looking kindly on us if we did it. In effect, he put China’s feelings ahead of our health and safety. Well, he was dead wrong. How many people died because he was wrong?
When a gentleman in Greenhills turned positive for and died of COVID, what did he say?
“There was no local transmission.” This I found humorously stupid. How did a man who never left the country get an imported virus except from someone else? That’s local transmission, yes? At that time, I dubbed this Greenhills case “the Immaculate Infection.”
It was funny, but Duque was dead wrong. How many people died because he was wrong?
Even earlier than this: when senators criticized the DOH for its failure in contract tracing, what did he say? “Heads will roll.” Heads didn’t roll. He was wrong again, dead wrong. How many people have died because he was wrong?
And after the PhilHealth brouhaha involving P15 billion that was unaccounted for — and the Health Secretary is the chair of the PhilHealth board — we now have this COA report speaking of disbursements amounting to P67 billion that are problematic.
Think about it: let us just say that only 1% of that P67 billion found their way into people’s pockets, we are talking of P670 million. That should be a “whiff” of corruption, yes?
But is 1% the going rate in our country?
If it is 10%, that’s P6.7 billion. That’s a stench.
Now, if you have COVID you won’t be able to smell that. If COVID has affected your eyes, you’ll be blind to it. If it has affected your mind… you’ll call the Secretary of Health a hero of the national response program.
Has COVID affected the Chief Executive?
The EJK issue won’t sink him. At least provided the next government does not turn him over to the ICC the way Sudan has surrendered its former president.
But trust me: his P67 billion secretary will sink him. Because people will start wondering why, in the face of all of these, the President still refuses to react to what is far, far more than a mere whiff of incompetence, if not corruption.
Fast on the draw with others, but super protective of The 67 Billion Peso Man?
Amazing. But why?
