GOTCHA By Jarius Bondoc, The Philippine Star, Wednesday, July 16, 2008
Sadly, the maker of home insecticides loaded in sunken m/v Princess of the Stars is keeping quiet about it. Although its tons of toxic chemicals can harm salvors and fish, the company prefers that authorities discover first before it talks. The insecticides consist of liquids in aerosol tins and plastic pails, and mosquito coils (katol) wrapped in paper and cardboard. The tins and plastic covers could be leaking deadly contents by now; too it takes only a few days for paper to disintegrate in seawater. Aerosols carry more than 50 percent LPG, which can explode if torch cutters are used to get to the cargo hold.
Del Monte has come clean about its poisonous endosulfan pesticide in steel barrels. Bayer Crop Science too admitted to loading into the passenger ship a few samples of farm insecticides. A spokeswoman said the niclosamide, methamidophos, carbefuran and propineb already could have been diluted by seawater. The Coast Guard and foreign salvors have considered the presence of the poisons in plans to either re-float or drag the ship to shore to recover trapped bodies and cargo.
The third chemical shipper thinks silence can save it from liability for its transfluthrin, tetramethrin, d-allethrin and permethrin. But irate employees might squeal — not only about the reckless cargo but also the sweatshops where these were made.
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The truth is unraveling, slowly but surely. A clique in the Arroyo admin is capturing the energy sector for kickbacks.
First, there was a sudden flurry to amend the Electric Power Industry Reform Act. Rep. Mikey Arroyo, the presidential son who chairs the House committee on energy, said it was necessary to bring down consumer rates. His congressmen-brother Dato and uncle Iggy assented as committee members. It turns out, however, that the main amendment is to advance the start of open access from the time 70 percent of Napocor generators are privatized to only 50 percent. While speeding up open access is fine on paper, since it will allow big users to pick their own electric retailer earlier, it would be unfair in practice. State-owned Napocor will still control half the power plants, so there won’t be true competition. Worse, the Napocor mafia will continue to dictate, for multimillion-dollar kickbacks, imports of coal to fuel the plants, whether sold or not.
Then, Gloria Arroyo appointed amiga Zenaida Ducut as Energy Regulatory Board chief. Aside from Ducut being the town mate from whom Mikey inherited his congressional seat in 2004, they have a common friend, the oft-named jueteng lord Bong Pineda. Ducut’s posting jolted the industry because of a recent Napocor scam. The state firm last Feb. awarded to a four-month-old, undercapitalized and flighty broker a P956.4-million coal import from
Among the listed incorporators of broker Transpacific Consolidated Resources Inc. are Leslie and Ressie Ducut, but Zenaida disclaims kinship. Still, there are many inconsistencies. Napocor faxed the bid invitation two weeks prior to TCRI’s only known address then, the nearby Danarra Hotel’s business center, closed since Christmas. Now Napocor insists it awarded the deal when TCRI moved into a real office — in two short weeks. Paid-up capital was only P62,500, but Napocor says “so what?”, in disregard of the Public Bidding Act that requires congruity of capital with contract price. Ducut says the scam does not matter since, as ERC chair, she will have nothing to do with Napocor operations. But Napocor spokesman admits that the ERC, aside from the energy department and NEDA, needs to approve coal imports.
The capture of the electricity sector is complete — from the executive and legislative branches to the quasi-judicial ERC. From there the clique can move to other energy sectors — say, oil exploration — if it has not already.
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Vice Gov. Rolex Suplico laments the Supreme Court’s basis for declaring as moot his petition to cancel as unconstitutional the ZTE deal. The Tribunal ruled that President Arroyo already scrapped the deal, as reported in October, so there was no need for judicial action. But Suplico says it should have sought official Malacañang verification of the cancellation, instead of just relying on Arroyo’s word. He recalled that Arroyo declared in Dec. 2002 that she would not run for President, but did just the same. So there.
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