I disagree with the author on many points, but this letter is worth posting in our Blog. Anything that will expose that arrogant and pretentious Roxas is good reading. Kuru-kapurit pano sa mga survey ini kaya sobrang trying hard... San EDSA 2 nagparatago lang ini sa kangkongan.



The Manila Times
Tuesday, July 21, 2009

By Alito L. Malinao Open letter to Sen. Mar Roxas
Dear Senator Roxas,

Among the so-called presidentiables, I have found you to be the most capable of running this country after President Arroyo.
I do not know you personally although I have on several occasions observed you closely while you were still the DTI secretary and as a senator.
In early September 2000, I was assigned as close-in reporter of former President Estrada when he attended the United Nations Millennium Summit held at the UN headquarters in New York.
It was during that trip that I had my first close encounter with you. In our one-day stopover in San Francisco before flying to Manila, Mr. Estrada received a delegation of American businessmen.
I was asked to attend the meeting, which was held at the presidential suite of a five-star San Francisco hotel where the former president stayed.
You were at the meeting as DTI secretary. During the whole meeting, you did all the talking while Estrada just smiled and nodded. And I found you to be very articulate as you assured the American businessmen of the benefits of investing in the Philippines.
Later, I also covered you at the protracted Senate hearings on the Japan-Philippines Economic Partnership Agreement (JPEPA). During the hearings, it was you as chairman of the Senate committee on trade and commerce who was the most prepared in discussing the JPEPA.
You were never absent in the JPEPA public hearings. Even when all the other senators were gone you stayed behind to grill the resource persons. Some of your colleagues just stayed for a few minutes but after facing the TV cameras silently disappeared. I was told that this is also true in other Senate hearings.
In the Senate, I found you to be hardworking, conscientious, resourceful and scrupulous. Indeed, you are a chip off the old block, a man destined to perpetuate the legacy of your great forebears, your grandfather, Manuel Roxas, your namesake, the first president of the Republic, and your illustrious father, the late Senator Gerry Roxas, who, with his glasses perpetually on, looked like a college professor than a politician.
What I am saying is that even without your "padyak-padyak" commercial and your much-hyped romance and impending marriage to broadcast journalist Korina Sanchez, your record in the Senate and as former DTI boss can stand public scrutiny.
But I have a word of caution for you, my dear Senator Roxas. There is such a thing as overkill. In the Greek mythology, the gods would destroy those who develop hubris or those who discard humility as a virtue.
While I am among the many beneficiaries of the Cheaper Medicines Act (my wife and I are taking maintenance medicines) that you have championed for so long, I was terribly disappointed when you announced to the media that you would summon President Arroyo to the Senate hearing.
Haven’t you gone too far in your desire to gain media mileage? Why have you become so arrogant to seek the presence of the President of the Republic in a Senate hearing? Why the cavalier attitude toward a president whom you once served? Have you forgotten the Confucian saying that "humility is the solid foundation of all virtues?"
I remember quite well that among the Estrada Cabinet members, you were the only one who joined the Arroyo government after the tumultuous EDSA 2 revolt. Out of delicadeza, like all your former colleagues in the Estrada administration, you could have refused to serve in the new government.
But you stayed perhaps believing that Mrs. Arroyo, like you an economist, could make the difference in this country.
However, times have changed. And you have changed with the times.
I agree with you that a delay in the implementation of the Cheaper Medicines Act is costly and even criminal because this would mean that people without money to buy maintenance medicines could die.
I am sure a lot of Filipinos have cheered you for the crusade that you have embarked, from your Quixotic fight against the big oil companies and the scrapping of the VAT on oil products to your lonely battle against unscrupulous pre-need companies and your spirited call for the full implementation of the Cheaper Medicines Act.
If elections are held today, I will vote for you because I have faith in your ability to lead this country.
But don’t squander your chance of leading this country by making reckless and puerile moves like asking the President to appear before you to be interrogated on the medicines law. However noble your objective was what you did was certainly an irresponsible act. This was like asking the mountain to go to Mahomet.
I have already forgiven you for the gutter language that you used in a Makati rally in attacking the President but asking her to kowtow to your whims is going too far.
God bless you, Senator Mar.
opinion@manilatimes.net