Is ruling Lakas-Kampi Party presidential standard bearer Gilberto Teodoro now talking to his rival ex-President Joseph Estrada to explore possibilities?

At around 9 pm of March 30, just when Metro Manila was slowly sinking into a pious mood ahead of Holy Week, my cellphone suddenly beeped out a text message.

The text was not from a politician nor a political handler but from one of my most trusted sources in the financial community. It went this way:

Gibo resigns as chairman of Lakas Kampi but supposedly still admin candidate. Heard garapal na daw lakas officials idenified with FG to support Villar.

It was the first time I had heard that Teodoro had resigned from the party chairmanship. The late evening news verified this later.

The rest of the message from my source was unclear.

I wasn’t sure if my source was telling me he had heard that Lakas officials identified with “FG” – presidential spouse Jose Miguel Arroyo – were “garapal” or shameless in supporting rival candidate Senator Manuel Villar instead of their standard bearer Teodoro.

Or if it was Gibo who had heard of this “garapal” development and therefore resigned to send a furious signal to the party.

To clarify this, I had a long phone conversation with my source who confirmed both interpretations were correct.

Then my source told me something else which I now tend to believe because of two things. First, Teodoro’s resignation had turned out to be true. Second, there is now a mountain of contradictory statements being issued by the Arroyo camp concerning Mike Arroyo and his allies’ switch of support to Villar. The presidential palace and Lakas officials have separately denied, on Mike Arroyo’s behalf, but I’d like to hear the denial straight from the First Gentleman himself.

Something is definitely going on. Key allies of the Arroyos in northern, central and southern Philippines have suddenly defected to Villar. And  not a pip was heard from Malacañang Palace, calling the defectors rats or “ingratos.” Making me suspect they are actually an advance party.

My source also told me Teodoro was now talking to Estrada, who is running third in surveys. And Teodoro was reportedly not alone in talking to Estrada. Two other Arroyo officials were also talking to Estrada: Defense Secretary Norberto Gonzales and Interior and Local Governments Secretary Ronaldo Puno.

I have tried to verify this portion but so far I have been unable to reach them. Perhaps they’re still on retreat. Perhaps by publishing this, others will come forward to deny, clarify or verify this.

Another tidbit of info I got was that Teodoro was being wooed to drop out and being enticed with a possible post – as Estrada’s Executive Secretary. As his Little President. The idea of Estrada withdrawing in behalf of Teodoro was also mentioned.

You know, politics is the art of the possible. Anything is possible at this point. Political pairings are much like those in show business where movie producers match seemingly disparate male and female stars to see which ones would click in the box office.

Just to get a sense of whether a modus vivendi between Teodoro and Estrada could somehow click, I asked a strategist within the Lakas coalition. He told me,

I think it’s possible for other people to be calling Gibo. For him to initiate calls I doubt that. It’s more of the people wanting to talk to him and wanting to verify all these rumors.

This source added that both Teodoro and Manzano had assured they won’t quit:

They are going to see this campaign through as official candidates of Lakas. Any other reports to the contrary are without any basis.

But I also asked someone who used to be very very close to Estrada. He told me it was “possible” that defense secretary Gonzales and local governments secretary Puno were talking to Erap. “Bert, during the time of Erap in Tanay (where he was detained while being tried on the charge of plunder), he cultivaed Erap. Bert is really dedicated to the transition plan” which calls for the establishment of a civilian-military junta. And it was Puno who arranged Estrada’s presidential pardon.

This source said:

“If Gibo realizes na linoko siya ng (he was fooled by the) administration, if he realizes Manny Villar is really the candidate of Gloria, why not support Erap on his own?”

And the source added:

Assuming Manny Villar is the real candidate of Gloria you have to shift Lakas support to Villar at the last moment. If you support Villar now you’ll kill him.

Only a mere 24 hours were needed to order a support switch, he said.

Villar himself has vehemently denied any arrangement. His ally, Senator Aquilino Pimentel Jr., pointed out that Villar doesn’t need Arroyo nor her money.

But as you can see, Arroyo may need either Villar or Erap to survive politically. Arroyo’s precarious situation may be likened to a scene in the movies where someone is dangling from atop a building ledge and trying to grab the nearest leg or limb for dear life.

Nearly eight years ago I asked President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo,  “I’m sure a lot of women are dying to ask you this question.”

“And since you are not a widow, they would like to ask you this question. You don’t have to answer this if you don’t want to, but a lot of women are dying to know – do you still have sex?”

The 55-year-old mother of three replied  “Plenty” – and gave a toothy smile.

Last January 22, when she hosted a a surprise dinner for 23 officers and members of the Foreign Correspondents Association of the Philippines (FOCAP) I asked her a milder personal question about her hair. Now I’m not so sure if her reluctant reply pertained to my question eight years ago or two Fridays ago.

President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo and FOCAP

During the hour-long dinner, Mrs Arroyo was at her gracious best but she was not all that candid. I must say, it took all of our reportorial skills  to get her to talk about her former college student and now leading presidential contender Senator Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III. She refused to talk about her party’s presidential standard bearer Gilbert Teodoro or about her feelings towards the Ampatuans – her long-time allies now accused of murdering 57 people including 30 journalists.

The ease with which she talked to reporters vanished in 2005 when wiretapped tapes of her, suggesting she was trying to rig her 2004 poll victory by a million votes, leaked out.

During her dinner some of that ease returned as she talked about the presidential palace, her girlhood and her Palace chef. Only to vanish when she refused to answer many questions she deemed “political” or which asked about her “feelings”.

Still, the occasion gave me a momentary glimpse of the power and the pomp of the presidency, its lonely isolation, and the woman who was determined to hold on to it for as long as she could.

I did not get any hint she was ready to clear out her desk by June 30 when her term ends.

At short notice. An invitation to dine with her, even at several hours’ notice, was highly unusual and one I seized at a moment’s notice. She had not seen FOCAP since 2007. A press conference in 2008 was abruptly canceled after we were told she would only talk about the economy and would not entertain political questions.

I was curious why the President wanted to meet us on the same day she waved goodbye to the remains of her press secretary, Cerge Remonde.

Her terms for engaging the foreign press quickly became evident. At the entrance to the presidential palace, the guards impounded all tape recorders and cameras on orders of the palace media relations office. It was a first for many of the journalists, including me, who have covered Palace events in three previous presidencies.

The media handlers later explained that no tape recorders and cameras were allowed because it was a strictly social event. A Palace photographer would snap photos. The confiscation disoriented me somewhat because we were informed earlier that while there was no formal Q and A, the President “may answer questions”.

Didn’t she want to be quoted correctly? And it would have been bad manners for us to scribble throughout the meal.

It turned out alright in the end, because someone else, who asked to remain unnamed, enabled me to put together almost the entire dinner conversation. Besides, Mrs Arroyo never told us it was off the record.

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Forming a unicameral legislature, that would in effect scrap the Philippine Senate, tops Gilberto Teodoro’s presidential agenda.

Gilberto Teodoro with his Xavier School classmates who promise to help him win - photo by Raissa Robles

The 45-year-old defense secretary told Asian Dragon magazine that he was running for the nation’s highest office “because a lot of people want me to become president (and) I think I can do some other things before I quit public service.”

The slender, six-foot tall Teodoro exudes confidence and an easy charm that seems to project only one message — “believe in me, I’m the one.”

“I’d like to reform society, transform the political structure, reform public governance, to put it that way,” he said.

Apparently realizing that the phrase “reform society” sounded too much like buzz words from the late strongman President Ferdinand Marcos, he shifted gears and said, “Not society but public governance.”

Teodoro believes constitutional change is key to securing the nation’s political and economic future: “It’s the only thing that should be done. Public governance. We must transform. If not, we would just be in the same system as now. Forget it.”

Among the 2010 presidential candidates, Teodoro is alone in aggressively pushing it as his main platform of government. His proposals are similar to those being pushed without success by President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo and the House of Representatives, which she has dominated.

One charter revision Teodoro is batting for is the partial lifting of the ban on foreign land ownership. His advocacy was borne out of his experience as a congressman of nine years and as a defense secretary for two years.

“I do not want a strictly presidential (form of government); it does not work in this country. And a bicameral presidential does not work,” he said. “It (the structure) could be parliamentary, (it) depends on the sense of the Constitutional Convention,” which he would ask Congress to convene immediately if he wins.

The bottom line is, “I’d like a more synergistic structure” in which there is “unity of effort, of cooperation” between and among those who make the laws and those who implement them.

He’s familiar with how a unicameral legislature works. For eight years since he was 14, his mother Mercedes served as an assemblywoman at the unicameral Batasang Pambansa that Marcos created in 1978 to lend his dictatorship a veneer of democracy.

Teodoro regrets the day his late aunt, former President Corazon Aquino, threw out Marcos’ 1973 Constitution and replaced it with a “reactionary” charter. “I’ve studied the (1987) Constitution for a long, long time,” he said. “It looks back. It just corrected everything… Marcos did. It did not provide a mechanism for the future.”

Teodoro believes Marcos was “wrong in declaring martial law” even though his uncle, businessman Eduardo “Danding” Cojuanco, was part of Marcos’ inner circle. Cojuangco heads the National People’s Coalition, of which Teodoro was a member before he bolted to join the Administration’s Lakas and be its standard bearer.

He said martial law “just prolonged the agony.” Marcos should have simply waited for the Constitutional Convention, in which Teodoro’s mom was a delegate helping draft a new charter. “And if the Constitutional Convention completed its work, (and) the Constitution was properly ratified, we would have had a good Constitution in 1973, except for the economic provisions.”

Asked if he could turn out like Marcos who was elected president at 47, Teodoro replied, “People have experienced what Marcos had done.” Besides, he added, “I’m a different person.”

“Marcos had a very, very strong sense of history. I don’t share that… I don’t keep a diary. I’m not that kind of a leader,” he said. “I’m a consensus builder leader. I’m not a dictator unless there’s something that has already been agreed upon and I need to enforce it.”

“I don’t intend to be a Roman conqueror. I intend to do what I can, contribute what I can, then go while I’m still young,” he said.

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The newspaper I write for in Hong Kong gave me permission to share its editorial and my stories on Typhoon Ondoy International Code Name Ketsana). The pieces remain relevant since horrific typhoons continue to batter the Philippines and the unfulfilled promises recently contributed to needless deaths.

The editorial is entitled “Arroyo must make good on radar systems pledge.” It was written by Peter Kammerer, SCMP’s International Editor. Earlier I asked Ellen Tordesillas to post the editorial in her widely popular blog and she very kindly did it.

Below the editorial are my two stories on the storm -

1. The sidebar -No one warned us,’ says villager searching for her lost children

2. The main piece – Understanding why Manila drowned

My newspaper agreed to have these disseminated on my blog and Facebook, in the hope they will help do some good. Thank you for finding the time to read them – Raissa Robles, SCMP senior Manila correspondent

Arroyo must make good on radar systems pledge

Editorial of South China Morning Post
Oct. 5, 2009

A government’s priority is to protect the well-being of its people.

There is no better test of its commitment than when disaster strikes.
Philippine President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s administration has, in
this regard, failed time and again. It did so spectacularly with
Tropical Storm Ketsana, again revealing how little it cares for its
constituents.

The Philippines is pounded by as many as 20 typhoons a year. Dozens,
sometimes hundreds, of people are killed and many millions of dollars
of damage is caused. Nature cannot be tamed, but in the case of severe weather events, technology means its wrath can be anticipated. Arroyo for the past five years has repeatedly promised to have advanced forecasting radar systems installed; politicking, corruption and government waste means they remain a pledge.

What happens when such systems are absent was demonstrated by Ketsana. (Ondoy)

Manila has not experienced as violent a downpour in 40 years. But in
the hours before the storm struck on the morning of September 26,
state weather forecasters were predicting only moderate to heavy rain.
No alert was issued and the city of 10 million was caught off-guard;
about 300 people were drowned by floodwaters and 300,000 made
homeless. Some parts of the city are still flooded.

The government’s failure extends beyond forecasting. Disaster response
mechanisms broke down. Emergency phones went unanswered. Rescue teams
had insufficient equipment and numbers. Citizens were forced to fend
for themselves.

Arroyo has promised, as she did after devastating storm-caused
landslides in 2004 and 2006, that there will not be a repeat. The
first two of up to 10 new weather radar systems could be in place by
the end of the year. Filipinos have learned not to hold their breath:
they have watched millions of dollars that could have bought such
systems several times over frittered away and Congressional debate
focused on seemingly more pressing matters like constitutional change.
But this time has to be different. Too many lives and livelihoods have
been needlessly lost and remain at risk.

No one warned us, says villager searching for her lost children

Raissa Robles
Updated on Oct 05, 2009

Victoria Tutor was beyond tears. She had just seen the body of her 16-year-old daughter, Vinaflor, and signed for the release of her remains.

That was Wednesday. Yesterday, there was still no sign of three of her other children who, like she and Vinaflor, had been swept away by rampaging waters caused by Tropical Storm Ketsana a week ago.
Her village, Bagong Silangan in Quezon City, was one of the hardest hit by the storm. Thirty-one bodies have been found, but a further 90, mostly children, are listed as missing.

Staff at Tajuna Funeral Home told Tutor they could only wrap Vinaflor’s body in cloth since they had run out of coffins. She said village officials, not just the incessant rain, were to blame for the tragedy. They had received no warning.

“There was none,” she said. “I only knew there was rain but had not heard news about a coming storm.”

Villagers were used to annual flooding brought by the rainy season, and normally just moved to higher ground when the water started flowing through, she said.

But on September 26, the floods came without warning. “We were inside the house and suddenly there was water. We went to the highest point in the village, and then the rushing waters met and we were forced to clamber onto rooftops.”

The water rose higher than the roofs and at 11am she and her six children were swept away. Two were saved. The others – Via, 11, Biancaflor, five, and Jonren, three – have yet to be found. Tutor managed to remain afloat by holding onto a piece of wood for three hours before being pulled to safety. “I bumped into a bridge and people on the bridge threw me a rope,” she said.

Her rescuers said Tutor was in Marikina City. Dazed and without money, she rested then started the long walk back to Bagong Silangan. Abandoned cars, buses and jeepneys jammed the roads. She arrived after an eight-hour trek in the dark.

Tutor sadly described her missing children in the desperate hope that someone would remember seeing them among the countless hordes of Manila.

Via was wearing a blouse with spaghetti straps and white pyjamas. Biancaflor was wearing a big white T-shirt, while Jonren was wearing a blue shirt and  and has a scar above his right eyebrow. “Please help me find them,” she said.

Filipinos received little warning and almost no official help

Raissa Robles, Updated on Oct 05, 2009</span>

When the typhoons and catastrophic rain they carried hit the Philippines, many of the impoverished residents received little warning. Hundreds died, and in the grief-filled aftermath, President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo pledged “never again”, ordering the deployment of advanced Doppler radars capable of detecting the scale of potential rainfall.

That was 2004.

About five years after the devastation in Quezon that claimed 1,800 lives, the Doppler radars have yet to be constructed. Their continued absence is just one link in a tragic chain of events that culminated in the deaths of about 300 people in the Philippines just over a week ago and paralysed Manila, as 80 per cent of the capital city went under water. Rescue services seemed at a loss, incapable of dealing with an emergency that, at its peak, left tens of thousands of people stranded, waiting in vain for rescuers who never came.

It is a sequence of events that began with the failure to detect the huge amount of rain being carried by then Tropical Storm Ketsana. But as the situation worsened, warnings failed to reach those most in need, who were then forced to fend for themselves as the muddy waters rose, and the chain of command began to break down.

Dr Prisco Nilo, the head of the Philippine weather bureau (known as Pagasa), acknowledges that Doppler radars would have given forecasters a much better idea of what to expect before Ketsana dumped about 40cm of rain on Manila in nine hours on September 26.

Doppler radars – which have been installed by Hong Kong, Thailand and Taiwan, among other places – give real-time data on rainfall intensity in highly specific areas, said Nilo’s deputy, Nathaniel Cruz. He said the Philippines’ first Doppler would go online by year’s end, in Zambales province, “to guard Metro Manila against future Ondoys”, the local name for Ketsana.

But Nilo conceded that the radar’s US-based manufacturer, Enterprise Electronics Corporation, “only said they’ll try”. In fact, he said, the 100 million peso (HK$16.5 million) contract states a delivery date in the middle of next year for two Dopplers – just before the typhoon season.

In all, eight Doppler radars are to be built, five of them taxpayer-funded and three paid for by the Japan International Co-operation Agency (Jica). In addition, two existing radars will be upgraded, which it is hoped will give the country 10 Dopplers by 2013.

Nilo said the failure to have Dopplers in place so long after the Quezon disaster was because “the budget process in the Philippines takes long and we also have to go through a bidding process”. Critics of Arroyo have blamed the slow process on the government’s skewed sense of priorities.

The weather bureau chief doesn’t share such sentiments. Nilo said bureau staff referred to the new equipment as the “PGMA Dopplers” – after President Arroyo’s initials – to give her credit for the initiative of purchasing the gear.

Yet even with sophisticated new radar in place, Cruz was reluctant to predict that a repeat of last week’s disaster couldn’t occur in the country. “Even if we say, `Manila should get ready’, if `Pedro’ does not listen to the news or the village leaders don’t tell residents or residents refuse to leave, deaths will still happen,” he said.

The suggestion that Manila residents themselves bore part of the blame for the extent of Ketsana’s impact was first raised by Cruz’sboss. “Instead of just watching soap operas on TV, they should also watch the news,” Nilo said on September 27, a day after the deluge.

Yet judging by Pagasa’s weather bulletin issued on the eve of the storm, Ketsana would be a typical tropical storm, of which about 20 visit the Philippines each year.

Nilo was quoted by the Philippine Star newspaper on the day Ketsana struck saying “the storm will not cross Metro Manila … [but the metropolis would experience] moderate to heavy rains”. He said later that the forecast changed overnight – too late for the Star to change.

By September 26, Ketsana was drawing huge amounts of moisture from the southwest monsoon, causing the deluge over Metro Manila, he said. Pagasa would try to devise flood intensity warnings, he said, but added that this might not work all the time because “sometimes people respond only when they see the actual floodwaters, but then it might be too late”.

In any event, none of the warnings reached Bagong Silangan village. Residents could not tune in to the news on the night of September 25 because of a power blackout, not uncommon in the Quezon City squatter village. Nor was there any newscast the next morning, even as the rain fell. And so Metro Manila – a city of 10 million residents crammed into 636 sq km – went about its usual business. Office and factory workers began their half-day at work, while families stayed home, or went shopping

In impoverished Bagong Silangan – the name of the official settlement camp for slum dwellers means “new birth” – residents were well aware of the dangers of flash flooding. Nine years ago, 300 residents were buried alive when an enormous mound of rubbish next to the settlement collapsed in heavy rain.

But with no warning of what was on the way, residents like Victoria Tutor and her six children simply decided to sit out the rain at home. They were all swept away in the torrent that surged through Bagong Silangan. Tutor and two of the children were rescued; of the other four, only the body of 16-year-old Vinaflor has been recovered.

As it became increasingly clear on September 26 that a major disaster was unfolding, the seeming lack of official action infuriated many locals.

Trapped residents cowering in the upper floors of their homes tried phoning the lead disaster agency, the National Disaster Co-ordinating Council, at the height of the storm. Most (including this reporter) were met with engaged signals or phones that rang unanswered.

By late on September 26, tens of thousands cowered on high points and awaited rescuers. Rescue boats were notable by their absence. Defence Secretary Gilberto Teodoro admitted that only one inflatable dinghy out of 13 he ordered made it to Marikina City – one of the worst-hit districts, where thousands awaited rescue.

There is some confusion about how many boats were pressed into action. Military spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Romeo Brawner said that contrary to Teodoro’s comments, 17 inflatable boats had been sent into action. But he conceded that not  all were immediately put to their  best use.

“These boats could not penetrate right away due to the strong currents,” Brawner said. Ironically, traffic gridlock caused by flooded streets prevented the navy from sending more inflatable boats.

Brawner said that as a result of the experience, Teodoro had ordered the purchase of 50 more rubber boats.

Regardless of exactly how many boats were used, Marikina’s mayor, Marides Fernando, maintains that by that Sunday morning, not a single boat had reached her inundated city.

While state agencies were paralysed, it fell on Manila’s residents to take action themselves. Thousands simply waded, swam or paddled to higher ground.

The Manila Dragons dragon boat team used their traditional vessels and inflatable boats to pluck many people to safety. Team manager Romulo Valientes said the team, which has competed in Hong Kong and mainland China, had great difficulty paddling in waters filled with trash, dead rats, snakes, grease and diesel fuel.

Quezon City Judge Ralph Lee mounted his jet ski and rescued no fewer than 100 citizens. “I was so carried away by the very sad situation,” he said.

On Tuesday, Arroyo met her cabinet for the first time since the rain began. Many people were still stranded. Two senior ministers complained that local and village executives simply disappeared during the disaster. “The city and municipal disaster centres are not functioning now,” Public Works Secretary Hermogenes Ebdane told her.

Arroyo herself noted that the mayors of Cainta and Pasig cities were not answering her calls. And a senior executive from a private firm helping out in rescue efforts told the South China Morning Post that one colonel “nearly wept” at the height of the disaster because he had no one to co-ordinate with.

Armed Forces deputy chief of staff Lieutenant General Rodrigo Maclang reported to Arroyo that nearly 20,000 residents had been rescued by 2,000 soldiers and a thousand police officers. But in reality, many swam or walked out themselves, albeit guided by the rescuers. And the numbers represent a drop in a very muddy ocean – by mid-week, there were more than 300,000 people taking refuge in shelters across Manila.

Few doubt that another major storm will one day hit Manila and trigger flooding again, although perhaps not on such a grand scale as in Ketsana’s case.

To avert a similar outcome, Teodoro has said he will position rescue equipment in advance and enforce the mandatory evacuations for children next time.

Lawmakers also promised to enact a long-pending comprehensive law on reducing disaster risk that includes a controversial proposal to regulate land use. Metro Manila Development Authority chairman Bayani Fernando has blamed the flooding on unregulated growth of gated communities that filled in natural waterways so that floodwaters had nowhere to drain.

But such pledges come too late for people such as Muelmar Magallanes, a heroic 18-year-old who saved 30 people in Bagong Silangan before he himself was engulfed and drowned. The greatest tragedy is that the efforts of people like Magallanes were required at all.