Tag Archives: Philippines

A Tale of Two Presiding Officers

Opinion, , , , ,

The Vice President’s impeachment trial started in an emotional, “I’m from Ateneo / UP Law, so shut up!” ruckus by the Cayetano siblings over the motion to elect Sen Chiz Escudero as the Impeachment trial’s Presiding officer. That was their first formal challenge to the new majority and directly against Senate President Win Gatchalian’s authority.

Senate President Win Gatchalian may be a veteran Senator, but he’s not a lawyer and this handicap would certainly be exploited by the Cayetanos to influence the Impeachment trial proceedings in a way that will benefit their ally the Vice President. We clearly saw that yesterday.

The Impeachment trial is not a purely legal exercise, it is also a political one, the public will be watching the trial from start to finish, and in politics optics matter. So when we saw Senate President Gatchalian move aside, figuratively and literally, to make room for Sen Chiz Escudero as the Presiding Officer of the Impeachment trial, it is tacit admission of this handicap. It is now a smear on the Senate Presidency of Win Gatchalian.

However, as demonstrated by the troublesome Cayetano siblings, such a move, a sacrifice even, by Senate President Gatchalian was the right move. Say what you will of Sen Chiz Escudero’s shrewdness, but he certainly has the legal skills and wits to keep the Cayetano siblings in check, and the impeachment trial from going off the rails.

Besides, while the Constitution is clear that the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court shall preside over the impeachment trial of the President, it doesn’t say that the Senate President shall preside over impeachment trials of other impeachable officers. Granted that the intention of the framers of the Constitution recognized that the Senate President will preside over the impeachment trial of other impeachable officers as he is the default presiding officer of the Senate, nothing stops the Senate President from appointing another Senator to become the presiding officer as it is common practice in the Senate’s performance of its legislative functions. The election of Sen Chiz Escudero as presiding officer of the impeachment trial of the Vice President is just an affirmation of the Senate President’s power to delegate.

At the end of the day, that’s what is important for the public: to have an impeachment trial that would be as fair, orderly and sensible as possible, so that the Vice President would be given the opportunity to be heard and defend herself.

By giving the Vice President due process, we reaffirm our commitment to the rule of law, democracy and respect for human rights, the very principles that the Dutertes stand opposite of.

BPI #SUCKS

Opinion,

At the start of the year, I joined a different organization which forced me to open a new payroll account with a bank that I left more than a decade ago, Bank of the Philippine Islands.

Which means that I was among the thousands of its customers that was temporarily denied access and use of my own money from June 14 up until June 17, 2026 when BPI’s online services and app had an epic downtime.

Today, BPI president and CEO TG Limcaoco, in an interview with One News Money Talks apologized for the outage which turns out was the result of their inadequate infrastructure and terrible planning:

“The reality is it’s a series of unfortunate events that just came one after the other. We had a network issue on Sunday, which we resolved, and then because we had updated the app to a new version… the load on the backend was quite heavy, given the outage on Sunday, and then it was payday. I apologize to all our customers, and I take it on myself. Its’ my responsibility.”

First, BPI is notorious for having frequent outages that usually happens on or before payday. So that alone is proof that the country’s oldest bank with an $8.38 billion market cap is still running on a weak and unreliable infrastructure.

Second, BPI’s management is either incompetent or stupid or both, as who in their right mind would push out an app update less than 24 hours to when your banking systems regularly see peak traffic because it’s payday?!

The bank president’s apology is not enough. BPI must be made accountable, in concrete terms. It’s high time to strengthen laws that regulate banks and financial institutions like huge fines for service disruptions. Waiver of or compensation for fees incurred because of delayed payments. Criminal prosecution for its officers. Apologies are not enough. Customers deserve a lot more.

Rodrigo Duterte will go to trial for crimes against humanity

Daily dose, , , ,

It’s a historic day for human rights and justice in the Philippines. The Pre-Trial Chamber I of the International Criminal Court has ruled to confirm the charges of crimes against humanity against former President Rodrigo Duterte:

Confirmed charges of war crimes against Duterte

It effectively denies his request to be released and returned the Philippines and sets the stage for the trial to follow. After years of living in anguish, suffering and fear, the victims of Duterte’s brutal war on drugs will finally have their day in court.

Improved PhilHealth services

Daily dose, , ,

After three days, my youngest was finally discharged from the hospital yesterday. This wasn’t his first hospital admission so we were more familiar with the discharge procedures. So after completing the paperwork and settling the part of the hospital bill that wasn’t covered by our HMO and PhilHealth, it was a pleasant surprise when an actual PhilHealth employee came to see us for a quick interview/survey.

The PhilHealth employee courteously introduced herself as someone directly assigned to monitor the state insurer’s services at the hospital we stayed at. She wen through our bill, clearly explaining how the PhilHealth coverage was like that and the amount it covered, which was significantly larger compared to the last time my youngest, or any of us, was admitted for hospital treatment.

She then went on to ask us if the hospital asked us to make a cash deposit prior to admission, as this was against PhilHealth’s ‘zero balance billing’ program. I replied in the negative. Then her next was question was whether or not there were any difficulties availing of PhilHealth services, again I replied in the negative. Come to think of it, we’ve never had any difficulties availing services from PhilHealth. It seems that this is advantage of having up to date records and continuous contributions since I joined the formal labor sector a little more than a decade ago.

Still, it’s a wonderful experience to see first hand some good customer service from a government agency such as PhilHealth. Hopefully it continues to improve, especially the coverage it provides as for other Filipinos, PhilHealth is the only means they are able to get some form of healthcare services in this country known for crushing poverty amidst healthcare services that are not only woefully inadequate, but also criminally expensive and unaffordable.

A far-right group of Filipinos have been recently gaining traction on social media. They organized an online webinar purportedly to teach the art of debate, riding on the popularity of late Christian nationalist celebrity, Charlie Kirk. They made a claim that “truth varies according to respective ideologies” then say that only conservatives guard “timeless truths” is a laughable self-contradiction.

Then again, it’s not much of a surprise since their group worships someone whose style of “debate” is built on rapid-fire fallacies, selective use of facts and bad-faith framing.