Doctor BBM

Corruption in our plundered country, according to President Marcos, is a cancer that must be excised.

One thing about certain cancer treatments: they can kill the cancer cells – along with the host.

In the excision, can Doctor Bongbong Marcos wield the scalpel or obliterate the carcinogens with chemo or radiation with surgical precision, so that the patient not only survives, but also thrives post-op?

Cancer treatment has improved exponentially in my lifetime. I know many cancer survivors, including several who were diagnosed to be in advanced stages, who regained their health, who had children and are still active a decade or two after their initial diagnosis. Cancer is no longer a surefire death sentence.

Still, despite advances in medicine, cancer remains a major killer, with certain types more aggressive than others. And sometimes, the treatment can hasten the patient’s demise.

Doc BBM correctly diagnosed the disease. Now can he prescribe the proper treatment?

After that impressive launch of his anti-corruption crackdown, through his memorable “mahiya naman kayo” State of the Nation Address followed by the identification of the biggest public works contractors and the opening of the sumbongsapangulo reporting site, BBM now seems to be groping blindly for his next moves.

The economy and other sectors are feeling the uncertainty. Business confidence is down; consumption is dampened; investors are on wait-and-see.

Opportunists are stirring unrest in the military and police, compelling BBM to buy their loyalty with a salary (and consequently, retirees’ pension) hike, leaving the next administration to deal with “fiscal collapse.” Is this cure worse than the disease?

Maybe the perpetually overworked and underpaid public school teachers and health workers should take up arms and spread rumors that they are planning to stage a coup.

Certain groups are exploring ways to exploit the public outrage, to seize power through extraconstitutional means so they can become the new ruling class of thieves.

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Presumably, there is increased public awareness that corruption takes away hefty sums from state coffers than can otherwise be used to improve government services.

For example, those billions in kickbacks pocketed by the looters in Congress could have built all the new roads in Mega Manila, to be used for free by taxpayers. Instead the government has to get the private sector to build the roads needed to ease traffic.

Since profit drives private enterprise, of course tolls are collected on these roads: P35 minimum to use just about a kilometer of the NAIA expressway from Macapagal Boulevard to the NAIA Terminal 1. For the four-kilometer Muntinlupa-Cavite Expressway, the toll is P23 for cars, P47 for buses and light trucks and P70 for heavy trucks.

With its billions in funding, how can the Department of Public Works and Highways be unable to build and maintain bypass roads of just one or four kilometers, which are badly needed to decongest Metro Manila traffic? Where do our road user’s taxes go? (OK, now we know – to overpriced traffic barriers, cat’s eyes and other kickback-enabling procurements.)

All these road tolls are tacked on to logistics costs, which contribute to inflation in food and all other commodities that require road transportation. And the steep tolls discourage their regular use, even among middle-class motorists, defeating the purpose of decongesting ground-level traffic.

Our government services are so pathetically inefficient NAIA operations had to be privatized, which resulted in higher fees for everything at the airport.

Now Lufthansa Technik Philippines, aircraft maintenance provider for international carriers, with 3,200 highly skilled employees, could pack up from the NAIA following an over-tenfold jump in its monthly lease rate, after its 25-year lease expired last August.

The Germans see a Fraport 2.0 shaping up – something that is reportedly spooking investors from the world’s third largest economy (and Europe’s largest).

Unless a compromise is struck soon, Lufthansa will reportedly pack up and relocate to more investment-friendly and predictable countries.

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The private sector addresses the weaknesses in governance, providing services that the state cannot deliver properly. But surely it’s not impossible to mobilize taxes to provide the infrastructure that we need, to spare the public from stiff road tolls and other fees.

Those trillions of pesos in public works funds pocketed by thieves could have built all the bypass roads, skyways and bridges that the government had to toss to the private sector. The trillions could have built science-based flood control projects that adhered to contract specs and actually worked.

In these infrastructure and budget anomalies, Doc BBM is not just trying to cure the patient. He won’t say it, but he must also be struggling to shield those close to him from being fatally zapped by his cure.

This cancer patient is already in the ICU. Yesterday, as part of his prescribed treatment, BBM and Congress leaders agreed to prioritize the passage of laws prohibiting dynasties, reforming the party-list system, creating an Independent People’s Commission and implementing blockchain technology to fight corruption.

I’ll laud this agreement if ever the proposals are actually enacted.

In diagnosing the disease, Doc BBM, a “nepo baby” of the entrenched Marcos-Romualdez dynasties, knows whereof he speaks. His mother, the immortal multiple-graft convict Imeldific, whom his family trots out to the public at every opportunity, is the best reminder of how corruption pays spectacularly in this country.

And yes, Juan and Juana, as the Marcoses’ dramatic reversal of fortunes showed, you can get away with it.

Right now, however, due to the lack of more palatable alternatives, the nation’s hopes are pinned on Doc BBM. Perhaps he can surprise us with a miracle cure.