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The Filipino nation rediscovers its brave heart
AS I WRECK THIS CHAIR By William M. Esposo
The Philippine Star 2008-02-14
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In this month of romance, Filipinos have been gifted with a national brave heart in the person of one quite unlikely folk hero, Rodolfo “Jun” Lozada.
Doctors and Filipino-Chinese are usually the last to become involved in political affairs or to express their outrage over a big scandal or issue. The gutsy example of Jun Lozada changed all that.
Reacting to the racial slur of Presidential Legal Counsel Sergio Apostol (of “Madame Wetness” fame) who said that Lozada should be deported for being a Tsinoy (the abbreviated term for Chinese-Pinoy), I received this SMS message from a Tsinoy friend:
“When Jun Lozada said that he’s a “PROBIN-SYANONG INTSIK” (Chinese from the province) and that he’s the son of poor Chinese migrants who wants this country to be a better place, Sergio Apostol, a cabinet secretary of GMA (Madame Gloria Macapagal Arroyo), insulted him for being a “Crying Boy” and Intsik and that he should be deported to China.
Didn’t Apostol know that we Filipino-Chinese contributed a lot for the growth of this country?
I am proud to be a Filipino but I can’t bear to be insulted for my Chinese heritage because I am also proud of it. I’d rather be called Intsik than be the likes of Apostol, Gonzalez, Puno and Arroyo et al who run this country like a Mafia.”
Then I was able to talk to Fil-Chinese activist and advocate Tessie Ang See who provided me with her own statement, as follows:
“All of us Filipinos take pride in having a Jun Lozada in our midst. For Tsinoys especially, who often prefer to be bystanders, we salute him for standing up for what is the right thing to do.
Sec. Sergio Apostol’s racist comment is uncalled for and insensitive. He should work to exile corrupt public servants instead and fill up the Philippines with upright people regardless of ethnic origins. That’s the only way our country can truly be great again.”
Dra. Minguita Padilla delivered a statement last February 10 (during a presscon of doctors) on behalf of the “Silent Majority” among Filipino doctors (Clinicians and members of the academe).
Dra. Padilla said: “We must speak out, even if we might be just voices in the wilderness. Silence is not an option.
We empathize with our honest, hard working, dedicated career bureaucrats who have to suffer under the leadership of inept and corrupt political appointees who use their positions simply as a means to enrich themselves. But we also believe that they are not helpless; we are not helpless to effect change and to bring about a TRUE moral revolution.
Jun Lozada has shown that it can be done. And so we are making our voices heard, not just to show our public support for Jun Lozada’s action, but more importantly to try to make sure his sacrifice is not in vain.
And so we demand that the list of all political appointees be made public so that these may be scrutinized by the citizenry and examined, and that the unqualified, inept, and corrupt among them either resign or be made to resign by the president.
We demand that the ombudsman start serious investigations on the growing number of cases filed before it, instead of just sitting on them and hoping we forget. Our public officials must be held accountable.
She then exhorted government workers: “We also call upon the good men and women in our government who are sick and tired of being made parties to corruption and all sorts of crimes in high places to all do a Jun Lozada. We know that there are still so many of you who would like to preserve the good within you so that you don’t end up losing your souls.
Denounce the evil that you are being forced to accept and participate in. In an administration where those who lie, steal and murder are rewarded, and those who uphold what is right are punished, you must reclaim the bureaucracy so that goodness may again prevail and suffocate and drive out those who can only thrive in darkness.”
Dra. Padilla closed with this: “Finally, we call on our citizens who ranted and raved, who were enraged and moved to tears as they witnessed Jun Lozada tell his story, who called him a hero, to join us in this call. Join us in this movement to bring goodness back into our government so that this can spill into all aspects of our national life.
Jun Lozada is but one example of the power of one man’s courage and determination to do the right thing. Imagine what we can do if we act together. The goal must be to reclaim government so that we may reclaim our nation.”
The reign of tyrants are about to end when the lambs of society start to roar like lions. Smart tyrants will cut clean. The others will simply be overrun by the tide of history.
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