LIFE’S INSPIRATIONS: “… Do not withhold good from those to whom it is due, when it is in your power to act…” (Psalm 3:27, the Holy Bible).
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FILIPINOS HAVE BECOME MALICIOUS: Filipinos, really, have become a thoroughly malicious nation. Once they fixed in their mind that something is wrong with another or with someting, and they were led to criticize the supposed wrong, no more subsequent manifestation of good faith on the part of the people who are said to have been involved in the alleged wrongdoing will ever be acceptable to them.
The example of the scandal that currently embroils both the Department of Tourism (DOT) and Bitag Media Production Unit, Inc shows this. When news of this problem was publicized by the Commission on Audit (COA), almost all the critics of Ben and Erwin Tulfo of Bitag, and of their sibling, DOT Secretary Wanda Tulfo Teo, uniformly ganged up on them, crying that the Tulfos should return the amount involved in the scandal, which is P60 million.
On Monday, May 07, 2018, after a family council meeting, the lawyer of Sec. Teo announced to the media that Bitag would return the whole of the P60 million, up to the last centavo. They decided to do this, it would appear, not because they were admitting that the transaction involving all of them was illegal, but to show that money was not the only consideration of the Tulfos in the transaction in question.
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FILIPINOS NO LONGER HAVE GOOD FAITH: How did their critics respond to this show of utmost good faith? They again chanted, in unison, that the return by the Tulfos of the P60 million is no longer important; that the Ombudsman should continue investigating them; and that Secretary Teo should resign just the same from her post at DOT. Well, well, well! Evidently, among many Filipinos, good faith—or the good intention of a person— is no longer of any value.
The rule of thumb among right thinking Filipinos had always been, and, of course, should always be that, once a person who is being accused by his critics of wrongdoing is able to show good faith in his transactions, similar to what the Tulfos had done in their decision to return the contested P60 million even if no legal proceeding has taken place yet, criticisms and character assassination should already cease.
The problem with many Filipinos, however, is this: good faith is no longer important nor relevant to them. The only important thing for them is for them to able to criticize, and, as in the case of the Tulfos who are proven to be very close with President Duterte, to criticize likewise their political patrons. The motive behind their criticisms is no longer the good of the many, but simply the destruction of their enemies.
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I DO NOT CONFORM TO TULFOS’ RETURN OF P60 M: Be that as it may, from where I sit, principally because of this predisposition to simply criticize now gripping many Filipinos, the Tulfos should not have decided right away to return any money their company received on the basis of their contract with PTV 4. First, their contract with the government media station is legal and legitimate, and remains to be valid and binding, even now.
Second, even while there is already some fury stirred by the COA findings, they remain nothing but, yes, “furious disclosures”. COA has not proven anything yet at the moment. If we look into COA’s past history, it has similarly flagged down many other government contracts and officials, yet the ultimate decision on what to do with the transactions being complained of by COA remains dependent on legal and judicial processes where everyone is given the right to due process first.
If Ben and Erwin found time to ask me, I would have told them to avoid rush or rash decision, and just wait for the appropriate orders from the appropriate courts, before agreeing or deciding to return anything, if ever returning money would be one of the options. The truth is that, both DOT and PTV4 already benefitted from the media programs where they are the hosts, precisely because they have discharged their contractual obligations with PTV 4.
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