Vol. 1 No.

2 of The Layout
2 Opinion Page | March 2020

THE VOICE Benito Iñigo Chan

Red-tagging as weapon in electoral campaign
Standing up to the neighborhood bully
Whoever is elected president on May 9 should
not be palsy-walsy with China, so the Philippines
can get the respect it deserves.
Our being too friendly with our big neighbor is
probably mistaken for obsequiousness. But let’s not
be too confrontational with China either.
Several incidents at the Panatag (Scarborough)
Shoal, wherein China coast guard ships either drove
or practically whisked away vessels carrying the
Philippine flag, have become common occurrences,
because we don’t stand our ground.
The incidents could be considered as a global
superpower bullying an itsy-bitsy country.
The reason for the continuous bullying at the Pa-
natag Shoal or Bajo de Masinloc, a traditional fishing
area for Filipino fishermen, is our seemingly meek
attitude.
Why don’t we do an Indonesia, whose coast
guard ships would persuade Chinese men-o’-war to
retreat from a confrontation over areas claimed by
both Indonesia and China?
This columnist used to agree with President
Rodrigo “Digong” Duterte’s stand that if a shooting
war erupts between our ships and those of China
over disputed areas in the South China Sea – or West
Philippine Sea as we call them – our ships would be
wiped out. But now I’ve changed my mind since the
fight between Russia and Ukraine. China would be-
come a pariah in the international community if she
fought us over contested areas in the West Philippine
Sea.
Even if we lose the fight, the Big Dragon would
lose its reputation as a peaceful,
willing-to-compromise titan.
Russia has become a leper in the community of
nations for invading Ukraine.
From where I sit as a former special envoy to
China who once had backchats with middle-level
Chinese officials and businessmen, our neighbor-
hood superpower will try to avoid being an outcast
in the community of nations.
In my back-channeling with some Chinese busi-
nessmen and middle-level officials through dinner
and moutai, the national liquor, I found that the
Chinese bureaucracy is so big and cumbersome that
oftentimes the right hand doesn’t know what the left
hand is doing.
The Layout Editorial Board
SY: 2021-2020
Editor-in-chief| Juan dela Cruz
News Editor| Leni Robredo
Features Editor| Bongbong Marcos
Science Editor| Isko Moreno
Sports Editor| Manny Pacquiao
Layout Artist| Ping Lacson
Photojournalist| Ka Leody
One wouldn’t have been surprised, but definitely would have wished that President Duterte – basically in
self-respect but much more so in respect for his high public office – shouldn’t have done it.
Without offering proof, in his televised public address last Monday, Duterte again accused the Maka-
bayan Coalition of using the party-list system to infiltrate Congress through its five party-list election partic-
ipants. These parties have all been duly vetted and certified by the Comelec in every national election since
2001 – when Bayan Muna topped the party-list voting that year, winning the maximum allowable three seats
in the House of Representatives. Bayan Muna has maintained representation in the House until today.
“So you won’t forget, remember the KABAG,” Duterte said, using a pejorative acronym (kabag pertains
to stomach discomfort) in reference to the five Makabayan parties: Kabataan, Anakpawis, Bayan Muna, ACT
Teachers and Gabriela Women’s Party. Accusing these organizations of supporting communist rebels, he
urged voters: “Do not vote for them. Let us put an end to that.”
Duterte wasn’t even original in coining the acronym. PhilSTAR reported last Thursday that Duterte’s
claim “echoed the narrative being pushed” by Lorraine Badoy, whose job title is Presidential Communica-
tions and Operations Office (PCOO) Undersecretary and a spokesperson for the National Task Force to
End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC). That’s odd. As NTF-ELCAC chairperson, the Presi-
dent was merely echoing his subordinate’s narrative, not the other way around.
Badoy had coined the term “kabag,” alleging the Makabayan parties were “fronts” and “urban operatives”
of the CPP-NPA. She had also posted on the NTF-ELCAC Facebook account and website that Vice Presi-
dent Leni Robredo was conspiring with the CPP-NPA after the Makabayan Coalition formally endorsed her
presidential candidacy.
Last week several progressive groups, including Makabayan, filed three separate complaints before the
Office of the Ombudsman, followed by another one last Wednesday – all charging Badoy with violating the
Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act and the Code of Conduct and Ethical Standards for Public Officials
and Employees. Another complaint, for electioneering and violating the Omnibus Election Code, has been
filed before the Comelec.
Assured of Duterte’s backing, Badoy has continued to act and speak impudently, and arrogantly carry on
with her red-tagging and false claims. Her latest outrageous act: she interviewed, for almost three hours in-
side the National Bilibid Prisons, inmate retired Army Maj. Gen. Jovito Palparan, Jr. The latter was convict-
ed, in 2018, and sentenced to life imprisonment for the kidnapping, serious illegal detention and disappear-
ance in 2016 of two former University of the Philippines students, Karen Empeño and Sherlyn Cadapan.
During the interview, aired last Wednesday on SMNI, the television outfit of Duterte’s close friend Apollo
Quiboloy, Badoy told Palparan: “The reason why we have invited you is, of course, to honor you, to vindicate
you and to show the Filipino people the harm that the (CPP-NPA-NDF) has done to us as a people.” She
claimed that Palparan had been convicted on “trumped-up” charges.
Asked to explain how Badoy was allowed to pull off such a malicious stunt, Justice Secretary Menardo
Guevarra lamely told the media his office was investigating how and why the interview happened.
Reacting to Duterte’s claim of infiltration of Congress via the party-list system, the Comelec vowed to
look into the matter. Commissioner George Garcia, however, pointed out that the Comelec could only act
if a petition for disqualification or cancellation of any party-list registration had been filed. As of now, he
explained, the party-list groups have been accredited and given “vested rights” to participate in the May 9
elections which, he emphasized, “we will have to respect.”
Last Wednesday, the Makabayan bloc described Duterte’s renewed verbal attack
against them as “a desperate election squid tactic to create a wedge in
the growing numbers of the political opposition that sup-
port the Leni Robredo-Kiko Pangilinan tandem, as
well as to prevent the eventual reelection
of progressive party-lists to
Congress.” “Clear-
ly lacking in
admissible
and credible
evidence that
will stand in
court,” said
House Dep-
uty Minority
Leader and
Bayan Muna
Rep. Carlos
Isagani Zarate,
Duterte and his minions “now resort to guilt by mere
association.” It’s a ploy also designed, he added, “to divert the attention of the people from the failings of the
Duterte administration in the past six years, especially during this time of the pandemic.”

Death and Taxes

The estate tax is levied for the privilege of transferring the
covered assets of a deceased
person to the heirs.
This is one of the things I have learned in my crash course
on Taxation 101, after
President Duterte himself asked aloud, in his most recent
stream-of-consciousness briefing, why
the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) is not collecting the
estate tax.
Duterte did not mention any names. But because the only
prominent estate tax case at
this time involves the billions that the BIR has been trying
to collect for over two decades now
(with the latest formal demand sent by the bureau on Dec.
2 last year) from the heirs of dictator
Ferdinand Marcos, people inevitably believed the Presi-
dent’s remark was aimed at the
administrator of the late dictator’s estate, his only son and
namesake Ferdinand “Bongbong” Jr.
Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez reiterated that the
BIR has been trying to collect the estate
tax, originally set at P23 billion, from the Marcoses, but the
family argues that the assets in
question are still under litigation, amid continuing efforts
of the Philippine government to
recover ill-gotten wealth. This issue had been settled by the
Supreme Court (SC) in a 1997 ruling on the estate tax
case, saying it was “at a loss as to how these cases are rele-
vant to the matter at issue.”
“The mere fact that the decedent has pending cases involv-
ing ill-gotten wealth does not
affect the enforcement of tax assessments over the proper-
ties indubitably included in his
estate,” the SC ruled.
The SC ruling became final and executory on March 9,
1999, as confirmed by the
Department of Finance, which has supervision over the
BIR. The amount reportedly ballooned
to an estimated P203 billion because of surcharges, interest
and related fees.
THE CLASH Benito Iñigo Chan
Despite that clear-cut ruling, successive administrations,
including that of Noynoy
Aquino, failed to enforce the SC ruling, or to file tax-relat-
ed criminal charges.
Certain quarters have bewailed this act of omission by the
government. They cite people
they know, who couldn’t even focus on grieving properly
for their dearly departed because the
tax police kept breathing down their neck. Some ended up
losing the assets in question because
of their failure to settle the estate tax in time.
Meanwhile, here we are, children of a lesser God, with the
Duterte administration
refusing to suspend even one percent of the 12 percent
value-added tax and additional excise
taxes on petroleum products as fuel prices surge.