President Rodrigo Duterte delivered a slam-dunk when he told ranking Daily Tribune executives in a meeting late Thursday that the Philippine Southeast Asian Games Organizing Committee (Phisgoc) Foundation Inc. should have no role in the country’s hosting of the 30th Southeast Asian Games. Hold My Beer of former Makati Mayor Jejomar Binay in 2016. Interestingly, the big boss of the Phisgoc in Cayetano, the former Foreign Affairs Secretary, was not part of Phisgoc Foundation. In a previous interview, he admitted that they deliberately excluded him from the list of original incorporators “because we didn’t want complications of a government official being in (Phisgoc) board.” Wow! How convenient. The POC executive board cried over this set up. They demanded an explanation from Vargas, but instead of shedding light over the matter, the POC chief tendered his irrevocable resignation from the Council. Obviously, the Chief Executive is aware of what’s going on. He knows that the biennial meet is such a massive endeavor that involves government money. So, putting it in the hands of a purely private entity with no accountability at all surely invites disaster Phisgoc’s leadership structure already tells a lot of stories. In its Articles of Incorporation, it shows that there are eight original incorporators. Among them are four former Philippine Olympic Committee (POC) officials in Ricky Vargas, Patrick Gregorio, Ed Picson and Tom Carrasco. The four other incorporators in Donaldo Caringal, Ramon Suzara, Monica Mitra and Dexter Estacio, however, are not part of either the PSC or POC families. They are members of the inner circle of Phisgoc chairman Alan Peter Cayetano. The four are purely private individuals and sports outsiders who could not be held accountable to the funds being released by government. Caringal is Cayetano’s boyhood pal at La Salle Zobel. Their Physical Education teacher was Suzara, the former Philippine Superliga president whose ties with his volleyball colleagues were severed by financial issues and other accusations hurled against him. A quick Google search on Caringal and Suzara would definitely yield a lot of “interesting” results. We’re not really sure about Mitra’s job description with Cayetano. All we know is that she has his ear and you have to go through her first if you want to reach the lawmaker from Taguig, if at all. Then, there’s Estacio. Multiple sources said Estacio is just a mere graphic artist at the Taguig City Hall. But he was elected as treasurer of Phisgoc who has control over the billions of pesos that the Foundation would raise through sponsorships, donations, subsidies and, yes, government money. He was also said to be one of the passengers of the helicopter that took aerial shots of the so-called Hacienda Binay in Rosario town in Batangas. The photos taken there played a crucial role in the demolition plot aimed at thwarting the Presidential bid Julius Manicad That resignation is the major problem that the POC is facing right now. Three executive council members followed suit while some of Vargas’ supporters are still claiming that they are still the rightful leaders, prompting the International Olympic Committee and the Olympic Council of Asia to step in and call for special elections. Actually, the Phisgoc’s leadership structure already tells a lot of stories. Anyway, it’s business as usual for Phisgoc. With Suzara calling the shots, Phisgoc executives organized the second chiefs of mission meeting also last Thursday at a posh hotel in Pasay City. Everybody was present except for a group of men who were supposed to serve as hosts — the POC board members. Apparently, they were not invited to crucial meetings. They felt slighted as all they got was an invite to a meaningless dinner. When Philippine Sports Commission chairman William “Butch” Ramirez told Phisgoc to invite acting POC president Joey Romasanta and secretary general Charlie Ho to the meetings, nobody lifted a finger. He gave the two officials rooms at the hotel as courtesy, but some Phisgoc executives simply brushed off his order. When Ramirez insisted that Romasanta, the highest- ranking sport official in the eyes of the SEA Games Federation Council, should be in the meeting, all Phisgoc officials did was to come up with an ugly, hand-written nameplate of Romasanta and placed it on the presidential table to send a message that “yes, we invited him, but he didn’t come.” Few hours later, Duterte made the pronouncement. He wants the government, meaning the PSC, to take full control of the SEA Games hosting in coordination with the POC, which is the rightful franchise-holder of the biennial meet in the country. In short, the President wants full accountability over government money. And it’s something Phisgoc couldn’t provide.