Kiss of death

With his record in public disservice, Antonio Trillanes IV does not deserve to be voted into whatever position he is contemplating seeking. Moreover, aspiring servants of government must disassociate from him or be infected by his stigma.

Government veterans such as former President Rodrigo Duterte and Chief Presidential Legal Counsel Juan Ponce Enrile know Trillanes’ caliber.

Duterte once branded Trillanes Senator “Retainer” for allegedly being the go-to guy for demolition operations against mostly targets of the yellow mob that he undertook using “leaked” documents.

Duterte, as chief executive, had access to a stream of reliable information on public officials, including Trillanes.

“Trillanes does not dabble in drugs but in the more lucrative business of prostituting his post to collect retainers from certain individuals,” Duterte had said.

A retainer is a regular payment to “retain” the services of a certain operator.

Trillanes was then a senator with the power to conduct inquiries or exposés on whomever he wished to put on the spot.

“It is known in the Senate that Trillanes uses his office to ask for retainers and this has become a lucrative business for him,” Duterte had said.

The first time Mr. “Retainer” was exposed was through his own mouth when he admitted conducting back-channel talks with China over the then worsening South China Sea situation.

In a confrontation with then-Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile sometime in September 2012, Trillanes was found to have been providing his services to Noynoy without the Senate’s knowledge.

Trillanes told media prior to the confrontation that then Foreign Affairs Secretary Albert del Rosario was sabotaging his “back-channeling” efforts with China.

Taking the floor, Enrile revealed the so-called Brady notes that were taken when Trillanes met with then-Philippine ambassador to China Sonia Brady in Beijing sometime in August 2012 where he supposedly criticized Del Rosario.

Trillanes walked out of the face-off with Enrile who exposed his incompetence as Noynoy’s agent.

“He can’t take the heat. He’s a coward,” Enrile said of Trillanes as he was leaving the hall.

Just recently, Trillanes tried to launch his flagging political prospects for next year’s polls by filing graft cases against his nemesis. The complaints were based on recycled allegations dating back to 2016.

It doesn’t matter that he is firing blanks against his opponents just so he is creating a public stir to remind voters of his futile bid for the Senate.

Trillanes said more cases will be filed before the Department of Justice which would likely involve more rehashed but debunked issues such as the fat bank accounts of the Duterte family.

The AMLC during the heat of the Trillanes offensive against Duterte denied having supplied the hapless putschist with documents regarding his allegations.

After being proven to have lied, Trillanes then asked Duterte to issue a waiver for the bank secrecy law so he could examine the latter’s bank records.

Trillanes tried to shift the burden of proving his charges of ill-gotten wealth on Duterte after he convincingly won the presidency in 2016. The recycled accusations failed to create a dent in Duterte and instead further propelled his survey ratings while Trillanes descended into political perdition.

The height of stupidity was that he believed that Duterte would help him accomplish his demolition operation.