You’ve got to laugh. If you don’t, you cry. Police stormed a condominium in Bonifacio Global City to serve an arrest warrant. And shocker: The man who flew out after President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s last State of the Nation Address was not home.
Make a warrant. Realize the suspect is in another time zone. Go to the condo anyway. Pretend you did something. One of the most brilliant displays of “we are totally not serious” we’ve ever seen.
And have you noticed — because everyone else has — how tender, how strangely nurturing the administration was toward Zaldy Co before he opened his mouth, as if they were watching someone babysit a grenade?
As if somebody whispered, very softly, “Zaldy, buddy, champ, why don’t you take a little break? Japan? Europe? Anywhere without a Senate hearing. Somewhere you can’t accidentally tell the truth?”
Then he talks. And the government? “Activate everything!” The fastest due process in history. Where was this energy hiding? Under the rug?
Then the Ombudsman (good boy, very obedient) is tapped to “handle” things. Romualdez gets a polite slap on the wrist just for balance.
And Zaldy? “Produce evidence.” But, of course, the evidence is useless if those heading the Department of Justice, the Department of the Interior and Local Government and the Ombudsman are your men.
So everyone now pretends this begins and ends with Zaldy. One lonely villain. One fall guy. Sacrificial goat.
The former Senate president lives just down the road — maybe a little farther, who knows — and yet, there was nary a ding-dong at his door. Not even a knock-knock joke: “Chiz who? Chiz who knows nothing but saw everything?”
Curious question: What can Chiz tell us about Zaldy’s confessions?
House Deputy Speaker Ronaldo Puno blamed Escudero and Zaldy for “the most corrupt budget of all time.”
He alleged the “small committee,” which finalized the allocations, included Escudero and Co, while Speaker Romualdez was absent and Poe, too, but mostly barred from attending meetings.
Closed-circuit television footage allegedly showed Escudero visiting the House twice during bicam, even on a holiday.
We don’t have to buy Puno’s story, but the Senate had a man — Chiz — who had line items that tower over Zaldy’s. Who wrote the bigger check?
Why is only one half of the alleged duo getting condo raids? If the budget is a puzzle, Chiz holds half the missing pieces. Why isn’t anyone asking?
If the small committee finalized the budget insertions and the version sent back to Congress already included them, who on the Senate side approved these changes? Where’s the SWAT team for Chiz? Given that he was allegedly present at the small committee, isn’t he equally responsible for oversight, just as Zaldy Co is being held accountable?
Because if Bongbong presses Chiz too hard, he becomes the next Zaldy. It’s not going to be only a story about one guy, but a symphony of evidence.
Fast, Mr. President. If your administration taught us anything, it’s that we’re very good at watching people leave the country right before we remember to look for them.