THE OTHER DAY while having my usual caffeine fix not at the usual, which is Starbucks, but at Mrs. Wharton’s (a change of scenery hehehe), an old friend, a former beauty queen way back from my advertising and TV days, walked in. As she was by her lonesome, Moi invited her to my table.
Of course, she was delighted and over coffee and tea plus the delectable pastries we had a lovely time catching up, We had a lively and animated conversation on just about everything under the sun from fashion shows, typhoons to badminton.
Eventually the conversation drifted to politics. It was quite obvious we will go into that as the elections are just a week away.
And this where our story begins…
My friend asked me what can I say about Sen. Bong Revilla. Not much, I said, except for the fact that he and senators Jinggoy Estrada and Juan Ponce Enrile were the strongest presidentiables then and were targets of a political demolition job intended to pave the way for then president Noynoy Aquino’s heir apparent, Mar Roxas.
Despite the fact that almost all senators except for three all enjoyed their largesse – Priority Development Assistance Fund or PDAF and the Disbursement Acceleration Program or DAP – only Revilla, Estrada and Enrile were singled out and investigated then arrested and detained.
Of course, the whole plan backfired. The rest is history and Sen. Bong Revilla was given a new lease in his political life.
And she started a narrative on who Bong Revilla is:
Did you know, she said, that Revilla was the first politician to respond when Typhoon “Frank” hit and devastated Iloilo? The day after he sent almost 2,000 sacks of rice to help the typhoon victims.
Well and good. But what about his legislative work? He was a senator and the job description was a member of the legislature that legislated laws.
We all know that he was incarcerated pretty much of the 17th Congress so we really could not expect any substantial legislative output.
However, the last Congress he was part of before Noynoy Aquino’s presidential demolition job was the 16th Congress so let’s see what his accomplishments were:
During the 16th Congress, Sen. Ramon “Bong” Revilla Jr. authored/co-authored many bills now signed into law that have achieved that noble standard.
Foremost among those bills was Republic Act (RA) 10665 or Open High School System Act which he personally authored and shepherded through the whole legislative process until it was signed into law.
This bill created the Open High School Program (OHSP) which has opened an alternative program and given new hope for Filipinos who could not attend regular high school class programs due to personal, financial and other reasons.
Barely three months after RA 10665 became law, RA 10687 or the Unified Student Financing Assistance System for Tertiary Education (UniFAST) followed, this time assisting qualified but financially disadvantaged students obtain a college degree.
In the socio-economic front, his RA 10693, the Microfinance NGOs Act and RA 10817, the Philippine Halal Export Development Act, has been a great help to small entrepreneurs all over the country.
RA 10692, the PAGASA Modernization Actm has given a much-needed boost to PAGASA’s technological capabilities to track and analyse weather patterns and
RA 10821, the Children’s Emergency Relief and Protection Act, underscores his concern for the plight of the most vulnerable sector of society during typhoons and other such calamities.
Not bad, really. Not bad at all. In fact quite commendable comparing it to Noynoy Aquino’s track record or the lack of it when he was a member of the House of Representatives and Senate for 12 years; he spent those ears with zero output, not a single law to his name.
It makes one wonder what Noynoy Aquino was doing all those years in Congress; perhaps chain smoking Marlboros in the parking.
Bong Revilla would have probably made a much better president than that nincompoop Noynoy Aquino.
Take note folks that we just featured his accomplishments only in the 16th Congress and he started as a member of the 13th on to the 14th and 15th congresses.
Here are some notable laws among others that he authored from the 13th on to the 14th and 15th congresses:
* 13th Congress – Biofuel Act of 2006 and Anti-terrorism Act of 2005
* 14th Congress – RA 9710 Magna Carta of Women
* 15th Congress – Cybercrime Prevention Act of 2012
Well…well it seems Sen. Bong Revilla is a busy man with all that accomplishments, plus garnering in 2010 the most number of votes in Philippine electoral history, surpassing even the votes garnered by the elected president. It does not come as surprise why Noynoy Aquino had him targeted for political elimination.
Just the thought of a Bong Revilla presidency must have sent shivers to that nincompoop Noynoy Aquino making him squirm in his drawers.
My friend then added in the latest survey conducted by the Social Weather Stations (SWS) he was in the seventh spot for preference for senator this coming midterm elections on Monday, May 13.
Good for him then. Me, I’m just happy that if Bong Revilla returns to the Senate, he is going to piss off and make all the “devotees to the cult of the yellow ribbon” and the Frappuccino-infused trendy social climbers squirm in their Marks and Spencer knickers. So there. (brotherlouie16@gmail.com/PN)
