I don’t know about you but I struggle at the thought that a retired judge was appointed to a regulatory body for numbers games and small-town lotteries.
That’s like taking a goldfish out of its fishbowl and letting him loose in the open sea. But that’s just me.
So the newly-appointed chairman of the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO) is Judge Felix Reyes (retired) of the Marikina RTC. He was also the president of the Philippine Judges Association (PJA) and a member of the PCSO board.
It is not clear why former chair Junie Cua was replaced, but all I can surmise is that this could be because of recent controversies hounding the agency over the alleged rigging of its lotteries to favor friends of the PCSO.
Also, the agency drew flak for manipulating the photo of one of its lottery winners, and no less than PCSO GM Mel Robles insisted that it was purposely done to protect the identity of the winner, which thereafter fueled speculations that the draws were fictitious and staged.
Methinks the best way to protect any winner’s identity is to not even show his or her photo in public – real or photoshopped. The PCSO is a government agency under the OP, its task is to raise funds and provide them to health programs, medical services, and charities through races, lotteries, sweepstakes, and as well as health and welfare-related placements.
The agency was created in 1935 via an approved Act 4130 under President Manuel Quezon for which the law was passed by the Philippine Legislature on October 30, 1934, thus creating the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes, replacing then National Charity Sweepstakes.
For a country that boasts as the only Christian nation (that’s not even accurate) in Asia, we sure put so much emphasis on gambling and in the numbers game, being a country of almost 85% Roman Catholics, 6% to nationalized cults, and 2% to some 100 Protestant denominations.
You don’t believe me? Just ask any priest who loves to gamble away some of that collection money. Remember, they just love bingo socials too, right? So why put a judge there?
When a close relative of mine was a justice of the Supreme Court, he would not even attend parties and social functions or even ribbon-cutting ceremonies even after his retirement.
He refused to dishonor the office he once occupied, plus the fact that the title stays with the person until death.
But sad to say, times have changed indeed, but Filipinos still love to gamble away – magistrates, priests, and the hoi polloi.
The appointed son of God as fugitive
Pastor Apollo Quiboloy has a lot of explaining to do both to his church members and to the courts. And most especially to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).
I am told that Quiboloy has connections in Calabasas, California, Las Vegas, Nevada, and Kapolei in Oahu. Well, that’s quite a remarkable place to receive a kalabasa award and for him to get lei’d, right? Right.
He is the founder of the controversial Kingdom Of Jesus Christ (KOJC) where he claims he is the “appointed Son of God” on earth. A cult leader who claims to have seven million followers,
Quiboloy is the only “son of God” who’s afraid to face the music, and would rather run away from justice.
The true Son of God never did that. He faced them squarely and defeated them with his spoken Word. He is wanted by the FBI for his alleged participation in a labor trafficking scheme that brought several church members to the US by obtaining fraudulent visas while forcing church members to solicit donations for a bogus charity and donations that were used to finance church operations and lavish lifestyles of church leaders.
According to the website of the FBI, it is alleged that females were recruited to work as personal assistants for Quiboloy, and that victims prepared his meals, cleaned his residences, gave him massages, and were required to have sex with him in what was called “night duty.”
Furthermore, the website says that Quiboloy was indicted by a federal grand jury in the US District Court for the Central District of California, Sta. Ana, California for conspiracy to engage in sex trafficking by force, fraud, and coercion and sex trafficking of children, bulk cash smuggling, and on November 10, 2021, a federal warrant was issued for his arrest.
It’s only a matter of time till they get him, even if the Dutertes are reported to be hiding him somewhere in Davao, being their spiritual adviser.
Thus, from a late-breaking news, the Supreme Court has ruled that Quiboloy will have to face trial in Metro Manila instead of his home base in Davao City, after the court ordered the transfer of his cases for sexual and child abuse, citing its mandate “to avoid a miscarriage of justice.”
This, after a request of Justice Secretary Jesus Crispin “Boying” Remulla to move the location of Quiboloy’s criminal cases be transferred from RTC Davao City to RTC Quezon City.
The reason behind this is simply because Quiboloy is known to be a very influential religious leader in Davao, hence the transfer was necessary to level the playing field so to speak.
Well, lesson learned, it’s always better to avoid organized religion and instead practice safe sects. (pun intended).
Desali Nation
With the coming rains, floodwaters will be everywhere once again. No high ground will ever be assured of safety as water levels will be rising rapidly. But the irony of it all is that drinking water, God forbid, may be scarce in a few years.
And because of this, government technical advisers and scientists would consider desalination as a solution to an imminent and serious drinking water shortage, especially when calamities strike.
This process, the removal of salt from sea water, is practiced routinely in many Middle Eastern countries which have turned many of their deserts into lush fruit and vegetable farms.
Distillation is the most widely-used desalination process today. A simple form of distillation apparatus is used in countries with salt water and intense sunlight – like the Philippines. Salt water is placed under a transparent cover and the sun’s rays partially vaporize the water.
The water vapor is caught in the transparent cover and, when it condenses into liquid form, water flows into a collecting through. Other processes make use of the fact that when salt water is frozen, the ice crystals contain no salt.
There are proposals for large-scale nuclear desalination which our current government can make inquiries about. But other more affordable desalination includes freezing, reverse osmosis, ionic processes, electrodialysis and techniques that change the physical and chemical properties of salt water – including the ones used by the Chinese for their water cannons.
And with the hundreds of millions of pesos used by the water companies in the country, how come no government expert has been assigned to look into these desalination programs?
Preliminary inquiries could be made with embassies of countries which have been utilizing successful desalination programs, and perhaps even our home-grown experts can be sent abroad to further look for a most suitable program for the country.
This is one expense that the people will surely welcome.
Paging Secretary DoST Secretary Renato Solidum Jr.