The whole country of the Philippines and ALL the citizens in it and around the world have been tarnished by this tragic incident. The excuses and reasons that we now read and see from the politicians, the police, the media, and ordinary citizens just make them even worse.
1. The Media: It's nice for ABSCBN to make their statements. Unfortunately the statements made ended up washing their hands in the end. The best and honourable thing to do right now is to admit our faults. Admission heals and calms. You may admit on the ten faults you made but as soon as you justify even just one, the admission, the sincerity all become useless and unfortunately only fuels the already unstable situation.
2. The Police. From the lowest to the highest rank. – No equipment, no training, no morale, no self-respect, no honor. This is not a put down but all the things that contributed to the tragedy. The best thing I heard was the admission by the few on how ill-prepared they are, how they made the wrong decision, and not saying it’s somebody else’s fault. Unfortunately those who were at fault need to face the consequences. That is the honourable thing to do. The officials need to take those actions. And if the action includes admission of fault at the highest levels, then resignations should be made. Let’s show the world that there is still a little bit of self respect and honor left in our blood.
3. Ordinary citizens. How on earth could you stand in front of that bus and take pictures?
4. The Politicians:
a. Senators - every time something happens your first reaction is ‘you will investigate’. Aren’t you all tired of all the investigations that you have started? Worst of all, aren’t you all ashamed that no justice has been achieved by all of your investigations? Please look yourselves in the mirror. Make our country proud. Make yourselves proud.
b. Mr Congressmen of the opposition, how could you, with straight faces, face the country and make statements that the previous president did better in this crisis? The new president has been in the position for two months. The previous, for nine years! What failed? The current administration didn’t hire the SWAT team during the last two months. The current administration didn’t take away their equipment budget, nor ‘untrained’ them in the last two months. How many hundreds of millions of pork barrel were you getting from the previous president that you pocketed instead of making this country be respected by its own people and be honourable around the world?
c. Mr. Lim – Humility is the best policy. We screwed up and that’s the bottom line.
d. Mr President – I know you inherited everything but unfortunately you are now at the helm. The police failed, the media failed, the politicians failed, your ordinary people failed, and unfortunately, you, your cabinet, and our country failed. It will take a long time to rise up from this. Every action that you make now will be critical. You will need to make a lot of difficult and unpopular decisions but they need to be made.
To All. We need to slowly gain back the little respect that we had. We need to show that we are serious with the reform. We need to make people accountable and not just by saying it but by showing that we acted on it. To the politicians who pocketed your millions, give them back so that we can create jobs for Filipinos. So that they don’t need to go to Hongkong to work and clean their toilets (no disrespect meant) and face the anger and humiliation that they are now facing. You all went into politics to make this your means of livelihood and not to serve your country. You and only your actions can prove otherwise. To the police, the worst failure we’ve seen in a long time. Everyone has blamed you. You need to pay the consequences, then rise up from all of this. The ones with honor and respect left need to resign. Those who do not have any, need to be let go. That includes the ombudsperson.
To the victims and their families and to the citizens of Hongkong. Philippines and its people failed you. I am deeply ashamed, embarrassed, and sincerely sorry for this tragedy. I am hopeful that those who failed in their duties pay their consequences soon. I am hopeful that immediate actions are taken to prevent this from ever happening again.
am hopeful that ALL the Filipino people wake up from this and look at ourselves and not to the person across from us. We all know what’s good and bad, what’s patriotic and what’s not, what’s honourable and what is not. One Hundred Million of us can do a lot to make our country proud. …. But we have to start on our own selves…