Editor’s Take By ISAGANI De CASTRO JR.   I’ve been a fan of Miriam Defensor-Santiago ever since she became a national figure during the Aquino administration. She rose to fame as an anti-corruption fighter at the then Commission on Immigration and De Editor’s Take By ISAGANI De CASTRO JR.  

I’ve been a fan of Miriam Defensor-Santiago ever since she became a national figure during the Aquino administration. She rose to fame as an anti-corruption fighter at the then Commission on Immigration and Deportation (CID) where she fought alien criminal syndicates, and at the Department of Agrarian Reform, where then President Aquino tasked her to check on overpriced land valuations and other anomalies.  

I’ve been a fan of Miriam Defensor-Santiago ever since she became a national figure during the Aquino administration. She rose to fame as an anti-corruption fighter at the then Commission on Immigration and Deportation (CID) where she fought alien criminal syndicates, and at the Department of Agrarian Reform, where then President Aquino tasked her to check on overpriced land valuations and other anomalies.  
 

Who can forget her response to a question about alleged threats to her life she was then receiving? “I eat death threats for breakfast!” she told reporters.  
 

Promising change and reform like Democratic presidential nominee Barrack Obama, Santiago joined the 1992 presidential elections and won the hearts of millions of Filipinos. She narrowly lost to Fidel Ramos in the official count, but Santiago claimed she was cheated of victory.  
 

It’s been fun watching and listening to her in the past two decades.  
 

She’s probably the only Cabinet official who’s been photographed wearing a bathing suit! She was on the cover of Asiaweek magazine, carrying a gun, under the headline: “Top Gun, Watch Out, Bad Guys – Miriam’s Coming.”  
 

She’s been, by far, the most quotable Filipino politician. Reporters flock to her for good soundbites, her ability to explain complicated issues in simple language.  
 

She has called a congressman “fungus-faced”, even challenging him to a fistfight.  
 

In her first confirmation hearing as secretary of DAR, Santiago said she felt like “Indiana Jones in the Temple of Doom.”  In one Commission on Appointments hearing, she was quoted as having said: “I am surrounded by idiots.”  
 

While on an elevator in Congress, Santiago once said: “There’s no intelligent life down there. Beam me up, Scotty.”  
 

In response to public servants who organized a protest after she was named DAR secretary, Santiago said: “Discombobulated moral retardates!”  
 

Throughout her political career, she has made good fun of Congress, the Cabinet (“A cabinet meeting has a decided soporific effect”), public relations firms (“Miserable little intellectual amoeba!”), and many others who have attacked her.  
 

Be the judge

Recently, this Web site and its staff were on the receiving end of Senator Santiago’s verbal attack.  
 

Last week, she accused us of “blackmail” for a series of articles on the Joint Power Congressional Commission (JCPC), which she co-heads. She claimed that the “giant Lopez business empire” was trying to blackmail her since she was an “advocate of reduced power rates from Meralco.”  
 

We prefer to let our readers be the judge of whether these articles constitute blackmail. Click on the articles:

Related Links • EPIRA author says power commission may be unlawful
• Santiago orders ERC to reduce power rates
• Senate probes on power sector show poor track record in legislation
• Power commission: big budget, excess authority
 

We would like to put on record though that in most, if not all of these articles, it is not this Web site speaking or commenting about the JCPC. The writers talked with several sources, including Santiago’s former colleague in the Senate, Senator John Osmena, who gave opinions and analysis of the JCPC.  
 

Apparently, what really pissed Senator Santiago was the article, “RP faces tough challenge in ICJ campaign for Santiago,” which said her campaign for a seat in the International Court of Justice (ICJ) was an “uphill battle.”
 
 

Public scrutiny

For the record, this ICJ article was assigned to the writer months before the issue of Meralco power rates became a national debate. Too much work just got in the way of writing it and having it published earlier.  
 

And just to put things in perspective, this Web site has also published a piece favorable to Santiago’s bid for the ICJ. Click here: Campaign for Santiago's ICJ nomination starts
 

In addition, this Web site has also published Santiago’s critical comments of Meralco. Read this piece: Miriam blames 'syndicates' in Meralco for high rates, firm denies charge
 

The piece on Santiago’s ICJ campaign was an article that assessed her chances of being chosen by the UN for the post. This is a valid public interest issue. It brings to public scrutiny, not only the qualifications of the candidate, but also the circumstances of the nomination.  
 

President Arroyo’s choices for many posts have always been a public interest issue, and the choice of Santiago is again a reflection of the President’s interests and considerations. We try to answer the question: Are the President’s appointments primarily based on qualifications or do political interests bear heavily on her choices? 
 

Good soundbites

Still, it’s been fun listening to Santiago through these years.  
 

In November last year, (and this was way before the issue of Meralco’s power rates came up), a retired diplomat I talked with couldn’t help but smile after listening to Santiago’s comment at the Senate investigation on the NBN-ZTE scandal, where she said that the “Chinese invented corruption”, for which she later apologized. The retired diplomat told this writer, well, there goes her ICJ bid. China, as one of the members of the UN Security Council, will have big say on who gets appointed to the ICJ.   
 

Good luck, Senator Santiago! As one of your close observers, I hope the Philippines will once again be represented in the ICJ after forty years. I look forward to good soundbites  and well-written decisions from a member of the world court.  
 

Editor's Take is a column written by editors of abs-cbnNEWS.com and news managers of ABS-CBN. It is our way of  introducing you, dear readers, to the way journalists work. We want to start a dialogue with you--and sustain it.