Band-aid benefits, assuaging feelings, and charity of the medieval kind.

ORDINARY CITIZEN'S NOTES. 30 JAN 2015. FRI. N4.
Band-aid benefits, assuaging feelings, and charity of the medieval kind. 

THIS COLOMA ANNOUNCEMENT is pathetic.

It is about a package of benefits for the 44 fallen in Mamasapano, these brave SAF policemen who answered the call of duty to serve. 

There is no problem in this promise, except that everything in this is a problem if these same benefits are not given to every member of the police force and the armed forces of the Philippines. 

We know for a fact that somewhere in between, budget for boots and for food get lost, and we remember what happened to the food budget for the police when Pope Francis came. 

Coloma's announcement, under the direction of who else but the president who was absent at the Villamor Air Base when the 42 coffins came, is band-aid, this must be said. 

What Coloma should do is confront his boss and tell him that apart from the 44 others who did the ultimate sacrifice, there are many others out there who, for one reason or another, live in the slums like the rest of 'em the great unwashed of the Philippines. 

I know so many police people and they do not live lives the way Coloma and the president must be imagining. 

I know so many soldiers and they do not live quality lives the way these Palace factotums know or pretend to know. 

Band-Aid? Bring 'em on. 

The problem, sirs, is deeper than what you naively think.

HON/