Opposition Senator Risa Hontiveros is at it again, shooting from the hip. Screaming like a banshee, Hontiveros points to the importation of 260 container vans of sugar made by several local companies, an act which she called “government-sponsored smuggling.” Playing to the gallery, she asks: “Aren’t the Filipino people the losers here?”
It seems that the real loser is, once again, Hontiveros. The term “smuggling” has a set legal meaning in Philippine jurisprudence, i.e., that it is “the fraudulent act of importing any goods into the Philippines” or of dealing with the same goods knowing them to have been smuggled. By Hontiveros’s own admission, however, the entry of the said shipment was covered by a memorandum order from the Sugar Board. And the importers are all registered sugar dealers with proven track records and no legal disqualifications — they correctly declared the cargo and went through Customs. So, wherein lies the smuggling? It does not even matter that there is a previous administrative moratorium on the importation of sugar; such limits are mere executive issuances. They are not laws, and can be amended or revised to adapt to exigencies. An Ilonggo friend thus jokingly said that by calling the sugar “smuggled,” Hontiveros deserves to be hit over the head with an “ismagol.”
This is not the first time the lady senator has acted recklessly. Remember when she shared with the public a screenshot of then Justice Secretary Aguirre’s text message as appearing on his phone, taken with a telephoto lens? All she got for her troubles was a criminal case for violating the Anti-Wire Tapping Act, which still subsists. After that, she went to town with supposed witnesses against Pharmally executives tampering with expiration dates on medical products supplied to the government, only to have the same witnesses recant and accuse her of bribing them to testify falsely. That earned her another case for graft and sedition, now pending before the Office of the Ombudsman. Seemingly unable to learn her lesson, she recently histrionically denounced a local company called Yatai International Corporation, claiming that it had links to a Chinese company called Yatai International Holdings Group, which she says was involved in illegal gambling and human trafficking.
Evidently, no one on her staff bothered to tell her that “Yatai” is a generic Mandarin phrase that simply means “Asia Pacific.” Worse, trying to get back at Pharmally which she suspected of having engineered a lawsuit against her, she linked the domestic Yatai company to Pharmally executive Linconn Ong. As expected, the Philippine Yatai pushed back, stating through their lawyer (reputedly someone with overwhelming sex appeal) that their twenty-year old company only manufactures rechargeable lamps and fans and has absolutely nothing to do with its Chinese namesake. Scoffingly, the spokesperson invited Hontiveros’s attention to Yatai Spa and Yatai Ramen, which also have no relation to Yatai International Company.
Before that, Hontiveros again shot her mouth off, tenuously linking Pharmally to human smuggling, on the forced logic that a private jet that took off last 15 February from the Ninoy Aquino International Airport with unauthorized passengers belonged to Hong Kong-based Cloud Nine Leasing Company, the same company — or so Hontiveros says — that supplied the aircraft when Pharmally executive Mohit Dargani tried to leave the country at the height of the Pharmally investigation before the Senate Blue Ribbon Committee last year. Which part of “leasing” does Hontiveros not understand? It’s like charging Grab for drug trafficking just because a passenger carrying some drugs had booked a ride.
Hontiveros, of course, has to make noise. As the lone survivor (by the skin of her teeth at that) of the Opposition senatorial debacle in 2022, she has to stay relevant. That is part of politics. But someone should tell her that it should not be at the expense of responsible public service, lest she lose the last shred of her credibility.