Gen. Bato Answers My Queries on Murders, ICC against Him

By Mortz C. Ortigoza

The reason why former four-star general and national police chief Ronald “Bato” dela Rosa earned a niche in the heart and mind of Filipino voters was not only his derring-do to belt a song or songs while lady spectators pulled their male counterparts to dance with the music he averagely sang but his provincial demeanour spiced up by his Cebuano or Mindanaon thick accented Tagalog.

These are his comparative advantage to other senatorial rivals like Bam Aquino, JV Ejercito, and others who were outside the Magic 12 of the 2019 Senate Race’s surveys.

I’ve been telling media colleagues here in Luzon why Tagalog ladies loved their Visayan or Mindanoan boyfriends or husbands not because of their sexual prowess but because of the thickness of their tongue in enunciating a correct sounding American word. 

Peace for them is “Pis”.
  As a resident of Mindanao in the middle of 1970s to middle of 1980s, the ballyhooed “Pis” word for them had, son of a gun, multiple meanings. 
Pis could be “Face”, “Peace”, “Paste”, "Piss", or “Fish”.

ITAGA MO SA BATO - Pollster’s Social Weather Station No. 10 senatorial wannabe retired police general Ronald “Bato” dela Rosa was smiling when I told him in "Bisaya" names of his relatives in Barangay Bato, Sta. Cruz , Davao del Sur, my town mate Agriculture Secretary Manny Piñol, and his "Good Boy" PMA, classmate in Mindanao.

That’s why when I told former Five –Time House Speaker Joe de Venecia at a presidential rally of the Liberal Party in 2016 that when I asked Senator Manny Pacquiao how was the Peace and Order situation in my beloved island Mindanao, he told me: “Many fish but no order in the Tuna Port there in my home place General Santos City”.

Of course I have to immediately calmed down the rabble rousing Speaker who had a  guffaw but seemed to be hit by a stroke on my joke on what he thought was a faux pas from the Senator whose college degree was complimented by the Acceleration or Accreditation and Equivalency Test of the Department of Education where the world saw him catapulted from Grade 6 to the Tertiary.

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Let’s go back to senatorial candidate Bato dela Rosa when he was invited last Monday by the ageless Bayambang Billionaire Mayor Cezar T. Quiambao, whose wife is the sultry and pretty young actress Niña" José, for a “stump (discourse)” inside the ritzy, cozy, swanky, and air conditioned public gymnasium  built under the intercession of Quiambao –  whose family controlled  a majority stocks of the renowned Stradcom Corporation.

“Si Mayor Cezar Quiambao pinaka idol ko. Huwag lang magtampo si (Alaminos City) Mayor Celeste (gubernatorial bet). Aminin ko talaga sa ngayon idol ko talaga si mayor!”, to the wild applause and cheers of the hoi polloi.

 The barrel chested and bald headed Bato, a handsome version of the American animated film hero Shrek, told the multitude how maids in Hong Kong swarmed on him and fellow senatorial aspirant Imee Marcos for three hours for photo takings a night before his appointment with Mayor Quiambao and the people of Bayambang.

“Walang one hour akong nagsalita doon. Tatlong oras ang picture taking. Sabi ko sa kanila ihing-ihi na ako. Sabi nila sir, ihi-an mo na kami!” the general, who even mentioned retired Pangasinan Colonels Manuel Velasco and Pat Orduna as colleague, cited.

KANTAHAN, SAYAWAN - General Bato (Left)) belts a song, his comparative advantage to senatorial rivals, in the Bayambang, Pangasinan public gym while provincial politicians led by gubernatorial bet Art Celeste and other politicians and their lady partners danced. In other photo Reelective Mayor Cezar T. Quiambao and the thousands of spectators relished the hoopla. Election na, kaya masaya sila!

After the event, I asked the Philippine Military Academy Class of 1986 if he was not bothered that he and President Rodrigo Duterte will be criminally tried someday by the International Criminal Court  (ICC) in the Hague and the opposition and those kin of those who were killed in the Drug War will file murder charges against them in the local court.

This was his retort to me:

“Well, ako naman ay lalaking may bayag. Kung talagang kagagawan ko iyon kung kailangan ikulong ako magpapakulong ako. Ganoon lang iyon! Ginawa mo iyan panindigan mo. Basta, ang problema kung talagang ginawa natin iyan. Pero I swear to God I have no orders. Wala ako orders sa mga tao, wala ako involvement na patayin iyong mga drug personalities na iyan. Wala ako order”.

Before I left the general, I told him in Bisaya about his once “bad boy PMA classmate” in Mindanao who was cashiered during their junior days ranks in the Officers’ Corp.

“Ah ha ha ha! Si ____  _________, mistah (classmate) ko iyan, mistah ko iyan! Kamusta mo ako sa kanya!,” he bursted into laughter.

In my next column, I will tell you how the recently Social Weather Station’s poll No. 10, gee whiz, KaPampangan Lito Lapid was No. 5, narrated how countless of Flips, er, Filipinos became “Zombies” because of kid gloves treatment of the past administrations against narcotics sellers if Duterte did not become president, how the country nearly become a Narco State like Colombia and Mexico when drug lords can fund an electoral candidate to win, how the Chinese inside the slammer Muntinlupa control more than 50 percent of the imported drug mostly shabu or meth in the Philippines and what did he do to them when he was the director of the Bureau of Correction.

READ MY OTHER ARTICLE:

FILIPINO SENATORS FOR SALE?

(You can read my selected columns at http://mortzortigoza.blogspot.com and articles at Pangasinan News Aro. You can send comments too at totomortz@yahoo.com)