Mayor, Father Blame Ex-Mayor Why Town Failed on SGFH

 By Mortz C. Ortigoza

I bumped into Calasiao Mayor Kevin Roy Macanlalay and his father the flourishing town former long reigning Hizzoner Roy as they conversed in the round table with retired Police Major Gen. Mariel Magaway (PMA’86) – my bilas who is the former Chief of the Directorial for Intelligence (D.I) of the national police. D.I is a feared division because it's a spook against the crooks among the police. My meeting with them was during the 87^th birthday bash of my mother-in-law Norma Montoya-Rosario held in her swanky residence in Brgy. Macabito, Calasiao.

My first poser to the Macanlalays when I sat near them: What happened to the first class town – one of the three most progressive municipalities in Pangasinan – that it was the lone local government unit (LGU) that did not pass the Seal of Good Financial Housekeeping (SGFH),” as I whisked out from my knapsack the headline of the Northern Watch Newspaper I bylined: 43 Pangasinan Towns Fete with SGFH.

Had the DILG negligently omitted that the Puto Town as part of those honored SGFH recipients?

“We have 44 towns in Pangasinan and it became suspicious to me upon browsing the report of the DILG that this thriving town was not included,” I told them.

Both of them said that it was the fault of former Mayor Joseph Bauzon who reigned the municipality from January to June 30, 2022 – the year the evaluation was done. They said many projects in the town did not pass the prying eyes of the Department of Interior & Local Government (DILG).

Were they dubious procurement and infrastructure projects?

DILG was the one that screened and approved who hurdle the SGFH. The requirements for passing it are: (1) the most recent available Commission on Audit (COA) audit opinion and (2) compliance with the Full Disclosure Policy by posting all required financial documents in three conspicuous places and in the FDP portal. The SGFH is one of the three core components to hurdle the most challenging award body’s Seal of Good Local Governance (SGLG) where an LGU should pass all the three components of Good Financial Housekeeping, Disaster Preparedness, and Social Protection and one of the three essential components in either of the business friendliness and competitiveness, peace and order and environmental management. It is dubbed as “3 + 1”.

Aside its seal as a ticket to an expedite loan transaction in a bank for the LGU it has a three million pesos award to a winner.

Last year, only 17 towns passed the elusive SGLG – the gold standard among all government plaudits among the 44 Pangasinan towns.

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 I asked the duo how they would react on the attacks from the mainstream and social media about Mayor Kevin transferring from the air-conditioned gym or sports center to their family's huge Plaza Adelaida Events Place and Catering Services in Barangay Bued the recent Kasalang Bayan (mass wedding of their constituents).

Critics said that during the six months’ administration of the late Mayor Maya Caramat public weddings were customarily held in the sports center in the poblacion area.

The Macanlalay Administration, as insinuated by these critics, to have profited on that supposed free wedding.

Former Mayor Roy said it was transferred in Adelaida for free because the air conditioning system in the gym had a problem and they were too happy to share for gratis the ambiance of their personal air conditioning system.

By the way, the seasoned nine years Mayor Roy told me he was the SAM of his son.

“What is SAM?” I asked him.

“SAM is Special Assistant to the Mayor with a one-peso salary a year.

It means he is the Grigori Rasputin of his mayor –son Kevin M.

Rasputin, to those jeepney drivers and carpenters who read this blog - was best-known as the adviser of the royal family of Nicholas II, the last King or Emperor of Russia, through whom he gained considerable influence in the later years of the Russian Empire.

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During the 87th birthday of my mother-in-law, I met too foreign nuns who have a convent in the village. One of them was a Sister Ana from El Salvador in Central America.

After my Missus Miles and I had photo-op with them, my friend Bong Aguillar – a rabid Macanlalay supporter – quipped: “Boss Mortz buti na lang di nila alam mga kuwento (nun and priest jokes) mo sa kanila”.

I told him in the vernacular: Itong katabi ko from El Salvador. Sabi ko magulo dati iyong bansa nila Communist vs. Rightists gaya ng Nicaragua Contra vs. Sandinista.

I told Sister Ana how the U.S government supported the abusive regime of Chile Augusto Pinochet - a General who brutally ruled Chile from 1973 to 1990 - from his coup d' tat (golpe de estado) against duly elected Marxist President Salvador Allende.

Tuwang tuwa si Sister marami daw ako alam sa Latin America.

I told her in English - since I could not speak in Spanish - that I used to teach International Politics among students who majored in Political Science in college.

The Sister lamented when I told her that during the knuckle duster regime of Pinochet whose name is synonymous with the words’ Desparecidos and the Caravan of Death, activists, socialist, and members of the opposition to his regime were not only killed and assassinated – 3,000 of em’ not including those 1,000 whose remains were not recovered - but thrown out from the helicopters. Some if not many of the orphans of these murdered citizens were even adopted by the same military officials who ordered their killings.

Son of a gun, it was like in the flick’s Zorro (starred by Antonio Banderas) where the infant Elena (Catherine Zeta-Jones) – and later Zorro’s girlfriend -  was taken by the corrupt California Governor Rafael Montero (Stuart Wilson) when the latter accidentally killed his loved of his life – the mother of Elena and ordered the imprisonment of Elena’s father Don Diego de la Vega (Anthony Hopkins).

Pinochet, by the way, ordered the assassination of Allende when he took power in September 11, 1973. But other historians said Allende poisoned himself rather than be captured in his hiding place at Palacio La Moneda in downtown Santiago by the soldiers of General Pinochet.

An Allende Administration would not be good with the U.S businesses in the region especially his reign was timed during the Cold War between the two superpowers the capitalist United States of America and the commie’s Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.

Even other important officials of Allende's government were tracked down by Pinochet’s spooks Dirección de Inteligencia Nacional (DINA) under the supervision of Operation Condor. General Carlos Prats, Pinochet's predecessor and army commander under Allende, who had resigned rather than support the Machiavellian scheme  of his successor against the Allende's Government, was assassinated in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in 1974. A year later, the murder of 119 opponents abroad was disguised as an internal conflict, the DINA setting up a propaganda campaign to support this idea (Operation Colombo), a campaign publicised by the leading newspaper in Chile, El Mercurio.

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