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Nocturnal President

First published in PCIJ’s “I” Magazine in 1999

by Ellen Tordesillas
Pres. Estrada’s late-night buddies influence decision-making in the Palace.

EstradaTHE MEETINGS take place at night and last until dawn. There, views are traded, strategies prepared, and deals struck. By the time the men at the table stand up and stagger out the door, much has been accomplished that may affect the way things are done in this country. President Joseph Estrada, of course, presides over these meetings. But more often than not, those gathered around him during these caucuses are far from being Cabinet secretaries. Rather, they are his personal friends, some of them buddies of long-standing, such as Ilocos Sur Rep. Luis ‘Chavit’ Singson and Caloocan congressman Luis ‘Baby’ Asistio, with whom, it is said, the president shares a fondness for the pleasures of the good life—gambling, alcohol and women included. Singson and Asistio, say Malacañang insiders, are among the president’s most constant late-night companions.

There are other persistent hangers-on, wheeler-dealers like online bingo operator Dante Tan whose BW Resources Corp. has been accused of insider trading and manipulation of the stock market. Certainly, it would seem that ethnic Chinese businessmen are keenly aware that with Estrada, out of sight is out of mind, and are among those that a Palace insider says are fond of “slipping in when dark sets in.”

Ramon Lee, a close associate of Dante Tan and an Estrada election contributor, drops in occasionally, say Malacañang sources. So does Lucio Co, the goateed owner of PureGold duty free stores who was recently accused of being a big-time smuggler. Another fixture of the late-night teté-a-tetés is Jaime Dichavez, a fiberglass manufacturer and real estate developer who was recently involved in the corporate coup at Belle Corporation, operator of the controversial jai-alai games. Dichavez, who has no official post except as head of the Malacañang golf club, is another of the President’s most trusted businessmen-friends.

Also sighted keeping Estrada company at night are presidential adviser on overseas Filipinos William Gatchalian, who has shifted from plastics to airlines and the tourism business, and Eusebio Tanco, who recently acquired the Tiwi-Makiling-Banahaw geothermal power plant from the National Power Corporation. Tanco is the brother-in-law of one of the country’s biggest coconut millers, Douglas Lu Ym.

(But the most trusted—and most reclusive—of the president’s friends is multimillionaire Jacinto “Jack” Ng, owner of Republic Biscuit Corp. or Rebisco and of some hefty real estate. Ng, however, reportedly does not take too well to the night life and is rarely seen in the late-evening socials the president enjoys.)

Whatever their past with the president and no matter where they come from, these men offer the actor-turned-President a respite from the heavy demands of being the head of state. This they do by keeping him company while he unwinds over drinks; they even sing with him on the karaoke, as well as play mahjong, which could stretch these boys’ nights out way past their usual quitting time if the President is losing. For the country’s chief executive apparently does not take defeat at the gaming table very well.

But he takes well to recommendations and pieces of advice offered by his friends during these midnight sessions, say some government officials. Indeed, they even say a number of presidential decisions with wide-ranging implications have been reached not during the Cabinet meetings that are usually held once a month, but during the informal discussions that take place while the President relaxes with his pals, who are not exactly without business interests to advance and defend.

That, say the officials, has made for policies and appointments done on the fly, actions that come not from careful thinking and consultations with experts, but from what appear to be off-the-top-of-the-head remarks of private individuals, who may or may not have been inebriated when they made their suggestions. For example, the use of pension funds of the Government Service Insurance System and the Social Security System for corporate takeovers was the bright idea broached on one of those late evenings with presidential friend Mark Jimenez, a shadowy businessman wanted for illegal campaign contributions in the U.S. Jimenez is reportedly a mean singer at the karaoke and is an occasional “good time” associate of Estrada.

Then again, perhaps this could only be expected of a presidency in which decision-making is seemingly dependent on the interplay not so much of ideas but of the vested interests of individuals who align themselves in loose blocs. The “Midnight Cabinet” is just one among the many groups that compete for the President’s attention, groups that have their respective trump cards to play whenever they feel someone else is gaining precious ground, or simply whenever they feel that the timing is right. There are no rules and no guarantees in this game, after all, and a bloc cannot hope to keep bending the President’s ear for too long.

IN TRUTH, when Estrada assumed the presidency on June 30, 1998, political analysts reckoned that there would be only three major groups that would be fighting it out in the Malacañang snakepit. One of these had the Zamoras at the helm. Another was identified with Robert Aventajado, a longtime Estrada friend and one of the pillars of JEEP, an Estrada political organization that operated parallel to the official Laban ng Mamamayang Masang Pilipino (LAMMP) but focused on the grassroots. The third bloc was headed by former Senate President Edgardo Angara, Estrada’s running mate, and the head of the Laban ng Demokratikong Pilipino (Laban), which had provided the Estrada campaign the national political network it had needed.

A year and a half later, these three blocs have lost some of their considerable clout and must now compete with the influence wielded by the President’s nocturnal companions, the gritty dealmaking by Estrada’s second “wife” Guia Gomez, and also the emerging power of Leonora de Jesus, chief of the Presidential Management Staff (PMS).

Certainly, Malacañang observers say that Aventajado, who was named presidential adviser on economic affairs and chair of the Presidential Committee on Flagship Projects, no longer wields the same kind of influence he did during Estrada’s presidential campaign. This could be because he turned down a position that would have put him in Malacañang, where he could be in close proximity to his President-buddy. Fearing the inevitable Palace intrigues, the former racecar driver and San Juan politico opted to dabble in Mindanao issues and take charge of infrastructure projects instead.

That didn’t spare him from the intrigues, however. Aventajado has ended up hounded by unsavory reports involving infrastructure projects under his committee, and Palace insiders say he has become distant from the president, an observation that the official denies. As he recently told a newspaper, “The important thing is that if I call him, he will talk to me, and if I go to Malacañang, he will receive me.”

Angara, meanwhile, as secretary of agriculture, is widely acknowledged to be in the margins of power. Although he did get the agriculture post, a position promised him by Estrada, he wields no clout beyond the Elliptical Road in Quezon City, where the Department of Agriculture (DA) is situated.

Proof of Angara’s diminished clout was the President’s executive order transferring four major DA agencies to the Office of the Presidential Adviser on Food Security, which was created for William Dar, a little-known scientist whom Angara had chosen to warm his seat at the DA while he waited out the expiration of the one-year ban on holding government positions for those who lost in the elections. But when Dar’s time was up, he tried to hold on to the position by making governors petition for his retention. When that failed, he made the President sign the executive order. This attempted dismemberment of the DA put the country’s food program at risk and was thwarted only with Dar’s appointment to the Food and Agriculture Organization in Rome.

Pitting Dar against Angara is seen by many as part of moves to marginalize Angara, who is believed to be nurturing presidential ambitions in 2004. In a way, these have succeeded, as Angara is no longer seen as having clout beyond the DA. Early on, he had even lost his man at the Department of Health (DOH), Dr. Felipe Estrella, whom he had endorsed as secretary. Estrella quit all too soon after becoming the subject of intrigues within the department, but not before saying he was simply too old and too tired to put up with such nonsense.

ENTER THE “Dragon Lady.” The formidable de Jesus has been PMS chief since the Aquino administration. But while she acquired a reputation as someone to reckon with during the Ramos presidency, any clout that she had was expected to diminish, if not disappear, once Estrada and his minions came in. Instead, the opposite seems to have happened, in large part because de Jesus is competent and more knowledgeable about how the Office of the President is supposed to work than most anyone else among the Palace lightweights.

De Jesus had been drawn into the Estrada camp by the man she lives with, Ramon Abad, who was Estrada’s deputy campaign manager. She soon proved invaluable to the new administration, becoming the instant guide to newcomers who could barely find their way through the maze that is the Malacañang bureaucracy.

That, however, didn’t endear her to Estrada’s longtime political associates who suddenly saw a new face as doorkeeper to the center of power. Palace insiders say that the reason why two agencies under the PMS last year were transferred to the Office of the Executive Secretary was because of growing wariness about her clout. The President also removed the Southern Philippines Development Authority, which oversees development projects in Mindanao, from de Jesus’s plate and onto Aventajado’s.

But de Jesus, a survivor of numerous power struggles, has shown savvy in choosing her allies. She maintains a close friendship with Senator Tessie Aquino-Oreta, whom the President openly calls “my favorite senator.” Trade Secretary Jose T. Pardo, who is said to be Estrada’s most trusted Cabinet member, is also sympathetic to de Jesus.

De Jesus also has on her side lawyer Crispin “Boying” Remulla, whom Estrada trusts. Now chief of the PMS’s legal section, Boying is a son of former Cavite Governor Juanito Remulla, a staunch Estrada ally. In addition, the younger Remulla had lawyered for Jose Victor “JV” Ejercito, believed to be the President’s favorite son. When the President removed from the Office of the Executive Secretary the power to review government contracts worth P50 million or more, it fell on the lap of the PMS section headed by Remulla.

Aside from the Zamora brothers—especially Ronnie, who has seen his political cache inside the Palace dwindle in the wake of de Jesus’s rise—those who wish the “Dragon Lady” political ill are said to include the “Greenhills group” composed of the President’s sisters, Pilarica, Marita, and Pat, brother Paulino and brother-in-law Raul de Guzman. Of late, de Jesus has managed to antagonize even the likes of neutral Press Secretary Rod Reyes, who was unceremoniously bumped off the presidential plane during a recent official trip to Cebu, in favor of Presidential Spokesman Jerry Barican, the PMS chief’s newest Malacañang confederate.

But all of de Jesus’s political friends and foes are no match in terms of clout to her most important ally, Guia Gomez, the mother of JV Ejercito and the most politically astute of the President’s women companions. When Estrada was mayor of San Juan, Gomez had acted as his first lady and was known to be active in the town’s politics. It is thus not surprising that Gomez is de Jesus’s main connection to many of those who make up the President’s Other Cabinet, which could be said to be the wild card in the Palace power deck.

THERE ARE, of course, bound to be turf wars fought by factions in any government, with the melees sometimes resulting in a skewered policy or two. But there has probably never been this many players before, and this many people who do not have official accountability but who are nevertheless participating in the business of running a country. It is bad enough that officials who should be helping the President keep order in the government are instead contributing to the disarray with all their bickering. But the situation can only deteriorate to downright chaos when officials also have to contend with presidential friends who seem to have the propensity of making suggestions on matters they should not have any say on.

To be sure, some of the advice they give may be solicited, albeit over a plate of pulutan. Some of them may even be well intentioned, and are meant to be no more than opinions offered to a friend who is asking for them. The problem, however, begins once the recipient takes these and without much thought assumes them to be correct. At the very least, it is a rather delusional way of making decisions, since there really is no processing of ideas that takes place. In government, it is also a method fraught with serious risks.

FORMER Housing and Urban Development Coordinating Council (HUDCC) chair Karina David said it best in her October 15, 1999 resignation letter to the President. Although she was actually referring to Estrada’s large assortment of presidential advisers, consultants and assistants, David was making a point about the dangers of relying on people who “have no line responsibility, yet enjoy direct personal access” to the President. This could very well also describe members of his Midnight Cabinet, as well as friends who have made it a habit of hanging around the Palace grounds during the day. Wrote David: “(The) more aggressive among them can actually subvert the authority of your own line people. Not being integrated into the system, they may often give you distorted information or, worse, engage in manipulation for self-serving interests.”

David did not say so directly in her letter, but it appears that she considers herself a victim of such a set-up. Four days before her resignation, she had received a call at midnight, informing her of a luncheon meeting at the Palace the next day. She was not told of the agenda. When she got there, she found a handful of movers and shakers, not all of them officials. These included businessmen Jack Ng and Jose Luis “Sel” Yulo, both members of the nocturnal Cabinet. The officials were de Jesus, Budget Secretary Benjamin Diokno, National Housing Authority general manager Anthony F. Leynes and Wilfredo Hernandez, president of the Home Insurance and Guaranty Corp. (HIGC). Leynes is widely known in the housing industry to owe his position to Guia Gomez.

The group was soon joined by a President concerned about his declining popularity. A few days before, Pulse Asia had briefed Malacañang on the results of its survey for the month of September. The report wasn’t good: The President’s approval rating had plunged 21 percentage points, from 65 percent in May, to 44 percent.

It was agreed that the housing sector would play a crucial role in getting Estrada’s approval ratings back up, and that David would “whip” all the housing agencies into shape. The meeting finished, David left. But as she was nearing the sentry gate, she got a call on her cellular phone informing her that PAG-IBIG head Mel Alonzo had been replaced. PAG-IBIG, a state-run housing loan agency, falls under the office headed by David. It may have struck her as odd that she had not been told beforehand of such a decision.

David marched back into the presidential residence, where the luncheon meeting had just been held and where PMS chief de Jesus holds office. De Jesus confirmed that Alonzo had been terminated. Realizing that there was no reversing the decision, David requested to allow the PAG-IBIG head to resign. Ramon Palma-Gil, a recommendee of Caloocan’s Baby Asistio, a frequent late-night visitor at the Palace, replaced Alonzo

The next day, Yulo, another erstwhile nocturnal adviser, called up David to inform her that he was faxing the Executive Order (EO) creating the Presidential Commission on Mass Housing (PCMH), with him as chair and David as member of the board. The new body essentially had the same functions as HUDCC. But the EO was not all that David’s fax machine spat out; there was also an appointment of Yulo as presidential adviser on housing, a position also held by David.

In her letter, David noted that “(parallel) structures without a clear center of accountability create confusion and instability.” She also said, “A shelter sector with two heads can only result in everyone working at cross-purposes, generating confusion, intrigue and suspicion.”

In addition, David observed, “Executive Orders vitally affecting the conduct of government need to be carefully studied. I was informed about our…lunch meeting only at midnight of the day before. In that meeting, there was a general agreement that we would work with the Presidential Management Staff towards the eventual reorganization of the shelter sector. There was no mention of an Executive Order. And yet one was signed in the evening of the same day. By the afternoon of October 13, despite my having raised concrete issues against many defective portions of the EO, His Excellency read a press statement that contained even more than what was in the EO.”

Yulo, however, would not last even a month. He resigned soon after a newspaper controlled by shadowy Estrada pal Mark Jimenez reported that he has nine estafa cases and is the subject of an arrest warrant arrest for issuing a bouncing check. Palace insiders say the ouster of Yulo was also on the Zamora bloc’s list of recommendations to reverse the decline of the President’s popularity. The list was apparently drawn up after the media outcry over David’s resignation, and was meant partly as a move against de Jesus, who was seen as having a hand in the way David had been treated. But the attempt to hit back at de Jesus may have backfired. When Yulo resigned, she was named as temporary co-chair of the PCMH, together with Hernandez of the HIGC.

The anti-Dragon Lady faction, though, then waged a media blitz against de Jesus, feeding reporters and editors a story about a petition, allegedly signed by 30 people, to oust her. The tale turned out to be false.

Meanwhile, Malacañang officials say that after his approval rating dropped, the President has been waking up early, which could mean reduced sessions with his Midnight Cabinet. He has even scheduled regular meetings with his official Cabinet.

At an El Shaddai rally at Luneta earlier in November, Estrada had also prayed for unity. But he may not have been referring to the bickering blocs that have made for a noisy and messy presidency. According to one Cabinet member, the President once remarked, “Hayaan mo sila mag-away-away, para ako pa rin ang boss (Let them quarrel so that I will still be the boss).”

Copyright © 1999 All rights reserved.
PHILIPPINE CENTER FOR INVESTIGATIVE JOURNALISM

Published inGovernanceGraft and corruption

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