FROM THE BARREL OF MY PEN/02/07/06
By Gonzalo “Jun” Policarpio
junpolicarpio@yahoo.com
www.junpolicarpio.com


“THE WAGES OF SIN”

With empty stomachs and emaciated bodies after almost a week’s waiting in the line outside the Ultra Stadium in the city of Pasig of MetroManila, some 30,000 poor and very poor Filipinos mostly middle-aged and elderly mothers rushed to the main gate in the early morning of February 4th with a single dream: to win some money to feed their families if not the top prize of one million pesos or a house and lot, or a jeep or a pedicab to earn a living. In order to protect their spot in the line while waiting for days and nights, some had to eat there and do their physical necessities using their friends as a human cover.

The popular game show rated number one in the Philippines called “Wowowee”named after Willie Revillame, the host who is also a well-known actor-comedian, was about to celebrate its first year anniversary by offering hundreds of raffle prizes and cash money to winners of the games amounting to 3 million pesos. But the give-away tickets to qualify for the games were only for 17,000 persons. On a first come-first served basis to receive a give-away ticket, a poor mother who spent her last pesos and centavos to travel from far-away barrios, provinces, and islands had to suffer everything to be near the entrance to the stadium. One mother had to put her 4-year old daughter atop a concrete fence to keep her safe from the thickening crowd. But at the sound of the stadium gate being opened by security personnel that early Saturday morning, thousands of human bodies turned into marauding animals in the ensuing stampede that the little girl who jumped from the fence to follow her mother to the gate was crushed to death.

Poverty and hunger indeed can make human beings behave like animals without regard to life. 79 poor and very poor Filipinos died in the stampede. And now these corrupt Filipino politicians running the government and business who stole the money belonging to the poor Filipino people out of pure greed and gluttony are trying to exploit this tragedy for their own selfish political motives.

Let’s not wait for that time when millions and millions of the hungry and impoverished Filipino masses will rush to the gates of political and business power and destroy the root cause of their miseries. I now say to all corrupt politicians and businessmen in the Philippines who hoard their stolen wealth in foreign countries: it’s time to return the money that belong to the Filipino people or receive the “wages of sin.”

End