Pichay–waiting in the wings

SHOES in hand, as noiselessly as possible, former Surigao del Sur Representative Prospero “Butch” Pichay has lately been busy tiptoeing around, “casing” the bureaucracy.

His objective—to pinpoint any of the possible sub-Cabinet slots where, as one sidekick describes it, “he can best continue to be of service to the Arroyo administration in its last two years in office.”

Apparently, Pichay expects to be among those to be appointed in the revamp that will coincide with the lapsing of the one-year electoral ban on the appointment of candidates who lost in the last elections. Pichay was one of the nine Team Unity senatorial candidates who didn’t make it.

He has been quietly waiting in the wings for a year, and today is the eve of the last day of the ban. And, as if on cue, the changing of the guard in the administration has begun. Bunye is the first to be touched—he goes to the Monetary Board as a member. His likely replacement as spokesman: Mike Defensor, one of the nine senatorial also-rans.

According to his aide, Pichay does not aspire to be the head of any department. “Nothing as lofty as that. Any top job at the bureau level will do, just as long as he can continue being of service to the government.”

No amount of badgering could make his assistant say what specific appointment Pichay expects to get. But Pichay’s recent moves indicate that he has zeroed in on two sensitive agencies, namely, the Bureau of Customs (BOC), which seems to be his first choice, or the National Food Authority (NFA), his second pick.

Two or three months ago, NFA employees were abuzz with speculations that Pichay was preparing to take over as administrator of the multibillion-peso grains agency. The talks started when a couple of unidentified “observers” paid the NFA head office in Quezon City a “casual” visit. But that was a couple of months ago. Pichay’s emissaries have not made a second visit since, and the presumption now shared among NFA employees is the whole thing was just a false alarm.

But, more recently, speculations that the controversial politician from Mindanao would be named commissioner of Customs in place of Napoleon Morales have persisted. This has been going on for several weeks now.

Like a storm gathering menacingly on the horizon, the business sector was shocked to learn that the gentleman from Surigao del Sur recently underwent a “secret crash course on customs procedures and other related matters” at the Subic Bay Metropolitan Authority (SBMA) head offices.

According to my midget mole in SBMA, Pichay got the crash course from Subic Port Collector Marietta Samoranos, a niece of former Commission on Elections Comissioner Virgilio Garcillano. The intense briefing was conducted under the watchful eyes of SBMA administrator Armand Arreza, Pichay’s nephew.

Private-sector suspicions that Pichay may be named Customs commissioner were bolstered when President Arroyo, during a surprise visit, gave top Customs officials a royal ass-chewing just a couple of weeks ago. The President was reportedly in a snit over the bureau’s apparent reluctance to prosecute the owners and officials of four companies caught red-handed trying to smuggle wheat into the country.

The four companies were identified as Front Runner Enterprises, Judd Monte Enterprises, Oriental Connections and Rubills Inc. Instead of charging them with smuggling, Morales merely suspended their accreditation after seizing their wheat shipments.

President Arroyo was particularly interested in what further action Morales was going to take against Rubills Inc. Customs’ records show that Rubills used to be headed by Francisco Billones, a church minister who later sold his interest to a group headed by a mayor from Cagayan province. However, it is no secret in the waterfront that the mayor’s group is just a dummy, and that the real owner of Rubills is a woman based in Canada.

“Definitely, whoever controls Rubills must be a mighty powerful individual. Rubills is the only trading warehouse in the country with the extremely rare privilege to import anything under the sun with the sanction of the BOC.”

President Arroyo, visibly irked, watched over the shoulder of lawyer Willy Sarmiento, prosecution chief, as he prepared the charge sheet against the four companies. Then she directed Morales to file the charges before the Department of Justice pronto (!) before concluding her lightning visit.

But we digress. Is Pichay indeed the next Customs commissioner? Nobody can really say, but anything is possible given Pichay’s supreme confidence that he had served President Arroyo well when he was a congressman. Pichay unabashedly claims he was GMA’s Dobermann or attack dog in the House. By implication, he feels it would only be just and fair if he were to be named the next Customs commissioner.

Whatever goes on in the presidential mind is, of course, next to impossible to divine. But this much is certain—if and when Pichay is appointed the new customs boss, Finance secretary Gary Teves will take it as a signal to pack up and go without an iota of hesitation.  

Omerta_bdc@yahoo.com

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Omerta: Pichay–waiting in the wings

SHOES in hand, as noiselessly as possible, former Surigao del Sur Representative Prospero “Butch” Pichay has lately been busy tiptoeing around, “casing” the bureaucracy.

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