From out of the confusing hues of the pandemic environ in this side of the virus besieged, beleaguered and bewildered planet, three animal species suddenly emerged to steal the show from the scary bug. One is imported, the other is invested hugely while the other is expropriated illegally.
The first to steal the limelight were two ostriches which ran loose in a subdivision in Metro Manila. While the flightless birds, which could outrun the average city denizen with its 40/kph record, government authorities are yet to be allowed to see them or their owners to explain.
I suggest Malacanang should assign somebody faster to run after, not the birds, but the negligent owners. Overweight police can do the job, with the added incentive of losing pounds gained during the pandemic and the birthday of a fat officer.
The presence of the lanky, gangling bird in an subdivision is not an ordinary thing. They’re supposed to be in the zoos or some exotic farms out there where they do less potential harm to people. An ostrich, according to research, can kick a lion into the next world.
Their unannounced appearance on the local scene may be an urgent sign of the domestic reality as far as our COVID 19 battle is concerned and other issues that havebeen pestering/postering us for the longest time. Don’t look now but we’re offcially now Southeast Asia’s COVID king.
The ostrich has been a mythical symbol for denial. It is said to bury its head in the sand when frightened by an enemy or something.
The recent convergent plea of the country’s medical frontliners for a time-out had implied, among other things, that there are ostriches leading the so-callled war. Instead of facing the realities of the situation, these nearly headless leaders have been doing the wrong things, saying the wrong messages, making the wrong moves and going in the wrong direction. Yeng Guiao, a shining example of good coaching, perhaps good governance, once said the road to perdition is paved with good intentions.
Which is why they had called for a time out. The President, hissing and fuming, had obliged instead with a 30-second break, not enough according to medical experts to stem the swelling tide of new infections rising exponentially.
But beggars are no choosers, so they settled for what’s available which, by some math wizards prediction, could slice about 50,000 cases from the 200,000 projected cases this August.
Still, the ostriches may still be out there, and government still has to identify them and put them somewhere else. One former doctor member of the anti-covid task force gave a clue: everyone of the 19 czars designated to head the agencies against COVID 19 should be backed up by a team of doctors.
You get the drift: competence is not necessarily fitness. Or more bluntly, square pegs don’t fit in round holes.Hello?
So much for the ostriches.
In Cebu, a pig was found roaming and grunting around a bridge.
In the land of pork, not China which raises 50 percent of the hog population in the world, unbridled corruption seems unstoppable even by the Administration which promised to rid the government, much less appoint ones to high posts where the temptation is higher, of their ilks and tribes.
For instance, PHILHEALTH is evidently hounded by the perennial disease with no less than the head it admitting that billions worth of fraudulent cases had happened under his nose. He’s clueless or helpless while some of his underlings tell a different, damaging contrary versions — and under oath.
The President is unconvinced: no hard evidence, no kick in the butt.
Not surprising. He has yet to fire members of his choir suspected beneath Ceazar’s wife integrity. Once he said, and he’s reminded by the ever-relentless Ping Lacson, that a whiff of it is enough. No need for a shower or spray of stench. We may be in danger: experts warn that the loss of sense of smell is a sure indication that one is sick of COVID 19.
But the Malacanang principal tenant is alive, well and kicking, according to his ward.
In Orwell’s ‘Animal Farm’, Napoleon, the pig, is the top animal, lording it over the donkey, the dog, the chicken and other less audacious animals. Of course, there were no ostriches in his allegorical novel.
The third animal to enter the current bleak scene is the pangolin which, based on the latest report by authorities, has been found aplenty in a boat of Chinese poachers. Pangolin is an endangered species and Chinese are hunting them to extinction because it’s been part of their traditional medical history.
Which means China may be taking faithfully the President’s recent pronouncement that he’s inutile as far as China’s encroachment into the Philippine territories is broached. Chinese poachers may have interpreted that to mean ‘ Go, make your day’.
It’s a serious warning. We may be like the frog in a kettle: cooked without feeling it while the heat is slowly being turned up.
Other animals are known to have a better sense or instinct when in mortal danger. Although, like the ostrich, they bury their head in the sand.
