BY JOHNNY DAYANG
Don Quixote de la Chine
Talk usually veers toward sympathy for OFWs whenever we learn of their travails and sorrows abroad. It wasn't that long ago when public anger reached fever pitch after Singaporean authorities hanged Flor Contemplacion in 1995 for two counts of murder.
But in the case of the three Filipinos originally sentenced to die in China this week, public sympathy and support seem fickle and, in some instances, lacking.
In the coffee shop I frequent, I even overheard two kababayans saying: "Of course, Chinese authorities will hang these Pinoys from the treetops for their audacity to bring illegal drugs to a communist country like China!”
I guess this is the difference between Flor Contemplacion and the OFWs convicted of drug trafficking: While the public is conversant with the harsh treatment suffered by Filipina maids from their abusive employers (hence the outpouring of support for Flor), Filipinos are also very aware of the illegal drug trade and the ills it foists on society.
I guess this is the difference between Flor Contemplacion and the OFWs convicted of drug trafficking: While the public is conversant with the harsh treatment suffered by Filipina maids from their abusive employers (hence the outpouring of support for Flor), Filipinos are also very aware of the illegal drug trade and the ills it foists on society.
Thus, to be caught taking or pushing drugs is to become a pariah in the eyes of many Filipinos. Not even pleas that, “poverty led these OFWs to do it,” will change this view.
And this tepid sympathy for the three, as well as for some 75 other Filipinos facing the death penalty in China for “smuggling large amounts of drugs” has placed my friend, Vice-President Jejomar Binay in a quandary.
Binay had to go to China, plead for the lives of Ramon Credo, Sally Villanueva, and Elizabeth Batain before a government still reeling from our mishandling of a hostage rescue that led to the deaths of Hong Kong-based Chinese nationals, and come back to a Filipino citizenry with mixed feelings about government’s handling of the matter.
Such an impossible task, a virtual “Don Quixote de la Chine” – this is what Binay did for those three OFWs.
And now, we hear critics saying the “stay in execution” that Binay wangled from the Chinese government is not at all acceptable.
C’mon guys, give my friend a break. A reprieve, coming so close to Judgment Day, maybe Binay’s “Don Quixote de la Chine” may have a Part 2, one wherein they get to commute death to life.
And this tepid sympathy for the three, as well as for some 75 other Filipinos facing the death penalty in China for “smuggling large amounts of drugs” has placed my friend, Vice-President Jejomar Binay in a quandary.
Binay had to go to China, plead for the lives of Ramon Credo, Sally Villanueva, and Elizabeth Batain before a government still reeling from our mishandling of a hostage rescue that led to the deaths of Hong Kong-based Chinese nationals, and come back to a Filipino citizenry with mixed feelings about government’s handling of the matter.
Such an impossible task, a virtual “Don Quixote de la Chine” – this is what Binay did for those three OFWs.
And now, we hear critics saying the “stay in execution” that Binay wangled from the Chinese government is not at all acceptable.
C’mon guys, give my friend a break. A reprieve, coming so close to Judgment Day, maybe Binay’s “Don Quixote de la Chine” may have a Part 2, one wherein they get to commute death to life.
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