Searching, scanning, praying for peace/unity in the scattered Philippine Olympic Committee (POC).
Your reporter here referred to the day’s news and other recent events.
How to dig for a semblance of order and sanity.
Try and check on the big fish at the Recto Bank in the West Philippine Sea. You could come upon stray tips. There could be marks on exclusivity deep in the ocean where you could pick up a manner to determine whether this or that colorful marine treasure is Chinese or Filipino.
Says the cunning Senate President Vicente Sotto III: “The fish could be coming from China, and the fish from the Philippines could be going to China … Exclusive types of fish found in China might have migrated from the Philippines.”
So which is which?
Isn’t what’s wrong similar to what’s not right?
Ricky Vargas, while still the POC president, said a total of 130 gold medals should be enough for the Philippines to top this year’s Southeast Asian Games.
He appeared calm, solid, sure.
No problem?
Of course, he was reeling under monumental pressure.
Vargas, after a few days, jumped out and resigned his top POC post. He said he wanted to devote time to his family and his job.
He has made himself scarce, at the same time putting the POC in disarray.
Vargas had cried he could not stomach the dirty political culture inside the POC.
He was clearly choking, shoved violently against the wall after blindly incorporating the Philippine Southeast Asian Games Organizing Committee Foundation.
Joey Romasanta dared and assumed the POC presidency after the Vargas bailout.
After an expected squabble, that next saw Romasanta stepping down from his assumed post, POC chair Abraham Tolentino emerged and announced the holding of a POC special election on July 5.
“This was agreed upon by majority of the general assembly members last Tuesday,” Tolentino declared.
Not that quick.
Romasanta said the decisions made by the general assembly on Tuesday were not binding because there was no formal session.
There were other tricky qualification issues.
Said veteran sports columnist Joaquin Henson: “The call is to resign from the executive board en masse. It’s the least the executive board can do to give the POC new life.”
Tolentino said the general assembly wants a clean slate, a fresh start.
Added Henson: “The special election is a golden opportunity for the POC to show it can rise from adversity and reemerge as a bastion of Olympic solidarity.”
Meanwhile, fellow deadline beater Percy Della surmised that fish in and around the Recto Bank are from China, thereby giving Chinese intruders authority to fish freely—“Kaya pwede magkalap mga Chino, hehe.”