Duterte vows to bring back death penalty

By throwing away money that his country can ill afford to lose, and making an unholy mess of the environment.

Why not use Occam's razor and accept that Durerte has been nobbled by Benjamin Yao of Asia Steel, who has 52% of the domestic market for rebar and who wants more of it, and who has been a major supporter of Duterte's campaign?

Oh, and in other news, Duterte wants to make Lapu Lapu "A proper hero!"

http://www.gmanetwork.com/news/stor...duterte-plans-to-make-lapu-lapu-a-proper-hero

Thought you told us that your fellow was not "anti-foreigner", Mark? This does not read that way.

And admits that he hasnt a clue about economics and development and the subjects bore him:

http://politics.com.ph/duterte-calls-mbc-members-elitistang-ulol/

He,s not If your a good little boy

One subject that Duterte admits to being a bit weak on is economics and finance.

If were Mark I would be wondering where the difference lies between Duterte and Corbyn

He has promised the Police a pay rise to 75,000 a month.

The cops get a thirteenth month at Christmas. They have families. If they haven't got the money by then, there will be hell to pay. And there are 100,000 of them.

If the cops get a raise, the armed forces - on whose loyalty he depends - will want one too. There are 130,000 of them.

As will the teachers (all 500,000 of them)

Meanwhile the corporate types who bank rolled his campaign will be wanting their tax breaks. Tax revenues always fall in the first year of a new President. He has proposed raising the "sin tax", but that will piss off Lucio Tan and Danding Cojuanco. He's going to have to borrow, wrecking Aquino's credit rating in the process and thereby raising inflation...

His support in the business community, already unimpressed after the MBC speech that wasn't will evaporate completely if he goes ahead with his stated intention to put a Communist in charge of labour relations. Then there is the MRT hot potato. And by Christmas he will have eliminated crime... or so he says. At the very least, the public will expect a string of dead drug lords.

All in all if I was Duterte I would not be looking forward to Christmas, which will bring all these troubles to a head.

One can not draw serious comparisons between the two. For almost as long as Corbyn has been a renegade backbench MP who regularly defied his party's whip, Duterte has been running the country's third city. Whilst Corbyn is a protestor who counts terrorists as his friends, Duterte is a leader who has fought terrorism.

I do foresee that Duterte may have to become somewhat of a revolutionary figure by disbanding Congress which will be opposed to his reforms. Members of Congress represent the moneyed and influential elite of Philippine society. They are funded by Makati businessmen, the sugar barons, the banking moguls, the transport magnates, the manufacturing tycoons, the hacienderos, and those who represent or lobby on behalf of multinationals and foreign interests. These people don't want land reform or any of the pro-people, pro-labour and pro-poor initiatives proposed by the incoming President.

I don't think any time scale has been announced as to the phasing-in of such a massive rise but I'm sure that the Police will be better paid this Christmas than they were last.

He has already promised that. Back in January .

Are you sure? What about the postal workers, doctors and nurses, fire-fighters and other public servants - aren't they equally deserving too?

He wasn't elected on a pro-business ticket, was he! The needs of ordinary Filipinos have been ignored by successive governments for far too long. This Presidency might go some way in redressing the balance. For sure the screams of the likes of the Cojuancos, Sys and Tans will echo chillingly around Manila but he possibly won't hear them.

I think I'll just leave Markham's revolutionary tract here, to be savoured at a later date. Perhaps around Christmas.

Democratic Socialists in the UK dont have a long history of killing minor offenders or violence towards women or indeed suspending the constitution Mark cant easily disengage himself from his long touted communist sympathiser
without looking really silly not that he wont try to dress it all up as what the country needs tough love indeed these days i only get a wiff of his prattle having employed the "ignore hypocrite button"

Oh , the cops; salary is to be raised to 75,000 pesos a month over three years.

This is going to be funded... somehow.

Edited to add - here's a clue...

Is "Democratic Socialists" the nom de jour for Momentum aka Militant Tendency aka Socialist Workers' Party? The two things they're not are "socialist" and "democratic" but rather a rag-bag of rabble-rousing protesters.

Duterte is definitely not a communist nor even a communist sympathiser but a pragmatic socialist who is smart enough to realise that one has to fashion alliances with those one might otherwise distance oneself from for the greater good.

If, as you claim, Duterte has "a long history of killing minor offenders" then kindly explain why he has never been arrested, charged and tried for even one such infraction.

To be accurate, Police salaries will rise to between 75,000 and 100,000 per month over a three year period, according to rank. The current rates of pay are as follows:

​

Would you put your life on the line for a measly Php 14,834 (~£242) a month? That is less than a cashier in SM Department Store is paid.

I would expect AFP salaries to increase commensurately.

I think you will find that the average policeman in the Philippines has a lot more financial perks to the job than the average check out girl at SM if you know what I mean

Not according to an expat friend whose wife is a serving Police Officer in Cebu City. Most of the "tea money" a junior officer might be given has to go to his immediate superior who takes his cut and passes the rest to his superior and so on up the chain. New recruits are taught this as part of their basic training.

Better to work for the city as a traffic enforcer or for LTO as a vehicle inspector: then you make money

A man who denies the evidence that 32 journalists were murdered by the Ampatuans is of course the ideal choice as Press Secretary to President Duterte.

... and the police salary may be bumped up if you now kill a criminal too. Kill a few an your wages increases considerably.

http://m.philstar.com/314191/show/efe6df639aec123aef3fbd45b3eabec4/?

I see Dick Gordon is back in the Senate. As Secretary for Tourism he ran the "Its more fun in the Philippines" campaign... - he might want to re-phrase that..

Sorry, Andrew, that campaign was devised by David Guerrero, who heads an advertising agency (BBDO Guerrero in Manila), and launched by PNoy's appointee as Tourism Secretary, Ramon R. Jimenez, Jr., during 2012, as best I can recall. You may be thinking of the "Wow Philippines!" campaign which was somewhat more successful - and had considerably more money allocated to it.

You couldnt make it up

Philippines - the new "Wild East"

In an exercise in complete insensitivity, Duterte has appointed Sal Panelo as his official spokesman.

Panelo was the fellow who absent mindedly posted pictures of Duterte having dinner with GMA a few days before the election - minus the neck brace that she sports in public - on his Twitter feed with the setting set to "public", but rather more importantly he is the Ampatuans' lawyer and is on record as saying that the massacre never happened. And he is going to be the Duterte administration's main point of contact with the Press...

A man who calmly says that 32 journalists were not murdered...

Oh and he also says that the Marcoses never stole anything...

(Mark will be along in a minute to tell us that he is kind to children and animals and that indeed the massacre never happened...)