Dispatch from Crame No. 1,117:
Sen. Leila M. de Lima on Duterte's Arrest Order against the Unvaccinated

8/7/21

It's way past the second year of the pandemic, and they still cannot get their act together. The President, in fact, leads the disinformation drive of his own government when he proclaimed that he would order the arrest of those who are not yet vaccinated, thus instigating the chaos in vaccination sites all throughout the Metro.

Wala na ngang naitutulong, gumawa pa ng gulo.

Of course, his minions in the IATF, namely, Harry Roque, Karlo Nograles, and Menardo Guevarra, chime in with their excuses, re-interpreting Duterte's proclamation as just an expression of his exasperation.

In a crisis where there is no room for equivocal messaging, this government makes it a point to do just the opposite, not only sending mixed signals but worse, spreading disinformation.

What do we expect? From the start, this was bound to be a Fake News Government. This is why it recruited Mocha Uson and Harry Roque as its foremost mouthpieces. They replicate Duterte's own methods in mindless chaos.

Duterte causes panic among the unvaccinated populace, triggering chaos all over the Metro. These mouthpieces say he was just exasperated. We all know that every time Duterte is exasperated, people are bound to die. Just look at the drug war, and his exasperation with the communists.

Let us break this down further.

First, Duterte started with the statement last year that the virus will go away by itself, so there is nothing to worry about. Of course, it did not. Only an idiot will think that pandemics just go away. Then, instead of containing the virus in the Metro, his personal butler, Sen. Bong Go, spread it all over the Philippines with his Balik Probinsiya Program.

Next, Duterte said everything will be normal by Christmas 2020, when the Chinese vaccines arrive. They didn't. What came was another major surge that almost broke the health system in the second quarter of 2021.

Third, his government misses out on buying the vaccines, and has to settle for donated shipments from China, the US and other countries. This causes a huge shortage in the country's vaccination requirements of tens of millions of doses for 110 million Filipinos.

The reason, therefore, why most Filipinos remain unvaccinated is because the government failed to purchase the necessary amount of vaccines and, instead, like Juan Tamad, just waited with its mouth open for the donations to fall on its face, while Duterte slept.

Fourth, instead of helping organize the vaccination efforts, Duterte threatens arrests and spreads disinformation, causing panic and, most likely, super spreader events in the vaccination centers themselves.

Imbes na bakuna, mas malamang na Delta ang nakuha ng mga nagkagulo sa mga vaccination centers sa NCR. Sino ang nag-umpisa ng tsismis? Sabi ni Roque, Nograles, at Guevarra, nawalan lang daw ng pasensya ang Pangulo kaya niya nasabi na ipapaaresto niya ang mga wala pang bakuna.

Mga ginoo, ubos na rin ang pasensya namin sa inyong boss. Kung wala na siyang maidudulot pa sa gobyerno at sa taumbayan kung hindi kaguluhan at kapahamakan, baka puwede ninyo namang sabihan na manahimik na lang muna siya.

Shape up or shut up. ###

(Access the handwritten version, here: https://issuu.com/senatorleilam.delima/docs/dispatchno1117)