The Epiphany You Never Had

        “The aorta is the EDSA of our body,” explained Health Secretary Francisco Duque in “Korina Today” a couple of weeks ago (ANC, ABS-CBN) on the topic of the First Gentleman’s aortic aneurysmectomy and triple bypass surgery. He meant:  it was the main artery thru which blood is transported to the vital organs of the body. You can’t block it. Just like EDSA. Epifanio de los Santos. Or else the world stops. Fates change.         

          And so, you would think, at the EDSA of his life, when his own EDSA was blocked, he would have an epiphany on the road to choosing whether he would open his heart or remain shut and closed  to what the world has been telling him these past six years.       

          One of his first visitors, as television news showed, on the first day after his surgery, lying in his near-death bed, not able to breathe on his own, was his libel-cases lawyer. I’m sure they weren’t talking about the disposition of his family and assets, (previously, months before, the libel-cases lawyer said in an ANC interview that he was handling only the libel cases of the First Gentleman.)      

             After being sliced open, his heart brought out and laid on a tray and  incised and cleaned out and repaired and sewed back, as he lay in intensive care, and talked in notes to family members and his libel-cases lawyer, the libel-cases hearings against  journalists continued for that week, each and everyone of the scheduled settings. Even as the oppositionists and critics called a ceasefire and spared him from any kind of stress, he continued harassing and knifing the journalists thru his lawyers, as the court calendars would show and the respondents and accused would confirm. After being carved up like a pig and stuffed with a shant, he laid there and went on with his attack against journalists thru his lawyers, there was no letting up on his part.     

             People like Mike Arroyo and those around him don’t give any quarters and remain ruthless until their imagined enemies are buried six feet.         

         Hurry back and get well soon, FG, every respondent and every accused you are harassing is entitled to at least one lawyer each, and everyone of those accused is entitled to one cross-examination of you as thoroughly and as extensively and as comprehensively as there are one thousand cases and one thousand ways of showing that you are a public figure, subject to public scrutiny of your public acts, that are the subject of these cases as they are entitled to say  (and be upheld) “Very relevant, very material, Your Honor” to your counsel’s every objection, that would actually prolong each of your cross-examination, without let-up, without postponements, without continuances, as marathonly as possible, and don’t bring any excuse slips and medical certificates, this is the road you chose, the epiphany you never had.