Editorial

Memo welcome but misses the mark

There is ample reason for all members of the Knights of Rizal to be thankful and to rejoice: for the first time in recent memory the highest ranking member of the Board of Directors, Acting Chairman Sir Virgilio Esguerra took the unprecedented act of communicating with the general membership via an official memorandum. Yes, in case some may have forgotten the title of Supreme Commander is synonymous with Chairman of the Board just as Board of Directors is with Supreme Council.

Truth is, all those “incendiary statements” and “insolent language” that Sir Esguerra refers to in his memo were products of the frustration among very concerned members who practically begged the Supreme Council to react, to respond and to communicate. Which is what Sir Esguerra did, finally !

Welcome though the memo is, there is however a slight problem. The message is off the mark. He points out that the problem the public corporation (which is what the Knights of Rizal is) has, has something to do “with imperfect system or institution”. That simply is not the case. To say so is to state the obvious – no system of any kind in any application and no institution of any type anywhere anytime is perfect. That is not what the issues are all about. That is not what the people are complaining about.

To be absolutely precise, judging by what everybody has said in the voluminous emails and public pronouncements made in various forms, the problems were and are specifically about:1) questionable decisions on appointments or revocation thereof; 2) alleged dishonorable and criminal acts of plagiarism and racism and 3) alleged violations of the By-laws and other questionable acts by certain appointed officers, in three foreign regions.

To generalize and lump them together as systemic or institutional is misleading and is indicative of a condition called “in denial”. Fact is, there is nothing complicated about these issues at all. They are also easy to deal with it doesn’t require a rocket scientist to unravel or a genius to solve. Lastly, it should also not take more than half a year to address any one of them. If there was an honest desire on the part of the leaders to settle, if there was any sincere concern for what repercussions those issues could cause, if there was an appreciation for the need to communicate, there would not have been any need for the memo at all.

Today it appears the desire to settle is present, the concern about the “concerns” is genuine, and the appreciation for the need to “sit and talk” is evident. We hope Sir Esguerra and his colleagues in the Supreme Council will also be expeditious in seeing their initiative through.