Dean Jorge Bocobo gets fired up

over the "missing PDI" article. He seems upset because he thinks PDI is playing politics by censoring itself and removing some of the "good news" re Big Brother Mike Arroyo (and you know we can't deny Mike Arroyo their "good news", bawal yan).

So he made some sarcastic comments about this. Yeah, maybe there's a conspiracy, Dean.

WHY PDI, WHY? I wonder how Philippine sports got so politicized this year that it has actually interfered with the conduct of sports itself. Now here is something STRANGE. I was going to link Philippine Commentary readers to this article, entitled, RP sports exec quashes Thai leader's doubts over SEA Games but it has DISAPPEARED from the Philippine Daily Inquirer's INQ7 website (404 error when you click on the link above). But the Global Mind never seems to forget, because in the Google Asia cache server, I found it, and here reproduce the same article in full:

RP sports exec quashes Thai leader's doubts over SEA Games

Nov 30, 2005
Updated 03:20pm (Mla time)
Veronica Uy
INQ7.net

DOUBTS over the fairness of the results in the Southeast Asian Games were quashed by a top sports official of host country Philippines on Wednesday.

Eric Buhain, chairman of the Games and Amusement Board and ambassador of the SEA Games, told INQ7.net that Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra should not question the performance of the Filipinos.

Earlier on Wednesday, without naming the Philippines, the Thai leader expressed disappointment over the outcome of the competitions and said that more importance had been given to the medal race than to the athletic spirit.

"Measurable sports like running, swimming, fencing, and water polo cannot be rigged as insinuated by Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra," Buhain said.

"The only way you can question the SEA Games is in the subjective games. This is just the fourth day and the Philippines is leading pero hindi pa tapos ang boxing, judo, o wrestling...[but boxing, judo or wrestling are not over] .One-zero ang bilangan sa mga yan [The counting in these competitions is one-zero]. Even in fencing, the scores are counted electronically," he said.

Buhain, who is in the Senate for the budget hearing of GAB, said the Philippines' top gold medal ranking was based on the actual performance of the athletes.

He attributed the rich medal harvest to First Gentleman Jose Miguel "Mike" Arroyo's financial assistance and the Philippines' "deep bench."

Buhain cited Arroyo's contribution to local sports through the Medalyang Ginto (Gold Medal) program, which gave 25 million pesos to 85 athletes in the last SEA Games.

"To prepare for this year, [the same program] supported 280 of the Philippines' 890 athletes with 160 million pesos. That's 160 million divided by 280 athletes," Buhain said.

"That's pretty big. That's why what we see now is really the result of that," he said.

Buhain said the Philippines and the 10 other countries, including Thailand, which participated in the last SEA Games in Vietnam did not question the host country when it got 150 gold medals. It was Vietnam's first time to host the biennial event.

"He [Thai prime minister] should not question our performance at all," Buhain said.

The Thai leader said he might raise the medal issue on the sidelines of the December summit of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations in Malaysia.

Four days into the SEA Games, the Philippines continues to lead the medal standings as it rakes in more golds in the various sporting events. Vietnam and Thailand are second and third respectively.

I have no idea how or why this article has apparently been pulled from the PDI INQ7 website, where it is the TOP HIT on Google Site Search for "eric buhain." Perhaps it was too revealing about the MONEY that has been floating around Philippine sports circles courtesy of the First Gentleman. He should've stayed in EXILE. He IS the black eye the President will be wearing at the ASEAN summit. Has PDI become a crony paper? Seems to me only direct communications with the Prieto family owners can accomplish this apparent act of SELF-CENSORSHIP. Hey Rizalist, where is that Journalist Code of Ethics again?

The Google Spider left this trace of its crawl at the PDI website: This is G o o g l e's cache of http://news.inq7.net/mpda/html_output/20051130-58286.xml.html as retrieved on 30 Nov 2005 10:16:34 GMT.

But why PDI, why? Was there a Temporary Restraining Order from the First Gentleman?

He later made a rowback and said there's nothing "sinister" about this after all. Well yes, Dean. ;)

UPDATE: I also told Dean na he should link to the PDI article, para malaman ng tao kung totoo yung sinasabi mo o hindi.

It's a good rule btw, the linking thing.

And one other thing, I'm one of PDI's biggest critics too, and I criticized them many times on serious mistakes and issues (where I even got the ombudsman to admit in private email na mali sila). But I thought this was non-issue from the beginning, so I was surprised on why Dean Jorge Bocobo (or Rizalist) made a huge fuss about this in the first place.

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