“MSL is my GM”

“MSL is my GM.”

He is mine, too—just to be clear about it.

But what does this famous battlecry really mean?

It can mean whatever pledge of allegiance to the man it means to you. What I will discuss here is what it means TO Mel S. Licoben.

Will NEA ever install Mel as BENECO GM? It can but it would rather not.

First, let’s talk about the “it can” part.

Recall that NEA did not terminate Mel, it just made him serve a 45-day suspension for reasons I don’t understand. Of course, those reasons are clearly stated in their decision and that is precisely why I don’t understand it.

The board of directors and the general manager are a tightly-coordinated “bomb-making” partnership, if you will. The board is the “rigger” and the GM is the “trigger.” If the crime committed was a bomb that exploded, the guilt of one is the same as the guilt of the other. As the bomb did not discriminate with its victims, you cannot discriminate between the perpetrators—the bomb makers.

That’s the simplest way I can explain how the board is the policymaker while the GM is its implementor.

NEA terminated the board—to the final and extreme prejudice of Magnificent Seven directors—Esteban Somngi, Jeffred Acop, Mike Wayway Maspil, Peter Busaing, Jonathan Obar, Josephine Tuling and Robert Valentin—for authoring policies that NEA saw as violative of sound business practice.

But it gave Mel—who implemented those policies—a mere slap on the wrist. I know you’ll say, “Eh, yun naman pala eh. Sumunod lang siya sa mga utos.”

No, it’s not that simple. The GM is the chief executive officer and many of the policies enacted by the board originated from operational recommendations submitted and championed by management. A strong GM, such as Gerry Versoza, imprints his philosophy on BENECO policies more than does the collegial body that merely provides him with the board resolution cover.

Mel, who apprenticed under Versoza, was his half-clone. His managerial talent, discretion and expert advise are a significant input in all board deliberations. He wasn’t just a passive errand runner for the board. Whenever Mel’s “fans club” extol his virtues as a wonderful GM, you will never hear them saying he was “only following orders.”

So why did NEA deal more harshly with the Magnificent Seven than Mel?

There is only one reason, and that reason is Mayor Benjie Bañez Magalong (“BBM” a tempting acronym to use, which I’d rather not.)

Right at the height of the BENECO crisis in 2021 (that’s when I started writing about BENECO) climaxing in that failed “kudeta” of October 18, Benjie had minced no words telling NEA to back off and issuing those now-famous words, “If it ain’t broken, don’t fix it!”

Benjie is not the threatening or sloganeering type. He backed his words by calling Duterte’s executive secretary Salvador Medialdia to squarely warn him that Malacañang doesn’t’ want Duterte to get embroiled in this torrid controversy so close to a national election in which Duterte’s daughter Inday Sara is a prominent player.

He also got in touch with the top leadership of the PNP as well as the service commander of the Philippine Army to hedge against any attempt to escalate the armed blitzkrieg that NEA amateurishly mounted against BENECO.

Why the Philippine Army only? Because no one is stupid enough to call fighter jets from the Philippine Air Force or battleships from the Philippine Navy to assault South Drive!

If all the PNP wants at that point was just to save face and not look like a bunch of fumbling stooges, the only logical “backup force” of armored personnel carriers it needs can only come from the Army.

But if they made the even more stupid mistake of sending in ordnance that heavy, there is no scenario where the government could come out less than bullies, and God knows at what high cost in terms of colateral damage, read civilian casualties. The whole thing could get messy beyond anyone’s imagination. In plain talk, Benjie told the military brass don’t shit in my turf.

Malacañang listened to Benjie. They had no choice. The guy is an international celebrity—his COVID Contact Tracing protocol copied by Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia and Thailand.

Plus he commanded the elite sleuthing agency CIDG. They knew that if there was anything General Magalong will never get wrong, it’s the intel. If he told them NEA’s Gestapo-like approach is high-risk-low-gain, that’s a doctrinal assessment by an expert they shouldn’t challenge

So the moment Benjie knocked the air out of the PNP’s spinnaker, it had lost all will and capability to finish what Harry Roque basically instigated them to start.

It’s a little-known detail that it was Duterte Press Secretary Roque who sassed PNP Chief Guillermo Eleazar, “Ano ba yan? You should be helping install Atty. Rafael more actively!” Roque owed Marie Rafael that much since many of the press kits Harry distributed to media used to be prepared by Rafael when she was PCOO Undersecretary.

And yet—take all of these considerations together, at the end of the day what STILL PREVAILED is Benjie Magalong. When he stepped his foot down and said, “ibalato nyo sa akin si Mel” everybody backed off. End of discussion.

In case that is somehow not yet clear, I will restate it: the ONLY REASON Mel is still in BENECO today (After NEA cut loose both the Magnificent Seven and Marie Rafael) is Benjie Magalong.

This is why Benjie had the moral ascendancy to tell Mel to just let sleeping dogs lie. He went way out on a limb to save his skin (not to mention his career)—assuring him of being able to retire without issues in the next year or two. And the least Mel can do to return the extraordinary favor is to call off his dogs snarling “MSL is my GM” all over social media, because it is starting to drive a wedge between Mayor Magalong and his grassroots political base—the barangays.

These “MSL is my GM” ideologues are holding on to that faint possibility that NEA might want to turn Mel into a double agent of their own. Like I said, it is DOABLE.

But there’s a very narrow window of opportunity within which to do it—this brief stint of the “Interim Board” of directors, who by my own reckoning are already OVERSTAYING by more than a month.

Give NEA some credit, it built in a margin of flexibility for itself in dealing with the MSL situation—by ruling that he was actually the ASSISTANT GENERAL MANAGER.

So technically, this Interim Board can promote Mel to full GM, without having to go through all that song and dance number of vetting and hiring a new GM. In fact, they actually promised to do it three weeks ago—but Almeda bucked the idea. End of discussion, too.

Because the problem is this: the only basis for them to do that is by invoking the Rotational and Succession Program for choosing the BENECO GM—but that successional policy was the brainchild of the Magnificent Seven!

If you’re going to promote Mel using the policy for which you fired the Magnificent Seven, that is something that will be extremely difficult to defend in any court of law, let alone the court of public opinion. Since the odds of NEA reinstating the Magnificent Seven ranges from zero to none, so too is the possibility of Mel being “promoted” full GM by the mechanism designed by the Magnificent Seven—hence the decision to reopen the regular hiring process instead. Besides, NEA has tons of experience manipulating the regular process.

If you notice, fewer and fewer BENECO employees are still using the “MSL is my GM” profile template on Facebook. That’s because Benjie, in one low-key tirade, told them if that sloganeering continues Mel’s problem will become HIS problem. Keeping up the now-impossible demand to return Mel as full GM is setting up Benjie for a promise he CANNOT deliver. He can protect Mel, but he cannot pull strings to promote him—because the only way he can muscle NEA to do it is to commit NEA to reinstate the Magnificent Seven, too.

Haven’t I pointed this out? Benjie came out hard for Benjie—BUT NOT for the Magnificent Seven.

I’ve seen countless barangay resolutions—because the “MSL is my GM” movement regularly republishes them—expressing the demand for Mel to be kept as BENECO GM.

I’ve never seen one demanding the reinstatement of the Magnificent Seven.

Personally, I don’t give too much premium on any of these barangay resolutions. Barangay officials are the quintessential footsoldiers of every incumbent mayor, for practical reasons. There is that adage, “You can’t fight City Hall” and every punong barangay knows it—because their constituents endlessly remind them that, too.

These barangays were emboldened to come out hard for Mel AFTER they saw Benjie stick his neck out for him, too. Make these barangays aware that there’s nothing Benjie can do for Mel anymore—and let them repass an updated resolution DEMANDING something they know Benjie cannot deliver anymore. Will any of them still want to have anything to do with setting up Benjie to FAIL?

It depends. Those who are close to Benjie will not even think of doing it. But those who are aligned with Benjie’s political opponents know that this is too good a chance to pass up. There is no better way to make Benjie FAIL than to tie him up to the undeliverable promise of bringing back Mel as GM.

That’s why EVERYTIME those resolutions are republished, it sends Benjie’s political strategists scrambling to verify if any of those resolutions are recent expressions of grassroots sentiment.

That has, to some degree, empowered the barangays AGAINST Mayor Magalong because unless and until these punong barangays do the rounds and expressly tell their constituents “We’re STILL with Benjie” the default significance of those mostly two year-old barangay resolutions is this: if Benjie CAN’T bring back Mel, then Mayor Magalong has betrayed us. It might be time to switch their support to, say, Mauricio Domogan or even Sol Go—both of whom have nothing to lose by promising the moon and the stars.

This has significantly raised the cost of buttressing Benjie’s support base, and left him too vulnerable to early horse-trading. Remember, next year 2024 is “bisperas ng election year 2025.” His political strategists cannot be happy about THAT.

THAT is what Benjie must mean when he says he doesn’t want Mel’s problem to become HIS PROBLEM.

I don’t think Benjie’s patience and long sufferance for protecting Mel is limitless.

I don’t know if Mel realizes that. But what I know for sure is that the “MSL is my GM” movement understands absolutely NOTHING of this. I would guess that Benjie understands that the “MSL is my GM” movement take their cue ONLY from Mel, who so far is NOT publicly discouraging the outdated slogan that is slowly driving a wedge between Benjie and his base.

Unless, of course, the message that Mel is really is trying to convey to Magalong is, if you can’t return me as BENECO GM, my supporters will make sure YOU LOSE your third term bid. *