A couple of friends, for example, got into an argument with a low-life taxi driver last Dec. 28, 2006 after the latter refused to give them a ride. That was understandable on the part of the driver who was driving a taxi with license plate number PWK-365 and registered as belonging to a transport company named "Isaga." After all, it was the Christmas holidays and that is one of the rare times in the year that a lot of cabbies become one of the most arrogant species in the country.

What made the altercation startling was the driver’s arrogance in insisting that it was his God-given right to refuse any passenger, which in his assessment he would have to convey through traffic. Naturally, my friends being such believers in the sacred duties of public utilities contested the cab driver’s beliefs. This only caused him to taunt the rejected passengers that not even the Department of Transportation and Communication (DOTC) could compel him to adhere to the provisions of his cab’s franchise. And, unless someone from the DOTC teaches this guy a lesson, that is one more arrogant cab driver, and I do not mean just during the Christmas season.

Over in Albay, households already battered by a series of natural calamities are all set to receive another set of crosses to bear, this time man-made and in the form of a triple-whammy of a power rate hike. The Albay Electric Cooperative (Aleco), which supplies power to the province, has just imposed a 72.7-centavo per kilowatt-hour (kwh) or 11.2 percent rate increase from its previous rate of P6.4698per kwh. This is not counting the expected 72 centavo per kwh rate increase once electricity users are slapped the value added tax next month, or the projected additional 12 percent rate increase necessary to keep Aleco afloat if economic conditions do not improve this year.

This, however, is no simple matter of economics. As I have pointed out on several occasions, Aleco is a prime example of inefficiency and corruption kept going by the graces of concerned public officials from the province who do not want to see their much-suffering constituents suffer the added misfortune of prolonged power outages. But this hardly matters to the key executives running Aleco as they continue to run the distribution utility more to their personal gain.

Then there is the alleged maltreatment of detained military officers 1st Lt. Sonny Sarmiento and 2nd Lt. Aldrin Baldonado, linked to the 2003 Oakwood incident. According to their wives, the two are being "tortured while in isolation at a maximum security area inside Fort Bonifacio. This, supposedly to get them to sign papers implicating government critics in their activities. This scheme has all the signature of some minor but arrogant military official out to curry favor with his superiors.

As we can all well see, arrogance is not the monopoly of the rich and powerful. Even those with so little authority or power in their possession may likewise abuse these. Against arrogance in low places, we are dependent on the vigilance of those on top to stamp it out. But these go on with seeming reckless abandon and those on top cannot seem to do anything to stop it.

How could they? Those who are supposed to guard against arrogance in low places are busy freeing a convicted rapist to please their American patrons even to the point of circumventing the judiciary, disposing of sequestered telecommunications shares at bargain basement prices, plotting to legitimize and prolong their stay in power by railroading the move to amend the 1987 Constitution and other similar acts of arrogance in high places.