MAGUINDANAO, SULU, LANAO DEL SUR: 2007
Alexander Martin Remollino
Maguindanao, Sulu, Lanao del Sur:
doon pinagpasyahan ng iilan ang kapasyahan ng bayan.
Doo'y nakapaghalal ang mga taumbayan
nang di naghahalal:
sa maraming bayan sa mga lalawigang iyon,
ni hindi nila nahipo ang mga balota.
Isang milyon halos ang mga botong mula roon,
mga botong isinulat ng mga kamay
na karamiha'y hindi nakahawak ng balota --
isang milyon halos na botong kung ibilang na lahat
ay sapat upang itakda ang kapalaran
ng dalawang mahigpit na naglalabang koalisyon.
Maguindanao, Sulu, Lanao del Sur:
doon ibinaba ng iilan ang hatol ng mga mamamayan
sa karampot na kriminal na ayaw maparusahan.
Sunday, May 27, 2007
CENTERSTAGE: ARMM
As the national canvassing of votes for the recently-concluded senatorial and local elections continues to go full-swing, all eyes are on the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) -– as massive fraud is alleged to have taken place in two of the region’s provinces while failure of elections has been declared in another.
BY ALEXANDER MARTIN REMOLLINO
Bulatlat
Election Watch
Vol. VII, No. 16 May 27-June 2, 2007
As the national canvassing of votes for the recently-concluded senatorial and local elections continues to go full-swing, all eyes are on the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) –- Sulu, Basilan, Tawi-Tawi, Shariff Kabunsuan, Lanao del Sur, Marawi City, and Maguindanao –- as massive fraud is alleged to have taken place in two of the region’s provinces while failure of elections has been declared in another.
Maguindanao and Sulu have aroused controversy for both delivering 12-0 victories for the administration coalition Team Unity. Meanwhile, a failure of election had been declared in 14 of the municipalities of Lanao del Sur.
The ARMM has a combined total of 1,381,467 registered voters, based on data from the regional office of the Commission on Elections (Comelec) there. Maguindanao has 212,795; Shariff Kabunsuan has 198,278; Lanao del Sur and Marawi City have 396,913; Basilan has 182,020; Sulu has 251,223; and Tawi-Tawi has 140, 238.
The size of the voting population in either Maguindanao or Sulu can affect the 11th and 12th slots in the senatorial race.
Based on the official Comelec count as of 7:30 p.m., May 25, Genuine Opposition candidates Antonio Trillanes IV and Aquilino “Koko” Pimentel are in the 11th and 12th slots, respectively.
The total number of registered voters in the entire ARMM is statistically enough to affect the rankings of all senatorial candidates.
Uncanvassed returns, pre-filled ballots
A May 25 report from the Task Force Poll Watch (TFPW) -– a joint effort by the progressive party-list bloc and the Genuine Opposition to monitor the counting of votes – reveals that up to 190 election returns (ERs) and 38 ballot boxes have yet to be canvassed in Pagalungan, Maguindanao.
“Up to now, the authorized Comelec officer has yet to collect the election returns and the 38 ballot boxes,” said Faizal Kalantungan, a member of Maguindanao’s Board of Election Inspectors (BEI), in an affidavit signed yesterday.
Kalantungan’s affidavit, which TFPW used as reference for its May 25 report sent to media, comes as a shocking disclosure considering that the Magundanao certificate of canvass (CoC) had been submitted to the Philippine International Convention Center (PICC), where the Comelec en banc is conducting the national canvassing of votes.
A TFPW fact-finding team sent to investigate the reported fraud in Maguindanao discovered that the 190 uncanvassed ERs mentioned in Kalantungan’s affidavit contained all the votes for eight out of 12 barangays (villages) in Pagalungan.
“It is highly irregular that the Provincial Board of Canvassers already finished canvassing ‘votes’ in Maguindanao while the ERs remain in the custody of poll officers at the municipal level,” said Satur Ocampo, first nominee of Bayan Muna (People First) which is among the initiators of TFPW.
“This is a clear case of election sabotage, a criminal and election offense,” Ocampo also said.
Kalantungan’s revelation comes on the heels of reports that teachers serving as election officials in Maguindanao were literally forced to deliver a 12-0 victory for senatorial candidates belonging to the administration coalition Team Unity.
In a news conference on May 20, the poll monitoring group Legal Network for Truthful Elections (Lente) –- headed by lawyer Carlos Medina –- stated that a teacher from Maguindanao had talked to its volunteers and said that election officials were ordered at gunpoint to fill the ballots with the names of Team Unity senatorial candidates, starting with those of Luis “Chavit” Singson and Prospero Pichay.
Aside from Singson and Pichay, Team Unity’s other senatorial candidates are: Juan Miguel Zubiri, Mike Defensor, Jamalul Kiram, Ralph Recto, Joker Arroyo, Mike Defensor, Edgardo Angara, Vicente “Tito” Sotto III, Teresa Aquino-Oreta, and Cesar Montano.
Not only that -– students and other children playing around on the school grounds were asked to mark the ballots with thumbprints and sign their names on the voters’ list.
Comelec chairman Benjamin Abalos has warned of the possibility of penalty should the Maguindanao teacher’s allegation “fail” to be substantiated. “We are also looking at the other side because unverified, invalidated reports, which cause alarm to our people, should not be tolerated and should not be left unpunished,” the Comelec chairman said in a press conference on May 22.
Lente even stated that the teacher said no actual voting took place in Maguindanao. “We request the Comelec to send an investigation team and talk to the common folk, look for indelible ink on their fingers because the teacher said the ink was not used,” Medina said.
Alongside Lente’s exposé came a report from Eric Alvia, secretary-general of the National Movement for Free Elections (Namfrel), that Maguindanao Comelec officers withheld copies of provincial ERs from Namfrel volunteers.
Fr. Eduardo Tanudtanud, Namfrel’s Maguindanao chairman, said their volunteers were told that municipal election officers issued a verbal order to withhold the release of all copies of the ERs –- including the copy for Namfrel.
Sulu
It is not only in Maguindanao that such occurrences have been reported. There were reports of similar occurrences in Sulu.
On election day, lawyer Raissa Jajurie, the only Lente lawyer assigned to Sulu, visited a number of polling precincts in the said province. “I was really taken aback by the massive cheating in the area,” she said in an account published in Mindanews.
This, she said, is what she witnessed in a school in one town (the identity of which she requested to be withheld):
“When I arrived, many of the rooms where the precincts were conducting business were closed, with a military guard right outside the door. When I tried to get in, I was told by the military that I could not, even if I showed him my (canvassing) ID.
“I peeped in and saw that there were people inside. I tried my luck in another building. I was able to get in. And I was shocked to see the BEIs (Board of Election Inspectors) writing on the ballots which had already been thumbmarked. They were writing the same list of candidates on each of the ballots. A man with a bolo was also near the BEI. A ballot box was open (without padlock) while ballots were being placed inside it.
“I saw the same thing (BEI writing on the ballots) being done in two precincts stationed on a stage (it is a school campus). When the BEI and other people around them realized that I was watching them, they whispered to each other but continued with their task. When I left, someone approached me and asked me what I was doing. I told him I’m a watcher, and showed him my IDs.”
In another school in the same town, Jajurie said, there were people “assisting” the voters. “There was no vote secrecy and voters, watchers and ‘other people’ were mingling in the rooms,” she said.
Jajurie said she had information that there were similar incidents in other towns in Sulu, but she admitted she had no opportunity to visit other areas.
The Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) has called for the declaration of a failure of elections in Sulu on account of what it described as the “massive fraud” that transpired in the said province.
“Déjà vu”
In its preliminary post-election report released May 21, the election monitoring group Kontra Daya (Anti-Fraud) –- which has among its conveners former Vice President Teofisto Guingona, Jr., Fr. Joe Dizon, former Transportation and Communication Secretary Josie Lichauco, film director Carlitos Siguion Reyna, retired Army Col. Gerry Cunanan, and National Artist for Literature Bienvenido Lumbera –- noted that the occurrences in the ARMM seemed like a repeat of what transpired in the 2004 elections, where the said region was reportedly a major operating center.
“Kontra Daya finds significant the reports of Maguindanao province delivering a 12-0 sweep for administration senatorial candidates,” the group stated in its report. “There are incoming reports that Sulu province is also poised to deliver a 12-0 sweep for Team Unity. Such an overnight sweep, which the government attributes to overwhelming popular support for the administration, simply strains credulity.”
Kontra Daya has accused Malacañang of engaging in “large-scale electoral fraud” to favor its candidates in the senatorial and party-list elections. It has also denounced the Comelec for being “directly complicit with the Arroyo administration” in perpetuating fraud. Bulatlat
As the national canvassing of votes for the recently-concluded senatorial and local elections continues to go full-swing, all eyes are on the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) -– as massive fraud is alleged to have taken place in two of the region’s provinces while failure of elections has been declared in another.
BY ALEXANDER MARTIN REMOLLINO
Bulatlat
Election Watch
Vol. VII, No. 16 May 27-June 2, 2007
As the national canvassing of votes for the recently-concluded senatorial and local elections continues to go full-swing, all eyes are on the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) –- Sulu, Basilan, Tawi-Tawi, Shariff Kabunsuan, Lanao del Sur, Marawi City, and Maguindanao –- as massive fraud is alleged to have taken place in two of the region’s provinces while failure of elections has been declared in another.
Maguindanao and Sulu have aroused controversy for both delivering 12-0 victories for the administration coalition Team Unity. Meanwhile, a failure of election had been declared in 14 of the municipalities of Lanao del Sur.
The ARMM has a combined total of 1,381,467 registered voters, based on data from the regional office of the Commission on Elections (Comelec) there. Maguindanao has 212,795; Shariff Kabunsuan has 198,278; Lanao del Sur and Marawi City have 396,913; Basilan has 182,020; Sulu has 251,223; and Tawi-Tawi has 140, 238.
The size of the voting population in either Maguindanao or Sulu can affect the 11th and 12th slots in the senatorial race.
Based on the official Comelec count as of 7:30 p.m., May 25, Genuine Opposition candidates Antonio Trillanes IV and Aquilino “Koko” Pimentel are in the 11th and 12th slots, respectively.
The total number of registered voters in the entire ARMM is statistically enough to affect the rankings of all senatorial candidates.
Uncanvassed returns, pre-filled ballots
A May 25 report from the Task Force Poll Watch (TFPW) -– a joint effort by the progressive party-list bloc and the Genuine Opposition to monitor the counting of votes – reveals that up to 190 election returns (ERs) and 38 ballot boxes have yet to be canvassed in Pagalungan, Maguindanao.
“Up to now, the authorized Comelec officer has yet to collect the election returns and the 38 ballot boxes,” said Faizal Kalantungan, a member of Maguindanao’s Board of Election Inspectors (BEI), in an affidavit signed yesterday.
Kalantungan’s affidavit, which TFPW used as reference for its May 25 report sent to media, comes as a shocking disclosure considering that the Magundanao certificate of canvass (CoC) had been submitted to the Philippine International Convention Center (PICC), where the Comelec en banc is conducting the national canvassing of votes.
A TFPW fact-finding team sent to investigate the reported fraud in Maguindanao discovered that the 190 uncanvassed ERs mentioned in Kalantungan’s affidavit contained all the votes for eight out of 12 barangays (villages) in Pagalungan.
“It is highly irregular that the Provincial Board of Canvassers already finished canvassing ‘votes’ in Maguindanao while the ERs remain in the custody of poll officers at the municipal level,” said Satur Ocampo, first nominee of Bayan Muna (People First) which is among the initiators of TFPW.
“This is a clear case of election sabotage, a criminal and election offense,” Ocampo also said.
Kalantungan’s revelation comes on the heels of reports that teachers serving as election officials in Maguindanao were literally forced to deliver a 12-0 victory for senatorial candidates belonging to the administration coalition Team Unity.
In a news conference on May 20, the poll monitoring group Legal Network for Truthful Elections (Lente) –- headed by lawyer Carlos Medina –- stated that a teacher from Maguindanao had talked to its volunteers and said that election officials were ordered at gunpoint to fill the ballots with the names of Team Unity senatorial candidates, starting with those of Luis “Chavit” Singson and Prospero Pichay.
Aside from Singson and Pichay, Team Unity’s other senatorial candidates are: Juan Miguel Zubiri, Mike Defensor, Jamalul Kiram, Ralph Recto, Joker Arroyo, Mike Defensor, Edgardo Angara, Vicente “Tito” Sotto III, Teresa Aquino-Oreta, and Cesar Montano.
Not only that -– students and other children playing around on the school grounds were asked to mark the ballots with thumbprints and sign their names on the voters’ list.
Comelec chairman Benjamin Abalos has warned of the possibility of penalty should the Maguindanao teacher’s allegation “fail” to be substantiated. “We are also looking at the other side because unverified, invalidated reports, which cause alarm to our people, should not be tolerated and should not be left unpunished,” the Comelec chairman said in a press conference on May 22.
Lente even stated that the teacher said no actual voting took place in Maguindanao. “We request the Comelec to send an investigation team and talk to the common folk, look for indelible ink on their fingers because the teacher said the ink was not used,” Medina said.
Alongside Lente’s exposé came a report from Eric Alvia, secretary-general of the National Movement for Free Elections (Namfrel), that Maguindanao Comelec officers withheld copies of provincial ERs from Namfrel volunteers.
Fr. Eduardo Tanudtanud, Namfrel’s Maguindanao chairman, said their volunteers were told that municipal election officers issued a verbal order to withhold the release of all copies of the ERs –- including the copy for Namfrel.
Sulu
It is not only in Maguindanao that such occurrences have been reported. There were reports of similar occurrences in Sulu.
On election day, lawyer Raissa Jajurie, the only Lente lawyer assigned to Sulu, visited a number of polling precincts in the said province. “I was really taken aback by the massive cheating in the area,” she said in an account published in Mindanews.
This, she said, is what she witnessed in a school in one town (the identity of which she requested to be withheld):
“When I arrived, many of the rooms where the precincts were conducting business were closed, with a military guard right outside the door. When I tried to get in, I was told by the military that I could not, even if I showed him my (canvassing) ID.
“I peeped in and saw that there were people inside. I tried my luck in another building. I was able to get in. And I was shocked to see the BEIs (Board of Election Inspectors) writing on the ballots which had already been thumbmarked. They were writing the same list of candidates on each of the ballots. A man with a bolo was also near the BEI. A ballot box was open (without padlock) while ballots were being placed inside it.
“I saw the same thing (BEI writing on the ballots) being done in two precincts stationed on a stage (it is a school campus). When the BEI and other people around them realized that I was watching them, they whispered to each other but continued with their task. When I left, someone approached me and asked me what I was doing. I told him I’m a watcher, and showed him my IDs.”
In another school in the same town, Jajurie said, there were people “assisting” the voters. “There was no vote secrecy and voters, watchers and ‘other people’ were mingling in the rooms,” she said.
Jajurie said she had information that there were similar incidents in other towns in Sulu, but she admitted she had no opportunity to visit other areas.
The Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) has called for the declaration of a failure of elections in Sulu on account of what it described as the “massive fraud” that transpired in the said province.
“Déjà vu”
In its preliminary post-election report released May 21, the election monitoring group Kontra Daya (Anti-Fraud) –- which has among its conveners former Vice President Teofisto Guingona, Jr., Fr. Joe Dizon, former Transportation and Communication Secretary Josie Lichauco, film director Carlitos Siguion Reyna, retired Army Col. Gerry Cunanan, and National Artist for Literature Bienvenido Lumbera –- noted that the occurrences in the ARMM seemed like a repeat of what transpired in the 2004 elections, where the said region was reportedly a major operating center.
“Kontra Daya finds significant the reports of Maguindanao province delivering a 12-0 sweep for administration senatorial candidates,” the group stated in its report. “There are incoming reports that Sulu province is also poised to deliver a 12-0 sweep for Team Unity. Such an overnight sweep, which the government attributes to overwhelming popular support for the administration, simply strains credulity.”
Kontra Daya has accused Malacañang of engaging in “large-scale electoral fraud” to favor its candidates in the senatorial and party-list elections. It has also denounced the Comelec for being “directly complicit with the Arroyo administration” in perpetuating fraud. Bulatlat
Thursday, May 17, 2007
PAGKAKAIT NG KATAHIMIKAN
Alexander Martin Remollino
Kabilang sa inaangkin nilang mga pribilehiyo
ng kanilang katungkulan at uniporme
ang karapatang ipagkait ang katahimikan
sa pinakatahimik man nating mga gabi.
Ilan nang kaanak at kaibigan
na nakitalad upang ang lipunan ng mga tao
ay maging karapat-dapat sa mga tao
ang kanilang pinapaglahong parang mga bula,
at tayo'y kanilang isinadlak
sa walang-katapusang pakikipagtalo sa mga sarili
hinggil sa kung ang nawawalang mga kaanak at kaibigan
ay aalayan na kaya ng mga elehiya
o patuloy na aantaying kumatok isang araw
sa mga pinto ng ating mga tahanan at tanggapan
o biglang sumulpot sa ating mga pagtitipon.
Dahil dito,
atin naman ang karapatang ipagkait sa kanila
ang katahimikan ng tiyak na pagkakaupo
sa mga luklukan ng kapangyarihan.
Atin ang karapatang ibitin ng buhok
sa tapat ng kanilang mga ulo
ang espada ni Damocles.
Alexander Martin Remollino
Sa mga kaanak at kaibigan ni Jonas Burgos at ng iba pang biktima ng sapilitang pagkawala
Kabilang sa inaangkin nilang mga pribilehiyo
ng kanilang katungkulan at uniporme
ang karapatang ipagkait ang katahimikan
sa pinakatahimik man nating mga gabi.
Ilan nang kaanak at kaibigan
na nakitalad upang ang lipunan ng mga tao
ay maging karapat-dapat sa mga tao
ang kanilang pinapaglahong parang mga bula,
at tayo'y kanilang isinadlak
sa walang-katapusang pakikipagtalo sa mga sarili
hinggil sa kung ang nawawalang mga kaanak at kaibigan
ay aalayan na kaya ng mga elehiya
o patuloy na aantaying kumatok isang araw
sa mga pinto ng ating mga tahanan at tanggapan
o biglang sumulpot sa ating mga pagtitipon.
Dahil dito,
atin naman ang karapatang ipagkait sa kanila
ang katahimikan ng tiyak na pagkakaupo
sa mga luklukan ng kapangyarihan.
Atin ang karapatang ibitin ng buhok
sa tapat ng kanilang mga ulo
ang espada ni Damocles.
Monday, May 14, 2007
IT WAS NOT A ONE-SHOT DEAL FOR YOU
Alexander Martin Remollino
Your courage does not lie in a one-time sigh of disappointment
at a seductive dream that turned out to be a nightmare.
Your life was a lifetime and a hundred of rage
against man's inhumanity to man.
From that fateful encounter with moneyed boors
at that market in your native Pangasinan
to your last days in America
(when you were too weak to even punch the typewriter's keys),
you were fighting for a truly human society.
It is not those one-hit wonders who can fully honor you.
It was not a one-shot deal for you
but a struggle lasting beyond a lifetime.
Alexander Martin Remollino
For Carlos Bulosan
Your courage does not lie in a one-time sigh of disappointment
at a seductive dream that turned out to be a nightmare.
Your life was a lifetime and a hundred of rage
against man's inhumanity to man.
From that fateful encounter with moneyed boors
at that market in your native Pangasinan
to your last days in America
(when you were too weak to even punch the typewriter's keys),
you were fighting for a truly human society.
It is not those one-hit wonders who can fully honor you.
It was not a one-shot deal for you
but a struggle lasting beyond a lifetime.
Sunday, May 13, 2007
SOLDIERS ORDERED TO VOTE FOR TEAM UNITY, DND EMPLOYEE CONFIRMS
In an interview with Bulatlat, an employee at the Department of National Defense corroborated reports that soldiers were instructed to vote 12-0 for the administration senatorial candidates as well as a military-backed party-list group.
BY ALEXANDER MARTIN REMOLLINO
Bulatlat
In an interview with Bulatlat, an employee at the Department of National Defense (DND) corroborated reports that soldiers were instructed to vote 12-0 for the senatorial candidates of the administration coalition Team Unity, as well as the party-list group Bantay (The True Marcos Loyalist) –- which has retired Army Maj. Gen. Jovito Palparan, Jr. as its first nominee.
Soldiers are among those covered by the Absentee Voting Law -– which allows voting ahead of schedule. Also covered by the said law are overseas Filipino workers (OFWs), policemen, and teachers performing election duties.
“They had orders to vote straight for Team Unity, and to vote for Bantay,” the DND employee -– who asked not to be named for security reasons -– told Bulatlat in an interview.
Team Unity’s candidates are: Edgardo Angara, Joker Arroyo, Mike Defensor, Jamalul Kiram, Vicente Magsaysay, Cesar Montano, Teresa Aquino-Oreta, Prospero Pichay Jr., Ralph Recto, Luis “Chavit” Singson, Vicente Sotto III and Juan Miguel Zubiri. Based on a list of party-list nominees recently released by the Commission on Elections (Comelec) upon orders following a Supreme Court ruling, Bantay’s other nominees aside from Palparan are: Ramon Garcia, Benjamin Angeles, Alan Guevara, and Agnes Reaño.
“General Esperon himself issued the order,” the DND employee said, referring to Gen. Hermogenes Esperon, chief of staff of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP).
The DND employee’s revelation corroborates the allegations made by a Col. Romeo A. Solina of the Philippine Army in a statement now circulating through the Internet. Solina’s letter was originally posted on the website http://sundalo.bravehost.com/, and began circulating around the Internet late last week.
“Information reportedly given by soldiers from different areas in the country claim that they were supervised by their commanders and ordered to vote straight Team Unity and for party list Bantay of retired general Palparan,” Solina said in his statement. “The soldiers come from Tarlac, from Samar, and from Davao. Personally, I also have my own informant confirming the same. Although out of the service, I still have a few soldiers in the active service who maintain contact with me.”
Before Solina’s statement started to circulate, senatorial candidate and former Navy officer Antonio Trillanes IV –- who is presently detained on mutiny charges -– had also told reporters that Esperon had issued a radio message to soldiers ordering them to “ensure victory” for Team Unity.
Esperon has denied the allegations of Trillanes, saying it is the military’s policy to remain non-partisan. “Internally, we have not been given or been giving instructions to our soldiers, officers and men, to vote for particular candidates and party-list groups,” the AFP chief of staff also told media.
Solina, however, is not convinced. “If he is telling the truth, then he has lost control of the AFP because someone in the organization can give out operational orders without his knowledge,” he said in his statement.
“And even if these orders really came from him, these may be ignored and disobeyed,” Solina added.
The DND employee expressed a similar view in the interview with Bulatlat. “I don’t know why the soldiers allowed themselves to be used in this manner,” the DND employee said. Bulatlat
In an interview with Bulatlat, an employee at the Department of National Defense corroborated reports that soldiers were instructed to vote 12-0 for the administration senatorial candidates as well as a military-backed party-list group.
BY ALEXANDER MARTIN REMOLLINO
Bulatlat
In an interview with Bulatlat, an employee at the Department of National Defense (DND) corroborated reports that soldiers were instructed to vote 12-0 for the senatorial candidates of the administration coalition Team Unity, as well as the party-list group Bantay (The True Marcos Loyalist) –- which has retired Army Maj. Gen. Jovito Palparan, Jr. as its first nominee.
Soldiers are among those covered by the Absentee Voting Law -– which allows voting ahead of schedule. Also covered by the said law are overseas Filipino workers (OFWs), policemen, and teachers performing election duties.
“They had orders to vote straight for Team Unity, and to vote for Bantay,” the DND employee -– who asked not to be named for security reasons -– told Bulatlat in an interview.
Team Unity’s candidates are: Edgardo Angara, Joker Arroyo, Mike Defensor, Jamalul Kiram, Vicente Magsaysay, Cesar Montano, Teresa Aquino-Oreta, Prospero Pichay Jr., Ralph Recto, Luis “Chavit” Singson, Vicente Sotto III and Juan Miguel Zubiri. Based on a list of party-list nominees recently released by the Commission on Elections (Comelec) upon orders following a Supreme Court ruling, Bantay’s other nominees aside from Palparan are: Ramon Garcia, Benjamin Angeles, Alan Guevara, and Agnes Reaño.
“General Esperon himself issued the order,” the DND employee said, referring to Gen. Hermogenes Esperon, chief of staff of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP).
The DND employee’s revelation corroborates the allegations made by a Col. Romeo A. Solina of the Philippine Army in a statement now circulating through the Internet. Solina’s letter was originally posted on the website http://sundalo.bravehost.com/, and began circulating around the Internet late last week.
“Information reportedly given by soldiers from different areas in the country claim that they were supervised by their commanders and ordered to vote straight Team Unity and for party list Bantay of retired general Palparan,” Solina said in his statement. “The soldiers come from Tarlac, from Samar, and from Davao. Personally, I also have my own informant confirming the same. Although out of the service, I still have a few soldiers in the active service who maintain contact with me.”
Before Solina’s statement started to circulate, senatorial candidate and former Navy officer Antonio Trillanes IV –- who is presently detained on mutiny charges -– had also told reporters that Esperon had issued a radio message to soldiers ordering them to “ensure victory” for Team Unity.
Esperon has denied the allegations of Trillanes, saying it is the military’s policy to remain non-partisan. “Internally, we have not been given or been giving instructions to our soldiers, officers and men, to vote for particular candidates and party-list groups,” the AFP chief of staff also told media.
Solina, however, is not convinced. “If he is telling the truth, then he has lost control of the AFP because someone in the organization can give out operational orders without his knowledge,” he said in his statement.
“And even if these orders really came from him, these may be ignored and disobeyed,” Solina added.
The DND employee expressed a similar view in the interview with Bulatlat. “I don’t know why the soldiers allowed themselves to be used in this manner,” the DND employee said. Bulatlat
QUO VADIS, GENUINE OPPOSITION?
Q & A with Atty. Adel Tamano, Genuine Opposition spokesperson
In this year’s senatorial elections, the Genuine Opposition is by all indications leading the race. What will it do if it is cheated -– or it does win?
BY ALEXANDER MARTIN REMOLLINO
Bulatlat
In this year’s senatorial elections, the Genuine Opposition is by all indications leading the race. All credible opinion surveys point to the Genuine Opposition as very likely to win the majority of the senatorial seats up for grabs in this year’s polls.
In its website, the Genuine Opposition describes itself as "the umbrella political coalition party of the opposition’s senatorial and local line-up for the 2007 Philippine Midterm Elections." It is further described as a "multi-party and multi-sectoral coalition" which includes the United Opposition (UNO), the Liberal Party, the Nacionalista Party, the Nationalist People’s Coalition (NPC), Aksyon Demokratiko, PDP-Laban, the Partido ng Masang Pilipino (Party of the A Filipino Masses), and a number of civil society groups.
Its candidates for the 2007 senatorial elections are: Benigno "Noynoy" Aquino III, Alan Peter Cayetano, Anna Dominique "Nikki" Coseteng, Francis "Chiz" Escudero, Panfilo "Ping" Lacson, Loren Legarda, John Henry Osmeña, Aquilino "Koko" Pimentel III, Sonia Roco, Antonio Trillanes IV and Manuel Villar.
The Genuine Opposition’s lead in all credible opinion polls shows that the coalition will win hands down in a clean and honest election.
The coalition’s lead over the administration’s Team Unity ticket is interpreted as a reflection of the electorate’s disgust with the Arroyo administration –- which is under fire from various quarters for massive human rights violations, corruption, and imposition of policies described as "anti-national and anti-people."
In what direction is the Genuine Opposition headed? What will it do if it is cheated in the coming elections? What will it do if it does win in the coming elections?
This interview with lawyer Adel Tamano, the Genuine Opposition’s spokesman, aims to provide answers to these questions.
How does the Genuine Opposition assess the conduct of its campaign thus far?
From the surveys, consistently we’ve been doing quite well. The surveys have been consistent that at least seven to eight of our candidates will come in.
So within the context that we don’t have much funds and logistics, and our opponents have so much funds and so much logistics, and we’re the underdogs because we’re not in power and yet in the surveys we're leading -- I think that's a testimony to the effectivity of our campaign.
Many are curious about why the Genuine Opposition did not field candidates in many of the local positions. Is there an explanation for that?
We have 50 percent of the candidates for provincial posts, we have 69 percent in the congressional districts, 25 percent of mayoral posts. Now, it may appear that we have a shortage of candidates.
But we have set up already an anti-poll fraud team that would cover 95 percent of municipalities. Because the next question would be, "How can you protect your votes?" In spite of the lack of candidates, the scope, the reach of our pollwatchers will be enough.
The Liberal Party, which is part of the Genuine Opposition coalition, has been accredited as the dominant minority party. Because of that, they will be able to get the election returns at the municipal level, which is the primary document used for canvassing and to assail the canvass.
So that is where we will get our protection.
As a related point, we don’t really believe that there is a command vote anymore, in the sense that Filipinos are maturing politically. So in spite of the claimed command votes, I think the Filipinos will really choose to vote on their own, regardless of what their political leaders say, and we’re putting our hopes on that also.
Team Unity spokespersons have been going around the entire country telling people that their so-called "political machinery" will ensure them a 12-0 victory in the coming elections. What do you make of this?
You know, I was just at a forum with Noynoy Aquino, and what he said was good, he had good insights.
In 2004 he campaigned with President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. He was a part of their slate, he was actually administration before, and he joined the opposition only in 2005. They campaigned really hard throughout Luzon then.
This is the same machinery, basically, that they’re tapping for the 2007 elections. And in Luzon in 2004 –- and it was just one person that they were really pushing for, it was just GMA. GMA only won in two provinces: Pampanga and Tarlac. So this goes to show you that this machinery actually, it's vaunted, but in real practice, in application, this showed the weakness of the machinery. Because in 2004 they were campaigning for only one person, and yet she only won in Tarlac and Pampanga, which is her own base. Now they're campaigning for a full 12 slate, and as Congressman Noynoy said –- since he has been in elective office for nine years –- if you ask the local leaders to add one or two candidates to the senatorial slate, it’s easy… But once you start doing four, five, six – the local officials will say, boss, that's no longer easy, because the amount of work they will have to do –- first to campaign, if the candidates are really palatable; and if they're not palatable, to cheat in order to get that result –- it would just be too much for the local candidates. So on the basis of that, he sees that it’s not gonna happen, this 12-0 boast. It’s not gonna happen. It's been proven. It’s really not possible.
There has been no closure on what happened to Fernando Poe, Jr.’s votes in 2004, as well as on the "Hello Garci" tapes. Do you expect a repeat of these scenarios in the next elections?
Two things:
First, we hope it won’t happen again because if we felt really that there was no more credibility in the election process, then one of the options for the opposition would have been to boycott. And there were calls, really, to boycott the elections. So our participation shows that we still believe in the process, that's number one.
Number two, this is not the same opposition as in 2004. We have learned from our mistakes and also from the cheating methods that they undertook in 2004, and we’re more prepared for that and we're taking the necessary steps to protect the votes and to ensure that "Hello Garci" doesn’t happen again.
Because we really believe that the country is not ready and cannot take another "Hello Garci" scandal.
Now, going to the legislative agenda of the Genuine Opposition…
We have 10 agenda points. They’re pretty broad, but you can see common threads. Our advocacies –- one common theme in all of them is that we are not promising to do something we cannot do. At the start of the campaign period, there were some discussions on, "How about we promise to give a P200 wage increase?" or "Why don’t we promise that we'll scrap the EVAT (Expanded Value-Added Tax) Law?" but we felt that as an organization, we would lose our credibility. Even if we win on that platform and we don't deliver, we would lose our credibility… In the long term, our credibility, we give it more importance than the short-term gain of promising so many things. I think the common thread in our legislative agenda is that it’s doable. For example, we want a moratorium on new taxes. That is doable. So we do not promise anything we cannot achieve, we want that to be one of the hallmarks of the Genuine Opposition, which is that we promise to do only that which we can do.
In the Genuine Opposition’s legislative agenda, there is an item which says something about instituting reforms “to make the economy more dynamic, efficient and equitable and make the Filipino workers and enterprises more globally competitive.” Would it be reasonable to expect then that these reforms would be taking place within the framework of the globalization program?
Yes, it’s reasonable to… Well, globalization, that is a tie that we cannot really go against. It’s here. We don't have to create a program for that: it’s here. It’s a reality that we face, and…
One of the things also that you’ll notice in our legislative agenda is we did not make it too specific. Because we want to give our opposition senators the leeway to make investigations and to decide which way they're going to go. So for example, to institute the necessary reforms to make us more globally competitive, I cannot give you a very specific answer to what specifically we would do, because we really want to also have the flexibility.
But underlying that is the idea that we feel that there must be not just economic growth, but an equitable distribution of that growth. Because we feel that you can have 5 percent GNP (Gross National Product) growth and even 10 percent GNP growth, but if poverty still remains at about 53 percent, then you don’t really call that a success. In fact, one of our primary beliefs is that one of the first freedoms is freedom from poverty, and until we achieve that, we’re not going to have a free society.
One of the items in the agenda that I noticed as being more specific is that on increased budgetary allocation for education.
Yes, under the Constitution, education should be given the top budgetary priority. Unfortunately now, under the current dispensation, the number one budgetary priority is debt servicing. Now, of course that’s a complicated issue, there are a lot of pros and cons to that, but for us, we want to give life to the letter and spirit of the Constitution. In fact, if you take a look at the 2007 budget, even the ranking –- number one is of course, debt servicing, while education is not even at numbers two, three and four –- it’s number five, if I'm not mistaken. Ahead of that are the allocations for the military, infrastructure – education is not as high on the priority list for this administration, and in fact on a per capita basis, expenditure for education has gone down by about P200 per student, and that shows you that we really have a long way to go.
Another thing is the generation of jobs "through labor-intensive infrastructure projects in the rural areas."
We feel the big projects, capital-intensive projects do not take full advantage, or do not take full account of our competitive advantage. Our competitive advantage is labor. We have cheap labor, we have plentiful labor, and our labor is actually skilled.
And yet we’re focusing on mega-buck projects. The focus on mega-buck projects is because it is easy to get cuts and kickbacks from these, as opposed to a project that is labor-intensive. So we feel that there should be a shift of emphasis, we feel that we should make the most use of our comparative advantage.
And that’s why we’re pushing for more labor-intensive industries, technologies, etc.
Just for clarification: aren’t the jobs to be generated from these projects more short-term in nature, or are they also long-term?
Of course, whenever you make a plan for job generation, you have to look at the short-term, the medium-term, and the long-term. Now these labor-intensive projects are varied –- again, I cannot really specify, like what specific project we're going to implement, because you have to see what the needs are.
The principle is sound that instead of more on the capital-intensive, focus on the labor-intensive.
So whether it’s short-term, medium-term or long-term -– at least you are able to address the issues of unemployment, underemployment. Of course we want...
It’s not just job generation per se, it’s also quality of jobs, it’s jobs that really give you the sufficient income to keep body and soul together. For us –- in this country it’s not just the lack of jobs, in this country you can have a job and still be poor. Obviously at a 53 percent poverty self-rating, we don’t have a 53 percent unemployment rate. Which just goes to show you that there are many people who are employed but consider themselves as poor. So that’s how we differ with more developed countries. In developed countries if you have any job, even a minimum-wage job, you don’t consider yourself poor, because it’s enough to take care of yourself and your family, unlike in our country.
A recent study by the World Bank put forward the observation that our extreme dependence on overseas remittances is not sustainable in the long term. What then can you say about the labor export policy being implemented by the government?
Let’s go back 30 years: in the 1970s, when we had our first OFWs (overseas Filipino woorkers) leave the country –- I know this because I used to teach Labor Law –- if you take a look at the original administrative orders, the original quasi-legislative papers, memoranda that were issued by the Office of the President, their perception really was that this OFW phenomenon would be a short-term phenomenon. The thinking was that this was brought about by the –- at that time was the oil shortage, the OPEC (Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries) –- their feeling was that it would only be short-term. In fact the idea was, eventually all these guys are going to return and everything would be normal. Because if you ask any Filipino, he’d rather stay home, right? Except the really rich ones who are more cosmopolitan.
But it persisted. Instead of being a short-term problem, it became a long-term problem. And in fact, this is a bit radical –- this is no longer the Genuine Opposition’s position, this is my own analysis –- one of the reasons why we don’t become competitive is that no matter what we do, no matter how badly we run this economy, we will always have that buffer, the OFW remittance that keeps the economy afloat. That’s the only reason this GMA economy is still afloat, it’s because of the OFW remittance.
So it’s both a blessing and a curse. It’s a blessing in the sense that of course we don’t want our people, we don’t want our economy to be destroyed, but it’s also a curse because it makes us lazy: it doesn’t force us to be competitive.
So it’s a very complex problem, what to do is to set up the legal and financial framework. Legal framework means we want to protect our OFWs, we want to strengthen the powers of the embassies and consuls to provide legal protection for our laborers. As an additional point, maybe give them insurance, other types of benefits outside of our country. And then the other component is the micro-financial component, because what we want is for our laborers, when they come back, if they save enough money, the government can give them some funding to set up small and medium enterprises so they don’t have to leave. I mean, that really should be the long-term thinking. The OFW phenomenon, it’s not a one-time phenomenon. We think they leave and don’t come back. But they go back and forth... Contracts, and then they come back and they spend all their money, and then leave again. It’s like that, it’s multiple exit and entry. And we have to really set up the legal and financial system so that if they return and they have money already, some savings, let’s give them micro-financing.
So they don’t have to keep coming back, because there’s a big social cost involved. You have to understand also that while economically it’s advantageous to us, the social cost –- in terms of families being destroyed, even increase in AIDS (Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome) amongst OFWs, health risks, of course those who get jailed or killed abroad –- all of these are social cost incurred because of the OFW phenomenon.
You know, I studied abroad, and I never met any -– even those who have fairly decent jobs –- (who would rather stay abroad). If you ask them, "If you could have the exact same job that pays the exact same amount of money in the Philippines, would you rather stay here in the United States?" and the answer is, "No, we’d rather stay in the Philippines." But precisely because they have no options, that’s why they leave our country.
I was at a recent miting de avance, and one of the performers there -– before giving his number – said something to the effect that the Philippines is presently "in danger" of having to go through another 1986-type scenario. Do you agree with that observation?
Well, if we’re talking about the 1986 scenario, if I recall in 1986 we won back our democracy because of People Power, so I don’t see anything so wrong with that. It’s not that I advocate revolution, but rather, if he was speaking in behalf of the administration –-
No, he was speaking against the administration.
Okay, if he was speaking against the administration, that’s something to look forward to –- that we’ll actually reclaim our democracy.
But I don’t want it to get to that point. The Genuine Opposition, our stand has been clear and in fact Joker Arroyo, at the start of the election period, said, "Well, the reason I didn’t join you is because you support revolution, you support unconstitutional means," so immediately we answered back and said, "That’s untrue, precisely we are participating in this election because we support constitutional processes in order to obtain reform." We do not want to have to go through that level, where we would have a revolution, in order to have reforms. We feel that there are sufficient constitutional processes under the rule of law that we can get the reforms through. Bulatlat
Q & A with Atty. Adel Tamano, Genuine Opposition spokesperson
In this year’s senatorial elections, the Genuine Opposition is by all indications leading the race. What will it do if it is cheated -– or it does win?
BY ALEXANDER MARTIN REMOLLINO
Bulatlat
In this year’s senatorial elections, the Genuine Opposition is by all indications leading the race. All credible opinion surveys point to the Genuine Opposition as very likely to win the majority of the senatorial seats up for grabs in this year’s polls.
In its website, the Genuine Opposition describes itself as "the umbrella political coalition party of the opposition’s senatorial and local line-up for the 2007 Philippine Midterm Elections." It is further described as a "multi-party and multi-sectoral coalition" which includes the United Opposition (UNO), the Liberal Party, the Nacionalista Party, the Nationalist People’s Coalition (NPC), Aksyon Demokratiko, PDP-Laban, the Partido ng Masang Pilipino (Party of the A Filipino Masses), and a number of civil society groups.
Its candidates for the 2007 senatorial elections are: Benigno "Noynoy" Aquino III, Alan Peter Cayetano, Anna Dominique "Nikki" Coseteng, Francis "Chiz" Escudero, Panfilo "Ping" Lacson, Loren Legarda, John Henry Osmeña, Aquilino "Koko" Pimentel III, Sonia Roco, Antonio Trillanes IV and Manuel Villar.
The Genuine Opposition’s lead in all credible opinion polls shows that the coalition will win hands down in a clean and honest election.
The coalition’s lead over the administration’s Team Unity ticket is interpreted as a reflection of the electorate’s disgust with the Arroyo administration –- which is under fire from various quarters for massive human rights violations, corruption, and imposition of policies described as "anti-national and anti-people."
In what direction is the Genuine Opposition headed? What will it do if it is cheated in the coming elections? What will it do if it does win in the coming elections?
This interview with lawyer Adel Tamano, the Genuine Opposition’s spokesman, aims to provide answers to these questions.
How does the Genuine Opposition assess the conduct of its campaign thus far?
From the surveys, consistently we’ve been doing quite well. The surveys have been consistent that at least seven to eight of our candidates will come in.
So within the context that we don’t have much funds and logistics, and our opponents have so much funds and so much logistics, and we’re the underdogs because we’re not in power and yet in the surveys we're leading -- I think that's a testimony to the effectivity of our campaign.
Many are curious about why the Genuine Opposition did not field candidates in many of the local positions. Is there an explanation for that?
We have 50 percent of the candidates for provincial posts, we have 69 percent in the congressional districts, 25 percent of mayoral posts. Now, it may appear that we have a shortage of candidates.
But we have set up already an anti-poll fraud team that would cover 95 percent of municipalities. Because the next question would be, "How can you protect your votes?" In spite of the lack of candidates, the scope, the reach of our pollwatchers will be enough.
The Liberal Party, which is part of the Genuine Opposition coalition, has been accredited as the dominant minority party. Because of that, they will be able to get the election returns at the municipal level, which is the primary document used for canvassing and to assail the canvass.
So that is where we will get our protection.
As a related point, we don’t really believe that there is a command vote anymore, in the sense that Filipinos are maturing politically. So in spite of the claimed command votes, I think the Filipinos will really choose to vote on their own, regardless of what their political leaders say, and we’re putting our hopes on that also.
Team Unity spokespersons have been going around the entire country telling people that their so-called "political machinery" will ensure them a 12-0 victory in the coming elections. What do you make of this?
You know, I was just at a forum with Noynoy Aquino, and what he said was good, he had good insights.
In 2004 he campaigned with President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. He was a part of their slate, he was actually administration before, and he joined the opposition only in 2005. They campaigned really hard throughout Luzon then.
This is the same machinery, basically, that they’re tapping for the 2007 elections. And in Luzon in 2004 –- and it was just one person that they were really pushing for, it was just GMA. GMA only won in two provinces: Pampanga and Tarlac. So this goes to show you that this machinery actually, it's vaunted, but in real practice, in application, this showed the weakness of the machinery. Because in 2004 they were campaigning for only one person, and yet she only won in Tarlac and Pampanga, which is her own base. Now they're campaigning for a full 12 slate, and as Congressman Noynoy said –- since he has been in elective office for nine years –- if you ask the local leaders to add one or two candidates to the senatorial slate, it’s easy… But once you start doing four, five, six – the local officials will say, boss, that's no longer easy, because the amount of work they will have to do –- first to campaign, if the candidates are really palatable; and if they're not palatable, to cheat in order to get that result –- it would just be too much for the local candidates. So on the basis of that, he sees that it’s not gonna happen, this 12-0 boast. It’s not gonna happen. It's been proven. It’s really not possible.
There has been no closure on what happened to Fernando Poe, Jr.’s votes in 2004, as well as on the "Hello Garci" tapes. Do you expect a repeat of these scenarios in the next elections?
Two things:
First, we hope it won’t happen again because if we felt really that there was no more credibility in the election process, then one of the options for the opposition would have been to boycott. And there were calls, really, to boycott the elections. So our participation shows that we still believe in the process, that's number one.
Number two, this is not the same opposition as in 2004. We have learned from our mistakes and also from the cheating methods that they undertook in 2004, and we’re more prepared for that and we're taking the necessary steps to protect the votes and to ensure that "Hello Garci" doesn’t happen again.
Because we really believe that the country is not ready and cannot take another "Hello Garci" scandal.
Now, going to the legislative agenda of the Genuine Opposition…
We have 10 agenda points. They’re pretty broad, but you can see common threads. Our advocacies –- one common theme in all of them is that we are not promising to do something we cannot do. At the start of the campaign period, there were some discussions on, "How about we promise to give a P200 wage increase?" or "Why don’t we promise that we'll scrap the EVAT (Expanded Value-Added Tax) Law?" but we felt that as an organization, we would lose our credibility. Even if we win on that platform and we don't deliver, we would lose our credibility… In the long term, our credibility, we give it more importance than the short-term gain of promising so many things. I think the common thread in our legislative agenda is that it’s doable. For example, we want a moratorium on new taxes. That is doable. So we do not promise anything we cannot achieve, we want that to be one of the hallmarks of the Genuine Opposition, which is that we promise to do only that which we can do.
In the Genuine Opposition’s legislative agenda, there is an item which says something about instituting reforms “to make the economy more dynamic, efficient and equitable and make the Filipino workers and enterprises more globally competitive.” Would it be reasonable to expect then that these reforms would be taking place within the framework of the globalization program?
Yes, it’s reasonable to… Well, globalization, that is a tie that we cannot really go against. It’s here. We don't have to create a program for that: it’s here. It’s a reality that we face, and…
One of the things also that you’ll notice in our legislative agenda is we did not make it too specific. Because we want to give our opposition senators the leeway to make investigations and to decide which way they're going to go. So for example, to institute the necessary reforms to make us more globally competitive, I cannot give you a very specific answer to what specifically we would do, because we really want to also have the flexibility.
But underlying that is the idea that we feel that there must be not just economic growth, but an equitable distribution of that growth. Because we feel that you can have 5 percent GNP (Gross National Product) growth and even 10 percent GNP growth, but if poverty still remains at about 53 percent, then you don’t really call that a success. In fact, one of our primary beliefs is that one of the first freedoms is freedom from poverty, and until we achieve that, we’re not going to have a free society.
One of the items in the agenda that I noticed as being more specific is that on increased budgetary allocation for education.
Yes, under the Constitution, education should be given the top budgetary priority. Unfortunately now, under the current dispensation, the number one budgetary priority is debt servicing. Now, of course that’s a complicated issue, there are a lot of pros and cons to that, but for us, we want to give life to the letter and spirit of the Constitution. In fact, if you take a look at the 2007 budget, even the ranking –- number one is of course, debt servicing, while education is not even at numbers two, three and four –- it’s number five, if I'm not mistaken. Ahead of that are the allocations for the military, infrastructure – education is not as high on the priority list for this administration, and in fact on a per capita basis, expenditure for education has gone down by about P200 per student, and that shows you that we really have a long way to go.
Another thing is the generation of jobs "through labor-intensive infrastructure projects in the rural areas."
We feel the big projects, capital-intensive projects do not take full advantage, or do not take full account of our competitive advantage. Our competitive advantage is labor. We have cheap labor, we have plentiful labor, and our labor is actually skilled.
And yet we’re focusing on mega-buck projects. The focus on mega-buck projects is because it is easy to get cuts and kickbacks from these, as opposed to a project that is labor-intensive. So we feel that there should be a shift of emphasis, we feel that we should make the most use of our comparative advantage.
And that’s why we’re pushing for more labor-intensive industries, technologies, etc.
Just for clarification: aren’t the jobs to be generated from these projects more short-term in nature, or are they also long-term?
Of course, whenever you make a plan for job generation, you have to look at the short-term, the medium-term, and the long-term. Now these labor-intensive projects are varied –- again, I cannot really specify, like what specific project we're going to implement, because you have to see what the needs are.
The principle is sound that instead of more on the capital-intensive, focus on the labor-intensive.
So whether it’s short-term, medium-term or long-term -– at least you are able to address the issues of unemployment, underemployment. Of course we want...
It’s not just job generation per se, it’s also quality of jobs, it’s jobs that really give you the sufficient income to keep body and soul together. For us –- in this country it’s not just the lack of jobs, in this country you can have a job and still be poor. Obviously at a 53 percent poverty self-rating, we don’t have a 53 percent unemployment rate. Which just goes to show you that there are many people who are employed but consider themselves as poor. So that’s how we differ with more developed countries. In developed countries if you have any job, even a minimum-wage job, you don’t consider yourself poor, because it’s enough to take care of yourself and your family, unlike in our country.
A recent study by the World Bank put forward the observation that our extreme dependence on overseas remittances is not sustainable in the long term. What then can you say about the labor export policy being implemented by the government?
Let’s go back 30 years: in the 1970s, when we had our first OFWs (overseas Filipino woorkers) leave the country –- I know this because I used to teach Labor Law –- if you take a look at the original administrative orders, the original quasi-legislative papers, memoranda that were issued by the Office of the President, their perception really was that this OFW phenomenon would be a short-term phenomenon. The thinking was that this was brought about by the –- at that time was the oil shortage, the OPEC (Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries) –- their feeling was that it would only be short-term. In fact the idea was, eventually all these guys are going to return and everything would be normal. Because if you ask any Filipino, he’d rather stay home, right? Except the really rich ones who are more cosmopolitan.
But it persisted. Instead of being a short-term problem, it became a long-term problem. And in fact, this is a bit radical –- this is no longer the Genuine Opposition’s position, this is my own analysis –- one of the reasons why we don’t become competitive is that no matter what we do, no matter how badly we run this economy, we will always have that buffer, the OFW remittance that keeps the economy afloat. That’s the only reason this GMA economy is still afloat, it’s because of the OFW remittance.
So it’s both a blessing and a curse. It’s a blessing in the sense that of course we don’t want our people, we don’t want our economy to be destroyed, but it’s also a curse because it makes us lazy: it doesn’t force us to be competitive.
So it’s a very complex problem, what to do is to set up the legal and financial framework. Legal framework means we want to protect our OFWs, we want to strengthen the powers of the embassies and consuls to provide legal protection for our laborers. As an additional point, maybe give them insurance, other types of benefits outside of our country. And then the other component is the micro-financial component, because what we want is for our laborers, when they come back, if they save enough money, the government can give them some funding to set up small and medium enterprises so they don’t have to leave. I mean, that really should be the long-term thinking. The OFW phenomenon, it’s not a one-time phenomenon. We think they leave and don’t come back. But they go back and forth... Contracts, and then they come back and they spend all their money, and then leave again. It’s like that, it’s multiple exit and entry. And we have to really set up the legal and financial system so that if they return and they have money already, some savings, let’s give them micro-financing.
So they don’t have to keep coming back, because there’s a big social cost involved. You have to understand also that while economically it’s advantageous to us, the social cost –- in terms of families being destroyed, even increase in AIDS (Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome) amongst OFWs, health risks, of course those who get jailed or killed abroad –- all of these are social cost incurred because of the OFW phenomenon.
You know, I studied abroad, and I never met any -– even those who have fairly decent jobs –- (who would rather stay abroad). If you ask them, "If you could have the exact same job that pays the exact same amount of money in the Philippines, would you rather stay here in the United States?" and the answer is, "No, we’d rather stay in the Philippines." But precisely because they have no options, that’s why they leave our country.
I was at a recent miting de avance, and one of the performers there -– before giving his number – said something to the effect that the Philippines is presently "in danger" of having to go through another 1986-type scenario. Do you agree with that observation?
Well, if we’re talking about the 1986 scenario, if I recall in 1986 we won back our democracy because of People Power, so I don’t see anything so wrong with that. It’s not that I advocate revolution, but rather, if he was speaking in behalf of the administration –-
No, he was speaking against the administration.
Okay, if he was speaking against the administration, that’s something to look forward to –- that we’ll actually reclaim our democracy.
But I don’t want it to get to that point. The Genuine Opposition, our stand has been clear and in fact Joker Arroyo, at the start of the election period, said, "Well, the reason I didn’t join you is because you support revolution, you support unconstitutional means," so immediately we answered back and said, "That’s untrue, precisely we are participating in this election because we support constitutional processes in order to obtain reform." We do not want to have to go through that level, where we would have a revolution, in order to have reforms. We feel that there are sufficient constitutional processes under the rule of law that we can get the reforms through. Bulatlat
Sunday, May 06, 2007
THE POLITICS OF THE FEW, THE CHALLENGES TO THE MANY
Oligarchic Politics by Francis A. Gealogo, Roland G. Simbulan, Ely H. Manalansan, Jr., Felix P. Muga II, Bobby M. Tuazon, Temario C. Rivera, and Danilo Araña Arao
Published by the Center for People Empowerment in Governance
Oligarchic Politics, published by the Center for People Empowerment in Governance (CenPEG), is a timely book considering that the Filipino electorate is again in the midst of an election season. The questions it raises and the answers it strives to provide, however, deal with issues the relevance of which will last beyond the coming electoral exercise.
BY ALEXANDER MARTIN REMOLLINO
Bulatlat
Politics in the Philippines is often observed to be largely an enclave of the country’s moneyed and privileged classes. A new book published by the policy study institution Center for People Empowerment in Governance (CenPEG), Oligarchic Politics –- set to be launched May 8 at the Balai Kalinaw, University of the Philippines (UP) in Diliman, Quezon City –- tells why this observation is sound.
Oligarchic Politics dissects the political party system in the Philippines, but gives special focus to the party-list bloc.
In his essay “History of Political Parties in the Philippines,” historian Francis A. Gealogo of the Ateneo de Manila University traces the roots of Philippine political parties to the American colonial period. He gives two reasons for their origins:
Roland G. Simbulan, a former Faculty Regent at UP, analyzes Philippine traditional politics since the 1986 downfall of the Marcos dictatorship in “Contemporary Politics in the Philippines: The Configuration of Post-Edsa I Political Parties,” using in part research by Cyrus Alanis. He puts forward in this essay the view that what happened after the ouster of Ferdinand Marcos from the presidency was not the restoration of “democracy” as claimed by some journalists and historians, but the restoration of what he calls “the trappings of the undeveloped and distorted party system”: elite domination and the “ideological monotony” of the mainstream political parties.
The succeeding chapter, “The Philippine Party-List System: Opportunities, Limitations and Prospects” by Ely H. Manalansan, Jr., provides a historical perspective on the Philippine party-list system. Manalansan, who was involved with a number of research institutions before working as a staff researcher at the House of Representatives, lays bare in his essay the bitter irony that while the party-list system is mandated to serve as a mechanism by which marginalized sectors may be represented in Congress, it is itself marginalized in the overall scheme of things.
He cites the proliferation of “party-list groups” that are appendages of traditional political parties and, worse, adjuncts of the incumbent administration. Manalansan also documents several instances in which the bills filed by progressive party-list groups were blocked, citing as a case in point the recall of Anakpawis (Toiling Masses) Rep. Crispin Beltran’s bill for a P125 across-the-board, nationwide wage increase for private-sector workers after it was approved at the House of Representatives. He also cites the political persecution of progressive party-list representatives.
In the end, Manalansan points to the progressive party-list bloc as the force that makes the party-list system really work for those sectors of society it is supposed to serve. As he says:
Meanwhile, in two essays -– “The Negation of the Party-List Law on the Principle of Proportional Representation” and “On Stakeholder-Based Allocation Method: A Fair Allocation of Power in the Philippine Party-List System,” Feliz P. Muga II, an associate professor of Mathematics at the Ateneo de Manila University, dissects the mathematics behind the principle of proportional representation in the party-list system.
The next chapter after Muga’s two essays –- “The Future of Oligarchic Politics and the Party-List System” by Bobby M. Tuazon, CenPEG’s Policy Study, Publication and Advocacy (PSPA) program director –- projects a not-so-bright future for the party-list system, with conditions having become “less and less favorable for its full realization” as he says, but nonetheless counsels the progressive bloc not to give up the struggle in the electoral arena even as he reminds that it is not only through electoral or parliamentary struggle that what he calls “real governance” can evolve.
In “The Crisis of Philippine Electoral Democracy,” Temario C. Rivera, a professor of Comparative Politics and International Relations at the International Christian University of Tokyo, examines what he considers the two “critical problems” of Philippine electoral democracy: the elitist mode of representation and the lack of accountability and its continuing political instability. “A clear alternative to this status quo lies in building up a strong and more representative and accountable party system that can challenge elite dominance of electoral processes,” Rivera writes.
The last chapter, “Elections, Personality Politics and the Mass Media” by UP Journalism professor Danilo Araña Arao, criticizes the personality-based orientation of much of media coverage of elections, and reminds journalists of their task “to ensure a comprehensive discussion of issues concerning politics, economics and culture and consequently transcend personality politics that characterizes campaigns during elections.”
Oligarchic Politics is a timely book considering that the Filipino electorate is again in the midst of an election season. The questions it raises and the answers it strives to provide, however, deal with issues the relevance of which will last beyond the coming electoral exercise. Bulatlat
Oligarchic Politics by Francis A. Gealogo, Roland G. Simbulan, Ely H. Manalansan, Jr., Felix P. Muga II, Bobby M. Tuazon, Temario C. Rivera, and Danilo Araña Arao
Published by the Center for People Empowerment in Governance
Oligarchic Politics, published by the Center for People Empowerment in Governance (CenPEG), is a timely book considering that the Filipino electorate is again in the midst of an election season. The questions it raises and the answers it strives to provide, however, deal with issues the relevance of which will last beyond the coming electoral exercise.
BY ALEXANDER MARTIN REMOLLINO
Bulatlat
Politics in the Philippines is often observed to be largely an enclave of the country’s moneyed and privileged classes. A new book published by the policy study institution Center for People Empowerment in Governance (CenPEG), Oligarchic Politics –- set to be launched May 8 at the Balai Kalinaw, University of the Philippines (UP) in Diliman, Quezon City –- tells why this observation is sound.
Oligarchic Politics dissects the political party system in the Philippines, but gives special focus to the party-list bloc.
In his essay “History of Political Parties in the Philippines,” historian Francis A. Gealogo of the Ateneo de Manila University traces the roots of Philippine political parties to the American colonial period. He gives two reasons for their origins:
The first was the realized need by the American colonizers to put forward a viable avenue for political participation by Filipinos as a counterpoint to the armed resistance of the Filipino revolutionaries against colonial occupation. The electoral exercise and the attendant formation of political parties will therefore present itself as an alternative reaction to American rule by Filipinos who would otherwise be involved in armed resistance. The second is the need to attract a significant number of Filipino elites into the fold of colonial governance. The electoral process would ensure elite participation in the colonial political project of integrating the well-to-do members of the society to the institutionalization of the colonial administrative control over the population.
Roland G. Simbulan, a former Faculty Regent at UP, analyzes Philippine traditional politics since the 1986 downfall of the Marcos dictatorship in “Contemporary Politics in the Philippines: The Configuration of Post-Edsa I Political Parties,” using in part research by Cyrus Alanis. He puts forward in this essay the view that what happened after the ouster of Ferdinand Marcos from the presidency was not the restoration of “democracy” as claimed by some journalists and historians, but the restoration of what he calls “the trappings of the undeveloped and distorted party system”: elite domination and the “ideological monotony” of the mainstream political parties.
The succeeding chapter, “The Philippine Party-List System: Opportunities, Limitations and Prospects” by Ely H. Manalansan, Jr., provides a historical perspective on the Philippine party-list system. Manalansan, who was involved with a number of research institutions before working as a staff researcher at the House of Representatives, lays bare in his essay the bitter irony that while the party-list system is mandated to serve as a mechanism by which marginalized sectors may be represented in Congress, it is itself marginalized in the overall scheme of things.
He cites the proliferation of “party-list groups” that are appendages of traditional political parties and, worse, adjuncts of the incumbent administration. Manalansan also documents several instances in which the bills filed by progressive party-list groups were blocked, citing as a case in point the recall of Anakpawis (Toiling Masses) Rep. Crispin Beltran’s bill for a P125 across-the-board, nationwide wage increase for private-sector workers after it was approved at the House of Representatives. He also cites the political persecution of progressive party-list representatives.
In the end, Manalansan points to the progressive party-list bloc as the force that makes the party-list system really work for those sectors of society it is supposed to serve. As he says:
Not only have they done the most in terms of legislations for the masses they represent, they likewise represent what genuine party-lists of the masses should be doing in Congress. Without them, prospects for the party-list system appear not very promising, even dreary. It may lead to party-lists becoming instruments of traditional political parties, as in fact is the trajectory of interests of elitists in government.
Meanwhile, in two essays -– “The Negation of the Party-List Law on the Principle of Proportional Representation” and “On Stakeholder-Based Allocation Method: A Fair Allocation of Power in the Philippine Party-List System,” Feliz P. Muga II, an associate professor of Mathematics at the Ateneo de Manila University, dissects the mathematics behind the principle of proportional representation in the party-list system.
The next chapter after Muga’s two essays –- “The Future of Oligarchic Politics and the Party-List System” by Bobby M. Tuazon, CenPEG’s Policy Study, Publication and Advocacy (PSPA) program director –- projects a not-so-bright future for the party-list system, with conditions having become “less and less favorable for its full realization” as he says, but nonetheless counsels the progressive bloc not to give up the struggle in the electoral arena even as he reminds that it is not only through electoral or parliamentary struggle that what he calls “real governance” can evolve.
In “The Crisis of Philippine Electoral Democracy,” Temario C. Rivera, a professor of Comparative Politics and International Relations at the International Christian University of Tokyo, examines what he considers the two “critical problems” of Philippine electoral democracy: the elitist mode of representation and the lack of accountability and its continuing political instability. “A clear alternative to this status quo lies in building up a strong and more representative and accountable party system that can challenge elite dominance of electoral processes,” Rivera writes.
The last chapter, “Elections, Personality Politics and the Mass Media” by UP Journalism professor Danilo Araña Arao, criticizes the personality-based orientation of much of media coverage of elections, and reminds journalists of their task “to ensure a comprehensive discussion of issues concerning politics, economics and culture and consequently transcend personality politics that characterizes campaigns during elections.”
Oligarchic Politics is a timely book considering that the Filipino electorate is again in the midst of an election season. The questions it raises and the answers it strives to provide, however, deal with issues the relevance of which will last beyond the coming electoral exercise. Bulatlat
Sunday, April 29, 2007
PALACE SUPPORT FOR PRO-GLORIA PARTY-LISTS A GROUND FOR IMPEACHMENT
Both Art. VI, Sec. 5 of the Constitution and Republic Act No. 7941 expressly reserve the party-list system for marginalized and underrepresented groups. The Supreme Court, in one of its landmark decisions, brought the matter further by explicitly barring groups linked to or supported by the government from participating in the party-list system.
BY ALEXANDER MARTIN REMOLLINO
Bulatlat
Should it be proven that Malacañang disbursed funds in support of pro-administration party-list groups, it could constitute an impeachable offense on the part of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.
Both Art. VI, Sec. 5 of the Constitution and Republic Act No. 7941 expressly reserve the party-list system for marginalized and underrepresented groups. The Supreme Court, in one of its landmark decisions, brought the matter further by explicitly barring groups linked to or supported by the government from participating in the party-list system.
In its decision on the 2001 case Ang Bagong Bayani-OFW Labor Party v. Commission on Elections, et al, the Supreme Court issued eight guidelines for screening party-list participants. The fifth guideline states thus:
The issue of government-backed party-list groups participating in the elections was recently brought to the fore when militant organizations and party-list groups including Gabriela Women’s Party (GWP) and Anakpawis (Toiling Masses) exposed a memorandum to the Office of the President from the Special Concerns Group of the Office of External Affairs (OEA-SCG), which is headed by Assistant Secretary Marcelo Fariñas II.
The memorandum is reported to have been leaked by a disgruntled OEA employee. Fariñas has denied issuing the memorandum.
The memorandum, dated Oct. 16, 2006 and bearing Fariñas' signature, refers to an administration party-list campaign with the following objectives:
“1. Provide full support to several COMELEC accredited (party-list) groups that are ascertained to be pro-administration and ensure the winning of nine (9) to twelve (12) seats in the House of Representatives;
“2. Form a party-list bloc that will support the plans and moves of the administration and help in countering destabilization moves by the opposition as well as left-leaning party-list groups; and
“3. Contribute in the overall campaign to substantially lower the number of votes of leftist and left-leaning party-list organizations, and in the process reduce the number of seats of these anti-administration parties in the House of Representatives.”
The memorandum –- of which Bulatlat received a copy courtesy of Migrante International –- specifically requests for “funding assistance” from the Office of the President's intelligence funds for the pro-administration party-list groups as well as the SCG.
Attached to the two-page memorandum is a “confidential” party-list campaign proposal including a proposed budget of P5.5 million from October to December 2006 ($107,192 based on the year's average exchange rate of $1:P51.31). The campaign proposal identifies the following as the four main party-list organizations to be supported: Agbiag! Timpuyog Ilocano (Agbiag!), Babae para sa Kaunlaran (Babae Ka or Women for Development), League of Youth for Peace and Development (LYPAD), and Kalahi Advocates for Overseas Filipinos (Kalahi).
Three of these groups –- Agbiag!, Babae Ka, and Kalahi –- are among 22 party-list organizations recently exposed as “Malacañang and AFP (Armed Forces of the Philippines) fronts” by the broad anti-fraud coalition Kontra Daya, which is led by former Vice President Teofisto Guingona, Jr. and Fr. Joe Dizon. Agbiag!, Babae Ka, and Kalahi had all also figured in an earlier exposé by the party-list group Akbayan.
Fariñas himself is reported to be secretary-general and one of the nominees of Agbiag! Babae Ka is reportedly a member of Sigaw ng Bayan (People’s Clamor), a pro-administration group that last year spearheaded a campaign to amend the Constitution through "people's initiative" and has Sally Dagami and Ruth Vasquez as its first and second nominees, respectively. Kalahi has as its first nominee Poe Gratela, who claimed to be an activist before he went over to the administration camp in 2004, led in forming the pro-administration migrants' group Kaisang Bayan, and went on to work for the OEA until recently.
“If it is proven that Malacañang disbursed funds in support of those party-list groups, that violates the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act,” said Judge Cleto Villacorta, a member of the Board of Directors of the policy study institution Center for People Empowerment in Governance (CenPEG), in an interview with Bulatlat. “That is also an impeachable offense.”
Sec. 3 of the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act (Republic Act No. 3019) classifies as a corrupt practice of public officers the act of:
Graft and corrupt practices is one of four impeachable offenses under the Constitution; the others are bribery, betrayal of public trust, and culpable violation of the Constitution.
The formation of these and other party-list groups with dubious connections and funding has been assailed as a move by Mrs. Arroyo to ensure additional votes that will be mobilized to thwart a possible third impeachment against her at the House of Representatives. It has also been denounced as part of government attempts to mangle the constitutional provision that calls for the representation of poor classes and sectors in the legislature and to evict the Left and other progressive groups from Congress. Bulatlat
Both Art. VI, Sec. 5 of the Constitution and Republic Act No. 7941 expressly reserve the party-list system for marginalized and underrepresented groups. The Supreme Court, in one of its landmark decisions, brought the matter further by explicitly barring groups linked to or supported by the government from participating in the party-list system.
BY ALEXANDER MARTIN REMOLLINO
Bulatlat
Should it be proven that Malacañang disbursed funds in support of pro-administration party-list groups, it could constitute an impeachable offense on the part of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.
Both Art. VI, Sec. 5 of the Constitution and Republic Act No. 7941 expressly reserve the party-list system for marginalized and underrepresented groups. The Supreme Court, in one of its landmark decisions, brought the matter further by explicitly barring groups linked to or supported by the government from participating in the party-list system.
In its decision on the 2001 case Ang Bagong Bayani-OFW Labor Party v. Commission on Elections, et al, the Supreme Court issued eight guidelines for screening party-list participants. The fifth guideline states thus:
x x x (The) party or organization must not be an adjunct of, or a project organized or an entity funded or assisted by, the government. By the very nature of the party-list system, the party or organization must be a group of citizens, organized by citizens and operated by citizens. It must be independent of the government. The participation of the government or its officials in the affairs of a party-list candidate is not only illegal and unfair to other parties, but also deleterious to the objective of the law: to enable citizens belonging to marginalized and underrepresented sectors and organizations to be elected to the House of Representatives.
The issue of government-backed party-list groups participating in the elections was recently brought to the fore when militant organizations and party-list groups including Gabriela Women’s Party (GWP) and Anakpawis (Toiling Masses) exposed a memorandum to the Office of the President from the Special Concerns Group of the Office of External Affairs (OEA-SCG), which is headed by Assistant Secretary Marcelo Fariñas II.
The memorandum is reported to have been leaked by a disgruntled OEA employee. Fariñas has denied issuing the memorandum.
The memorandum, dated Oct. 16, 2006 and bearing Fariñas' signature, refers to an administration party-list campaign with the following objectives:
“1. Provide full support to several COMELEC accredited (party-list) groups that are ascertained to be pro-administration and ensure the winning of nine (9) to twelve (12) seats in the House of Representatives;
“2. Form a party-list bloc that will support the plans and moves of the administration and help in countering destabilization moves by the opposition as well as left-leaning party-list groups; and
“3. Contribute in the overall campaign to substantially lower the number of votes of leftist and left-leaning party-list organizations, and in the process reduce the number of seats of these anti-administration parties in the House of Representatives.”
The memorandum –- of which Bulatlat received a copy courtesy of Migrante International –- specifically requests for “funding assistance” from the Office of the President's intelligence funds for the pro-administration party-list groups as well as the SCG.
Attached to the two-page memorandum is a “confidential” party-list campaign proposal including a proposed budget of P5.5 million from October to December 2006 ($107,192 based on the year's average exchange rate of $1:P51.31). The campaign proposal identifies the following as the four main party-list organizations to be supported: Agbiag! Timpuyog Ilocano (Agbiag!), Babae para sa Kaunlaran (Babae Ka or Women for Development), League of Youth for Peace and Development (LYPAD), and Kalahi Advocates for Overseas Filipinos (Kalahi).
Three of these groups –- Agbiag!, Babae Ka, and Kalahi –- are among 22 party-list organizations recently exposed as “Malacañang and AFP (Armed Forces of the Philippines) fronts” by the broad anti-fraud coalition Kontra Daya, which is led by former Vice President Teofisto Guingona, Jr. and Fr. Joe Dizon. Agbiag!, Babae Ka, and Kalahi had all also figured in an earlier exposé by the party-list group Akbayan.
Fariñas himself is reported to be secretary-general and one of the nominees of Agbiag! Babae Ka is reportedly a member of Sigaw ng Bayan (People’s Clamor), a pro-administration group that last year spearheaded a campaign to amend the Constitution through "people's initiative" and has Sally Dagami and Ruth Vasquez as its first and second nominees, respectively. Kalahi has as its first nominee Poe Gratela, who claimed to be an activist before he went over to the administration camp in 2004, led in forming the pro-administration migrants' group Kaisang Bayan, and went on to work for the OEA until recently.
“If it is proven that Malacañang disbursed funds in support of those party-list groups, that violates the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act,” said Judge Cleto Villacorta, a member of the Board of Directors of the policy study institution Center for People Empowerment in Governance (CenPEG), in an interview with Bulatlat. “That is also an impeachable offense.”
Sec. 3 of the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act (Republic Act No. 3019) classifies as a corrupt practice of public officers the act of:
Knowingly approving or granting any license, permit, privilege or benefit in favor of any person not qualified for or not legally entitled to such license, permit, privilege or advantage, or of a mere representative or dummy of one who is not so qualified or entitled.
Graft and corrupt practices is one of four impeachable offenses under the Constitution; the others are bribery, betrayal of public trust, and culpable violation of the Constitution.
The formation of these and other party-list groups with dubious connections and funding has been assailed as a move by Mrs. Arroyo to ensure additional votes that will be mobilized to thwart a possible third impeachment against her at the House of Representatives. It has also been denounced as part of government attempts to mangle the constitutional provision that calls for the representation of poor classes and sectors in the legislature and to evict the Left and other progressive groups from Congress. Bulatlat
Thursday, April 26, 2007
MASSACRES BY SOLDIERS PROVOKED LATEST CLASH, MNLF LEADER SAYS
A series of massacres of civilians in Sulu, including those of two grandchildren of an MNLF leader, provoked the latest wave of fighting between government troops and the Moro revolutionary group.
BY ALEXANDER MARTIN REMOLLINO
Bulatlat
Last Feb. 17, Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) state chairman Khaid Ajibon sent two grandsons of his on an errand to the market in Indanan, Sulu. Upon their return, soldiers fired at them. One of the children was killed.
Eight days later, Scout Rangers bombarded the MNLF headquarters in Indanan, where Ajibon is based.
On April 25, Scout Rangers massacred a family of 10 in Timpuok, Patikul, Sulu. Only one of the family's members managed to survive.
These incidents are what provoked the latest wave of fighting between the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) and the MNLF, Bangsamoro People’s National Congress (BPNC) chairman Ustadz Zain Jali told Bulatlat in an interview this week.
“Because of these, (MNLF commander) Ustadz Habier Malik has had enough,” Jali said. “He cannot take these anymore.”
At around 6 a.m. on April 14, MNLF forces led by Malik attacked the detachment of the 11th Marine Battalion Landing Team in Tayungan, Panamao, Sulu. The assault left two soldiers dead and eight others wounded.
Before the series of massacres that provoked the latest wave of clashes, Malik and his men had “detained” a group led by Muslim convert Marine Maj. Gen. Benjamin Dolorfino in Jolo, Sulu. That was on Feb. 2-4.
Dolorfino, who also uses the name Ben Muhammad, went with Undersecretary for Peace Ramon Santos and 13 others to the MNLF’s Camp Jabal Ubod in Panamao, Sulu in the morning of Feb. 2 to talk with MNLF representatives headed by Malik. The group included two colonels, a junior officer, nine enlisted men, and several members of Santos’ staff.
The talks were to tackle the holding of a tripartite meeting, proposed late last year by the MNLF, with the Government of the Republic of the Philippines (GRP) and the Organization of Islamic Conference.
In the afternoon of that same day, Dolorfino and his group were prevented from leaving the camp.
“General Dolorfino and his group were asked why the tripartite meeting had been postponed again, and Undersecretary Santos could not give any answer,” Jolo Councilor Cocoy Tulawie told Bulatlat in an earlier interview. “So they were prevented from leaving until the GRP and the OIC agreed to schedule a meeting for March 17.”
The proposed tripartite meeting was to tackle issues related to the 1996 Final Peace Agreement between the GRP and the MNLF.
The meeting scheduled for March 17 was to be a preliminary meeting in preparation for the tripartite meeting. “It didn’t push through,” Jali revealed.
The Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) is accusing the MNLF of coddling members of the bandit Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG) –- an accusation that the Moro revolutionary group has vehemently denied.
“There is one group of people in Sulu tipping off others as ‘terrorists’ or ‘terrorist coddlers’ to the military, just for the bounty,” Jali disclosed. “That is why the military has these accusations against the MNLF.
Displacement
The fighting has displaced more than 40,000 civilians in Sulu. Some of the evacuees have been relocated at the Panglima Mamah Elementary School in Tagbak, Indanan, Sulu. The rest are in Jolo, the provincial capital –- where there are no evacuation centers.
“There are no sanitary conditions (in the evacuation center),” Jali told Bulatlat. “The dangers of epidemics breaking out there are very high.”
In a separate interview, Moro-Christian People’s Alliance (MCPA) secretary-general Amirah Ali Lidasan confirmed this.
“Within the confines of the evacuation centers, the refugees catch different diseases,” Lidasan, who is also one of the nominees of the Suara Bangsamoro (Voice of the Moro People) Party, said. “And the food is never enough for all of them.”
Flashback
The MNLF traces its origins to a massacre of between 28 and 64 Moro fighters recruited by the government in 1968 for a scheme to occupy Sabah, an island near Mindanao to which the Philippines has a historic claim.
Sabah ended up in the hands of the Malaysian government during the presidency of Diosdado Macapagal (1961-1965). His successor Ferdinand Marcos conceived a scheme involving the recruitment of Moro fighters to occupy the island.
The recruits were summarily executed by their military superiors in 1968, in what is now known as the infamous Jabidah Massacre.
The Jabidah Massacre triggered widespread outrage among the Moros and led to the formation of the MNLF that same year. The MNLF waged an armed revolutionary struggle against the GRP for an independent Muslim state in Mindanao.
The Marcos government, weighed down by the costs of the Mindanao war, negotiated for peace and signed an agreement with the MNLF in Tripoli, Libya in the mid-1970s. The pact involved the grant of autonomy to the Mindanao Muslims.
Negotiations between the GRP and the MNLF went on and off until 1996, when the two parties signed a Final Peace Agreement which created the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) as a concession to the group.
Sulu is one of four provinces under the ARMM: the others are Basilan, Maguindanao, and Tawi-Tawi.
In October 2001, hostilities broke out anew between the GRP and the MNLF. The military was in hot pursuit of Abu Sayyaf bandits who had abducted tourists in Sipadan, Malaysia. At one point, the military had announced the defeat of an “Abu Sayyaf” contingent in Talipao, Sulu.
The MNLF, however, said that it was its guerrillas, not Abu Sayyaf bandits, who were killed by the military.
The massacre in Talipao led the MNLF, just five years after signing a peace agreement with the government, to once more take up arms. MNLF founding chairman Nur Misuari, a former political science professor at the University of the Philippines (UP) who was then ARMM governor, said the Talipao Massacre was a “violation” of the 1996 Peace Agreement.
Misuari, who was then in Malaysia, ended up being arrested and subsequently detained in a military camp in Sta. Rosa, Laguna (38 kms south of Manila) and charged with rebellion. He is currently under house arrest in New Manila, Quezon City while still facing rebellion charges.
Since 2001, there has been sporadic fighting between the AFP and the MNLF. The waves of fighting have invariably been provoked by massacres of Moro civilians by soldiers, Jali said.
“Our people are always being massacred,” he said. Bulatlat
A series of massacres of civilians in Sulu, including those of two grandchildren of an MNLF leader, provoked the latest wave of fighting between government troops and the Moro revolutionary group.
BY ALEXANDER MARTIN REMOLLINO
Bulatlat
Last Feb. 17, Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) state chairman Khaid Ajibon sent two grandsons of his on an errand to the market in Indanan, Sulu. Upon their return, soldiers fired at them. One of the children was killed.
Eight days later, Scout Rangers bombarded the MNLF headquarters in Indanan, where Ajibon is based.
On April 25, Scout Rangers massacred a family of 10 in Timpuok, Patikul, Sulu. Only one of the family's members managed to survive.
These incidents are what provoked the latest wave of fighting between the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) and the MNLF, Bangsamoro People’s National Congress (BPNC) chairman Ustadz Zain Jali told Bulatlat in an interview this week.
“Because of these, (MNLF commander) Ustadz Habier Malik has had enough,” Jali said. “He cannot take these anymore.”
At around 6 a.m. on April 14, MNLF forces led by Malik attacked the detachment of the 11th Marine Battalion Landing Team in Tayungan, Panamao, Sulu. The assault left two soldiers dead and eight others wounded.
Before the series of massacres that provoked the latest wave of clashes, Malik and his men had “detained” a group led by Muslim convert Marine Maj. Gen. Benjamin Dolorfino in Jolo, Sulu. That was on Feb. 2-4.
Dolorfino, who also uses the name Ben Muhammad, went with Undersecretary for Peace Ramon Santos and 13 others to the MNLF’s Camp Jabal Ubod in Panamao, Sulu in the morning of Feb. 2 to talk with MNLF representatives headed by Malik. The group included two colonels, a junior officer, nine enlisted men, and several members of Santos’ staff.
The talks were to tackle the holding of a tripartite meeting, proposed late last year by the MNLF, with the Government of the Republic of the Philippines (GRP) and the Organization of Islamic Conference.
In the afternoon of that same day, Dolorfino and his group were prevented from leaving the camp.
“General Dolorfino and his group were asked why the tripartite meeting had been postponed again, and Undersecretary Santos could not give any answer,” Jolo Councilor Cocoy Tulawie told Bulatlat in an earlier interview. “So they were prevented from leaving until the GRP and the OIC agreed to schedule a meeting for March 17.”
The proposed tripartite meeting was to tackle issues related to the 1996 Final Peace Agreement between the GRP and the MNLF.
The meeting scheduled for March 17 was to be a preliminary meeting in preparation for the tripartite meeting. “It didn’t push through,” Jali revealed.
The Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) is accusing the MNLF of coddling members of the bandit Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG) –- an accusation that the Moro revolutionary group has vehemently denied.
“There is one group of people in Sulu tipping off others as ‘terrorists’ or ‘terrorist coddlers’ to the military, just for the bounty,” Jali disclosed. “That is why the military has these accusations against the MNLF.
Displacement
The fighting has displaced more than 40,000 civilians in Sulu. Some of the evacuees have been relocated at the Panglima Mamah Elementary School in Tagbak, Indanan, Sulu. The rest are in Jolo, the provincial capital –- where there are no evacuation centers.
“There are no sanitary conditions (in the evacuation center),” Jali told Bulatlat. “The dangers of epidemics breaking out there are very high.”
In a separate interview, Moro-Christian People’s Alliance (MCPA) secretary-general Amirah Ali Lidasan confirmed this.
“Within the confines of the evacuation centers, the refugees catch different diseases,” Lidasan, who is also one of the nominees of the Suara Bangsamoro (Voice of the Moro People) Party, said. “And the food is never enough for all of them.”
Flashback
The MNLF traces its origins to a massacre of between 28 and 64 Moro fighters recruited by the government in 1968 for a scheme to occupy Sabah, an island near Mindanao to which the Philippines has a historic claim.
Sabah ended up in the hands of the Malaysian government during the presidency of Diosdado Macapagal (1961-1965). His successor Ferdinand Marcos conceived a scheme involving the recruitment of Moro fighters to occupy the island.
The recruits were summarily executed by their military superiors in 1968, in what is now known as the infamous Jabidah Massacre.
The Jabidah Massacre triggered widespread outrage among the Moros and led to the formation of the MNLF that same year. The MNLF waged an armed revolutionary struggle against the GRP for an independent Muslim state in Mindanao.
The Marcos government, weighed down by the costs of the Mindanao war, negotiated for peace and signed an agreement with the MNLF in Tripoli, Libya in the mid-1970s. The pact involved the grant of autonomy to the Mindanao Muslims.
Negotiations between the GRP and the MNLF went on and off until 1996, when the two parties signed a Final Peace Agreement which created the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) as a concession to the group.
Sulu is one of four provinces under the ARMM: the others are Basilan, Maguindanao, and Tawi-Tawi.
In October 2001, hostilities broke out anew between the GRP and the MNLF. The military was in hot pursuit of Abu Sayyaf bandits who had abducted tourists in Sipadan, Malaysia. At one point, the military had announced the defeat of an “Abu Sayyaf” contingent in Talipao, Sulu.
The MNLF, however, said that it was its guerrillas, not Abu Sayyaf bandits, who were killed by the military.
The massacre in Talipao led the MNLF, just five years after signing a peace agreement with the government, to once more take up arms. MNLF founding chairman Nur Misuari, a former political science professor at the University of the Philippines (UP) who was then ARMM governor, said the Talipao Massacre was a “violation” of the 1996 Peace Agreement.
Misuari, who was then in Malaysia, ended up being arrested and subsequently detained in a military camp in Sta. Rosa, Laguna (38 kms south of Manila) and charged with rebellion. He is currently under house arrest in New Manila, Quezon City while still facing rebellion charges.
Since 2001, there has been sporadic fighting between the AFP and the MNLF. The waves of fighting have invariably been provoked by massacres of Moro civilians by soldiers, Jali said.
“Our people are always being massacred,” he said. Bulatlat
Sunday, April 15, 2007
PARTY-LIST LEGISLATION IN THE 13TH CONGRESS
The party-list system was envisioned by its advocates as purportedly a counter-current to the dominance of pro-foreign and elite interests in Philippine traditional politics. How have the party-list groups done in terms of their legislative work? Have they fulfilled the mandate of legislating particularly for the marginalized and underrepresented sectors? A look at the bills filed by party-list groups during the 13th Congress can give one an idea.
BY ALEXANDER MARTIN REMOLLINO
Bulatlat
The party-list system makes it possible for groups representing the country’s marginalized and underrepresented sectors to have seats at the House of Representatives. It was envisioned by its advocates as purportedly a counter-current to the dominance of pro-foreign and elite interests in Philippine traditional politics.
The 1987 Constitution has a provision that representatives from party-list groups are to be allotted 20 percent of the total number of seats at the House of Representatives. For three consecutive terms under the 1987 Constitution, representatives from the labor, peasant, urban poor, indigenous cultural communities, women, youth, and other sectors as may be provided by law –- except the religious sector –- were selected or elected to fill half of the seats allocated to party-list representatives.
Republic Act No. 7941, passed in 1995, served as the enabling law for the constitutional provision for a party-list system. It also adds the elderly, the handicapped, veterans, overseas workers, and professionals to the list of sectors that party-list groups are supposed to represent.
As representatives of marginalized and underrepresented groups, party-list lawmakers are expected to contribute legislation that would benefit their immediate constituency and the nation in general. As the Supreme Court stated in its landmark decision on Ang Bagong Bayani-OFW v. Comelec, et al, “while lacking a well-defined political constituency, the (party-list) nominee must likewise be able to contribute to the formulation and enactment of appropriate legislation that will benefit the nation as a whole.”
How have the party-list groups done in terms of their legislative work? Have they fulfilled the mandate of legislating particularly for the marginalized and underrepresented sectors? A look at the bills they filed can give one an idea.
The party-list groups that won seats in the 13th Congress are: Bayan Muna (People First), Anakpawis (Toiling Masses), Akbayan, Association of Philippine Electric Cooperatives (APEC), Buhay Hayaan Yumabong (Buhay or Let Life Grow), Anakpawis (Toiling Masses), Gabriela Women’s Party (GWP), Citizen’s Battle Against Corruption (Cibac), Butil (Grain) Farmer Party, Veterans Freedom Party, Cooperative-National Confederation of Cooperatives (Coop-Natcco), An Waray (literally, Those Who Have Nothing), Anak Mindanao (AMIN or Children of Mindanao), Ang Laban ng Indiginong Filipino (ALIF or The Struggle of Indigenous Filipino), and Alagad (literally, Agent).
Based on the Social Weather Station (SWS) survey last March, six of these party-list groups could expect to maintain, if not increase, their seats at the House of Representatives: Bayan Muna, Akbayan, Anakpawis, GWP, AMIN and Cibac. Four of them, meanwhile, fell short of the statistical requirement for congressional representation but are close to the threshold: APEC, Partido ng Manggagawa, Buhay, and Coop-Natcco.
Their performance during the 13th Congress may be taken as a measure of how they may be expected to do if they all manage to win seats in the 14th Congress.
Bayan Muna was represented by Satur Ocampo, Teddy Casiño, and Joel Virador. The three filed more than 200 bills and resolutions in all during the 13th Congress, based on data from the House of Representatives.
Ocampo’s bills dealt primarily with human rights and foreign debt. Among his human rights bills are those repealing Batas Pambansa Blg. 880 and strengthening the right to free expression and peaceable assembly, defining and penalizing the crime of forced disappearance and declaring torture as a crime and prescribing penalties for acts of torture. He also has bills repealing the Automatic Appropriations Act, cancelling “fraudulent” loans incurred during the Marcos regime as well as those that resulted from onerous contracts.
Casiño, a former student leader, had a number of bills seeking to regulate tuition and other fee increases in private colleges and universities and mandating them to allow a certain number of students as scholarship grantees. Virador, meanwhile, is known for his bill repealing the Mining Act of 1995.
Anakpawis Rep. Crispin Beltran –- who has been confined under police custody at the Philippine Heart Center since February 2006 following his warrantless arrest on rebellion charges –- is best known for his bills providing for wage increases for private-sector workers and government employees. He also filed a bill seeking to repeal the Downstream Oil Industry Deregulation Act of 1998.
The other Anakpawis representative, Rafael Mariano –- a farmer from Nueva Ecija and a long-time peasant leader before being elected to Congress –- had bills focusing mainly on land rights for farmers.
GWP’s Liza Maza filed a bill providing for equal rights for husbands and wives by amending Articles 333, 334, and 344 of the Revised Penal Code. Her bills have dealt mostly with the promotion of women’s and children’s rights.
Akbayan’s bills dealt mainly with the promotion of human rights education and international humanitarian law, and amendments to the country’s tax and labor laws.
APEC filed a few bills dealing with extending tax exemptions to electric cooperatives. Meanwhile, Coop-Natcco’s Guillermo Cua had bills seeking to strengthen cooperatives and give them representation in certain government agencies.
Buhay’s Hans Christian Señeres and Rene Velarde filed a few bills dealing with child pornography and abortion. Cibac’s Joel Villanueva filed bills against corruption, marital infidelity, and pornography.
AMIN’s Mujiv Hataman filed bills which provide for the mandatory study of Moro and Lumad history, culture and identity in all levels of education in the Philippines. Many of his other bills, however, are particular to certain legislative districts in Mindanao.
Partido ng Manggagawa represents workers. It is represented in Congress by Renato Magtubo. The House of Representatives website has no listing for bills under Magtubo’s name, but the Partido ng Manggagawa website lists, among other measures, a bill establishing a New Labor Code of the Philippines as well as bills providing for salary increases for public school teachers. Magtubo co-sponsored Beltran’s bills on wage increases for private-sector workers and government employees.
Having identified the major bills they filed, it remains another matter altogether as to why most of them have not been approved by the House of Representatives. Bulatlat
The party-list system was envisioned by its advocates as purportedly a counter-current to the dominance of pro-foreign and elite interests in Philippine traditional politics. How have the party-list groups done in terms of their legislative work? Have they fulfilled the mandate of legislating particularly for the marginalized and underrepresented sectors? A look at the bills filed by party-list groups during the 13th Congress can give one an idea.
BY ALEXANDER MARTIN REMOLLINO
Bulatlat
The party-list system makes it possible for groups representing the country’s marginalized and underrepresented sectors to have seats at the House of Representatives. It was envisioned by its advocates as purportedly a counter-current to the dominance of pro-foreign and elite interests in Philippine traditional politics.
The 1987 Constitution has a provision that representatives from party-list groups are to be allotted 20 percent of the total number of seats at the House of Representatives. For three consecutive terms under the 1987 Constitution, representatives from the labor, peasant, urban poor, indigenous cultural communities, women, youth, and other sectors as may be provided by law –- except the religious sector –- were selected or elected to fill half of the seats allocated to party-list representatives.
Republic Act No. 7941, passed in 1995, served as the enabling law for the constitutional provision for a party-list system. It also adds the elderly, the handicapped, veterans, overseas workers, and professionals to the list of sectors that party-list groups are supposed to represent.
As representatives of marginalized and underrepresented groups, party-list lawmakers are expected to contribute legislation that would benefit their immediate constituency and the nation in general. As the Supreme Court stated in its landmark decision on Ang Bagong Bayani-OFW v. Comelec, et al, “while lacking a well-defined political constituency, the (party-list) nominee must likewise be able to contribute to the formulation and enactment of appropriate legislation that will benefit the nation as a whole.”
How have the party-list groups done in terms of their legislative work? Have they fulfilled the mandate of legislating particularly for the marginalized and underrepresented sectors? A look at the bills they filed can give one an idea.
The party-list groups that won seats in the 13th Congress are: Bayan Muna (People First), Anakpawis (Toiling Masses), Akbayan, Association of Philippine Electric Cooperatives (APEC), Buhay Hayaan Yumabong (Buhay or Let Life Grow), Anakpawis (Toiling Masses), Gabriela Women’s Party (GWP), Citizen’s Battle Against Corruption (Cibac), Butil (Grain) Farmer Party, Veterans Freedom Party, Cooperative-National Confederation of Cooperatives (Coop-Natcco), An Waray (literally, Those Who Have Nothing), Anak Mindanao (AMIN or Children of Mindanao), Ang Laban ng Indiginong Filipino (ALIF or The Struggle of Indigenous Filipino), and Alagad (literally, Agent).
Based on the Social Weather Station (SWS) survey last March, six of these party-list groups could expect to maintain, if not increase, their seats at the House of Representatives: Bayan Muna, Akbayan, Anakpawis, GWP, AMIN and Cibac. Four of them, meanwhile, fell short of the statistical requirement for congressional representation but are close to the threshold: APEC, Partido ng Manggagawa, Buhay, and Coop-Natcco.
Their performance during the 13th Congress may be taken as a measure of how they may be expected to do if they all manage to win seats in the 14th Congress.
Bayan Muna was represented by Satur Ocampo, Teddy Casiño, and Joel Virador. The three filed more than 200 bills and resolutions in all during the 13th Congress, based on data from the House of Representatives.
Ocampo’s bills dealt primarily with human rights and foreign debt. Among his human rights bills are those repealing Batas Pambansa Blg. 880 and strengthening the right to free expression and peaceable assembly, defining and penalizing the crime of forced disappearance and declaring torture as a crime and prescribing penalties for acts of torture. He also has bills repealing the Automatic Appropriations Act, cancelling “fraudulent” loans incurred during the Marcos regime as well as those that resulted from onerous contracts.
Casiño, a former student leader, had a number of bills seeking to regulate tuition and other fee increases in private colleges and universities and mandating them to allow a certain number of students as scholarship grantees. Virador, meanwhile, is known for his bill repealing the Mining Act of 1995.
Anakpawis Rep. Crispin Beltran –- who has been confined under police custody at the Philippine Heart Center since February 2006 following his warrantless arrest on rebellion charges –- is best known for his bills providing for wage increases for private-sector workers and government employees. He also filed a bill seeking to repeal the Downstream Oil Industry Deregulation Act of 1998.
The other Anakpawis representative, Rafael Mariano –- a farmer from Nueva Ecija and a long-time peasant leader before being elected to Congress –- had bills focusing mainly on land rights for farmers.
GWP’s Liza Maza filed a bill providing for equal rights for husbands and wives by amending Articles 333, 334, and 344 of the Revised Penal Code. Her bills have dealt mostly with the promotion of women’s and children’s rights.
Akbayan’s bills dealt mainly with the promotion of human rights education and international humanitarian law, and amendments to the country’s tax and labor laws.
APEC filed a few bills dealing with extending tax exemptions to electric cooperatives. Meanwhile, Coop-Natcco’s Guillermo Cua had bills seeking to strengthen cooperatives and give them representation in certain government agencies.
Buhay’s Hans Christian Señeres and Rene Velarde filed a few bills dealing with child pornography and abortion. Cibac’s Joel Villanueva filed bills against corruption, marital infidelity, and pornography.
AMIN’s Mujiv Hataman filed bills which provide for the mandatory study of Moro and Lumad history, culture and identity in all levels of education in the Philippines. Many of his other bills, however, are particular to certain legislative districts in Mindanao.
Partido ng Manggagawa represents workers. It is represented in Congress by Renato Magtubo. The House of Representatives website has no listing for bills under Magtubo’s name, but the Partido ng Manggagawa website lists, among other measures, a bill establishing a New Labor Code of the Philippines as well as bills providing for salary increases for public school teachers. Magtubo co-sponsored Beltran’s bills on wage increases for private-sector workers and government employees.
Having identified the major bills they filed, it remains another matter altogether as to why most of them have not been approved by the House of Representatives. Bulatlat
Thursday, April 12, 2007
SAPAGKAT NASA GAYONG PAGHIHINTAY ANG PAG-ASA NILA'T KINABUKASAN
Alexander Martin Remollino
Mapalad ang mga nangangailangan
sapagkat ang kanilang pag-asa't kinabukasan
ay nasa paghihintay lamang ng suwerte sa tuwi-tuwina.
Kailangan lamang nilang mag-antay na irehistro ng mga bola
ang numero ng kanilang tiket,
o maambunan sila ng mga proyektong pangkawanggawa
ng gobyernong walang pakialam
kung mabutasan nang kasinlalaki ng kamao
ang mga bituka ng mga mamamayan.
Ito lamang ang kanilang dapat na gawin.
Di na kailangang putlin pa nila
ang mga ugat ng kanilang pangangailangan.
Kailangan lamang nilang maghintay ng suwerte
sa tuwi-tuwina
sapagkat nasa gayong paghihintay
ang kanilang pag-asa't kinabukasan.
Mapalad ang mga nangangailangan.
The Makata, April 2007
Alexander Martin Remollino
Mapalad ang mga nangangailangan
sapagkat ang kanilang pag-asa't kinabukasan
ay nasa paghihintay lamang ng suwerte sa tuwi-tuwina.
Kailangan lamang nilang mag-antay na irehistro ng mga bola
ang numero ng kanilang tiket,
o maambunan sila ng mga proyektong pangkawanggawa
ng gobyernong walang pakialam
kung mabutasan nang kasinlalaki ng kamao
ang mga bituka ng mga mamamayan.
Ito lamang ang kanilang dapat na gawin.
Di na kailangang putlin pa nila
ang mga ugat ng kanilang pangangailangan.
Kailangan lamang nilang maghintay ng suwerte
sa tuwi-tuwina
sapagkat nasa gayong paghihintay
ang kanilang pag-asa't kinabukasan.
Mapalad ang mga nangangailangan.
The Makata, April 2007
Saturday, April 07, 2007
AND SO THE BELL SHOULD NOW TOLL FOR THEE
Alexander Martin Remollino
You are not having the bell toll for them.
"A mere speck of blood," you say
of the bloodbath that they in the Palace
have brought upon this nation.
Close to a thousand innocent lives seized
in just a little more than six years --
that, to you, is "a mere speck of blood."
Do you hold human life so cheaply
as to scoff at the slays of hundreds of innocents?
Just one such murder is too much,
and here you have hundreds, hundreds --
and still you have not found it fit
to cry for a stop to the killings.
You are not having the bell toll for them.
Is there a heart that beats in your chest?
It would be no surprise to find none.
And so the bell should now toll for thee.
Alexander Martin Remollino
“(What is happening today by way of human rights abuses) is nothing compared (to what we have experienced. What is happening under the Arroyo regime today) is so tiny that it is a mere speck.”
-- Gaudencio Cardinal Rosales, Archbishop of Manila, 26 March 2007
You are not having the bell toll for them.
"A mere speck of blood," you say
of the bloodbath that they in the Palace
have brought upon this nation.
Close to a thousand innocent lives seized
in just a little more than six years --
that, to you, is "a mere speck of blood."
Do you hold human life so cheaply
as to scoff at the slays of hundreds of innocents?
Just one such murder is too much,
and here you have hundreds, hundreds --
and still you have not found it fit
to cry for a stop to the killings.
You are not having the bell toll for them.
Is there a heart that beats in your chest?
It would be no surprise to find none.
And so the bell should now toll for thee.
Friday, April 06, 2007
PANALANGIN NG NAKIKITALAD PARA SA KATARUNGAN
Alexander Martin Remollino
Ama naming nasa langit
Na nais din naming malikha sa lupa,
Sambahin ang ngalan Mo.
Mapasaamin ang kaharian Mo
At ang niloloob Mong katarungan para sa lahat
Ay mangyari nawa sa lupa,
Para nang sa langit.
Bigyan Mo kami ng tapang at tatag
Upang harapin at labanan ang mga kumakamkam
Ng aming kakanin sa araw-araw.
At patawarin Mo kami
Kung di-sadyang may pagkukulang sa aming pagbabantay
Sa kapakanan ng aming kapwa,
Para nang pagpapatawad namin
Sa mga di-sadyang nagkulang nang gayon sa amin.
At huwag mo kaming ipahintulot
Sa tukso ng kasakiman,
At iadya Mo kami
Sa lahat ng masama.
Siya nawa.
Alexander Martin Remollino
Ama naming nasa langit
Na nais din naming malikha sa lupa,
Sambahin ang ngalan Mo.
Mapasaamin ang kaharian Mo
At ang niloloob Mong katarungan para sa lahat
Ay mangyari nawa sa lupa,
Para nang sa langit.
Bigyan Mo kami ng tapang at tatag
Upang harapin at labanan ang mga kumakamkam
Ng aming kakanin sa araw-araw.
At patawarin Mo kami
Kung di-sadyang may pagkukulang sa aming pagbabantay
Sa kapakanan ng aming kapwa,
Para nang pagpapatawad namin
Sa mga di-sadyang nagkulang nang gayon sa amin.
At huwag mo kaming ipahintulot
Sa tukso ng kasakiman,
At iadya Mo kami
Sa lahat ng masama.
Siya nawa.
MESSAGE TO THE GUILTLESS
Alexander Martin Remollino
It is not just that ten nights a week you party
like you'd never go to another party
while multitudes rot like plants long deprived of water
in this basket case of a country.
When those who bring the sumptuous dishes to your tables
ask for a greater share of the food they produce
from back-breaking toil in the fields and factories,
their demands fall on deaf ears --
or they themselves are fed to the prisons
or peppered with bullets.
They who feed the nation
are left to starve to death
so that you can continue
with your nightly bacchanalian orgies.
And you are guiltless.
Alexander Martin Remollino
There is this mindset, which I think is so passe, that says: "The country is in shambles and the country is having a hard time and you are out there partying." But this generation is guiltless when it comes to that.
-- Tim Yap
It is not just that ten nights a week you party
like you'd never go to another party
while multitudes rot like plants long deprived of water
in this basket case of a country.
When those who bring the sumptuous dishes to your tables
ask for a greater share of the food they produce
from back-breaking toil in the fields and factories,
their demands fall on deaf ears --
or they themselves are fed to the prisons
or peppered with bullets.
They who feed the nation
are left to starve to death
so that you can continue
with your nightly bacchanalian orgies.
And you are guiltless.
Monday, April 02, 2007
SI GMA AT ANG SEMANTIKA NG KAGUTUMAN
Alexander Martin Remollino
Gaano kalala ang suliranin ng kagutuman sa Pilipinas? Maliit na bagay lamang, kung tatanungin ang diumano’y Pangulong Glorria Macapagal-Arroyo.
Batay sa panlipunang sarbey ng Social Weather Station (SWS) para sa unang sikapat ng 2007, may 19 porsiyento ng mga tumugon ang nagsabing sila’y nakaranas ng kagutuman. Ganito rin ang dami ng mga tumugon sa panlipunang sarbey ng SWS din para naman sa huling sikapat ng 2006 na nagsabing sila’y dumanas ng kagutuman. Ito ang pinakamalawak na kagutumang naitala sa buong bansa mula nang magsimulang magsarbey ukol sa kagutuman ang SWS noong 1998.
Gayundin, may 12 sikapat nang tuluy-tuloy na nasa 10 porsiyento pataas ang lawak ng kagutumang naitatala ng mga sarbey ng SWS.
Dalawang uri ng kagutuman ang pinagbatayan ng SWS sa sarbey nito: ang matinding kagutuman, na ang ibig sabihi’y “madalas o palaging” nakararanas ng gutom at walang makain ang tumutugon; at ang di-gaanong matinding kagutuman, na ang ibig sabihi’y “minsan o mga ilang beses” lamang nakaranas ng gutom at walang makain ang tumutugon. Upang mabatid ito, ang tanong sa mga tumutugon ay:
“Nitong nakaraang 3 buwan, nangyari po ba na ang inyong pamilya ay nakaranas ng gutom at walang makain? KUNG OO: Nangyari po ba ‘yan (nang) MINSAN LAMANG, MGA ILANG BESES, MADALAS, O PALAGI?”
Mantakin ninyong sabihin ni Arroyo na maging siya’y nakaranas ng gutom nitong nakaraang tatlong buwan – siya na may suweldong P40,000 bilang diumano’y pangulo at ang asawa’t mga anak ay may kani-kanyang hanapbuhay at ang buong pamilya’y may iba pang kayamanan (huwag na munang pag-usapan kung saan nakuha). Paano raw nangyari ito? Aniya:
“Kasi ‘yon naman ang question ng hunger, e, ‘Did you miss one meal in the last three months?’ E pati naman ako, I have missed one meal in the last three months.”
Unang-una’y malinaw na hindi ganoon ang tanong ng SWS. Kung isasalin sa Ingles ang tanong na ginagamit sa sarbey ng SWS, ganito ang kalalabasan:
“Was there any time during the last three months that your family experienced hunger and had nothing to eat? IF YES: Did it happen ONCE, A FEW TIMES, OFTEN, or ALWAYS?”
Ikalawa ngunit higit pa, maliwanag na may pambabaluktot sa sagot ni Arroyo. Kagaya ng ipinaliliwanag sa press release ng SWS ukol sa nasabing sarbey, ang sinasabi nilang kagutuman ay “di-kusa” (involuntary, sa wikang Ingles). Hindi itinatanong ng SWS kung ang tumutugon ba’y may panahong kumain nang kulang sa tatlong beses sa isang araw, kahit na may pagkakataong kumain nang sapat, nitong nakaraang tatlong buwan: ang itinatanong ng SWS ay kung ang tumutugon ba’y may panahong hindi makakain nang tatlong beses sa isang araw, nitong nakaraang tatlong buwan. Ito ang lohika sa likod ng paggamit ng pariralang “walang makain” –- ibig sabihin, may panahong gustuhin man nilang kumain nang tatlong beses sa isang araw ay hindi nila magawa sapagkat kulang sa pambili o walang pambili ng sapat na pagkain.
Papagsamahin natin ang dalawang punto laban sa sagot ni Arroyo sa kinalabasan ng sarbey ng SWS, at makikita nating mambabaluktot na lang siya ng semantika’y hindi pa nagawa nang mahusay-husay. Magsasabing pati naman siya’y “nagutom” nitong nakaraang tatlong buwan –- isang litaw na tangkang kuwestiyunin ang kredibilidad ng mga estadistikang natipon ng SWS, sa layong mapalitaw na ang kagutuman sa bansa ngayo’y hindi kasinlawak ng nakikita sa mga resulta ng sarbey –- bago’y ni hindi pala niya naiintindihan kung ano ang ibig sabihin ng gutom, at maging yaong kasimple-simpleng Pilipino na nga sa tanong ng SWS ay hindi pa rin naunawaan.
Bakit gayon na lamang ang pagpupumilit niyang baluktutin ang katotohanang inilalarawan ng mga estadistika ng SWS? Bakit gayon na lamang ang pagpupumilit niyang palitawing maliit na bagay lamang ang kagutuman sa ating bansa sa kasalukuyan?
Kagaya ng nauna nang mabanggit, may 12 sikapat nang tuluy-tuloy na nasa 10 porsiyento pataas ang lawak ng kagutuman sa bansa. Una itong umabot sa lawak na 10 porsiyento pataas noong 2004 –- ang taong diumano’y nanalo siya sa halalan sa pagkapangulo.
Magbuhat noo’y walang pagbaba ang lawak ng kagutuman sa bansa batay sa mga sarbey ng SWS, at ngayon nga’y dalawang sikapat nang nasa 19 porsiyento ito.
Maliwanag na walang ginawa ang rehimeng Arroyo upang mabawasan ang kagutuman ng ating mga kababayan, gayong may kapangyarihan itong magsagawa ng mga karampatang hakbang.
Ito ang katotohanang ibig ikubli ni Arroyo –- kaya gayon na lamang ang pagpupumilit niyang baluktutin ang semantika ng kagutuman, kuwestiyunin ang kredibilidad ng mga estadistika ng SWS at palitawing ang kagutuman sa bansa’y maliit na bagay lamang.
Alexander Martin Remollino
Gaano kalala ang suliranin ng kagutuman sa Pilipinas? Maliit na bagay lamang, kung tatanungin ang diumano’y Pangulong Glorria Macapagal-Arroyo.
Batay sa panlipunang sarbey ng Social Weather Station (SWS) para sa unang sikapat ng 2007, may 19 porsiyento ng mga tumugon ang nagsabing sila’y nakaranas ng kagutuman. Ganito rin ang dami ng mga tumugon sa panlipunang sarbey ng SWS din para naman sa huling sikapat ng 2006 na nagsabing sila’y dumanas ng kagutuman. Ito ang pinakamalawak na kagutumang naitala sa buong bansa mula nang magsimulang magsarbey ukol sa kagutuman ang SWS noong 1998.
Gayundin, may 12 sikapat nang tuluy-tuloy na nasa 10 porsiyento pataas ang lawak ng kagutumang naitatala ng mga sarbey ng SWS.
Dalawang uri ng kagutuman ang pinagbatayan ng SWS sa sarbey nito: ang matinding kagutuman, na ang ibig sabihi’y “madalas o palaging” nakararanas ng gutom at walang makain ang tumutugon; at ang di-gaanong matinding kagutuman, na ang ibig sabihi’y “minsan o mga ilang beses” lamang nakaranas ng gutom at walang makain ang tumutugon. Upang mabatid ito, ang tanong sa mga tumutugon ay:
“Nitong nakaraang 3 buwan, nangyari po ba na ang inyong pamilya ay nakaranas ng gutom at walang makain? KUNG OO: Nangyari po ba ‘yan (nang) MINSAN LAMANG, MGA ILANG BESES, MADALAS, O PALAGI?”
Mantakin ninyong sabihin ni Arroyo na maging siya’y nakaranas ng gutom nitong nakaraang tatlong buwan – siya na may suweldong P40,000 bilang diumano’y pangulo at ang asawa’t mga anak ay may kani-kanyang hanapbuhay at ang buong pamilya’y may iba pang kayamanan (huwag na munang pag-usapan kung saan nakuha). Paano raw nangyari ito? Aniya:
“Kasi ‘yon naman ang question ng hunger, e, ‘Did you miss one meal in the last three months?’ E pati naman ako, I have missed one meal in the last three months.”
Unang-una’y malinaw na hindi ganoon ang tanong ng SWS. Kung isasalin sa Ingles ang tanong na ginagamit sa sarbey ng SWS, ganito ang kalalabasan:
“Was there any time during the last three months that your family experienced hunger and had nothing to eat? IF YES: Did it happen ONCE, A FEW TIMES, OFTEN, or ALWAYS?”
Ikalawa ngunit higit pa, maliwanag na may pambabaluktot sa sagot ni Arroyo. Kagaya ng ipinaliliwanag sa press release ng SWS ukol sa nasabing sarbey, ang sinasabi nilang kagutuman ay “di-kusa” (involuntary, sa wikang Ingles). Hindi itinatanong ng SWS kung ang tumutugon ba’y may panahong kumain nang kulang sa tatlong beses sa isang araw, kahit na may pagkakataong kumain nang sapat, nitong nakaraang tatlong buwan: ang itinatanong ng SWS ay kung ang tumutugon ba’y may panahong hindi makakain nang tatlong beses sa isang araw, nitong nakaraang tatlong buwan. Ito ang lohika sa likod ng paggamit ng pariralang “walang makain” –- ibig sabihin, may panahong gustuhin man nilang kumain nang tatlong beses sa isang araw ay hindi nila magawa sapagkat kulang sa pambili o walang pambili ng sapat na pagkain.
Papagsamahin natin ang dalawang punto laban sa sagot ni Arroyo sa kinalabasan ng sarbey ng SWS, at makikita nating mambabaluktot na lang siya ng semantika’y hindi pa nagawa nang mahusay-husay. Magsasabing pati naman siya’y “nagutom” nitong nakaraang tatlong buwan –- isang litaw na tangkang kuwestiyunin ang kredibilidad ng mga estadistikang natipon ng SWS, sa layong mapalitaw na ang kagutuman sa bansa ngayo’y hindi kasinlawak ng nakikita sa mga resulta ng sarbey –- bago’y ni hindi pala niya naiintindihan kung ano ang ibig sabihin ng gutom, at maging yaong kasimple-simpleng Pilipino na nga sa tanong ng SWS ay hindi pa rin naunawaan.
Bakit gayon na lamang ang pagpupumilit niyang baluktutin ang katotohanang inilalarawan ng mga estadistika ng SWS? Bakit gayon na lamang ang pagpupumilit niyang palitawing maliit na bagay lamang ang kagutuman sa ating bansa sa kasalukuyan?
Kagaya ng nauna nang mabanggit, may 12 sikapat nang tuluy-tuloy na nasa 10 porsiyento pataas ang lawak ng kagutuman sa bansa. Una itong umabot sa lawak na 10 porsiyento pataas noong 2004 –- ang taong diumano’y nanalo siya sa halalan sa pagkapangulo.
Magbuhat noo’y walang pagbaba ang lawak ng kagutuman sa bansa batay sa mga sarbey ng SWS, at ngayon nga’y dalawang sikapat nang nasa 19 porsiyento ito.
Maliwanag na walang ginawa ang rehimeng Arroyo upang mabawasan ang kagutuman ng ating mga kababayan, gayong may kapangyarihan itong magsagawa ng mga karampatang hakbang.
Ito ang katotohanang ibig ikubli ni Arroyo –- kaya gayon na lamang ang pagpupumilit niyang baluktutin ang semantika ng kagutuman, kuwestiyunin ang kredibilidad ng mga estadistika ng SWS at palitawing ang kagutuman sa bansa’y maliit na bagay lamang.
Sunday, March 25, 2007
NOBEL LAUREATE SUPPORTS PERMANENT PEOPLES' TRIBUNAL 2ND SESSION ON RP
Nobel Peace Prize Winner Most Rev. Desmond Tutu, Archbishop Emeritus of Cape Town, South Africa, is one of the several supporters of the 2nd Session on the Philippines of the Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal (PPT) –- where the Arroyo regime, the U.S. government, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank (IMF-WB), the World Trade Organization (WTO) and multinational corporations are facing charges for gross violations of civil and political rights, economic plunder and ecological destruction, and transgression of the Filipino peoples’ sovereignty.
BY ALEXANDER MARTIN REMOLLINO
Bulatlat
Nobel Peace Prize Winner Most Rev. Desmond Tutu, Archbishop Emeritus of Cape Town, South Africa, is one of the several supporters of the 2nd Session on the Philippines of the Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal (PPT) –- where the Arroyo regime, the U.S. government, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank (IMF-WB), the World Trade Organization (WTO) and multinational corporations are facing charges for gross violations of civil and political rights, economic plunder and ecological destruction, and transgression of the Filipino peoples’ sovereignty.
“I wholeheartedly support the Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal on the Philippines in their noble cause and pray that all of us through them will succeed in this pursuit of justice and peace in the Philippines!” Tutu said in his message of endorsement sent to the PPT.
“Our brothers and sisters in the Philippines who are fighting for justice and well-being for all…are being slaughtered as we speak!” he said.
“Stop the terror inflicted on those who seek justice in your land,” he also called on President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. “Stop using the so-called war against terrorism to oppress and kill your own people!”
Tutu won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1984. He had risen to world fame in the previous decades as a vocal opponent of apartheid. He is also a recipient of the Albert Schweitzer Prize for Humanitarianism and, in 1986, was given the Magubela Prize for Liberty. In 2005, he was awarded the Gandhi Peace Prize.
He is also known as an anti-AIDS activist and has served as honorary chairman of the Global AIDS Alliance.
Other endorsers
Other prominent endorsements came from 2005 Right Livelihood Award (alternative Nobel) recipient and National Chairperson of The Council of Canadians, Ms. Maude Barlow; 2005 Right Livelihood Award recipient and founder of the Polaris Institute, Tony Clarke, PhD; World Alliance for Citizen Participation (CIVICUS) official, Cardinal Uwishaka of Mozambique; Prof. Dr. Yong Bock-Kim of the Presbyterian Church of Korea; Secretary General Tang Shu of the Labor Party of Taiwan; Legislator Kao Su-Mei Chin of the Non-Partisan Solidarity Union of Taiwan; Japanese international affairs expert and Peace Research Institute director, Professor Kinhide Mushakoji; and Professor (Elizabeth) Jane Kelsey of the ARENA Network – Aotearoa / New Zealand.
The Asia-Japan Women’s Resource Center, through Secretary General Hisako Motoyama, has expressed solidarity with the Filipino people “in their fight against brutal powers.” The world’s largest grassroots environmental network, Friends of the Earth International, also sent its endorsement for the Tribunal session on the Philippines.
The PPT’s Second Session on the Philippines opened on March 22 in The Hague, The Netherlands. The PPT is expected to deliver its verdict this March 25.
The petition for the PPT’s Second Session on the Philippines was filed by: Hustisya (Justice), an organization of human rights victims under the Arroyo administration and their relatives; Desaparecidos, a group of relatives of victims of enforced disappearances; Samahan ng mga Ex-Detainee Laban sa Detensyon at para sa Amnestiya (SELDA or Society of Ex-Detainees Against Detention and for Amnesty); and the multi-sectoral Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (Bayan or New Patriotic Alliance).
1980
The PPT heard the case of the Filipino people against the Marcos regime and the U.S. government in 1980 in Antwerp, Belgium. The jury found the Marcos dictatorship “guilty of grave economic and political crimes against his own people and against the Bangsa Moro people,” and declared Marcos “unfit to govern and subject to severe punishment for his offenses.” It also recognized the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) and the Moro National Liberation Front), which had filed the 1980 charges, as “the legitimate representatives” of the Filipino and Moro peoples, respectively.
The Member Jurors of the PPT First Session on the Philippines were: Sergio Mendes Arceo, Roman Catholic Archbishop of Guernavaca, Mexico; Richard Baumlin, Swiss legal scholar and parliamentarian; Harvey Cox, professor of theology at Harvard University and author of the book Secular City; Richard Falk, professor of international law at Princeton University and noted environmentalist; Andrea Giardina, professor of international law at the University of Naples; Francois Houtart, professor of sociology at the University of Louvain; Ajit Roy, Indian writer; Makoto Oda; Ernst Utrecht, professor at Sidney University and a fellow of the Transnational Institute in Amsterdam; George Wald, Nobel Prize winner and president of the First Session on the Philippines; Muireann O’ Brian, Irish lawyer; and Gianni Tognoni, coordinator of the First Session on the Philippines.
The Marcos dictatorship was eventually ousted from power by a popular uprising in February 1986.
Jurors
Falk, Houtart, and Oda are also serving as Jurors in the PPT Second Session on the Philippines. The other Jurors are: Lilia Solano (Colombia), a 2005 Right Livelihood Awardee, professor of Social and Political Sciences at the National University in Bogota, Director of the Project for Life and Peace, and a member of the National Movement of Victims ofState-Sponsored Crimes; Oystein Tveter (Norway), a lawyer and former director of the Karibu Foundation, an organization helping to rehabilitate child war victims in Rwanda; Ties Prakken, a Dutch human rights lawyer and professor of Criminal Law at Maastricht University; and Irene Fernandez, Malaysian trade unionist, women and consumer rights advocate, and a founding member of the Asia-Pacific Forum on Women, Law and Development (APWLD). Bulatlat
Nobel Peace Prize Winner Most Rev. Desmond Tutu, Archbishop Emeritus of Cape Town, South Africa, is one of the several supporters of the 2nd Session on the Philippines of the Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal (PPT) –- where the Arroyo regime, the U.S. government, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank (IMF-WB), the World Trade Organization (WTO) and multinational corporations are facing charges for gross violations of civil and political rights, economic plunder and ecological destruction, and transgression of the Filipino peoples’ sovereignty.
BY ALEXANDER MARTIN REMOLLINO
Bulatlat
Nobel Peace Prize Winner Most Rev. Desmond Tutu, Archbishop Emeritus of Cape Town, South Africa, is one of the several supporters of the 2nd Session on the Philippines of the Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal (PPT) –- where the Arroyo regime, the U.S. government, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank (IMF-WB), the World Trade Organization (WTO) and multinational corporations are facing charges for gross violations of civil and political rights, economic plunder and ecological destruction, and transgression of the Filipino peoples’ sovereignty.
“I wholeheartedly support the Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal on the Philippines in their noble cause and pray that all of us through them will succeed in this pursuit of justice and peace in the Philippines!” Tutu said in his message of endorsement sent to the PPT.
“Our brothers and sisters in the Philippines who are fighting for justice and well-being for all…are being slaughtered as we speak!” he said.
“Stop the terror inflicted on those who seek justice in your land,” he also called on President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. “Stop using the so-called war against terrorism to oppress and kill your own people!”
Tutu won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1984. He had risen to world fame in the previous decades as a vocal opponent of apartheid. He is also a recipient of the Albert Schweitzer Prize for Humanitarianism and, in 1986, was given the Magubela Prize for Liberty. In 2005, he was awarded the Gandhi Peace Prize.
He is also known as an anti-AIDS activist and has served as honorary chairman of the Global AIDS Alliance.
Other endorsers
Other prominent endorsements came from 2005 Right Livelihood Award (alternative Nobel) recipient and National Chairperson of The Council of Canadians, Ms. Maude Barlow; 2005 Right Livelihood Award recipient and founder of the Polaris Institute, Tony Clarke, PhD; World Alliance for Citizen Participation (CIVICUS) official, Cardinal Uwishaka of Mozambique; Prof. Dr. Yong Bock-Kim of the Presbyterian Church of Korea; Secretary General Tang Shu of the Labor Party of Taiwan; Legislator Kao Su-Mei Chin of the Non-Partisan Solidarity Union of Taiwan; Japanese international affairs expert and Peace Research Institute director, Professor Kinhide Mushakoji; and Professor (Elizabeth) Jane Kelsey of the ARENA Network – Aotearoa / New Zealand.
The Asia-Japan Women’s Resource Center, through Secretary General Hisako Motoyama, has expressed solidarity with the Filipino people “in their fight against brutal powers.” The world’s largest grassroots environmental network, Friends of the Earth International, also sent its endorsement for the Tribunal session on the Philippines.
The PPT’s Second Session on the Philippines opened on March 22 in The Hague, The Netherlands. The PPT is expected to deliver its verdict this March 25.
The petition for the PPT’s Second Session on the Philippines was filed by: Hustisya (Justice), an organization of human rights victims under the Arroyo administration and their relatives; Desaparecidos, a group of relatives of victims of enforced disappearances; Samahan ng mga Ex-Detainee Laban sa Detensyon at para sa Amnestiya (SELDA or Society of Ex-Detainees Against Detention and for Amnesty); and the multi-sectoral Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (Bayan or New Patriotic Alliance).
1980
The PPT heard the case of the Filipino people against the Marcos regime and the U.S. government in 1980 in Antwerp, Belgium. The jury found the Marcos dictatorship “guilty of grave economic and political crimes against his own people and against the Bangsa Moro people,” and declared Marcos “unfit to govern and subject to severe punishment for his offenses.” It also recognized the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) and the Moro National Liberation Front), which had filed the 1980 charges, as “the legitimate representatives” of the Filipino and Moro peoples, respectively.
The Member Jurors of the PPT First Session on the Philippines were: Sergio Mendes Arceo, Roman Catholic Archbishop of Guernavaca, Mexico; Richard Baumlin, Swiss legal scholar and parliamentarian; Harvey Cox, professor of theology at Harvard University and author of the book Secular City; Richard Falk, professor of international law at Princeton University and noted environmentalist; Andrea Giardina, professor of international law at the University of Naples; Francois Houtart, professor of sociology at the University of Louvain; Ajit Roy, Indian writer; Makoto Oda; Ernst Utrecht, professor at Sidney University and a fellow of the Transnational Institute in Amsterdam; George Wald, Nobel Prize winner and president of the First Session on the Philippines; Muireann O’ Brian, Irish lawyer; and Gianni Tognoni, coordinator of the First Session on the Philippines.
The Marcos dictatorship was eventually ousted from power by a popular uprising in February 1986.
Jurors
Falk, Houtart, and Oda are also serving as Jurors in the PPT Second Session on the Philippines. The other Jurors are: Lilia Solano (Colombia), a 2005 Right Livelihood Awardee, professor of Social and Political Sciences at the National University in Bogota, Director of the Project for Life and Peace, and a member of the National Movement of Victims ofState-Sponsored Crimes; Oystein Tveter (Norway), a lawyer and former director of the Karibu Foundation, an organization helping to rehabilitate child war victims in Rwanda; Ties Prakken, a Dutch human rights lawyer and professor of Criminal Law at Maastricht University; and Irene Fernandez, Malaysian trade unionist, women and consumer rights advocate, and a founding member of the Asia-Pacific Forum on Women, Law and Development (APWLD). Bulatlat
THE SENATORIABLES: HOW THEY STAND ON MAJOR PEOPLE'S ISSUES
The administration’s Team Unity and the Genuine Opposition, the two main contending forces in this year’s senatorial elections, have been exchanging challenges to a debate for the past few weeks. While both sides have agreed on a possible venue for the debate, they have not agreed on what issues to debate about.
BY ALEXANDER MARTIN REMOLLINO
Bulatlat
The administration’s Team Unity and the Genuine Opposition, the two main contending forces in this year’s senatorial elections, have been exchanging challenges to a debate for the past few weeks.
Both slates had even agreed on Plaza Miranda in Quiapo, Manila as an appropriate venue for the debate.
But they have not agreed on what issues to debate about. Team Unity insists that the debate revolve only around economic issues. The Genuine Opposition refuses to tackle economic issues without going into political issues. So while a Team Unity-Genuine Opposition debate on the issues of the day has yet to take place, the two sides are already exchanging barbs on what to exchange barbs about at Plaza Miranda.
This makes it difficult for the electorate to assess the two slates based on what a public-affairs TV program has dubbed the “Philippine agenda.”
It is possible, however, to make at least a preliminary assessment of some of the candidates of both sides based on how they stood on issues that greatly affected the people. Issues that turned out to be of particular importance in the nearly three years since the last elections are those related to the Restructured Value-Added Tax (RVAT), the impeachment of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, the Subic rape case and the Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA), political killings and repression, and the legislated wage hike.
Team Unity’s candidates are: Edgardo Angara, Joker Arroyo, Mike Defensor, Jamalul Kiram, Vicente Magsaysay, Cesar Montano, Teresa Aquino-Oreta, Prospero Pichay Jr., Ralph Recto, Luis “Chavit” Singson, Vicente Sotto III and Juan Miguel Zubiri.
The Genuine Opposition’s candidates are: Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III, Alan Peter Cayetano, Anna Dominique “Nikki” Coseteng, Francis “Chiz” Escudero, Panfilo Lacson, Loren Legarda, John Henry Osmeña, Aquilino “Koko” Pimentel III, Sonia Roco, Antonio Trillanes IV and Manuel Villar.
RVAT
One of the issues the Arroyo administration was criticized for after the 2004 elections –- in which it was supposed to have won a fresh mandate three years after being installed into power through a popular uprising –- was the restructuring of the Expanded Value-Added Tax (EVAT), an indirect tax measure prescribed by the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank (IMF-WB) on debtor countries.
The RVAT expanded EVAT coverage to include oil, electricity, and transport services and raised its taxation percentage from 10 to 12 percent. The EVAT Law that was passed in 1996 included the following: food products (processed meat, canned fish, coconut and vegetable oil, bakery products, noodles, milk, dairy products, coffee, sugar); clothing, footwear, tannery and leather products; drugs and medicine, furniture, pulp and paper; glass and glass products; cement, steel, iron, wood and most construction materials; electrical lamps and equipment; machinery and equipment both for manufacturing and agriculture; wholesale trade and retail trade; pawnshops; restaurants, cafes and other eating and drinking places; employment and recruitment agencies; motion picture production; hotels and motels; and telecommunications (including landline, post-paid and pre-paid mobile phone services).
The imposition of the RVAT led to the increase in prices of basic goods and services and added to the financial burdens of a populace already weighed down by high costs of living.
Recto –- who is known to have made much of his being a grandson of the nationalist statesman Claro M. Recto –- was the author of the Senate version of the RVAT law. In his political ads he boasts of the RVAT as one of his legislative accomplishments.
Also in Team Unity’s slate are: Arroyo, who voted for the Senate version of the bill and Zubiri, who voted in favor of the bill’s House version.
Arroyo even said the RVAT would not affect consumers much. “VAT does not affect much the public for it will not have a direct impact to consumers,” he said in an April 15, 2005 press conference.
Villar who is running as an independent but was adopted by the Genuine Opposition as a guest candidate voted for the RVAT.
Lacson was among the senators who voted against the bill.
Escudero and Cayetano, who were representatives when the RVAT bill was passed, are known to have been vocal critics of the said tax measure, and participated in several broad campaign efforts to stop the bill’s passage. John Osmeña is making his anti-RVAT position as one of his advocacies in his political ads.
Trillanes, who has been in detention since 2003 for being one of the leaders in the Oakwood uprising, includes “anti-poverty” in his legislative program but makes no mention of any proposed bill that would serve as an antidote to the RVAT. In fact his “anti-poverty” program does not touch on the country’s taxation system.
Impeachment
2005 and 2006 each witnessed impeachment drives against President Arroyo.
The impeachment campaigns were fuelled primarily by the so-called “Hello Garci” tapes –- in which a voice similar to the President’s is heard instructing an election official –- widely believed to be former Election Commissioner Virgilio Garcillano –- to rig the 2004 polls and assure her of victory by more than a million votes.
President Arroyo won by more than a million votes over her closest rival, actor Fernando Poe, Jr. who died in December 2004. She has admitted talking to election officials during the counting of votes, and Garcillano has admitted talking to candidates during the same period –- but both have denied rigging the 2004 elections.
In both 2005 and 2006, impeachment complaints were filed against President Arroyo, citing her for betrayal of public trust, bribery, graft and corruption, and culpable violation of the Constitution.
Escudero and Cayetano were among the most vocal proponents of the two impeachment bids in the House of Representatives.
Cayetano even raised allegations of congressmen having been bribed in exchange for voting against the 2005 impeachment complaint. “Don’t you know that this is the best Congress money can buy?” he said in a rally in September 2005.
Aquino voted against junking the complaints. Lacson supported both impeachment bids and members of his Be Not Afraid Movement were among the signatories to both complaints.
Trillanes was already in detention at the time of the impeachment crises and while he is not known to have made any direct statement on either of the two complaints, he is vocal in calling for President Arroyo’s ouster.
Legarda, who was Poe’s running mate in 2004, was pursuing her election protest against Vice President Noli de Castro when the impeachment campaign was at its peak.
Sotto was vocal in his support of both complaints, and Angara was aligned with the United Opposition (UNO), of which Escudero was also part, at the time of the impeachment crises. They have been hard-put to defend their transfer to the administration camp.
Zubiri and Pichay voted to junk both impeachment bids. Defensor and Singson both came out with statements supporting President Arroyo during the impeachment crises.
The Subic rape case and the VFA
The Subic rape case of November 2005 put the VFA, which grants extraterritorial and extrajudicial privileges on U.S. troops visiting the country for military “exercises,” on the spotlight six years after it was approved by the Senate and ratified by Malacañang.
Based on Senate records, those who voted in favor of the VFA were: Marcelo Fernan, then Senate President; Robert Barbers, Rodolfo Biazon, Rene Cayetano, Anna Dominique “Nikki” Coseteng, Franklin Drilon, Juan Ponce Enrile, Juan Flavier, Gregorio Honasan, Robert Jaworski, Ramon Magsaysay Jr., Blas Ople, Teresa Aquino-Oreta, John Osmeña, Ramon Revilla, Miriam Defensor-Santiago, Vicente Sotto III and Francisco Tatad. Those who voted against the VFA were Teofisto Guingona Jr., Loren Legarda, Sergio Osmeña III, Aquilino Pimentel Jr. and Raul Roco, Senate records also show.
Oreta and Sotto are running under Team Unity; while Coseteng, John Osmeña, and Legarda are all running under the Genuine Opposition.
Arroyo was among a group that petitioned the Supreme Court in 1999 to declare the VFA as “void and unconstitutional.” He was in this group with former Senate President Jovito Salonga, former Sen. Wigberto Tañada, University of the Philippines (UP) professor Roland Simbulan, Pablito Sanidad, Ma. Socorro Diokno, Nini Quezon-Avanceña, Francisco Rivera Jr., Rene Saguisag, Kilosbayan, and the Movement of Attorneys for Brotherhood, Integrity and Nationalism (MABINI).
Political repression and killings
The issue of political repression, together with extrajudicial killings of activists and other government critics, has been one of the main issues against the Arroyo regime since the latter part of 2005.
In late 2005 Malacañang imposed the calibrated preemptive response policy (CPR), which dropped the maximum tolerance policy on protest actions. This was soon followed by Executive Order No. 464, which prohibited cabinet officials from appearing in congressional hearings without clearance from the Office of the President. In February 2006, President Arroyo issued Presidential Proclamation No. 1017, which declared a “state of emergency” throughout the country and allowed the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) and the Philippine National Police (PNP) to “intervene” in “national security situations.”
The three decrees led to violent dispersals of rallies, the suspension of congressional investigations in aid of legislation, and a crackdown on prominent anti-administration groups and personalities –- most notably from the Left.
Meanwhile, the issue of extrajudicial killings has aroused condemnation even from local quarters that previously declined from criticizing the Arroyo regime, as well as from the international community. State forces are seen as the perpetrators in several of the cases of extrajudicial killings, which are linked with the government’s counter-insurgency drive as can be gleaned from several statements by National Security Adviser Norberto Gonzales.
The recently-passed Anti-Terrorism Bill is seen as a repressive measure because it defines “terrorism” so broadly that even legal protest actions may be classified as “acts of terrorism,” and even legal cause-oriented groups may be proscribed as “terrorist organizations.”
When the Supreme Court declared CPR as unconstitutional, Joker Arroyo was jubilant. He was likewise opposed to EO 464 and PP 1017.
However, he voted in favor of the Anti-Terrorism Bill and has urged the public to be “careful” in condemning the AFP for extrajudicial killings.
Another Team Unity candidate who voted in favor of the Anti-Terrorism Bill was Recto.
Villar likewise voted in favor of the bill.
Lacson, like Arroyo, opposed CPR, EO 464, and PP 1017. However, he was the author of one of five Anti-Terrorism Bills filed in the Senate, and he voted in favor of the final version.
Meanwhile, Escudero and Cayetano were both vocal against CPR, EO 464, and PP 1017. Escudero has gone as far as saying that extrajudicial killings under the Arroyo regime are worse than those which took place during the Marcos dictatorship.
Wage hike
The Arroyo administration earned the ire of labor groups –- most notably the Kilusang Mayo Uno (KMU or May 1st Movement) –- early on for refusing to pass a legislated wage hike bill that would help the people cope with rising costs of living.
The KMU has been demanding a legislated P125 across-the-board, nationwide wage increase for private-sector workers. This particular demand of the KMU, which Anakpawis (Toiling Masses) Rep. Crispin Beltran put forward at the House of Representatives, was recently also supported by the Partido ng Manggagawa (Workers’ Party) which was represented by Renato Magtubo in the 13th Congress.
Other groups like the Trade Union Congress of the Philippines (TUCP) have also raised demands for wages increases, but these were much lower than that of the KMU and Anakpawis.
KMU also supports the demand of the Confederation for the Unity, Recognition and Advancement of Government Employees (Courage) for a legislated P3,000 across-the-board, nationwide wage increase for public-sector workers.
Recto and Villar had early on made known their opposition to a legislated wage increase. Joker Arroyo, meanwhile, was a proponent of a 10-percent salary increase for government employees –- a measure that heavily favors those with higher salaries over the rank-and-file.
Escudero, meanwhile, has been vocal in supporting legislated wage hike for both private-sector workers and government employees.
Trillanes’ legislative agenda includes a bill that would provide for an automatic and periodic wage review, based on three-year changes in the inflation rate.
“This is a proven effective anti-corruption policy employed by other countries,” Trillanes said. “It also intends to provide for a decent standard of living for all government employees as well as to attract qualified people from the private sector to join government.
Still preliminary
This, thus far, is how some of the candidates from both Team Unity and the Genuine Opposition have stood on a number of major people’s issues. The assessment that may be made from these is still preliminary and only a clearer articulation of the candidates’ respective legislative proposals would enable a deeper analysis of how they stand vis-à-vis issues affecting the people whose votes they court. Bulatlat
The administration’s Team Unity and the Genuine Opposition, the two main contending forces in this year’s senatorial elections, have been exchanging challenges to a debate for the past few weeks. While both sides have agreed on a possible venue for the debate, they have not agreed on what issues to debate about.
BY ALEXANDER MARTIN REMOLLINO
Bulatlat
The administration’s Team Unity and the Genuine Opposition, the two main contending forces in this year’s senatorial elections, have been exchanging challenges to a debate for the past few weeks.
Both slates had even agreed on Plaza Miranda in Quiapo, Manila as an appropriate venue for the debate.
But they have not agreed on what issues to debate about. Team Unity insists that the debate revolve only around economic issues. The Genuine Opposition refuses to tackle economic issues without going into political issues. So while a Team Unity-Genuine Opposition debate on the issues of the day has yet to take place, the two sides are already exchanging barbs on what to exchange barbs about at Plaza Miranda.
This makes it difficult for the electorate to assess the two slates based on what a public-affairs TV program has dubbed the “Philippine agenda.”
It is possible, however, to make at least a preliminary assessment of some of the candidates of both sides based on how they stood on issues that greatly affected the people. Issues that turned out to be of particular importance in the nearly three years since the last elections are those related to the Restructured Value-Added Tax (RVAT), the impeachment of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, the Subic rape case and the Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA), political killings and repression, and the legislated wage hike.
Team Unity’s candidates are: Edgardo Angara, Joker Arroyo, Mike Defensor, Jamalul Kiram, Vicente Magsaysay, Cesar Montano, Teresa Aquino-Oreta, Prospero Pichay Jr., Ralph Recto, Luis “Chavit” Singson, Vicente Sotto III and Juan Miguel Zubiri.
The Genuine Opposition’s candidates are: Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III, Alan Peter Cayetano, Anna Dominique “Nikki” Coseteng, Francis “Chiz” Escudero, Panfilo Lacson, Loren Legarda, John Henry Osmeña, Aquilino “Koko” Pimentel III, Sonia Roco, Antonio Trillanes IV and Manuel Villar.
RVAT
One of the issues the Arroyo administration was criticized for after the 2004 elections –- in which it was supposed to have won a fresh mandate three years after being installed into power through a popular uprising –- was the restructuring of the Expanded Value-Added Tax (EVAT), an indirect tax measure prescribed by the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank (IMF-WB) on debtor countries.
The RVAT expanded EVAT coverage to include oil, electricity, and transport services and raised its taxation percentage from 10 to 12 percent. The EVAT Law that was passed in 1996 included the following: food products (processed meat, canned fish, coconut and vegetable oil, bakery products, noodles, milk, dairy products, coffee, sugar); clothing, footwear, tannery and leather products; drugs and medicine, furniture, pulp and paper; glass and glass products; cement, steel, iron, wood and most construction materials; electrical lamps and equipment; machinery and equipment both for manufacturing and agriculture; wholesale trade and retail trade; pawnshops; restaurants, cafes and other eating and drinking places; employment and recruitment agencies; motion picture production; hotels and motels; and telecommunications (including landline, post-paid and pre-paid mobile phone services).
The imposition of the RVAT led to the increase in prices of basic goods and services and added to the financial burdens of a populace already weighed down by high costs of living.
Recto –- who is known to have made much of his being a grandson of the nationalist statesman Claro M. Recto –- was the author of the Senate version of the RVAT law. In his political ads he boasts of the RVAT as one of his legislative accomplishments.
Also in Team Unity’s slate are: Arroyo, who voted for the Senate version of the bill and Zubiri, who voted in favor of the bill’s House version.
Arroyo even said the RVAT would not affect consumers much. “VAT does not affect much the public for it will not have a direct impact to consumers,” he said in an April 15, 2005 press conference.
Villar who is running as an independent but was adopted by the Genuine Opposition as a guest candidate voted for the RVAT.
Lacson was among the senators who voted against the bill.
Escudero and Cayetano, who were representatives when the RVAT bill was passed, are known to have been vocal critics of the said tax measure, and participated in several broad campaign efforts to stop the bill’s passage. John Osmeña is making his anti-RVAT position as one of his advocacies in his political ads.
Trillanes, who has been in detention since 2003 for being one of the leaders in the Oakwood uprising, includes “anti-poverty” in his legislative program but makes no mention of any proposed bill that would serve as an antidote to the RVAT. In fact his “anti-poverty” program does not touch on the country’s taxation system.
Impeachment
2005 and 2006 each witnessed impeachment drives against President Arroyo.
The impeachment campaigns were fuelled primarily by the so-called “Hello Garci” tapes –- in which a voice similar to the President’s is heard instructing an election official –- widely believed to be former Election Commissioner Virgilio Garcillano –- to rig the 2004 polls and assure her of victory by more than a million votes.
President Arroyo won by more than a million votes over her closest rival, actor Fernando Poe, Jr. who died in December 2004. She has admitted talking to election officials during the counting of votes, and Garcillano has admitted talking to candidates during the same period –- but both have denied rigging the 2004 elections.
In both 2005 and 2006, impeachment complaints were filed against President Arroyo, citing her for betrayal of public trust, bribery, graft and corruption, and culpable violation of the Constitution.
Escudero and Cayetano were among the most vocal proponents of the two impeachment bids in the House of Representatives.
Cayetano even raised allegations of congressmen having been bribed in exchange for voting against the 2005 impeachment complaint. “Don’t you know that this is the best Congress money can buy?” he said in a rally in September 2005.
Aquino voted against junking the complaints. Lacson supported both impeachment bids and members of his Be Not Afraid Movement were among the signatories to both complaints.
Trillanes was already in detention at the time of the impeachment crises and while he is not known to have made any direct statement on either of the two complaints, he is vocal in calling for President Arroyo’s ouster.
Legarda, who was Poe’s running mate in 2004, was pursuing her election protest against Vice President Noli de Castro when the impeachment campaign was at its peak.
Sotto was vocal in his support of both complaints, and Angara was aligned with the United Opposition (UNO), of which Escudero was also part, at the time of the impeachment crises. They have been hard-put to defend their transfer to the administration camp.
Zubiri and Pichay voted to junk both impeachment bids. Defensor and Singson both came out with statements supporting President Arroyo during the impeachment crises.
The Subic rape case and the VFA
The Subic rape case of November 2005 put the VFA, which grants extraterritorial and extrajudicial privileges on U.S. troops visiting the country for military “exercises,” on the spotlight six years after it was approved by the Senate and ratified by Malacañang.
Based on Senate records, those who voted in favor of the VFA were: Marcelo Fernan, then Senate President; Robert Barbers, Rodolfo Biazon, Rene Cayetano, Anna Dominique “Nikki” Coseteng, Franklin Drilon, Juan Ponce Enrile, Juan Flavier, Gregorio Honasan, Robert Jaworski, Ramon Magsaysay Jr., Blas Ople, Teresa Aquino-Oreta, John Osmeña, Ramon Revilla, Miriam Defensor-Santiago, Vicente Sotto III and Francisco Tatad. Those who voted against the VFA were Teofisto Guingona Jr., Loren Legarda, Sergio Osmeña III, Aquilino Pimentel Jr. and Raul Roco, Senate records also show.
Oreta and Sotto are running under Team Unity; while Coseteng, John Osmeña, and Legarda are all running under the Genuine Opposition.
Arroyo was among a group that petitioned the Supreme Court in 1999 to declare the VFA as “void and unconstitutional.” He was in this group with former Senate President Jovito Salonga, former Sen. Wigberto Tañada, University of the Philippines (UP) professor Roland Simbulan, Pablito Sanidad, Ma. Socorro Diokno, Nini Quezon-Avanceña, Francisco Rivera Jr., Rene Saguisag, Kilosbayan, and the Movement of Attorneys for Brotherhood, Integrity and Nationalism (MABINI).
Political repression and killings
The issue of political repression, together with extrajudicial killings of activists and other government critics, has been one of the main issues against the Arroyo regime since the latter part of 2005.
In late 2005 Malacañang imposed the calibrated preemptive response policy (CPR), which dropped the maximum tolerance policy on protest actions. This was soon followed by Executive Order No. 464, which prohibited cabinet officials from appearing in congressional hearings without clearance from the Office of the President. In February 2006, President Arroyo issued Presidential Proclamation No. 1017, which declared a “state of emergency” throughout the country and allowed the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) and the Philippine National Police (PNP) to “intervene” in “national security situations.”
The three decrees led to violent dispersals of rallies, the suspension of congressional investigations in aid of legislation, and a crackdown on prominent anti-administration groups and personalities –- most notably from the Left.
Meanwhile, the issue of extrajudicial killings has aroused condemnation even from local quarters that previously declined from criticizing the Arroyo regime, as well as from the international community. State forces are seen as the perpetrators in several of the cases of extrajudicial killings, which are linked with the government’s counter-insurgency drive as can be gleaned from several statements by National Security Adviser Norberto Gonzales.
The recently-passed Anti-Terrorism Bill is seen as a repressive measure because it defines “terrorism” so broadly that even legal protest actions may be classified as “acts of terrorism,” and even legal cause-oriented groups may be proscribed as “terrorist organizations.”
When the Supreme Court declared CPR as unconstitutional, Joker Arroyo was jubilant. He was likewise opposed to EO 464 and PP 1017.
However, he voted in favor of the Anti-Terrorism Bill and has urged the public to be “careful” in condemning the AFP for extrajudicial killings.
Another Team Unity candidate who voted in favor of the Anti-Terrorism Bill was Recto.
Villar likewise voted in favor of the bill.
Lacson, like Arroyo, opposed CPR, EO 464, and PP 1017. However, he was the author of one of five Anti-Terrorism Bills filed in the Senate, and he voted in favor of the final version.
Meanwhile, Escudero and Cayetano were both vocal against CPR, EO 464, and PP 1017. Escudero has gone as far as saying that extrajudicial killings under the Arroyo regime are worse than those which took place during the Marcos dictatorship.
Wage hike
The Arroyo administration earned the ire of labor groups –- most notably the Kilusang Mayo Uno (KMU or May 1st Movement) –- early on for refusing to pass a legislated wage hike bill that would help the people cope with rising costs of living.
The KMU has been demanding a legislated P125 across-the-board, nationwide wage increase for private-sector workers. This particular demand of the KMU, which Anakpawis (Toiling Masses) Rep. Crispin Beltran put forward at the House of Representatives, was recently also supported by the Partido ng Manggagawa (Workers’ Party) which was represented by Renato Magtubo in the 13th Congress.
Other groups like the Trade Union Congress of the Philippines (TUCP) have also raised demands for wages increases, but these were much lower than that of the KMU and Anakpawis.
KMU also supports the demand of the Confederation for the Unity, Recognition and Advancement of Government Employees (Courage) for a legislated P3,000 across-the-board, nationwide wage increase for public-sector workers.
Recto and Villar had early on made known their opposition to a legislated wage increase. Joker Arroyo, meanwhile, was a proponent of a 10-percent salary increase for government employees –- a measure that heavily favors those with higher salaries over the rank-and-file.
Escudero, meanwhile, has been vocal in supporting legislated wage hike for both private-sector workers and government employees.
Trillanes’ legislative agenda includes a bill that would provide for an automatic and periodic wage review, based on three-year changes in the inflation rate.
“This is a proven effective anti-corruption policy employed by other countries,” Trillanes said. “It also intends to provide for a decent standard of living for all government employees as well as to attract qualified people from the private sector to join government.
Still preliminary
This, thus far, is how some of the candidates from both Team Unity and the Genuine Opposition have stood on a number of major people’s issues. The assessment that may be made from these is still preliminary and only a clearer articulation of the candidates’ respective legislative proposals would enable a deeper analysis of how they stand vis-à-vis issues affecting the people whose votes they court. Bulatlat
Tuesday, March 20, 2007
DIRTY AIR, DIRTY AIR MONITORING?
Can a project for monitoring air pollution turn out to be as dirty as the air it is supposed to monitor? This is the question provoked by the DENR’s Air Monitoring Network Project, for which the government agency has been paying a contractor, through a foreign loan, to set up, maintain, and operate 10 air quality monitoring stations in Metro Manila and nearby provinces.
BY ALEXANDER MARTIN REMOLLINO
Bulatlat
Can a project for monitoring air pollution turn out to be as dirty as the air it is supposed to monitor?
This is the question provoked by the Air Monitoring Network Project (AMNP) of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR), for which the government agency has been paying a contractor, through a foreign loan, to set up, maintain, and operate 10 air quality monitoring stations in Metro Manila and nearby provinces.
Based on a 2005 report by the World Health Organization (WHO), Metro Manila ranks among the urban areas in the world with the most polluted air -- next only to Mexico City, Shanghai, and New Delhi. Metro Manila, the country’s National Capital Region (NCR), had been climbing the air pollution charts for the few years previous to 2005.
This is the situation that the Metro Manila Air Quality Improvement Sector Development Program (MMAQISDP) was supposed to mitigate. Funded by the Asian Development Bank (ADB) to the tune of $623.36 million, the MMAQISDP was supposed to be implemented from December 1998 to December 2006 in support of the implementation of the Clean Air Act of 1999.
AMNP
The AMNP is part of the MMAQISDP and is funded by ADB Loan No. 1665 aiming to set up, operate, and maintain a network of 10 air monitoring stations around the Metro Manila airshed, which includes Pampanga, Laguna, Cavite, and Batangas.
The ten stations are located in the following areas: Ateneo de Manila University, Katipunan Road, Quezon City; Bureau of Broadcasting Services, Marulas, Valenzuela City; Clark Air Field, San Fernando City, Pampanga; Polytechnic University of the Philippines, Sta. Mesa, Manila; Cavite State University, Indang; Fort Bonifacio, Taguig City; Bureau of Plant Industry, Los Banos, Laguna; Provincial Veterinary Office, Batangas City; New Bilibid Prison, Muntinlupa City; and Valle Verde Subdivision, Pasig City (mobile van). These stations are expected to measure criteria air pollutants like sulfur dioxide, oxides of nitrogen, carbon monoxide, ozone, particulate matter and total suspended solids; as well as non-criteria pollutants like benzene, toluene, and xylene (henceforth to be referred to in combination as BTX).
The AMNP can be traced all the way to November 2000, when the DENR called for tenders in the repair and upgrading of the ten stations. The only responsive bidder was ETI-IMACH, a joint venture between Emission Technology, Inc. (ETI), a Guam-based U.S. company; and its local partner, Industramach, Inc. (IMACH), an accredited equipment supplier of the Environmental Management Bureau (EMB).
On Nov. 26, 2002, then Environment Secretary Heherson Alvarez signed a contract with ETI-IMACH for the rehabilitation and upgrading of the ten stations with full concurrence from the DENR and the ADB. The operation and maintenance of the ten stations by ETI-IMACH began in October 2003 and was to have ended on December 31, 2006.
The project also entailed the involvement of a quality assistance or quality control consultant to ensure that all information produced by the air monitoring network meets quality standards. The DENR executed a contract with Maunsell Hongkong, Ltd. on April 13, 2004.
“It turned out to be a dirty and expensive environmental failure,” saidx Celemente Bautista Jr., chairman of the Kalikasan-People’s Network for the Environment (KPNE), in an interview. “It didn’t serve its purpose.”
Polluted deal
From November 2003 to October 2004, the DENR paid ETI-IMACH $64,198.07 monthly for operations and maintenance. ETI-IMACH received the payments even at times when not all 10 stations were operating simultaneously.
ETI reported certain deficiencies in the Quality Assurance Project Plan to the DENR in October 2004. The next month, payment for the operation and maintenance of the stations was suspended over technical and contractual issues. On Dec. 22 that same year, Undersecretary for Forestry and Environment Ramon Paje and the EMB issued a memorandum suspending payments to ETI and Maunsell for inadequate performance of the consultants.
One of the bigger problems to crop up was what would be seen as ETI’s use of unreliable equipment.
On Feb. 14, 2005, the EMB met with ETI-IMACH to discuss issues related to ETI’s contractual obligations. Among the issues discussed were delays in project implementation.
“The reason of ETI for the delay in the operation of the BTX analyzers in all stations which was the delayed site acquisition, was not accepted by the EMB,” wrote Jean N. Rosete of the MMAQISDP in the minutes of the Feb. 14, 2005 meeting which she prepared. “It was pointed out by EMB that it is more of (a) technology problem (BTX AIM analyzers). Hence, the ETI was requested to get a certification for verification from the manufacturer...”
Among those listed in the minutes of the meeting as having been in attendance was Rep. Edcel Lagman.
That same day, IMACH withdrew as ETI’s local partner, citing among others what IMACH managing director Eduardo Mendoza described as ETI’s use of “ineffective” equipment.
Wrote Mendoza in a letter to then Environment Secretary Mike Defensor:
The BTX analyzers cost almost $1 million.
Mendoza also cited ETI’s alleged non-compliance with contractual obligations, as well as employment of “unqualified and unprofessional” personnel.
These issues prompted several reviews and inspections. The contractual and technical issues raised against ETI, however, remained unsolved, leading Usec. Armando de Castro to issue, on October 7, 2005, a final demand letter instructing ETI to comply with the contract.
ETI has refused to comply with the DENR’s final demand letter.
Pressure
Lagman and the ADB have also pressured the DENR to continue the project.
In the minutes of a Sept. 15, 2005 between the DENR, ETI, and Maunsell, Lagman was cited as having expressed his intention to mediate between ETI and the EMB regarding financial issues of the contract; even as the legal aspect of his involvement had been passed on to his son Atty. Edcel Lagman Jr., based on an April 28, 2005 letter from the Lagman, Lagman and Mones Law Firm.
The ADB went to the extent of endorsing ETI, and commissioning Mr. Gordon Jones to conduct an evaluation from Sept. 27 to 29, 2005. Jones concluded that all monitoring stations are producing data in compliance with U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) standards.
On Nov. 11, 2005, Shihiru Date, an ADB transport specialist, wrote to Defensor saying that since Jones had completed his tasks the contractual issues related to the project had already been addressed. “Given the agreement reached, the progress made, and the assessment provided by USEPA, we would not see any reason at this stage to further delay the payment related to ETI’s work since November 2004,” wrote Giraud.
After evaluating the Jones report later that month, Undersecretary de Castro wrote on behalf of the EMB to Patrick Giraud, Director of the Infrastructure Division of the ADB’s Southeast Asia Department, saying that the DENR could not possibly agree with Date’s recommendations since ETI had yet to comply with the technical and contruactual issues and the resolution of contractual issues is “outside Jones’ competence.”
ETI once more refused to comply. On Dec. 7, 2005, ETI submitted a monthly report advising the DENR that various network stations are to be brought off-line and the network is degrading for lack of operational resources, as a result of “delinquency in payment.”
In 2006, the EMB made several recommendations for the termination of the project. This was concurred with by Atty. Armi Jane Roa Borje, officer-in-charge for the DENR Undersecretary for Legal Affairs, in a Nov. 24, 2006 memorandum for then Environment Secretary Angelo Reyes.
On Dec. 14, 2006, ETI president Robert Wilson wrote to EMB director Ely Anthony Ouano, emphasizing the agreement forged the day before “in the presence and with the conformity of Sec. Angelo Reyes,” stipulating that the DENR-EMB shall immediately pay ETI in full the amount of $1.03 million corresponding to the billings of November 2004-February 2006.
Corruption?
“It is very illogical for the DENR secretary to pursue this project without considering the position of his officials, without considering the position of IMACH, one of the contractors, and without considering the country’s experience in the three years of the project,” Bautista told Bulatlat.
“There could be something dirty going on there,” the KPNE chairman added. “There could be corruption behind that.” Bulatlat
Can a project for monitoring air pollution turn out to be as dirty as the air it is supposed to monitor? This is the question provoked by the DENR’s Air Monitoring Network Project, for which the government agency has been paying a contractor, through a foreign loan, to set up, maintain, and operate 10 air quality monitoring stations in Metro Manila and nearby provinces.
BY ALEXANDER MARTIN REMOLLINO
Bulatlat
Can a project for monitoring air pollution turn out to be as dirty as the air it is supposed to monitor?
This is the question provoked by the Air Monitoring Network Project (AMNP) of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR), for which the government agency has been paying a contractor, through a foreign loan, to set up, maintain, and operate 10 air quality monitoring stations in Metro Manila and nearby provinces.
Based on a 2005 report by the World Health Organization (WHO), Metro Manila ranks among the urban areas in the world with the most polluted air -- next only to Mexico City, Shanghai, and New Delhi. Metro Manila, the country’s National Capital Region (NCR), had been climbing the air pollution charts for the few years previous to 2005.
This is the situation that the Metro Manila Air Quality Improvement Sector Development Program (MMAQISDP) was supposed to mitigate. Funded by the Asian Development Bank (ADB) to the tune of $623.36 million, the MMAQISDP was supposed to be implemented from December 1998 to December 2006 in support of the implementation of the Clean Air Act of 1999.
AMNP
The AMNP is part of the MMAQISDP and is funded by ADB Loan No. 1665 aiming to set up, operate, and maintain a network of 10 air monitoring stations around the Metro Manila airshed, which includes Pampanga, Laguna, Cavite, and Batangas.
The ten stations are located in the following areas: Ateneo de Manila University, Katipunan Road, Quezon City; Bureau of Broadcasting Services, Marulas, Valenzuela City; Clark Air Field, San Fernando City, Pampanga; Polytechnic University of the Philippines, Sta. Mesa, Manila; Cavite State University, Indang; Fort Bonifacio, Taguig City; Bureau of Plant Industry, Los Banos, Laguna; Provincial Veterinary Office, Batangas City; New Bilibid Prison, Muntinlupa City; and Valle Verde Subdivision, Pasig City (mobile van). These stations are expected to measure criteria air pollutants like sulfur dioxide, oxides of nitrogen, carbon monoxide, ozone, particulate matter and total suspended solids; as well as non-criteria pollutants like benzene, toluene, and xylene (henceforth to be referred to in combination as BTX).
The AMNP can be traced all the way to November 2000, when the DENR called for tenders in the repair and upgrading of the ten stations. The only responsive bidder was ETI-IMACH, a joint venture between Emission Technology, Inc. (ETI), a Guam-based U.S. company; and its local partner, Industramach, Inc. (IMACH), an accredited equipment supplier of the Environmental Management Bureau (EMB).
On Nov. 26, 2002, then Environment Secretary Heherson Alvarez signed a contract with ETI-IMACH for the rehabilitation and upgrading of the ten stations with full concurrence from the DENR and the ADB. The operation and maintenance of the ten stations by ETI-IMACH began in October 2003 and was to have ended on December 31, 2006.
The project also entailed the involvement of a quality assistance or quality control consultant to ensure that all information produced by the air monitoring network meets quality standards. The DENR executed a contract with Maunsell Hongkong, Ltd. on April 13, 2004.
“It turned out to be a dirty and expensive environmental failure,” saidx Celemente Bautista Jr., chairman of the Kalikasan-People’s Network for the Environment (KPNE), in an interview. “It didn’t serve its purpose.”
Polluted deal
From November 2003 to October 2004, the DENR paid ETI-IMACH $64,198.07 monthly for operations and maintenance. ETI-IMACH received the payments even at times when not all 10 stations were operating simultaneously.
ETI reported certain deficiencies in the Quality Assurance Project Plan to the DENR in October 2004. The next month, payment for the operation and maintenance of the stations was suspended over technical and contractual issues. On Dec. 22 that same year, Undersecretary for Forestry and Environment Ramon Paje and the EMB issued a memorandum suspending payments to ETI and Maunsell for inadequate performance of the consultants.
One of the bigger problems to crop up was what would be seen as ETI’s use of unreliable equipment.
On Feb. 14, 2005, the EMB met with ETI-IMACH to discuss issues related to ETI’s contractual obligations. Among the issues discussed were delays in project implementation.
“The reason of ETI for the delay in the operation of the BTX analyzers in all stations which was the delayed site acquisition, was not accepted by the EMB,” wrote Jean N. Rosete of the MMAQISDP in the minutes of the Feb. 14, 2005 meeting which she prepared. “It was pointed out by EMB that it is more of (a) technology problem (BTX AIM analyzers). Hence, the ETI was requested to get a certification for verification from the manufacturer...”
Among those listed in the minutes of the meeting as having been in attendance was Rep. Edcel Lagman.
That same day, IMACH withdrew as ETI’s local partner, citing among others what IMACH managing director Eduardo Mendoza described as ETI’s use of “ineffective” equipment.
Wrote Mendoza in a letter to then Environment Secretary Mike Defensor:
Invoking its supposed reputation as an equipment expert, ETI recommended the use of Air Instrument Measurement Open-path Analyzer to measure Benzene, Toluene and Xylene (BTX) in ambient air. Despite information that AIM analyzer is still in its developmental stage, ETI made Industramach and EMB believe that this equipment is already a developed and recognized ambient monitor. Unfortunately, ETI has failed to provide for the requested documentation by EMB to prove that this AIM analyzer is no longer in its developmental stage.
Moreover, the AIM analyzer has proven to be ineffective to measure the BTX parameters over a short open path length of ten (10) meters which was ETI’s biggest selling point for the approval of the equipment. Initial tests conducted of the analyzer installed at the Ateneo station could not provide quality BTX data. To make this analyzer unit work, our Filipino Instrumentation Specialists had to modify some of its hardware and totally its software, which proved to be expensive to (set up) and operate.
The BTX analyzers cost almost $1 million.
Mendoza also cited ETI’s alleged non-compliance with contractual obligations, as well as employment of “unqualified and unprofessional” personnel.
These issues prompted several reviews and inspections. The contractual and technical issues raised against ETI, however, remained unsolved, leading Usec. Armando de Castro to issue, on October 7, 2005, a final demand letter instructing ETI to comply with the contract.
ETI has refused to comply with the DENR’s final demand letter.
Pressure
Lagman and the ADB have also pressured the DENR to continue the project.
In the minutes of a Sept. 15, 2005 between the DENR, ETI, and Maunsell, Lagman was cited as having expressed his intention to mediate between ETI and the EMB regarding financial issues of the contract; even as the legal aspect of his involvement had been passed on to his son Atty. Edcel Lagman Jr., based on an April 28, 2005 letter from the Lagman, Lagman and Mones Law Firm.
The ADB went to the extent of endorsing ETI, and commissioning Mr. Gordon Jones to conduct an evaluation from Sept. 27 to 29, 2005. Jones concluded that all monitoring stations are producing data in compliance with U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) standards.
On Nov. 11, 2005, Shihiru Date, an ADB transport specialist, wrote to Defensor saying that since Jones had completed his tasks the contractual issues related to the project had already been addressed. “Given the agreement reached, the progress made, and the assessment provided by USEPA, we would not see any reason at this stage to further delay the payment related to ETI’s work since November 2004,” wrote Giraud.
After evaluating the Jones report later that month, Undersecretary de Castro wrote on behalf of the EMB to Patrick Giraud, Director of the Infrastructure Division of the ADB’s Southeast Asia Department, saying that the DENR could not possibly agree with Date’s recommendations since ETI had yet to comply with the technical and contruactual issues and the resolution of contractual issues is “outside Jones’ competence.”
ETI once more refused to comply. On Dec. 7, 2005, ETI submitted a monthly report advising the DENR that various network stations are to be brought off-line and the network is degrading for lack of operational resources, as a result of “delinquency in payment.”
In 2006, the EMB made several recommendations for the termination of the project. This was concurred with by Atty. Armi Jane Roa Borje, officer-in-charge for the DENR Undersecretary for Legal Affairs, in a Nov. 24, 2006 memorandum for then Environment Secretary Angelo Reyes.
On Dec. 14, 2006, ETI president Robert Wilson wrote to EMB director Ely Anthony Ouano, emphasizing the agreement forged the day before “in the presence and with the conformity of Sec. Angelo Reyes,” stipulating that the DENR-EMB shall immediately pay ETI in full the amount of $1.03 million corresponding to the billings of November 2004-February 2006.
Corruption?
“It is very illogical for the DENR secretary to pursue this project without considering the position of his officials, without considering the position of IMACH, one of the contractors, and without considering the country’s experience in the three years of the project,” Bautista told Bulatlat.
“There could be something dirty going on there,” the KPNE chairman added. “There could be corruption behind that.” Bulatlat
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