SAN FERNANDO, Pampanga.—A close ally of President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo may yet regain the governorship of Pampanga, the province where she is seeking a congressional seat in the May elections.
The Commission on Elections is scheduled to promulgate on Thursday its decision on the electoral case filed by former provincial board member and Arroyo ally Lilia Pineda against Catholic priest Gov. Eddie Panlilio.
The case could go either way, but it is being decided in the Second Division, headed by Commissioner Nicodemo Ferrer, who had earlier ruled against Isabela governor Grace Padaca in the electoral contest filed against her by her opponent, former governor Benjamin Dy.
Both Panlilio and Padaca ran against well-entrenched political families in their respective provinces and won on what were perceived to be progressive platforms of government. Their opponents have been trying to unseat them.
EIGHT of the nine presidential candidates running in the May elections attended a forum organized by broadsheet Philippine Daily Inquirer at the University of the Philippines Theatre in Quezon City Monday.
The forum,dubbed “1st Edition Presidential Debate” was attended by Senator Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III, Councilor JC delos Reyes, Senator Richard “Dick” Gordon, Senator Maria Ana Consuelo “Jamby” Madrigal, Environmentalist Nicanor “Nicky” Perlas, former defense secretary and administration candidate Gilbert “Gibo” Teodoro, evangelist Eddie Villanueva, and Senator Manny Villar. Absent was former president Joseph Estrada.
Although billed as a a debate, the event was more of a forum with a question-and-answer format where the candidates were asked questions by three sets of three panelists which included Inquirer editors, columnists and reporters Jorge Aruta, Father Joaquin Bernas SJ, Rina Jimenez David, Raul Pangalangan, Michael Tan, Raul Marcelo, Pam Pastor, and Fe Zamora.
Supporters of Gilbert Teodoro waiting outside the theatre before the debate reacted to anti-Gibo slogans carried by different student organizations, although the signs and posters were not exclusively critical of Teodoro.
DAVAO CITY.--The Ampatuans, Mangudadatus, Midtimbangs, Sinsuats, Masturas, Sangkis comprise the majority among Maguindanao’s 879 candidates running for 374 posts: two congressional representatives to Congress, one governor, one vice-governor, 10 provincial board members, 36 mayors, 36 vice mayors and 288 municipal board members or councilors.
The Ampatuans lead the list of candidates with 50 carrying the same surname, at least 23 of them directly related to the patriarch, Datu Andal Ampatuan, Sr., and 18 with Ampatuan as middle name, according to records of the Commission on Elections.
Among the Ampatuans running are the patriarch, Datu Andal Ampatuan, Sr., the three-term governor of Maguindanao who resigned in January 2009 and returned as OIC governor in late 2009 (he was OIC governor when the November 23 massacre in Ampatuan town happened).
THE Commission on Elections held a test run Saturday of the automated voting system to be used in the May elections.
Voters in select precincts in the cities of Quezon, Taguig, Baguio, Cebu and Davao took part in the mock elections.
But instead of the names of actual candidates, voters chose among a list of national heroes.
VERA Files' Mario Ignacio was at the New Era Elementary School in Tandang Sora, Quezon City and witnessed the conduct of the mock polls. He captured images that will give votes a taste of what to expect when they go out to vote on May 10, 2010.
THE Commission on Elections held field tests in Taguig and Pateros Friday to try out the automated voting machines to be used in the May elections.
But in Aguho Elementary School in Pateros, the Precinct Count Optical Scan (PCOS) machine failed several times to transmit the election reports using its modem which had Subscriber Identity Module (SIM) cards from telecommunication networks Smart, Globe, and Sun.
Only at 11:51 a.m., three hours after the tests started, were the PCOS technicians able to transmit the election reports. In the absence of any signal from the three networks, PCOS technicians used the Broadband Global Area Network (BGAN).
The BGAN is a device that connects to a satellite network to transmit data, but this too was not easy. PCOS technician Mark Oliver Vergara had to bring the BGAN machine outside the classroom to get a signal.
Acquiring a signal from the BGAN was another challenge as Vergara had to walk around carrying the machine. After successfully getting a signal, Vergara even had to borrow a tripod from a cameraman to keep the satellite in place.
Comelec Officer Enriqueta Danieles however remained positive saying they were “nanganganay sa sistema (adjusting to the system).”
THE Manila city government unveiled a monument to former President Corazon Aquino on Monday, her 77th birthday.
Mayor Alfredo Lim led the ceremonies, which had Sen. Benigno "Noynoy" Aquino III as guest of honor.
The 15-foot monument, sculpted by Eduardo Castrillo, stands across a monument to her husband Benigno Aquino Jr. at Padre Burgos Drive and Roxas Boulevard.
THEY thought by now, nearly two months after their loved ones perished in the country’s worst pre-election violence in Ampatuan town, Maguindanao, they were already past grief.
And so, when the widows and mother of nine slain journalists and the daughter of a missing newsman met recently with a prominent psychiatrist at a major government-run hospital in Quezon City for group therapy, they were all smiles—until tears began to flow.
For Glenna Legarta, the therapy was her very first chance to openly confront the death of her husband, Bienvendio “Jun” Legarta of Pronterra Balita. The last time she saw Jun, he was no more than a bloated and decomposing cadaver at a dirty funeral parlor in Koronadal City.
The usually jolly Glenna suddenly lost her composure when the psychiatrist asked her to share her feelings about his death. She broke into tears before the group, admitting what she had been keeping to herself all along.
MEDIA and human rights groups marked the second month anniversary of the Ampatuan massacre by lighting candles at the steps of the University of the Philippines College of Mass Communication in Quezon City.
Families of the victims and their lawyers attended the event. Media groups such as the Center for Community Journalism and Development (CCJD) and the National Union of Journalists (NUJP) said they were now helping the families deal with the trauma brought about by the loss of loved ones. The CCJD said it was providing assistance to journalists in Maguindanao whose lives are endangered because of their reportage of the massacre.
THE number of out-of-school children in the Philippines has breached the one-million mark and one in four pupils is dropping out before Grade 5, prompting the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization to declare the country in “real danger” of not achieving universal primary education by 2015.
In its latest Education for All global monitoring report launched in New York on Tuesday, Unesco said the Philippines accounts for the biggest share of the East Asia-Pacific region’s nine million primary school age children who are out of school. Indonesia, whose population is 2.8 times bigger than the Philippines, has half a million out-of-school children.
The 2010 report, Reaching the marginalized, pointed out that the country’s net enrolment ratio in the elementary grades has stagnated from 92 percent in 1999 to 91 percent in 2007.
Unesco said achieving universal primary education ought to have been a “formality” for the Philippines, given its level of wealth and starting point at the time the six EFA goals were adopted by 160 countries in Dakar in 2000.
JOINING the already crowded presidential derby at the last minute, Sen. Richard “Dick” Gordon is banking on his image as an action man to win votes and implement genuine changes in 2010.
The former mayor of Olongapo City, founding chair and administrator of the Subic Bay Metropolitan Authority and chair of the Philippine National Red Cross, who is known to rule with an iron fist, boasts of his long and impressive track record as a local chief executive prior to being a legislator. But a nephew, who is also running for president, has warned about a Dick Gordon presidency.
In a one-on-one interview with Probe Profiles’ host Cheche Lazaro, Gordon discusses his leadership principles and explains his perceived dictatorial tendencies. He outlines his vision and plans for the country in the following interview:
FLOATS depicting the Maguindanao massacre and giant effigies of boxing champ Manny Pacquiao and his celebrity mother Dionisia hogged the limelight at the 2009 Lantern Parade of the University of the Philippines Diliman campus Friday.
But it was the College of Engineering, celebrating its centennial next year, which won the best “lantern” for its entry, a diorama of Mother Nature and a robot, made from scrap material. A panel of judges named it the best among this year’s “lanterns” for its creativity and use of recycled material. The College of Engineering also displayed an e-jeepney, which is fuel-free and runs on just a Motolite battery.
These were among the dozens of “lanterns” on display at the Lantern Parade, which marks the closing of classes for the year at the country’s premier state university.
2009 is the deadliest year for journalists worldwide, with the election-related massacre of 31 journalists and media workers in the Nov. 23 Maguindanao massacre fuelling the record toll of 68, the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists said Thursday.
In its yearend analysis, the CPJ said the killings in Maguindanao make up the “deadliest event for the press in CPJ history.”
The New York group recorded at least 68 journalists worldwide killed for their work this year, “the highest yearly tally” it said it ever documented, surpassing the previous record of 67 deaths set in 2007 when the Iraq war was raging.
The CPJ is investigating 20 other journalist deaths this year to determine if they were work-related. The 2009 toll is up more than 60 percent from the 42 deaths recorded last year.
THEIR husbands were close friends but their wives did not know one another. The Ampatuan massacre changed that.
When they finally met, Myrna Reblando, Glenna Legarta and Mary Jean Merisco would refer to each other as 17, 20 and 19—the numbers assigned by the police to the bodies of their husbands found near each other at the scene of the crime. A fourth widow, Norma Parcon, said her husband’s body was among those buried and recovered by a backhoe.
None of the widows was allowed to walk up to the hill where 57 people, including 30 reporters and media workers were gunned down and mutilated on Nov. 23. It was only days later, after police pictures were leaked to the internet, that the women saw their husbands’ bodies.
Parcon did not see her husband in the photos but she would identify him later through copies of the raw police video reproduced by DVD traders. “Pag-angat ng backhoe, nalaglag yung green ID holder nya–alam ko siya yun (When the backhoe lifted a body, a green ID holder fell—and I knew it was him),” she said.
THE international outrage generated by last month’s massacre in Maguindanao of 57 men and women, half of them journalists, may offer opportunities to make progress in the areas of justice, security and peace, the Brussels-based International Crisis Group said in its latest update.
The Philippines: After the Maguindanao Massacre, the update briefing from the ICG, shows how the Nov. 23 killings were not the result of a clan feud, as widely reported, but of Manila’s deliberate nurturing of a ruthless warlord in exchange for votes.
“To call it a feud is to diminish the Arroyo administration’s role in allowing a local despot to indulge his greed and ambition, including through building up a private army in the name of fighting insurgents,” says Sidney Jones, senior adviser to Crisis Group’s Asia program.
The ICG is an international nongovernmental organization committed to preventing and resolving deadly conflict.
By JOSEPH ARNEL DELIVERIO Sibugay Express and VERA Files
MORO National Liberation Front chairman Nur Misuari will question the legality of the recent oil exploration and drilling in the Sulu Sea, saying such activities should be coursed through the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao and not through the national government.
Misuari issued the statement during his visit to Ipil, Zamboanga Sibugay last weekend to grace the Fifth Grand Summit of the MNLF and the Bangsa Moro Army. More than 20,000 of its members from all over Mindanao attended.
Misuari, who is running for governor of Sulu province next year, said the national government cannot grant permits for oil explorations and drilling in the Sulu Sea without consulting ARMM leaders.
THE Commission on Elections on Tuesday narrowed down the list of candidates for national positions to eight for president, eight for vice president and 58 for senator. Following is Comelec Resolution No. 8713 giving due course to their certificates of candidacy and disqualifying the rest:
WITH about four months to go before the May 10, 2010 elections, presidential candidates Sen. Benigno C. Aquino (Liberal Party) and Sen. Manuel B. Villar (Nacionalista Party) are tied in first place in the latest Pulse Asia survey.
In the survey conducted nationwide Jan. 22 to 26 among 1,800 respondents, Aquino gained the votes of37 percent got Villar 35 percent. The survey had a margin of error of +/-2 percent.
The other candidate with a double digit score was former President Joseph Estrada (Pwersa ng Masang Pilipino) with12 percent.
RELATIVES of 13 journalists slain in the Nov. 23 massacre in Ampatuan, Maguindanao filed on Tuesday a landmark suit before the newly established ASEAN Intergovernmental Commission on Human Rights (AICHR) to hold the Philippine government accountable for the carnage.
Their 23-page “preliminary request” urges the Jakarta-based AICHR to call on the Philippine government to ensure that the perpetrators of massacre are brought to justice and adequate reparations are made to the heirs of the victims under international law.
“Clearly, all of those responsible for the carnage are agents of the Philippine State,” they said in their suit. “Their acts in connection with the 23 November 2009 Maguindanao massacre are attributable under international law to the Republic of the Philippines.”
These are the highlights of the Social Weather Station survey conductedlast January 21 up to 24 among 2,100 nationwide. The survey was commissioned by the newspaper, BusinessWorld.
Liberal Party standard-bearer Benigno Simeon “Noynoy” C. Aquino III ,with 42 %, remains the top choice of the respondents who were asked, “Sa mga sumusunod na pangalan sa listahang ito, sino po ang malamang ninyong iboboto bilang Presidente ng Pilipinas, kung ang eleksyon ay gaganapin ngayon? (Among the names found on this list, who will you probably vote for as President of the Philippines if the elections were held today?) The error margin used was ±2%.
Nacionalista Party presidential betManuel Villar Jr came second with 35% and former President Joseph Estrada , third with 13%.
NINE out of 10 business establishments in the “information economy” in the country use computers, and eight in 10 use the Internet in their business operations, preliminary results of a government survey on information and communication technology show.
However, less than half of the employees (43 percent) routinely use computers and even fewer—only three in 10—use the Internet at work, according to the survey of 10,000 establishments conducted last year by the National Statistics Office.
The survey also shows less than half of business establishments (45.6 percent) reported a Web presence and only a third engaged in E-commerce transactions.
THREE in five adult Filipinos expect a happy Christmas this year, one in 10 think it will be sad, and one in four says it will be neither, according to the Social Weather Stations’ Dec. 5 to 10 poll.
The research organization said more Filipinos used to expect a happy Christmas—82 percent in 2002 and 77 percent in 2003—until 2004 the figure slid to 63 and 64 percent. This coincided with the rise in the percentage of Filipinos who expect a sad Christmas: From only 3 percent in 2002 and 2003 to 7 to 8 percent from 2005 to 2008 and an all-time high of 10 percent in 2004.
SEN. Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III and Sen. Manuel “Manny” Villar and former President Joseph Estrada are leading in the presidential race, according to the Dec. 5-10 pre-election survey of BusinessWorld and the Social Weather Stations.
The survey also found Senators Manuel Roxas and Loren Legarda leading in the ice presidential race.
In the Senate race, Sen. Miriam Defensor Santiago, Sen. Ramon Revilla Jr. and Sen. Jinggoy Estrada lead the first circle of 12 that includes three candidates from the Liberal Party, two from Lakas-Kampi-CMD, two from Pwersa ng Masang Pilipino, one each from the People’s Reform Party, Nacionalista Party, Nationalist People’s Coalition, and Kilusang Bagong Lipunan, and one independent.
THEY thought by now, nearly two months after their loved ones perished in the country’s worst pre-election violence in Ampatuan town, Maguindanao, they were already past grief.
THE number of out-of-school children in the Philippines has breached the one-million mark and one in four pupils is dropping out before Grade 5, prompting the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization to declare the country in “real danger” of not achieving universal primary education by 2015.
But it was the College of Engineering, celebrating its centennial next year, which won the best “lantern” for its entry, a diorama of Mother Nature and a robot, made from scrap material. A panel of judges named it the best among this year’s “lanterns” for its creativity and use of recycled material. The College of Engineering also displayed an e-jeepney, which is fuel-free and runs on just a Motolite battery. 
THEIR husbands were close friends but their wives did not know one another. The Ampatuan massacre changed that.