Intimidation is the name of this administration's game. The President and his network of subservient devotees have resorted to the same strategy: to scold people in public.

They curse. They shout. They tell you that you're wrong. If you ask them questions, they curse you all the more.

They remind you of your teacher who chastised you in front of your classmates. Only that now, these are adults who think they own the country and their rule is eternal.

And the way they intimidate is far more insidious than it seems. Their intimidation carries a moral tone: either you're with them or against them.

Moral crusade

They have launched a moral crusade between themselves – lovers of the country – and their critics – enemies of the state. In this cosmic battle, journalists, human rights activists, and anyone associated with the political opposition are evil people who must be brought down by all means.

Its moral crusade appeals to the "people" and the "country" as if they are powerful divine forces. Forget that they are empty signifiers. The point is that they justify and even explain away an administration's excesses.

Here we find the marriage of unholy forces. The welfare of the "people" becomes the excuse for the curtailment of other freedoms.

Thus it is not all rhetoric.

The state has resorted to legal remedy to silence its opponents. From the impeachment proceedings against the Chief Justice to the cancellation of a news company's license, we see the same pattern. It is a moral crusade against those who disagree with what the administration does.

Do not forget too that the Vice President has a battle to face. And if you think that she is unassailable, just look at the former CHED [Commission on Higher Education] chair who, in the end, had no choice but to resign after a phone call.

What this atmosphere of intimidation creates is this: self-censorship. For others, it is much worse: weariness.

Either way, intimidation breeds silence.

And silence is the desire of a dictatorial state that pretends to be democratic. It hides behind the tyranny of opinion, the popularity of a charismatic figure, and the spirit of unyielding legalism.

Tyranny

Philippine society has entered a twilight zone of moral complexity. Many people have accepted as the new normal unexplained killings, the castration of the opposition, and the silencing of alternative voices.

These sacrifices, as it were, are justified for the sake of progress and security.

Born after the Martial Law, I never thought I would ever face the specter of political oppression. But now I fret the day when professors like myself and our students are arrested for the same reason.

The regrettable part about the new normal is that it has its own legitimate believers. And there are so many of them.

They are convinced that sacrifices in fact have to be made. In abandoning their freedoms to the presumed benevolence of one man, they have conveniently forgotten that no one is infallible.

In the words of John Stuart Mill, the new normal is the "tyranny of the majority".

And so times like these call for eccentricity – that people who have opposing views muster the courage, no matter how dreadful, to speak up and do something. It is "desirable, in order to break through that tyranny, that people should be eccentric. Eccentricity has always abounded when and where strength of character has abounded."

Thankfully, all is not yet lost. There is still space to be eccentric. Those of us in civil society need to widen and deepen the way we engage the administration, its policies, and overall direction.

Eccentricity is the potent antidote to intimidation.

But time may be running out as intimidation intensifies. The day is fast approaching when either we restrain ourselves or are restrained. That would be the day we've lost our democratic spirit.

And we have all become complicit to the new normal. – Rappler.com

Jayeel Cornelio, PhD is a 2017 Outstanding Young Scientist of the Philippines and a visiting professor at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. He is on leave from the Ateneo de Manila where he is the director of the Development Studies Program. You may reach him on Twitter @jayeel_cornelio.

A few days ago, President Duterte’s political party bared the details of their proposed overhaul to the Constitution.

Federalism, they say, will solve key economic problems that have long ailed our country, especially the “imperial” nature of Metro Manila and the long-standing “imbalances” and inequalities between the regions. 

In this article I use data to show that many regions are indeed lagging behind Metro Manila. But federalism will not necessarily solve these economic disparities. In fact, federalism might worsen them.

Some regions are outpacing Metro Manila

The executive summary of PDP-Laban’s proposal for federalism begins by denouncing the “imperial” status of Metro Manila.

They say that such an extraordinary concentration of political and economic power has resulted in a “grave imbalance in the distribution of resources among regions and local government units” over time. In turn, this has led to inequality, social unrest, and armed uprisings like those in Mindanao.

Data confirm that Metro Manila is the country’s economic behemoth: in 2016 it accounted for 37% (more than a third) of the country’s total output or GDP (gross domestic product). Together with nearby regions Calabarzon (17%) and Central Luzon (10%), these 3 regions accounted for 64% (or nearly two-thirds) of GDP.

But even if Metro Manila is the largest region, it’s not the fastest-growing. The orange bars in Figure 1 show that this distinction belongs to Central Visayas (which grew by 74% from 2009 to 2016), followed by Caraga (69.9%), Central Luzon (66.5%), and Duterte’s home region of Davao (61.9%).

Figure 1. Source: PSA. Regional GDP in 2000 prices.

NCR or National Capital Region came in at fifth (56.8%), followed by Northern Mindanao (54.2%). This ranking is roughly the same if we look at the blue bars instead, which represent the growth of average incomes (GDP per person).

But more regions are lagging behind

Although some regions are outpacing Metro Manila, many more are lagging behind. This is where the real problem lies.

Figure 2 below shows that rich regions are seemingly growing faster than poor ones. This is shown by the upward pattern of the dots.

This is not the pattern we’re supposed to be seeing: economic growth theory suggests that poorer regions (like ARMM and Bicol) should be growing faster than richer ones (like NCR or Calabarzon). This is otherwise known as “regional convergence.”

But instead, the dots show the opposite pattern. As long as many poor regions continue to grow slowly, they will never catch up with Metro Manila. Rather than converge, the regions will diverge.

Figure 2. Source: Author’s calculations of PSA data from 2009-2016. Values in log terms. Note that the pattern is tenuous. If we remove ARMM, there seems to be no relation between annualized growth rates and 2009 income levels (that is, there’s neither regional convergence nor divergence).

Regional divergence is also shown by the increasing dispersion of average incomes between the regions (statistically, the standard deviation of per-capita incomes has increased by 11% from 2009 to 2016).

Federalism won’t ensure faster catch up

With many poor regions lagging behind, can federalism – as envisioned by Duterte and his party – correct this? Will federalism make poorer regions catch up faster?

Not necessarily.

Economic growth occurs when people are more productive. Productivity, in turn, is proportional to the degree of investments made by the private and public sectors, whether in the form of physical capital (roads, bridges, airports) or human capital (education, health, training).

Federalism won’t foster growth if the Regional Governments fail to promote investments or raise people’s productivity. Here are two reasons why this is more likely to happen than not.

1) Investments will still flock to richer regions

Duterte’s federalism will create 11 or so Regional Governments, each of which will have the power to create its own laws, regulations, and taxes suited to the particular needs of its constituents.

To promote growth, each Regional Government will have to boost investments, either through tax revenues or by attracting private investors.

But poor regions are doubly at a disadvantage. Places like ARMM or Eastern Visayas, for example, have small economies to begin with, and have fewer goods and services to tax. Their small economies will yield little tax revenues they can invest for their future growth. 

By contrast, richer regions like NCR and Calabarzon already have large economies and substantial tax revenues at the outset, which they can use to fund major public investments or offer incentives to prospective investors (like tax holidays or subsidies).

Hence, even with federalism in place, investments could still end up flocking to richer regions rather than poorer regions.

To remedy these initial imbalances, the proposed federal setup will include “intergovernmental transfers”: that is, part of taxes from rich regions will be transferred to poor regions in need of fiscal assistance.

But aside from the logistical challenges – Finance Secretary Sonny Dominguez says it could be a “nightmare” – many studies have found that “fiscal equalization” of this sort typically doesn’t encourage poor regions to be more productive. If anything, it tends to make them more dependent on richer regions.

It’s always fun to spend money you didn’t earn. This same principle applies to Regional Governments of various incomes.

2) Greater political autonomy could raise the cost of doing business

Local politics in the Philippines is chiefly characterized by “patronage”: local leaders see themselves as patrons who provide various services for their constituents – like basketball courts with their names on the roofs, or ambulances with their faces plastered on the doors. In return, constituents pay back with their votes.

Patronage politics explains why many mayors and governors give special treatment to businesses owned by themselves, family, and friends. They are also known to impose strict standards, extract bribes, or even deny permits to businesses that threaten special interests.

Duterte’s federalism will grant political autonomy to local officials, but given our political culture this could also afford them more economic power in their respective jurisdictions.

This is worrisome for 3 reasons. First, local leaders and elites might capture larger segments of their respective economies. This will defeat federalism’s ostensible purpose of promoting inclusive growth.

Second, stifled competition could mean that constituents will face higher prices and lower quality for the goods and services they buy.

Third, dealing with 11 different sets of laws, regulatory standards, and tax systems nationwide – one for each Regional Government – could raise the overall cost of doing business across the country. Small and medium enterprises (SMEs) wishing to expand could hurt the most.

All in all, the proposals for federalism should not be blind to the political and economic realities on the ground. Otherwise, federalism will only be fraught with many unintended consequences. 

Let’s read between the lines

It’s true that many regions of the Philippines are lagging behind Metro Manila in terms of incomes and living standards.

But there’s simply no data or evidence to suggest that the proposed shift to a federal system will make poorer regions catch up faster.

In fact, if we ignore the political and economic realities on the ground – like patronage politics – federalism could even worsen existing regional inequalities.

Just look at ARMM: nearly 30 years since it gained autonomy and established its own regional government, it has remained the poorest region in the country.

Many of the proposed changes to the Constitution also have nothing to do with regional development at all. These include extending term limits (Duterte and all lawmakers could serve for another 10 years), abolishing the office of the vice president, and indefinitely postponing elections.

Truth to tell, if you carefully read the proposal, Duterte’s federalism looks less like a plan to promote regional development, and more like a ploy to concentrate political power on Duterte and his political party for the next 5 to 10 years.

Before it's too late, let us all read between the lines. – Rappler.com

The author is a PhD candidate and teaching fellow at the UP School of Economics. His views are independent of the views of his affiliations. Follow JC on Twitter: @jcpunongbayan.

I am outraged by the huge hollow block thrown against the entire Filipino nation by Presidential Spokesman Harry Roque when he claimed that Filipinos cannot afford to explore Benham Rise – that "no one can do it," that the Philippines "needs China" to do it, and "only China qualifies." That is completely wrong, based on ignorance, a serious disservice to Filipino scientists in particular and the Filipino people in general, and an over-exaggeration of China's potential role in Philippine ocean sciences.

In the first place, Filipinos have been exploring the Benham Rise Region for years now.

From 2004 to 2008, then again in 2010, the National Mapping and Resource Information Authority of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) sent BRP Hydrographer Presbitero on multiple bathymetric and hydrographic surveys of the Benham Rise Region. The surveys produced a highly detailed 3D digital bathymetric model (resolution of 1 meter for an area covering 30 million hectares) of the entire region, compliant with the highest quality standards of the International Hydrographic Organization. That was a Philippine vessel with full Filipino crew (mariners of the Coast and Geodetic Survey Division) funded completely by the Philippine government. That batheymetric model was absolutely necessary for the Philippines to support its claim to the continental shelf beyond 200 nautical miles with 2D and 3D geomorphological analysis.

For the past decade, the Department of Agriculture's Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources has been annually conducting fisheries research and experimental fishing expeditions in the Benham Rise region, particularly in areas between the coast of Luzon and Benham Bank, to determine the tuna fishery potential of its waters. This has been undertaken by the M/V DA-BFAR multi-mission research vessel for so long that BFAR has confidence in promoting and opening the region as the country's new tuna fishing ground.

Two oceanographic research cruises have been organized – funded by the Department of Science and Technology, supported by DA-BFAR, and with the participation of the University of the Philippines (UP), De La Salle University, Silliman University, and other academic institutions (apologies as I forget) – which gave the Philippines its initial glimpse of Benham Bank, the shallowest portion of Benham Rise. These were done in 2014 and 2016. A 3rd cruise is being planned for this summer 2018 (fingers crossed). All are crewed by Filipino scientists, marine science students, Navy and Coast Guard technical divers, and mariners. Supplementary support/assistance so far was provided by Oceana, a non-governmental organization advocating marine resources conservation, in the form only of a remotely-operated vehicle unit and technicians to control it, and additional scientists and technical divers to augment the second expedition's personnel. Both previous expeditions were Philippine-funded, the same goes for the planned 3rd cruise. The first people to actually descend and "touch" Benham Bank 50 meters below the Pacific were Filipino technical divers. That's our "Neil Armstrong setting foot on the moon" historical moment.

Since 2016, the UP National Institute of Geological Sciences (NIGS) and the UP Marine Science Institute (MSI) have been collaborating with counterpart institutions in South Korea and Japan, namely the Korea Institute for Ocean Science and Technology and the Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology, to begin initial exploration of the seabed in Benham Rise itself under separate memoranda of agreements. As I understand it, among other things, the Philippines intends to get seabed core samples through this arrangement, which push forward the resource assessment and exploration efforts for the Rise. 

Geologists of the UP NIGS have acquired and reviewed available public domain data from multiple scientific research cruises by multiple nations that have passed through the Benham Rise region, and produced academic papers and analyses of their own, which were used as evidence to support the claim to Benham Rise. The detailed tectonic history, geological characteristics, and underwater topography have been determined and analyzed by these Filipino scientists, and their findings were tested and their papers validated by foreign scientific advisors as well as the scientific community through the continental shelf claim process and the academic press.

Marine biologists of UP MSI, UP School of Environmental Science and Management, and other schools have been analyzing the many samples and observations that they gathered from the two research cruises, and making some interesting findings and potential discoveries of their own. These are Filipino researchers, earning salaries and wages from Philippine sources, and working in accordance with stringent scientific standards and procedures on a par with anyone else in the world.

In addition to the small research vessels of UP, DENR, and DA-BFAR, the Philippines now has a deep-sea research vessel in the form of the BRP Gregorio Velasquez that was handed over to the Philippine Navy by the United States. This ship used to be the USS Melville, carrying a crew of 23 plus up to 38 marine scientists on board, and was formerly operated by the Scripps Institute of Oceanography. It played a key role in US oceanography for over 45 years, and is still going strong. The Philippine Navy, in collaboration with marine science institutions, is developing its own capacity to operate and maximize the use of this venerable vessel for hydrography and marine science. Last summer, the PN and UP-MSI took the ship "around the block," conducting a running MSR data-collecting cruise spanning the waters of Mindoro, Kalayaan Islands Group, Southern Palawan, the Sulu Sea, and Tubbataha Reef. Even the PN, with multi-purpose ships like the BRP Davao del Sur, has demonstrated that it can operate in the area, and with appropriate crew and equipment, can host all manner of research activities in addition to military purposes. 

By the way, the Philippines has yet to explore the possibilities of using new technologies that are becoming fast accessible and affordable. Technologies and techniques for manufacturing floating and underwater autonomous vehicles (sometimes called "gliders" or "drones") guided by artificial intelligence, each unit costing around US$100,000 each, have been offered for free to the Philippines by at least one friendly country, not China. This could mark a new era in indigenous marine resource exploration in the near future. Other countries are already using these gliders to conduct oceanographic researches in the deep ocean at a fraction of what they used to cost. A small squadron of AI-guided gliders could quickly conduct deep seabed exploration in the deep oceans at much less expense than even current levels. And I have no doubt that the Philippines can do it as well.

For government to say that Filipinos need China to explore Benham Rise as if there is no one else that can do it is both a brazen falsehood and a disservice to the hard work and dedication, the talents, and capacities of the Filipino scientific community, a number of whom I have worked with and call my colleagues and friends. 

I have had the privilege of working on international legal claims with these talented people, through the Tubbataha Reef Particularly Sensitive Sea Area Application before the International Maritime Organization, and the Extended Continental Shelf Project, which generated two claim documents (one for Benham Rise region, successfully submitted and validated, and another for the Western Palawan region, which up to now has been sitting on somebody's desk, but that's another story entirely) for the Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf. 

Although China is indeed a formidable scientific force in the contemporary ocean sciences, it is by no means the only one. To date, even without China, the Philippines has been able to assemble its own modest scientific expeditions, and continues to develop its capacities and capabilities to do so, both on its own and with willing partners. China is an obvious opportunity but not an absolute necessity. To imply that only China can give the Philippines any hope in exploring and exploiting Benham Rise is a twisted and gross exaggeration of its potential role in cooperation with the Philippine marine science community. While the possible benefits from cooperation with China should be recognized, we should not be fixated with it.

The limitations upon Philippine marine science capacities and capabilities is not so much a matter of poverty as it is a matter of priorities. The modest efforts to date demonstrate that with the proper budgetary support from government and clear research goals and objectives, as well as a good vision and great confidence in our own people and expertise, the Philippines can do these things on its own. It may take longer, and may be more difficult, but we have shown that we can do it. We may have relatively few marine scientists and even fewer marine science vessels, but they have done a lot despite limited resources. What more if government actually gave the sector the attention and respect it deserves? 

This government’s denigration of Filipino scientists and Filipinos in general, claiming they cannot explore Benham Rise without China or Chinese money, is a total sham meant to disempower and demean Filipinos and their capacity and capability as a people. It makes Filipinos appear helpless, clueless, and penniless on something already demonstrated they are not. We are not a nation of beggars for small change, even that coming from a country as big and rich as China.

But then, again, maybe that’s what government means by “change is coming.” – Rappler.com 

Dr Jay L. Batongbacal is associate professor at the University of the Philippines College of Law, and and director of the UP Institute for Maritime Affairs and Law of the Sea. Aside from teaching law, he undertakes research on maritime affairs, including Philippine and US maritime security policies and the Rule of Law in the South China Sea disputes. This piece was originally posted in his Facebook account, and has been republished, with a few edits, with his permission. 

The new year greeted the Philippine legal community with two controversial Court of Appeals decisions, in the cases of the Indonesian drug arrest and pending execution Mary Jane Veloso, and the murder of Doc Gerry Ortega.

Both these decisions ironically revolve around the important concept of due process, the legal virtue all but happily ignored when it came to the casualties of the present drug war. Yet the controversy we tackle now showcases the other unjust extreme: a myopic view that, just as happily, favors technicality over the substantive ends of the judicial process, lip service convenience over the obligations of professional thoroughness.

In both the drug war deaths and these decisions lie the same inequity: truth shackled in silence. In this article, we tackle the CA's permanent injunction of Veloso's deposition, having overturned the trial court's own decision to proceed with it.

An important note: none of this is meant to prejudge the pending case against the accused, or the merits of Veloso's accusations being the core of her defense in her Indonesian trial. Our obligations under law are always with the rights of all parties concerned, with attention to the vulnerable and needy – but our emphasis is that those rights are best served by the thoroughness of due process afforded to all parties, to arrive at the truth. A process stymied by the transnational nature of Veloso's case, and the CA's decision.

There is an undeniably cruel aspect to the Appellate's injunction – we do not say this with malice towards the division involved, but such is the necessary consequence of their decision. Veloso (there is no delicate way to put this) has been dangling on the end of death row since Indonesian President Joko Widodo stayed her execution for drug running in April 2015.

That stay is dependent on the outcome of the human trafficking case filed against the alleged perpetrators of her fate: Ma. Kristina Sergio and Julius Calanilao. In that case, Veloso is the primary witness, wherein her intent is to explain how she ended up in Indonesia without knowledge of the drugs discovered in her luggage.

And there lies the rub.

To briefly recap, what the CA denied is the motion to depose her in Indonesia. In every trial, witnesses are bound to testify in open court. Yet there are instances where a witness is unable to testify when he or she is called to do so, by reasons of death, distance, sickness, cannot be subpoenaed, or under similar exceptional circumstances.

This is where depositions come in, a mode of discovery by which the testimony of a witness may be taken “upon oral examination or written interrogatories” (Rule 23 Sec. 1, Rules of Court), written down, and presented to the court in substitution. The deposition, in effect, “becomes the witness”, to quote a writing on the subject. Veloso's camp pushed for deposition as, by reason of her arrest and conviction in Indonesia, she obviously cannot stand in or be subpoenaed into local jurisdiction for her complaint against Sergio and Calanilao. The trial Judge Anarica Castillo-Reyes granted the motion, and even volunteered to fly to Indonesia to observe Veloso's deposition. And it was this which the CA blocked.

Cruel the CA's decision may be, its legal foundation however is a sacrosanct due process right of every person charged of a crime: the right to confront his accusers and witnesses, and cross-examine them. Moreover, Philippine case law emphasizes the importance of live testimony by a testifying witness, so that the trial judge can observe their deportment and conduct during direct and cross-examination in order to establish his credibility (in fact, this is the motive behind Judge Castillo-Reyes' proposal to travel to Indonesia).

In the injunction, emphasis was made on the Supreme Court's ruling in Manguerra v. Risos which ruled out using depositions in criminal trials. What was allowable was Rule 119, conditional examination, requiring that the examination be done “before the court where the case is pending.” Yet Indonesia not being Philippine jurisdiction (especifically Regional Trial Court Branch 88), any examination done in Indonesia will likely not satisfy Rule 119, either. Ipso facto: there was no way under the rules for Veloso's testimony to be admitted. And since her testimony as the offended private party is the evidence-in-chief of the prosecution…Nothing stops a case faster than a complainant unable to raise a complaint (again, sadly familiar in Philippine history).

We obviously carry no opposition to protecting the confrontation right: it is a pillar of the accused's Constitutional due process rights. This is carried over from the American legal tradition, which has held that a person shall not be convicted by reason of ex parte testimony: statements made by his accusers to which he had no opportunity to respond, rebut, or refute directly.

One of the virtues of the adversarial process is that, when done properly, one will most likely weed out the cow manure in either parties' case, in order to arrive as close as possible to the truth. Which is why Rule 119 makes sense, as emphasized by Manguerra: “this requirement ensures that the judge would be able to observe the witness deportment to enable him to properly assess his credibility.”

Yet Veloso's case reveals a glaring inadequacy in Manguerra, showing how it – and Philippine legal procedure – is horribly ill-equipped for 21^st century transnational issues like human trafficking and modern slavery, the drug trade, terrorism, regional environmental degradation, money laundering, and the legal needs of the Filipino diaspora, all of which cross state borders.

Upon her  testimony lies the potential to discover the truth behind the drugs found in her luggage, and thus the merits of her Indonesian conviction. It is a merit that Indonesian courts obviously cannot pass completely upon, depending on action in the Philippines to resolve the questions she raised. Yet that same border is also the reason why Philippine courts cannot answer those questions either, if her testimony cannot be heard per our Rules.

How terribly inconvenient. So many of our fellow Filipinos find themselves in similar straits. Filipino law students should be familiar with Saudia v. Court of Appeals, where a Filipina flight attendant working for Saudia Airlines accused fellow cabin crew members of attempted rape in Jakarta. She instead was charged with adultery before Saudi courts (later dismissed as a wrongful suit by royal intervention) and fired as a consequence.

The Supreme Court found her subsequent suit for compensation against Saudia in Philippine courts proper, given the circumstances. Not every Filipino who finds himself or herself in dire straits abroad finds the same happy ending, however, especially when the death penalty becomes involved, or the poverty that drove him or her to greener pastures is exploited here and abroad to enslave – and keep from rescue and redress from home.

And on Philippine courts lie the hopes of these Filipinos to reveal the truth behind their fate – except for that terrible inconvenience of borders. Indeed, the confrontation right must be upheld (the past couple of years should bear out its wisdom!). But the effect is to deny the due process right of the aggrieved party to seek legal redress, through no fault or malice of said party, only because of that terrible convenience.

Due process cuts both ways, says Dimatulac v. Villon: “Indeed, for justice to prevail, the scales must balance; justice is not to be dispensed for the accused alone. The interests of society and the offended parties which have been wronged must be equally considered.” One's due process cannot be advanced at the expense of another, except in the case of genuine doubt as to application of law or finding of fact (and certainly not due to technicalities alone). And as with the drug war deaths, and so many other cases, ignoring anyone's due process is injustice, period. Even if the CA technically had legal basis to do so. Even if it was not the intent of Manguerra to do so.

Yet in looking at this inadequacy, we can point to ways by which the Supreme Court can allow Veloso to testify while respecting the confrontation right. Such requires the High Court's intervention, either to overturn/provide an exception to Manguerra, or to provide new legal procedure to address the gap.

It pays to look back at the evolution of American legal process to the present day, to see parallels which can inform our own dilemmas. The present controlling doctrine there is Crawford v. Washington, penned by the late Justice Antonin Scalia, noted (even notorious) for hewing quite closely to the historical foundations of the US Constitution and legal concepts.

Prior to Crawford, out of court testimony could still be used in trial, despite the lack of cross-examination, under one of the exceptions to the hearsay doctrine, or if it bears an adequate “indicia of reliability”, under the Ohio v. Roberts case. With Crawford, accusatory testimony now required cross-examination, otherwise it ought to be excluded as hearsay and/or for violating the accused's confrontation right.

Yet even Crawford admits a long-standing exception to the confrontation right: “forfeiture by wrongdoing.” Per the US Federal Rules of Evidence 804(b)(6) which codified it, “[a] statement offered against a party that has engaged or acquiesced in wrongdoing that was intended to, and did, procure the unavailability of the declarant as a witness” can be admitted as an exception to the hearsay rule.

The later case of Giles v. California, Scalia once again divined case history to opine that an accused strictly should more or less have had the deliberate design of preventing the testimony against him for the exception to apply. Justice Stephen Breyer strongly dissented with such an approach, noting that the Scalian ratio decidendi of strictness was “built on what is at most common-law silence on the subject.”

Obviously here is not America; their cases do not bind Philippine cases, but they are traditionally held to be very persuasive given our legal antecedents. And neither is it our purpose here to hash through the debates surrounding Giles. But looking at Crawford and Giles is useful because forfeiture by wrongdoing is not a recognized hearsay exception under our Rules of Court, whose strict adherence Manguerra mandated.

Neither does Manguerra allow for forfeiture, either – though it was not really at issue in that case (to paraphrase Breyer, it is silent on the subject). Yet even Veloso's case would have confounded the Giles court. Veloso's accusation is the very reason why she is prevented from appearing in a Philippine court. But the question required by the Giles ruling is, did Sergio and Calanilao act with a specific design to prevent Veloso from testifying against them by deploying her to Indonesia and thus to her arrest? (As this cuts into the heart of the case against the accused, resolving it might have the effect of prejudging the case just to resolve the admissability of Veloso's testimony!)

On the less Scalia-strict approach implied by Breyer, if evidence would show even just Sergio's and Calanilao's principal involvement in Veloso's deployment to Indonesia (regardless of whether it would constitute human trafficking, so as not to prejudge the case), but knowing it would put her beyond Philippine jurisdiction, would it count as forfeiture of the confrontation right by wrongdoing?

To be fair, neither of us are suggesting adopting the whole forfeiture hog into the Philippine Rules of Court, the danger of conviction by way of denying due process rights to the accused being all too real in this country's past. That much is and should be entitled to Sergio and Calanilao. Yet as we had earlier noted, jurisdictional borders have a way of wrecking the legal process in crimes of a transnational nature. And the Philippines sits in the perfect storm for it, given the Filipino diaspora, illegal recruitment, weaknesses of local institutions, and the never-ending search for labor to abuse.

We make no light statement saying “abuse”. We recently read that, as a result of Filipinos and Indonesians in Hong Kong increasingly pushing for their labor rights, some unscrupulous employers there have begun mining alternative labor pools. 

Our OFWs deserve more success stories of faithful employers for faithful service, of bonds professional and personal forged between Filipino labor and foreign employment, between their countries and ours. They certainly do not deserve the borders they cross, and the technicalities surrounding them, getting in the way of legal redress and the search for truth, whether in their adopted residence or their own homeland.

And that is the essential end of due process, a theme we will revisit in the succeeding article on the Ortega case, another controversial CA decision: truth-telling. This is why Dimatulac says the scales must balance. For in the quasi-adversarial proceeding among accuser, accused, and judge that forms the sacrosanct trinity of Philippine criminal procedure, lies the hope for truth (or as damn close as we can get).

The final and just resolution of the questions Veloso raised, in her defense against the death penalty in Indonesia and in accusation against Sergio and Calanilao, depends on the process in “due process” pushing through. And the American doctrine of forfeiture by wrongdoing, even if we do not call for its wholesale adoption, should nonetheless open the door for the Philippine Supreme Court to consider flexible application of the Rules of Court to address the Manguerra gap, the insufficiency of Scalian strictness, and ultimately the inadequacy of the Rules in a transnational legal world and a global Philippines, and somehow allow Veloso's testimony to be admitted into consideration. After all, it is enshrined in Philippine case law that rules of procedure are meant to serve the ends of substantive justice, such that a liberal interpretation may be allowed in order to do so. 

Here, we may humbly offer a few alternatives, as all the ingredients are already present. Given the exceptional nature of Veloso's predicament, a finding by preponderant evidence (the standard required under American case law) that the accused had a principal hand in her deployment to Indonesia ought to give consideration to applying Rule 23 instead of Rule 119, in light of a modified (and Breyer-centric) application of the forfeiture doctrine, except with the added security of Judge Castillo-Reyes attending the deposition to provide the personal observation of deportment required by Manguerra, as she originally intended.

Alternatively, given that the Filipino diaspora regularly communicates with loved ones back home through Skype, with the assistance of responsible Indonesian authorities and the Philippine consulate, what is to say that the hearings where Veloso is to testify and be cross-examined be conducted through internet communications technology?

Certainly, this could be intended by Rule 10(1) of the Rules on Electronic Evidence, permitting testimony presented by electronic means, as observed by a 2006 American Bar Association assessment of Philippine evidence rules – it went as far as to note that it was “more expansive than practice in the United States.” To a Manguerra-based objection requiring live, in-court testimony or conditional examination, again the forfeiture doctrine can be raised for flexibility or a reconsideration.

Both options will require the cooperation of Indonesian jurisdiction, but this is well within the province of the Supreme Court to request of a fellow foreign High Court, as are the foreign ministries involved. After all, our countries are fellow ASEAN members, and there is interjudiciary cooperation through the ASEAN Chief Justices' Meeting, and legal cooperation through the ASEAN Law Association. And again, given the need for interstate cooperation not just in Veloso's case, but in transnational concerns, the Supreme Court could not do worse now, given how it is beset with internal distractions, than to go out and see the world, and work with it, for justice here and abroad.

Let’s bend forward, not backward, to help Mary Jane Veloso. We can do that without violating due process and the rights of the accused.

To reiterate, the Filipino diaspora deserves no less. – Rappler.com

*Christian Laluna is a graduate of the Ateneo School of Law. He is waiting for the results of the bar examinations by collaborating with Professor La Viña in several projects.

MANILA, Philippines – In this week's episode of Basagan Ng Trip, history teacher Leloy Claudio talks about the importance of political participation, and why apathy is fast becoming the silent killer of democracy.

MORE ON 'BASAGAN NG TRIP'

On using the term 'Filipino'

Is human rights relevant to Filipinos?

Whom to trust – journalists or social media stars?

What liberalism, LP, and yellow really mean 

Is Islam violent?

Why a depreciating Philippine peso might be a good thing

What's the government's problem with ride-sharing companies?

Ferdinand Marcos’ great ideas, bad executions

Was Martial Law needed to defeat the communists?

On 'The Duterte Reader' and identifying Digong

On Filipinos' obsession with titles

The case for a biased, honest media

Is Duterte a dictator, a fascist, or a populist?

5 tips when writing in English

5 ways to shield yourself from fake news

Would the entry of a third player make sense in the highly competitive Philippine telecommunications business?

Although the third player would enjoy the unbridled support of the Duterte government, the answer does not sound encouraging for a third player. See the state of the Philippine economy. Consider the dynamics of the local telecommunications sector and its future directions. Look at the overall policy environment.

Even as the third player comes out with a joint venture agreement with local business groups to form a new telecommunications firm – holding the maximum constitutionally allowed minority stake of 40% of the total equity, and getting past the regulatory and corporate issues and other barriers to entry – it would still be the overall economic condition that would dictate its entry.

Incidentally, President Rodrigo Duterte, speaking with a combined sense of bluster and bravura, announced late last year the entry into the Philippine market of the state-owned China Telecom by March this year, raising skepticism about the feasibility of having a third player in so short period of time.

It was later clarified that what he said was the announcement of the selection, and not necessarily the entry, of a third player in the local market, which would certainly take years. The final selection has to be moved to a later date because it is not possible to make a final decision in March.

.

Heavy investments

The telecommunications boom that characterized the first decade of the 2000s is over; the wireless revolution that saw massive profits for the two telecommunications giants – the PLDT and Globe Telecom Groups – has ended. Their potential has reached a plateau. The telecommunications sector has matured. Such maturity has far reaching implications and consequences for the national economy.

A study by Dr Epictetus Patalinjug of the University of the Philippines Virata School of Business showed that retail, food, and beverage industries are more profitable than telecommunications and real estate sectors. A comparative look at the profitability indicators showed that retail, food, and beverage companies have higher rates of return than the top telecommunications and real estate firms in the country.

According to the study, although they contribute significantly to infrastructure building and development, the capital intensive nature of the telecommunications and real estate sectors does not appear to be an incentive for future investments. Capital intensive industries require heavy investments at the start of operations; it takes 5-10 years before they post profits.

Notwithstanding the regulatory hurdles and other barriers to entry, a prospective third player may not exactly like the idea of investing in the Philippines. They have to endure successive years of heavy losses before they could generate decent profits.
 
In fact, Patalinghug has postulated that over a longer time horizon, PLDT and Globe Telecom, and even SM Prime and Ayala Land, would be earning below the average rate of returns attained by top Philippine firms in other industries.  
 
Department store chain SM, for instance, had a return on assets (ROA) of 14.42%, while Asia Brewery’s ROA reached 12.13%. PLDT and SM Prime however, recorded ROAs of only 9.18% and 8.49% respectively. Globe and Ayala Land even ranked lower with 6.7% and 5.96%
 
Patalinjug’s study suggests that telcos and real estate developers would have to resort aggressively to increase capital expenditures and generate sufficient cash flow to sustain the required investments in capital intensive industries. Moreover, the lack of state expenditures on national telecommunications networks, housing, and transport infrastructure compound the issue of heavy investment requirements.

Likewise it implies that a third telco player would have to endure lower rates of return, thus decreasing its commercial viability. How it could sustain its operations despite year of losses and how it could endure the competition from the PLDT-Globe duopoly is anybody’s guess. But the business environment would not easy for the third player.

Policy environment

On the basic investment policy, Paragraph E of Section 4 of Republic Act 7925, or the Public Telecommunications Act of 1995, says: “Public telecommunications services shall be provided by private enterprises. The private sector shall be the engine of rapid and efficient growth in the telecommunications industry.”

This policy ties the government's hands; it cannot just invest in the telecommunications sector. National Telecommunications Commission chief Gamaliel Cordoba noted that while other ASEAN member-states have telecommunications networks that are either wholly-owned or partly owned, financed, and operated by their governments, the Philippines is the only country in the ASEAN region whose entire broadband networks have to be built solely by private firms.
 
This is a disincentive to any third player angling to join the fray. For its part, the Duterte government has not taken steps to alter the policy environment. There are no congressional incentives to amend RA 7925 to allow state investments in the telecommunications sector.

What the country has at the moment is the announcement of the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) that it has finally recognized the need for government support in telecommunications. It has announced its plan to put up 250,000 Wi-Fi access points and 47,000 cell sites nationwide before the end of the Duterte administration in 2022.

Noises on third player

Duterte’s announcement of the entry of the third player this March has triggered a lot of noise. The acquisition of Philippine Telegraph & Telephone Corp’s (PT&T) by the Salvador Zamora group has been hailed as a step to position itself to be that potential “game-changer,” as it has announced plans to partner with Chinese firms to challenge PLDT and Globe Telecom.

So far, not much has been accomplished to actualize the much ballyhooed entry of the third telco player. Not much has been laid down on the table. What the country has been noticing are the loud noises. – Rappler.com

I grew up breathing Thomasian air. 

My father, an alumnus of the UST himself (as with all my other relatives), took me to numerous games of UAAP when I was still a kid and showed me how passionate and warm the Thomasian Community is. The same can be said when I entered the university as, presently, a senior high school student: the people, the culture, and the sense of belongingness made me fall in love with the University. 

As a debater, I take pride in knowing that I study in a university that, in 1999, won the World’s Debating Championship, the tournament dubbed as the Olympics of debate. 

As an activist, legendary figures of UST’s yesteryears like Jose Rizal, Senator Jose Diokno, General Antonio Luna, former Chief Justice Cayetano Arellano, and Senator Benigno Aquino Sr – revered men who embodied Thomasian excellence – reinforced my being part of this tradition. In short, I’m a proud student of the University of Santo Tomas.

The UST Alumni Association Incorporated's (USTAAI) award to Ms Mocha Uson, as with all challenges faced by my university, violated every fiber of my dignity as a Thomasian. 

St Thomas Aquinas once said: “He who is not angry when there is just cause for anger is immoral. Why? Because anger looks to the good of justice. And if you can live amid injustice without anger, you are immoral as well as unjust.” This characteristic is what drives my sentiments on Ms Uson’s award.

I will be very frank: giving an award to Ms Uson was shameful and tasteless. She neither has the sensibilities of a supposed educated Thomasian nor the tact of a public servant. The public, together with my fellow Thomasians– students, alumni, and administrators alike – have every right to condemn this stunt of the USTAAI.  

Many of us from the Thomasian Community lost our chill when the alumni group put Uson on a pedestal as role model for students. 

Fellow Thomasian and kasama Akbayan Representative Tomasito Villarin was spot on in his statement when he returned his Thomasian in Government Service Award in protest: "It is shameful and unpleasant for someone to accept the award when one’s actions go against the core values of Thomasians, 'truth in charity' as well as public accountability and transparency in government.”

However, as critical citizens who are part of the national political conversation, the discussion is now beyond the faults of the USTAAI. The issue is symptomatic of a bigger national issue: the proliferation of government-run fake news meant to scam the public.

The outrage of students and the sectors of the Thomasian Community led to the resignation of USTAAI president Henry Tenedoro and later, a defeated Uson who surrendered the award. This episode, where students won against a manipulator of the public, served as a warning to other institutions to stop glorifying fake news peddlers. 

It led netizens to look at BAYAN which gave President Duterte the Gawad Supremo award despite the thousands killed, the Gusi Peace Prize which gave PNP Chief Bato dela Rosa an ironic Peacebuilding award, and other bodies that have awarded the dictator and his supporters.

This outrage that erupted in UST needs to grow into a movement against fake news. This movement can flourish outside the walls of UST – in schools, workplaces, and communities nationwide. As we build our movement, we should be careful not to get distracted from our end goal: to defend truth and justice.  

This is the strategy, in my opinion, of the current administration: to divide us and manipulate us through a platform overloaded with so many things to consume. We are distracted from our bigger battle against fake news. This movement will need the whole Thomasian Community to work, even the UST alumni association that should have learned its lessons now. 

If we are to be effective defenders of democracy, we must stay vigilant and be able to sift through the tsunami of information, a task never too daunting for a Filipino. – Rappler.com

Pablo Joaquín Foronda Tanglao is a senior high school student of the University of Santo Tomas. He is an activist from Akbayan Youth, a multi-awarded debater, writer, an aspiring music producer, and a humanitarian – the youngest to have ever worked for United Nations Philippines. He is a national convener for the Students Rights and Welfare Coalition Philippines (STRAW PH).

Feared or indulged as an autocratic provincial-city mayor for more than two decades, Rodrigo Duterte, as president, has had his way similarly, to no small degree. A captive Congress, a sycophantic secretary of justice, and a blindly obedient police force have much to do with that.

Whatever it is Duterte has got done, in any case, makes for dubious achievement. It tends to be motivated by vindictiveness, as with the imprisonment, on indeterminate charges, of Senator Leila de Lima, the human-rights watchdog who has been hounding him; or it has to do with fixations, of which the most dramatic is his war on drugs, which has left thousands dead and provoked a worldwide uproar among rights advocates.

Meantime, the plot around which he has built his political alliances has been running into major obstacles. Rewriting the Constitution in order to accommodate the shift they are pushing for from the present unitary system of government to a federal one is proving not so easy to pull off as they thought in spite of their ridiculous numbers – a 90-plus percent majority in the House of Representatives and a nearly 80%, as revealed by a voting pattern, in the Senate.

Duterte, the certified narcissist that he is, had at first thought he could swing the deal by sheer force of personality. He said he would set up a revolutionary government to get a new Constitution written so as not to lose time. But the secretary of defense and the armed forces chief served prompt notice they would not support such an unconstitutional arrangement. That they did so in a briefing asked for by the sidelined vice president and constitutional successor to Duterte, Leni Robredo, must have yet given their opposition, plainly spoken enough as it was, a righteously defiant quality.       

Duterte backed off, for now, and left his congressional colluders to their own self-serving devices.   

Predictably enough, the House of Representatives decided to itself tinker with the Constitution, instead of giving way to rewriters chosen by national vote or by other means that would somehow ensure an independent, suitable hand and a proper job.  

Federalism’s short-term appeal to sitting congressmen and other officials lies with the prospect of their continuance in office unelected during the transition. Over the long term, by dividing the nation into autonomous states, federalism will likely only further entrench dynasties and other political clubs operating by patronage. Members of the House are precisely such types, elected by their district domains. 

Not a few senators themselves come from the same political patron class, but, elected by national vote, thus answerable to a national constituency, they may have developed some measure of independent-mindedness. That virtue does not show decidedly in the senators’ opposition to the way things are cooking in the House, but, in a Senate where Duterte has so far won all his battles, any opposition is significant opposition. And this one is definitely serious.

Two basic things don’t sit well with the Senate: one, the uncertainty of its place in both the transition into a federal system and the federal system itself; two, the insistence by the Speaker that in bicameral voting, where two-thirds of the total number of votes is required to pass a motion, the vote of one senator should be equal to that of one House member, a patently ridiculous reckoning of parity between two equal houses: with 24 senators and 296 House members, the formula dilutes the Senate vote more than 12 times that of the House.  

These differences are so critical they are bound to derail the Duterte federal express. And to one who can’t abide dissent, derailment is bound to trigger rage, itself a form of panic, a sense of which seems reflected in Duterte’s appointment of new cooks – consultative cooks tasked to produce draft amendments to the Constitution. 

The group is headed, curiously, by a former Supreme Court Chief Justice who is himself no avid federalist or supporter of the idea of a sitting Congress tinkering with the Constitution – Reynato Puno. He and his cooks are given a few months to produce the dish.

Duterte is in a great hurry. He wants to put federalism on track, hoping to construct around it some reason, some excuse, some pretext to stop the May 2019 midterm elections. Elections are an iffy business. They could break his political gang, and set back his plot. – Rappler.com

There is a line in the much-praised film The Darkest Hour where Gary Oldman, playing Winston Churchill, says, “Lost causes are the only ones worth fighting for.” Rappler looks like a lost cause. But is it really?

Juggernaut versus Rappler

There is more than one sense in which the Oldman-Churchill lost cause analogy is appropriate to Rappler’s situation. Like Hitler’s armies in 1940, the whole Duterte juggeranut is now bearing down on defiant Rappler, having swept nearly everything before it. The juggeranut says that the matter is a constitutional issue, that Rappler violated media ownership rules. But not even the apologists of the administration can say that with a straight face, without spluttering, since they know they are engaged in what they hope will be final stage of a political maneuver to silence the last independent medium on the national scene, one that President Duterte himself publicly launched in his State of the Nation address last July.  

At another time, the question of ownership might be a valid subject of legal debate, but not when what is at really at issue is a brazen move to advance towards dictatorship, not when there are no other independent media around to check Malacanang’s dark ambitions.

Like the Marcos burial, like the frame-up of Senator Leila de Lima, like the effort to impeach Chief Justice Maria Lourdes Sereno, the SEC move against Rappler is part of the multi-sided offensive to lock up the Philippine political system for good, and this is why it must be resisted.

Blitzkrieg Fascism

The circumstances are not auspicious for the resistance, let us admit that. In an article I wrote early in the Duterte regime, I said that carrying out thousands of killings in the war on drugs was a new variant of fascism – blitzkrieg fascism – where indiscriminate repression comes at the start rather than at the tail end of the drive towards authoritarianism, with the destruction of the separation of powers and elimination of political rights left to the end as mopping up operations in a political climate where the opposition has been terrorized into submission.

Contrary to the original plan, the opposition has not been terrorized into submission. But it is relatively weak and disunited. A great number of people are staying on the sidelines, as a regime with significant and vociferous backing from the elite and middle class tramples its way to authoritarian rule.

Fascism’s Appeal

Successful resistance is rooted in an acknowledgment of realities, while not being overwhelmed by them. We must first of all try to understand why the Duterte regime’s moves to lock up the political system appear to have backing from a significant portion of the citizenry.

Most fascist regimes have had popular support, and the reason for this is that they take advantage of people’s fears and frustrations, of the failure of democratic systems to deliver on their promise to protect them from the ravages of an economy that favors the powerful and the rich, of their toleration of pervasive corruption, of their inability to curb the use of democratic freedoms to advance selfish interests.  

In this regard, many Filipinos have cynically resigned themselves to pervasive corruption in the Philippine press, to the ubiquity of “envelopmental journalism,” that they feel an independent press is not worth fighting for.  In a sense, it is ironic that Rappler, an independent, crusading medium that was founded precisely to carry out the functions of a free, critical, and clean press that is not beholden to any vested interest is paying the price for the sins of others, including the despicable hacks that sold their their pens to the highest bidders and enriched themselves that are now in the forefront of the Duterte blitz against press freedom.

The Challenge

An open and plural political system where rights and freedoms are respected is not worth fighting for since it fails to delivers on the things that really matter to people: That is the subliminal message that Malacañang is promoting as it shuts down the institutions of free choice, free expression, and critical opposition one by one. It is, one must admit, a powerful message to the frustrated and the angry. To resist it we must first acknowledge its power, so we can successfully craft a more persuasive, more potent message, that while elite democracy has indeed failed, the administration’s solution – authoritarian rule – will bring about a worse outcome. Moreover, central to our response must not just be a warning of worse things to come but a positive program of genuine, as opposed to elite, democracy, of which a truly independent press, like Rapper, is a part. That struggle of ideas is one to which we must launch ourselves with not a moment to lose, with the underdog’s determination to prevail against the most powerful threat that our people have ever confronted.

Rappler may look like a lost cause, but it is only a lost cause if we who value its role believe the administration propaganda that it is a lost cause. In fact, the administration’s assault on it can turn out to be a blessing in disguise if a unified defense of Rappler becomes one of the launching pads of the long-postponed counter-offensive of the forces determined to save the country from a slipping into the darkness of authoritarian rule, again.  It is up to us to make that move. – Rappler.com

Walden Bello writes regularly for Rappler.  He made the only recorded resignation on principle in the history of Philippine Congress during the Aquino administration owing to differences with then President Benigno Aquino III on a number of issues, like the Disbursement Acceleration Program (DAP), the Mamasapano Raid, and the Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement (EDCA) with the United States.

Kung si Assistant Secretary for Presidential Communications Mocha Uson ang tatanungin, lumipat na sa Naga ang bulkang Mayon, ang mga tropang Honduras ay Pinoy, at lahat ng mamamahayag sa mainstream ay "presstitute".

Nasaan ang competence, compassion?

Sa kabila ng pagkakalat ng kasinungalingan habang nasa pwesto, ginawaran siya ng Thomasian Alumni Award for Government Service.

“Hindi isinaalang-alang ang “morality, uprightness” sa pagbibigay ng award kay Uson, ito ang paliwanag ng nagbitiw na pangulo ng University of Santo Tomas Alumni Association Inc na si Henry Tenedero. Ang pamantayan daw nila ay “competence, commitment at compassion.”

Parang hindi ’ata pasado ang ex-sexy entertainer at blogger na si Esther Margaux Uson sa dalawa sa tatlong C. Commitment lang ang pinamalas ng ale – commitment bilang pinakamakamandag na supporter ni Pangulong Rodrigo Duterte.

Sabit na sabit si Uson sa competence. Siya ang pangunahing tagapagtulak ng fake news sa bansa, at lahat nang 'yan bilang isang opisyal ng gobyerno na ang mandato'y magsulong ng epektibong komunikasyon sa ikabubuti ng bansa. Sa madaling salita, incompetent si Mocha!

At lalong sablay siya sa compassion – kung pagbabatayan ang mga tirada niya laban sa mga kritiko ng Pangulo tulad ni Bise Presidente Leni Robredo, Senador Antonio Trillanes at Senadora Leila de Lima. "Leni, you are stupid," sabi ni Uson kay Robredo. 

At bakit hindi isasama ang morality at uprightness sa pamantayan? 'Di ba't bantay ng moralidad at pagiging matuwid ang UST? Hindi ba dapat tingnan din kung paano namuhay-Thomasian ang bawa't nominado?

Ibabahagi namin ang words of (non) wisdom ni Ms Uson mula sa isa niyang Facebook Live post, na tila nagbabadya ng malamig na relasyon n'ya ngayon sa netizens: "At ang lamig lamig po dito ngayon.(cough) Ang lamig po. Grabe ang lamig. Ahh hindi naman po masyado malamig pero malamig sakto lang po. Parang ano, parang Baguio na mas malamig po."

Chill, mga kababayan. 'Wag na natin pag-usapan ang talas at dunong ni Mocha. Gusto ni Uson na mag-move-on na tayo, para maibaon na sa limot ito. Huwag mag-alala, marami pa 'yan! :)

Salamin, salamin

Ang pag-usapan natin ay ang nagyeyelo nating sentido bilang isang lipunan. Dahil sa bandang huli, salamin natin ang mga pinunong iniluluklok natin sa poder.

Bakit tayo umabot sa puntong ginagantimpalaan natin ang katangahan, kagarapalan, at kakupalan? Bakit tayo umabot sa puntong sumisikat ang mga Uson, RJ Nieto at Sass Sasot? Idagdag na ang wannabe at isa pa ring government official na si Lorraine Badoy na walang alam kundi manlait ng itsura ng katunggali?

At huwag kalilimutan ang spokesman ng Pangulo na si Harry Roque. Ayon sa dating kongresista na tinangkang sipain ng sariling partylist niya, matuwa daw tayo sa fake news dahil kung wala ito, di natin malalaman kung ano ang totoo! Ano daw? 'Yan ang "creative interpretation". Sa Filipino, lantarang pang-uulol.

Parangal na walang dangal?

Nakapangingilabot ang mga ehemplo ng tatawagin naming "Baliw Awards" sa panahon ni Pangulong Duterte.

Bakit binalahura ang mahabang kasaysayan ng kagalingan ng mga Thomasian sa isang award na 'di pinag-isipan?

Bakit binigyan si Ronald dela Rosa ng Gusi Peace Price International? Siya na tagpagpatupad ng Tokhang na kumitil ng higit 7,000 buhay?

At bakit binigyan ng Bagong Alyansang Makabayan si Pangulong Duterte noong Agosto 2016 – kung kailan kaulayaw pa ng Kaliwa ang administrasyon – ng 1st Gawad Supremo Award? Siya na arkitekto ng PH drug war na pangunahing bumibiktima sa mga dukha, inihanay kay Gat Andres Bonifacio na tagapagtanggol ng inaaping masa!

Baligtad na mundo

Ano na po ba ang nangyari sa atin, Bayan? Bakit itim na ang puti at puti ang itim? Bakit pinapalakpakan natin ang mali at pinupukol ang tama? Bakit natin sila inilalagay sa pedestal?

Bakit ingay ng perya ang nangingibabaw? Bakit kababawan ang nananaig sa pagbibigay ng award at sa pagpili ng mamumuno sa bansa? Bakit puro echo na lamang ang naririnig sa mga bulwagan ng pampublikong talastasan at matagal nang nagsiuwian ang lohika, pagsisiyasat, at pagsusuri?

Ito na ba ang ating mga values bilang Pilipino? Ito na ba ang buod ng ating pagkatao – ang maging hindi makatao, hindi rasyonal, hindi makatotohanan?

Tulad ng gulong ng buhay, minsan nasa ibabaw, minsan nasa ilalim. Umaasa kaming ayaw lang makipagsigawan ng mga nasa tuwid na pag-iisip. Ayaw lang pumatol ng mga disente, magalang, at mahinahon.

Umaasa pa rin kaming hindi pa ganap ang takipsilim. Naririnig na namin ang pag-iinot ng nagtutulugtulugan. Nararamdaman na natin ang pag-uumapaw ng galit at damdamin.

Panahon nang kumibo at sindihan ang mga kandila sa dilim. – Rappler.com 

It is time I talked about a large number of people who truly love the country and have done their best – the lowly career civil servants.

It has been months that I have been meaning to write this. I couldn’t. I will never know for sure that I am doing the right thing.

Because for me, and those who serve that I admire, the first rule of our service is not to brag about it. This is our highest calling. To serve our people is a work that demands the best of what we are and can be. It is the bottomline that makes us come on time, put in the hours, do the overtime and go home with our meager pay. Why brag about anything you do as a public servant when the mere fact that the people pay our salaries and give us the power to run their institutions is enough glory, honor, and flattery?

We do not ask whether Mang Pandoy or Aling Nena or Intoy Isko deserve our courtesy and efficiency. They definitely do. Rather, we ask whether we deserve the salaries they pay us. The situation is reversed for the civil servant. We ask not whether the people deserve our services but whether we deserve to be the ones to bring that service to them.

It is a never-ending task to serve and serve better. The good people in the civil service know that excellence and going-beyond is just what we should do – we are astounded when we are asked, “At ano naman ang ginawa mo para sa bayan?” Or even, “Perpekto ka ba?” We do our best but it is never enough and never the best. As long as there is a Filipino out there who is poor, or hungry or oppressed. It is not enough. Ano ang ginawa ko para sa bayan? Kulang na kulang po.

Many of us have spent years of service, have tried our best to be excellent at our jobs, have safeguarded the people’s money in their tens or in their billions in the vouchers we certify. Wala po kaming nagawa. Nanilbihan lang po. Buong buhay po. Wala naman yun.

There are thousands of us in government. The messenger, the doctor, the scientist, the administrative officer, the lawyer, the soldier. And we go on even if people around us steal, manipulate their power and self aggrandize in ways that make us squirm. We serve by displaying the same faith in our people – even if our bosses in the upper echelons of power never honor our work.

Honor and excellence

I joined government when I became a substitute instructor at the UP College of Social Work and Community Development. I didn’t have many responsibilities then. Except the rather grave one of shaping the young men and women who came to my class. I needed to teach them the most cutting-edge theories, give them up-to-date information.

While staying within the syllabus, I had to teach them the habits of life-long learning that would make them better citizens – critical thinking, compassion, love of our people. And I needed to make this enjoyable for them. I figured that since I was teaching the crème de la crème at the national university – it spoke very poorly of me as a teacher if anyone failed. I would come to class each session, teach until the end of the session. I would agonize about giving grades fairly and on time.

In order to do this, I had to make sure I read everything I could on the subject I taught. I had to test the things I taught against the realities of this poor country. I do not know when I began to realize what truth lay in UP’s motto: honor and excellence.

And sure, there were lousy colleagues. Those who sexually harassed students, those who bragged about their accomplishments instead of telling students that surpassing the teacher is always the goal of the teacher, those who delighted at failing half their classes regularly, those who gave everyone the same high grade because they couldn’t be bothered to compute, those who made learning so difficult satisfying their sadism, all the while claiming that they were doing this to teach their students about the real world.

I have since been promoted and have held positions of greater responsibility. And all it has done is call for more humility. To serve those who work under you and with you as hard as you serve the public. To ensure even more that I use my power even more responsibly.

The ethics of service

Part of being in government is knowing your place and role and the ethics of that job. And each of us has to learn the ethics of this. One of my students, a former soldier said, “I still find it difficult to have a political opinion because we soldiers must not be engaged in politics and follow civilian rule.”

As for me, I cannot dream of not being a critic because that is my role as a public intellectual. The clerk, the receptionist, the book keeper, the accountant and the judge – our jobs demand different standards of excellence. But if you are a public servant, you find out what your job demands.

If you are an information officer, you don’t spread fake news. If you are in the justice system you don’t pervert the system for the sake of political vendettas. And if you are in any way the appointing authority you make sure the people you appoint are qualified. Loyalty to you as a person is no match to loyalty to the institution and the standards of service.

Perpekto ka ba? Hindi. Tao lang. Ang dami-dami naming taong mataas ang kalidad ang serbisyo. And it is an insult, an absolute insult, to the men and women I have met in government service when incompetents, charlatans, power trippers are appointed merely because they are sycophants to the appointing authority.

And when you criticize the true public servant because we made a mistake we do not arrogantly defend ourselves by saying, “Are you, yourself perfect?” We do not defend ourselves by asking, “What have you done for the country?” As if criticizing us is an insult to the country and work we do. And we do not make “pity me” statements that we did not want the job and we are so aggrieved because we have to serve.

Our current leaders should know this. They come and go. But a core of career civil servants keeps the government going. They help the government survive every round of carpet-baggers and charlatans our broken political system throws into leadership.

Perpekto ka ba? Wala namang perpekto. Nguni’t napakaraming mahusay at tapat. Hindi nila ito sinisingil o ipagmamalaki. Kasi po, trabaho lang, serbisyo lang. Tao lang na sumusubok maging anghel dahil bayan ang ipinaglalaban.– Rappler.com

Sylvia Estrada Claudio is currently the Dean of the College of Social Work and Community Development, University of the Philippines

During the Senate hearing on fake news on Tuesday, January 30, Senator Benigno Aquino IV posed a challenge to Presidential Communications Secretary Martin Andanar: Can he tell pro-Duterte bloggers to stop the use of hate speech and misleading information?

This will be a true test for Andanar’s leadership and effectiveness as a communications chief. Can Andanar rise to the challenge? 

At the Senate hearing, Andanar was hesitant to take it on. He at first denied knowing the people who run the pro-Duterte sites. 

“Hindi ko po kilala 'yung mga may-ari ng mga Facebook pages na 'yon, but I can certainly ask people around kung kilala nila itong mga may-ari ng mga Duterte pages (I don’t know the owners of these Facebook pages, but I can certainly ask people around if they know who own these Duterte pages),” he told Aquino. 

Under Aquino’s persistent questioning, Andanar admitted that he did know the members of the “core communications group” of President Rodrigo Duterte’s campaign. While he was not active in the campaign, he said he met them after Duterte’s electoral victory.

Aquino then rephrased his original challenge, this time framing it as being for the benefit of the PCOO.

“Maybe for the benefit also of PCOO, when you give presentations about your fight against fake news, that even the sites you are allied with, you can talk to the members who organized them in the 2016 campaign?” asked Aquino.

To this, Andanar was ready to say, “I will reach out to the original communications core group.”

Who are the members of this core group?

One of them is likely Nic Gabunada, the man who directed the social media team of Duterte’s 2016 campaign.

When Rappler spoke to him in June 2016, he admitted there were bad apples among the volunteer netizens they had tapped. These were the netizens who would threaten and aggressively insult anyone who dared oppose Duterte’s candidacy. 

Gabunada claimed then that the social media team would immediately respond.

“If there are people whom we thought are doing something that is no longer good, we call their attention,” he explained.  

At one point, he had even asked someone close to Duterte to tell the volunteer netizens "to stop bashing.”

With the current social media environment, did the team’s efforts work? Will Andanar be more effective?

Contradicting policies 

For too long, Andanar’s PCOO has relied on rabid pro-Duterte bloggers to promote the administration’s policies, but held them at arm’s length when they did anything controversial.

Case in point: Mocha Uson’s Facebook “blog.”

The Facebook page MOCHA USON BLOG, now with 5.5 million followers, is often touted by Andanar as the reason why she is an effective communicator of government policies. He has called her a “social media rockstar” who has built a following precisely because of her hardcore online support for the President.

This following and online support is synonymous to her blog.

When she participates in Duterte’s trips abroad, she goes live on Facebook to talk to overseas Filipino workers or to interview Cabinet secretaries.

In fact, it's hard to say if she does any other work on these trips than go live on her blog or star in a social video also posted on her blog.

It would be absurd to say she is doing these things as a private citizen or blogger and not as a government official. Her status as a government official is precisely what gave her access to attend such events and talk to such high-ranking executives. 

The PCOO never questioned her use of government resources and time spent on these Facebook interviews posted on her private blog.

Yet when Uson uses the same platform to comment on a senator’s private parts or label journalists as paid hacks, Andanar is quick to say her page does not represent government. 

“Mocha Uson Blog is not an agency of PCOO,” Andanar told Radyo Pilipinas' Erwin Tulfo the day after the hearing.

“So if they judge the PCOO, they should not judge it based on what comes out of that blog,” he added.

But he’s had to capitulate. Because he’s often asked to explain the gaffes of Uson,  his subordinate, Andanar has asked Uson to delete certain posts.  

“I have called her out a few times, and she has also taken down a few of her remarks,” Andanar said in the Senate hearing on Tuesday.

It's obvious Andanar was smarting from the focus on Uson's blog and how he was made to answer for the controversies hounding it.

"What the enemy is saying is, because of Mocha, everything becomes fake news, which is very unfair for the entire organization," he said in a dwIZ radio interview.

At the time of the Senate hearing, Uson was in Milan on the request of Foreign Secretary Alan Peter Cayetano, to attend a command conference of over 30 Philippine ambassadors to countries in Europe, Africa, and the Middle East.

Andanar’s clout

If getting Uson to toe the line isn’t difficult enough, Andanar must now get other pro-Duterte bloggers, citizens who are not technically in government, to temper their language as well. 

This is not going to be easy. Any suggestions for them to stop using “offensive, inflammatory, or provocative language” have been violently resisted by bloggers. 

One blogger even said in a PCOO forum that it’s precisely this type of language that gives them “the reach we have.” 

But Andanar, during the Senate hearing, confirmed that aside from condemning the spread of false information, PCOO also does not accept hate speech.

"I just wanted to clarify, even hate speech, in your view is not appropriate in our society, is that right?" asked Aquino.

"That's correct," responded Andanar in Filipino.

If talking to the account owners won’t work, Andanar has only one recourse: to talk to Duterte himself.

Only a clear message from the President to stop ad hominem attacks against his critics could change the behavior of pro-Duterte bloggers – that is, if their devotion to him means they will follow his every word.

Andanar has his work cut out for him. – Rappler.com

On Monday, January 29, former senator and losing vice presidential candidate Ferdinand "Bongbong" Marcos Jr held a press conference, where he reiterated his accusation of cheating against the Commission on Elections (Comelec), Smartmatic, and Vice President Leni Robredo. 

You will recall that on August 29, 2017, the Presidential Electoral Tribunal dismissed his earlier claims that Robredo cheated him by rigging the transmission of votes to the Comelec Transparency Server. This time, he claims that Robredo cheated him through SD cards, which were supposedly formatted in secret hubs surreptitiously authorized by the Comelec. According to him, the rigged SD cards instructed the vote-counting machines (VCM) to count in favor of Robredo regardless of the actual vote fed into them. 

To prove his allegation, Marcos presented what he called “shocking” evidence: 5 ballot images. Three of them purportedly show a case of “overvotes,”or where the voters erroneously cast multiple votes for vice president yet the machines counted them in favor of Robredo. The two other ballots showed shades for Marcos but were not counted by the machine. Marcos also questioned the presence of boxes in the ballot images and the fact that the ovals in the original ballots have disappeared in the scanned images.

READ ALSO: What Marcos Jr should do to prove election fraud

To determine if these marks on the ballot images are anomalous, we should first understand basic concepts in our automated election system.

What are ballot images? 

Ballot images are scanned copies of the physical ballots used during elections. Every time a voter feeds his ballot to the VCM, the latter scans it, encrypts the scanned image for security, and stores the image on the SD card. Later, the SD cards containing the images are backed up and stored in a secured Comelec facility.

Why is there a need for ballot images? 

Ballot images are a security feature of the automated election system. It prevents the old-school cheating scheme where losing candidates would tamper with the original paper ballots, file an election protest before courts, and "prove" their case using the doctored ballots. This was prevalent in manual elections, as the paper ballots were not only the primary evidence of the votes, but the only available evidence. 

With ballot images, however, losing candidates may tamper with the physical ballots all they want, but the Comelec retains scanned copies of the originals. Thus, the poll body will be able to detect and debunk any post-election tampering by comparing the images with the physical ballots.

Since their introduction in 2010, ballot images have been successfully used to expose post-election fraud. Even the Supreme Court, in a string of jurisprudence, has elevated their reliability to a level not just equal, but even higher than, the physical ballots.

What is this threshold?

In the topmost portion of the ballot, the voter is instructed, using the official marker provided by the Comelec, to fully shade the inside of the ovals corresponding to the chosen candidate. The instruction shows an example of the proper shade that the VCM will admit as a valid vote. 

The Comelec, however, anticipates, as it should, that not everyone will comply with the instructions or even read them. This where the so-called “threshold” comes in. The threshold refers to the minimum amount of shade in the oval which the VCM will admit as a valid vote. 

What percentage of shade is considered the minimum threshold? Republic Act Number 8436, as amended, is silent on this. The determination of the shading threshold is, however, deemed included in the general authority given by Congress to the Comelec to use an automated election system. So far, the percentage of the threshold has varied and been continuously adjusted by the Comelec every automated election. In 2010, the threshold set by the Comelec was at 50% of the oval; in 2013, it was significantly lowered to 20%; in 2016, it was slightly increased to 25%.

Why does the Comelec keep on changing this? It must be understood that setting the threshold too low would cause the VCM to interpret dirt, spots, and accidental marks as valid votes. On the other hand, if set too high, there is a risk that the machine will not count those shades which are less than full, and this could lead to disenfranchisement. Like Goldilocks finding her perfect porridge, the Comelec settled at 25% in 2016.

How does this rule on threshold play out?

If the shade in the oval reaches the 25% threshold, it is considered a valid vote by the VCM and counted in favor of the corresponding candidate. A shade less than the 25% threshold is not considered a valid vote and therefore disregarded as stray or a vote not credited to any candidate. 

In a single slot position – say, for the position of vice president – when two shades satisfy the threshold, the VCM will interpret it as a double vote. A double vote is considered a stray vote and, thus, the vote will not be credited to either of the candidates.

If this is the rule, then why were the ballots presented by Marcos showing apparent overvotes credited to Robredo, and not considered as stray votes? A closer look will show that the shades for Robredo satisfy the threshold, while the shades for Marcos did not. Clearly, the VCM interpreted the compliant shades for Robredo as valid votes and disregarded the others as stray. While there are two conflicting manifestations of intent to vote, of the two, the one with the fuller shade can be safely deemed as the clearer manifestation of the voter’s intent to vote, thus taking precedence.

Why are there ‘boxes’ around the shades?

The boxes on the ballot images are one of the improvements introduced in the 2016 elections, a feature not present in the 2010 and 2013 ballot images. The boxes are intended as visual indicators that a particular shade has passed the 25% threshold requirement.

Why is there a need to adopt this feature? The boxes around the shades are the VCM’s way of telling revisors – or those who manually count the physical ballots in recount proceedings – which among the shades passed the 25% threshold (boxed) and those that fell below (no box).

The human eye may see shades in the oval, but it can never be certain as to its exact amount. The VCM, on the other hand, has the technological capability to determine with precision whether a shade satisfies a threshold, be it set at 1%, 99%, or 25%. Thus, following the 25% threshold in the 2016 elections, a 24% shade will be rejected by the VCM being below the minimum, a level of precision and sophistication which the human eye does not have. This VCM versus human eye appreciation of shades can present confusion during the recount proceedings, especially in how to treat apparent double votes. But this is a more complicated issue deserving its own article. 

Why are ovals in the original ballots not visible on printed ballot images?

The explanation for this is very simple. The ovals in the original ballots are deliberately printed in red precisely for them to be invisible to the VCMs. Why print in red and not in black so they can be seen on the ballot images? The VCM scanner sees in black and white. When the ovals are printed in black and are detected, it can affect how the machine measures whether a shade satisfies the threshold or not.

In the end, all of these “shocking” anomalies pointed out by Marcos are not evidence of cheating but are just new features or improvements in the automated voting system, which Marcos unfortunately did not understand.

It must be recalled that the 2016 VCMs are entirely new machines, different from the precinct count optical scan (PCOS) machines used in the 2010 and 2013 elections. All of these changes, including the new format of the ballot images, have been reviewed by political parties and independently reviewed by United States-based company SLI Global Solutions (SLI) as required by RA 9369. The features should not have come as a shock to election observers.

However, to prevent surprises in the future or to prevent anyone from mistakenly crying foul over nothing, the Comelec should completely, patiently, and publicly disclose all changes to the voting system down to that innocent red oval or that innocuous box. Most Filipinos now, especially millennials, are tech-literate and can easily grasp these concepts. With the public being well- and fully-informed of the voting technology and its intricacies, it is easier to arrest any misinformation or disinformation thrown around to discredit the electoral system or any winning candidate. – Rappler.com 

Emil Marañon III is one of the election lawyers consulted by the camp of Vice President Leni Robredo, whose victory is being contested by former senator Ferdinand Marcos Jr. Marañon served as chief of staff of retired Comelec Chairman Sixto Brillantes Jr. He graduated from the SOAS, University of London, where he studied Human Rights, Conflict and Justice as a Chevening scholar. 

May isang linya si Gary Oldman, bilang Winston Churchill, sa pelikulang The Darkest Hour: "Lost causes are the only ones worth fighting for." Sa pinaikling interpretasyon sa Filipino, "mas masarap ipaglaban ang mga talo/talunan."  Ang Rappler ay isang "talunan." Ngunit totoo na nga bang talunan ang Rappler?

Malakas na puwersa laban sa Rappler

Kung gagamitin ang linya ni Oldman-bilang-Churchill, angkop ito sa sitwasyon ng Rappler dahil, tulad ng ginawa ng army ni Hitler noong 1940 laban sa kaaway, pinagtutulungan ng army o puwersa ni Duterte ngayon ang Rappler, pagkatapos nilang patahimikin ang iba pang oposisyon bago pa ang kampanya laban sa Rappler. Ang sinasabi ng puwersa ni Duterte ay isyu ito ng pagiging konstitusyonal, na nilabag ng Rappler ang Konstitusyon. Pero kahit mismong mga kaalyado ng administrasyon ay paiwas ang mga sinasabi tungkol sa isyung ito – alam kasi nilang bahagi pa rin ito ng manipulasyon ng administrasyon para mapatahimik ang isang independyenteng media. Mismong si Duterte ang naglunsad ng kampanyang ito sa kanyang State of the Nation noong Hulyo 2017.

Sa ibang panahon, ang kuwestyon ng pag-aari sa media ay isang mahalagang isyu na dapat mapag-usapan, ngunit hindi sa panahong ito na ang isyu talaga ay ang ambisyon ng administrasyon na magtatag ng diktadurya; na ang layunin talaga ay tanggalin ang sinuman o anumang hahadlang sa ambisyon ng gobyerno. Bahagi pa rin ito ng mga naging aksyon ng administrasyon, tulad ng pagpapalibing kay Marcos, pagpapakulong kay Senador Leila de Lima, tangkang pagpapatalsik kay Chief Justice Maria Lourdes Sereno, at desisyon ng SEC laban sa Rappler. Lahat ng ito ay bahagi ng opensiba na gawing permanenteng kalagayan ang pagpapahigpit ng sistemang pampulitika, kaya dapat itong tutulan.

Opensibang pasista

Totoong hindi maganda ang kondisyon para sa pakikibaka. Sa isa kong naisulat na artikulo, sinabi ko na isang uri ng pasismo – pasismong nasa opensiba – ang isinagawa ng administrasyon ni Duterte sa pamamagitan ng tokhang o giyera sa droga sa umpisa pa lang ng kanyang pamamahala. Matindi agad ang represyon para sa layuning awtoritaryan sa halip na gawin niya ito nang hakbang-hakbang tungo sa pagtatapos ng kanyang termino. Sa nangyari, pagkukumpleto na lang ng opensiba ang pagtanggal sa separasyon ng kapangyarihan sa mga sangay ng gobyerno at pagwasak ng mga karapatang pulitikal, dahil nanahimik na ang oposisyon. 

Kabaligtaran ng orihinal na plano ng administrasyon, nanahimik at sumunod na lang ang oposisyon hindi dahil natakot ito; mas resulta ito ng pagiging mahina at watak-watak ng oposisyon. Karamihan din ay nasa gilid lang. Kaya’t namamayagpag ang rehimeng ito tungo sa awtoritaryanismo dahil may sapat at lantarang suporta ng mayayaman at panggitnang uri. 

May dating ang pasismo

Para maging matagumpay ang pagtutol o pakikibaka, dapat na nakaugat ito sa pagkilala sa mga realidad. Dapat maintindihan kung bakit nakakakuha ng suporta sa kalakhan ng mamamayan ang tunguhing awtoritaryan ng administrasyon ni Duterte. 

Karamihan ng mga rehimeng pasista noong nakaraan ay nagkaroon din ng suportang popular. Ginawa ng mga itong bentahe ang takot at pagkadismaya ng mga tao at ang kabiguan ng mga sistemang demokratiko na ihatid ang pangakong pangalagaan ang mamamayan sa kahirapan at laban sa mga makapangyarihan at mayayaman, laban sa korapsyon. Mismong sa ilalim din ng mga demokratikong sistema ay natatapakan ang mga karapatan ng mamamayan dahil sa mga makasariling interes. 

Dahil dito, maraming Filipino ang tinatanggap na lang na may korapsyon sa media, ang "envelopmental journalism," kaya't di nila nakikitang karapat-dapat na ipaglaban ang isang malaya at independyenteng media. Sa ganitong anggulo, tila Rappler, na isang tagapagtaguyod ng malaya, kritikal, at malinis na media, ang nagbabayad ngayon ng mga nakaraang kasalanan, pati na ng kasalanan ng mga mamamahayag na ngayon ay bayaran na rin ng administrasyong Duterte. Ang mga bayarang ito rin ngayon ang nangunguna sa kampanya laban sa kalayaaan sa pamamahayag.

Ang hamon

Kinakagat ng mga tao ang mensaheng ito ng Malacañang: ang isang bukas at demokratikong sistema, kung saan ang mga tao ay makakatamasa ng mga kalayaan at karapatan, ay di karapat-dapat ipaglaban dahil bigo ang sistemang ito sa pagtataguyod ng interes at kapakinabangan ng mamamayan. Isang makapangyarihang mensahe ito para sa mga mamamayan na matagal nang bigo at dismayado. Kailangang matapatan ito ng isa ring makapangyarihang mensahe na bagaman bigo ang sistemang "elite democracy," hindi rin solusyon ang awtoritaryanismo, at mas malala pa nga ang magiging resulta nito. Ang mensahe ay di lang dapat nakatuon sa mga problemang magiging dala ng awtoritaryanismo kundi maglaman din ng mga alternatibong programa. Ano ang dapat alternatibo sa elite democracy, kung saan ang isang tunay na malayang press, tulad ng Rappler, ay maaaring maging bahagi? Kagyat ang labanan ng mga ideya at walang panahong dapat sayangin dahil nahaharap tayo sa isa sa mga pinakamakapangyarihang banta.

Kung titingnan, maaaring parang talunan na nga ang isyu ng Rappler. Ngunit magiging talunan lang ito kung paniniwalaan ang propaganda ng administrasyon. Sa katunayan, ang pag-atakeng ito ng administrasyon sa malayang pamamahayag ay magiging positibo kung magbibigay-daan ito sa nagkakaisang depensa para sa Rappler at ito ay magiging tuntungan pa ng opensiba para tutulan o pigilan ang pagdausdos ng bansa sa kadiliman sa ilalim ng isang awtoritaryang paghahari. Nasa atin ang pagkilos. 

(Basahin ang bersiyon sa Ingles dito.) 

– Rappler.com  

Si Walden Bello ay madalas magsulat para sa Rappler. Dati siyang kinatawan sa Mababang Kapulungan ngunit nagbiitiw dahil as prinsipyo dahil sa pagkakaiba ng posisyon sa dating administrasyon Aquino sa iba-ibang isyu, kasama ang DAP, Mamasapano, at yung EDCA.  Ang pagbibitiw niya ay ang kaisa-isang pagbibitiw dahil sa prinsipyo sa buong kasaysayan ng Kongreso. 

Whenever I see Mayon volcano in the news these days because of its eruption, I don’t just see ashes and smoke compulsively kissing the sky or lava flowing down its slope. I don’t just sense the fear, pain, or panic of its surrounding residents. It also reminds me of my eldest brother.

In May of last year, the day after one of my sisters got married in Daet, Camarines Norte, I, together with my eldest brother Kuya Oni, his wife and two kids, and my youngest brother Ronnel went on a journey to transform the Google images in our heads into a real one of Mayon, one of the 2008 Seven Wonders of the World located in Albay in the Bicol region about 500 kilometers south of Manila.

I can still clearly remember how I jumped from one humongous rock to another in my attempt to capture the quintessential shot of its perfect cone as Kazuo Ishiguro’s captivating words in his book, The Remains of the Day, flashed in my memory: “What is pertinent is the calmness of beauty, its sense of restraint. It is as though the land knows of its own beauty, its own greatness, and feels no need to shout it.”

It was not a spur-of-the-moment decision but a planned adventure to witness with our own eyes Mayon’s grandiosity.  Spending time with our kuya – an overseas Filipino worker (OFW) in Qatar – is unpredictable.  Sometimes, it would take two or 3 years before we see each other again.

“Who would like to join us tomorrow?” Kuya Oni asked the other members of my family. “Let’s finalize it tonight.”

“Where are we going?” I asked him with excitement.

“To Mayon, Ben,” he answered. “Prepare your things, we’ll leave early in the morning.” 

“At last, we’ll see the ‘perfect cone’!” I said.

This conversation may just be a mundane for you. But not for us.

When my father died about a couple of decades ago, Kuya had to mature fast and help my mother in taking care of the family. He was still in college then and I was 9. I was oblivious to the encumbrance that had been swiftly heaped on his shoulders. I thought my father would return someday, that he just had to rest for a while. But after months passed by, little by little, the reality of his death dawned on me.

Kuya was a force of nature, a stratovolcano like Mayon if you will, with his periodic eruptions. In his attempt to discipline us, he imposed his own version of martial law at home. Don’t play outside when it’s already dark or when it’s raining. Take a nap in the afternoon after school. Don’t get into a fight with your siblings. No noise or chitchat. Buy me this and that. When I call out your name, run and stand in front of me.

When you’re a child and you’re forced to stay inside the house while your playmates are enjoying basketball or you hear them giggling and shouting at the top of their lungs under the pouring rain, you question everything even though you’re frightened. Why is he doing this to us? 

We didn’t talk that much. He was preoccupied with a lot of things: work, relationship, friends. Looking back, I couldn’t recall a time he divulged his true self or his softer side to me. Rather, there was a wall I couldn’t get through. But as I grew older, I understood why he was like that.

He had to project a strong image for us or else we could have broken down. We needed a source of inspiration, courage, and strength and he provided all that. He finished his degree on time and he is continuously developing himself as a professional in a foreign land. In college, he was considered as one of the outstanding students in his electrical engineering class. The back cover of his thesis is scribbled with praises on how well he handled himself with his peers, professors, and yes, even admirers. He achieved a lot despite the financial challenges he had to face.

During our trip to Mayon, while driving, he made jokes about the distinct smell which emanated from the rows of carabao poop at the side of the road. Like a TV announcer, he gave a blow-by-blow update on the remaining time before we reached our destination. We screamed when we had a first look of the cone-shaped land formation at the right side of our car as we cruised the highway. But seconds later, to our dismay, the vision disappeared as clouds devoured the volcano.

As I held a cup of chili-pili ice cream with the Cagsawa Ruins as my backdrop, I glanced at Kuya. The unfamiliarity and awkwardness forged by his long absence vanished instantaneously. I saw him smile while he carried his daughter and I smiled back at them. It was then that it occurred to me how much he has changed in his ways, actions, and temper. I sensed calmness, peace, and serenity in his eyes. Time and distance indubitably help us transform ourselves for the better.

While Mayon continues to spew multi-storey plumes of smoke and ash and hurl pyroclastic material down its slopes, I don’t just see its wrath. What it reminds me more than anything is that one crisp afternoon in May of last year. It was that peculiar, tranquil moment when I, together with my eldest kuya, stared at Mayon with a sense of hope that someday, if given a chance, we’ll go on another adventure together, share stories of triumphs and failures, and invigorate the sleeping strands between us hanging above the vast ocean or the incalculable, free-flowing molten lava. – Rappler.com

Benre J. Zenarosa (zenarosabenre.wordpress.com) is a freelance writer. He's the recipient of the 2016 Lasallian Scholarum Award for Outstanding Published Column Article on Youth and Education in a Nationally Circulated Publication. He loves writing stories and letters in his head while riding a jam-packed train on his way to work. 

Senator Leila de Lima will complete a full year of imprisonment on February 24. It’s not imprisonment, only detention, her jailers might correct us. But no trick of technical hair-splitting can minimize the injustice done her. It only adds insult to injury.

Make no mistake about it: Leila de Lima is a prisoner of conscience. Indeed, she is the conscience of our time. Her story is our story. We can only ignore it at our peril: our very rights and freedoms turn on it.

If we allow ourselves to be cowed or otherwise led into believing she is a criminal or an enemy, deserving therefore to be locked away, we will be abandoning our every good sense; we will be walking into our own prison cell, for that's what life is like in a world turned upside down after Rodrigo Duterte's heavy hands have worked it over.

But, really, how can anyone be mistaken about De Lima's case when there is actually no case? The plot is simply too ridiculous to be credible.

Duterte's justice secretary forms a choir of drug-dealing convicts to testify against her. It’s an enlistment they cannot refuse. But what have they got to lose anyway? They are all in for life.

And so, they shed their prison clothes, slip into decent civvies, and proceed to sing their song. As justice secretary once herself, De Lima, they intone, allowed them to continue their drug trade from prison and took a share in the profits.

Further, to create the impression that she is by trait no good, inquisitors from the Department of Justice and the Duterte-controlled Congress rake up a private romance of hers and misrepresent it, spectacularly, on national television.

Certain issues arising from De Lima's case have gone up to the highest court. At every instance, she was found deserving of all that had befallen her and denied any relief, not even such standard sort as bail for provisional and limited liberty.

But what had her accusers got on her really? Nothing but the word of men condemned to prison for the rest of their lives (unless pardoned by the President) for far graver crimes than untrustworthiness and conscripted by the country’s chief jailer himself for his plot – a plot so simplistic and indeterminate he has to this day not made up his mind as to what exact charge to finally bring.

As for concrete evidence, not one penny of dirty money or one gram of illicit drug has been presented.

The case has been put through the normal judicial process, true, but that does not make for any guarantee that justice is being done or any justification of De Lima’s incarceration.

In Duterte’s presidency, the pattern of voting in the Supreme Court itself scarcely inspires trust in the process.  At least two of its rulings – apart yet from the one denying de Lima’s plea for liberty on an invalid warrant of arrest – could only have pleased Duterte: one  acquitted former president Gloria Arroyo, the other hero’s burial for the dictator Ferdinand Marcos. By its acquittal of Arroyo, the Supreme Court also supplied the precedent that inspired the graft court, Sandiganbayan, to grant bail to former Senator Jinggoy Estrada, also accused of plunder, a crime for which no bail is normally allowed.

Arroyo, Marcos’ heirs, and Estrada’s father, Joseph, mayor of Manila and himself a former president and plunder convict, who owes Arroyo his pardon, all happen to be chief allies of Duterte’s.

The Supreme Court is composed mostly of Arroyo and Duterte appointees, and they tend to vote as a bloc.

De Lima’s persecution, in any case, goes beyond politics; it is personal and pathological: she has crossed a certified narcissist and autocrat. The collision goes back 8 years. As chairperson of the Commission on Human Rights, De Lima began to investigate Duterte, mayor then of his native Davao City, for allegations of death-squad murders.

As senator, she continued hounding him in his presidency as similar allegations resounded around his war on drugs, which by then had already left too many dead (the number has since grown to several thousands). At a Senate hearing she chaired, a colleague in the opposition, Antonio Trillanes IV, presented a confessed assassin for Duterte who testified that Duterte had ordered a plot against her, to be carried out when she traveled to Davao for her initial inquiry.

The testimony triggered efforts to get her out of the way. On short order, she was robbed of her committee in the Senate, then of her very dignity, as the tables were turned on her and her most private life was transmogrified and paraded at public hearings in both houses of Congress; in the end she was robbed of her freedom.   

That’s why Leila de Lima’s story bears constant retelling. Her trials are our trials, her tragedy is our tragedy. – Rappler.com

The Senate committee on public information and mass media recently conducted its second inquiry into the issue of fake news. Among those invited were government officials from the Presidential Communications Operations Office (PCOO), journalists, and bloggers. 

Ideally, the inquiry might have been a venue for serious academic debate on the breadth and scope of free speech, the wisdom of imposing intermediary liability on social media, and the consequences of any alleged use by the government of fake news to pursue its agenda. 

Quite disappointingly, though, it served as a ground for the grandstanding of legislators who finally found the opportunity to confront bloggers and writers who had written something displeasing about them in the past. 

The inquiry also showcased the limited understanding by Malacañang's own communications officials of free expression, as they constantly blurred the line between political opinion and fake news, deliberately or negligently. 

If anything, the inquiry exhibited a disdainfully unsophisticated understanding of fake news in the Philippines.

For one, the focus of the inquiry was misplaced, leaving no proper and thorough discussion of the more relevant issues. The Revised Penal Code already punishes the spread of false news in Article 154, par. 1, which provides:

Article 154. Unlawful use of means of publication and unlawful utterances. – The penalty of arresto mayor and a fine ranging from P200 to P1,000 pesos shall be imposed upon:

1. Any person who by means of printing, lithography, or any other means of publication shall publish or cause to be published as news any false news which may endanger the public order, or cause damage to the interest or credit of the State

Thus, any discussion concerning the regulation of fake news must necessarily first deliberate the propriety of amending, repealing, or retaining this penal provision. 

Second, there was no firm commitment on the part of the committee to formulate a definition of fake news and distinguish it from other forms of speech (e.g. political dissent and satire).

Communications Secretary Martin Andanar even boldly claimed that "hate posts" are considered fake news, and had to be lectured on the difference between political opinion and fake news by lawyers present in the inquiry. (READ: Test for Andanar: Can he stop fake news, hate speech from pro-Duterte accounts?)

Under the present circumstances, there may be a need to look at the international standards on freedom of expression and the experiences of other countries which may provide guidance and shed light on the issue of fake news.

First and foremost, the Philippines is a party to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR). By virtue of the incorporation clause in Article II, Section 2 of the 1987 Constitution, the provisions of the ICCPR form part of the laws of the land. Article 19, par. 2 of the ICCPR provides: 

"2. Everyone shall have the right to freedom of expression; this right shall include freedom to seek, receive, and impart information and ideas of all kinds, regardless of frontiers, either orally, in writing or in print, in the form of art, or through any other media of his choice."

In this connection, any restriction on the right to freedom of expression must comply with the 3-part test in Article 19, par. 3 of the ICCPR – it must be provided by law, it must pursue a legitimate State aim, and it must be necessary in a democratic society.

Second, the special rapporteurs on freedom of expression of 4 international organizations, including the United Nations, issued a Joint Declaration on Freedom of Expression and "Fake News," Disinformation and Propaganda. Special Rapporteurs have the mandate to investigate States and ensure States' compliance with their international human rights obligations. Among the key principles declared are the following:

a. General prohibitions on the dissemination of information based on vague and ambiguous ideas, including "false news" or "non-objective information," are incompatible with international standards for restrictions on freedom of expression.

b. Criminal defamation laws are unduly restrictive and should be abolished. Civil law rules on opportunity and fail to prove the truth of those statements and also benefit from other defences, such as fair comment.

c. State actors should not make, sponsor, encourage or further disseminate statements which they know or reasonably should know to be false (disinformation) or which demonstrate a reckless disregard for verifiable information (propaganda).

d. State actors should, in accordance with their domestic and international legal obligations and their public duties, take care to ensure that they disseminate reliable and trustworthy information, including about matters of public interest, such as the economy, public health, security and the environment.

Third, the phenomenon of fake news is not unique to the Philippines. Other countries that are also parties to the ICCPR have had cases on fake news filed and litigated in their courts. 

International cases

In the 2004 Ugandan case of Obbo and Another v. Attorney General, two journalists were charged with publishing false news when they reported that the commander of the Uganda Revenue's Anti-Smuggling Unit played a key role in the transfer of gold consignment from the Democratic Republic of Congo to Uganda. 

The Ugandan Constitutional Court ruled in favor of the journalists and decided to apply the constitutional right to free speech in the case. In its decision, the Court stated that "applying the constitutional protection to false expressions is not to 'uphold falsity' as implied in the majority judgment. The purpose is to avoid the greater danger of 'smothering alternative views' of fact or opinion."

In the 2014 Zambian case of Chipenzi v. People, the journalists published a news story that the Zambian secret police had recruited a number of foreign militia into the main stream police force. They were arrested for violating a criminal law punishing the dissemination of false information. 

The High Court of Zambia ruled that the said criminal law was unconstitutional for being overbroad as it not only prohibited false news but also punished those with honest beliefs that their statements were true. The law was held to be unconstitutional also because the accused had to prove that he lacked knowledge of the falsity of the information before he published it in order for the courts to acquit him. 

This violated the presumption of innocence of the accused as he now has the burden of proving his innocence instead of the State having to prove his guilt.

Finally, in Grech and Montanaro v. Malta, a commercial libel case decided by the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) in 1997, the accused were editors of a newspaper that published a letter from an anonymous reader accusing a company of selling tuna fish as sardines. 

The Maltese domestic Press Act imposes monetary sanctions and payment of damages against those that publish statements which they knew, or ought to have known, to be false, and which causes damage to any business concern. 

The accused editors were ordered to pay a certain sum to the maligned company. During trial, they did not dispute that the information in the letter they published were false. The damages caused the company were also firmly established. Hence, the ECHR found that the imposition of monetary sanctions and damages was not a violation of the editors' right to freedom of expression.

Lessons can be learned from the international community in order to properly address the issue of fake news in the Philippines. 

At the outset, the difference in treatment between fake news propagated by ordinary citizens and fake news peddled by the government should be recognized. 

We must all be reminded that the Bill of Rights in the Constitution contains safeguards for citizens against the government, and that the government cannot invoke the same rights to the prejudice of ordinary people. 

The right to freedom of expression dictates that no criminal penalty should be imposed for fake news driven by ordinary citizens, and that the corresponding penalty under the civil laws should suffice. There is greater good in protecting the right to freedom of expression, especially of those who dissent and disagree, than there is to penalize those who spread false information. 

However, there is a need for heavier sanctions to be imposed upon public officials who spread fake news, most especially against members of the free society, including the press and the advocates of civil liberties. 

Government officials should be made to bear higher standards in disseminating information considering that they have all the resources necessary to verify the truthfulness of their statements. They are in a position of power and influence, and spreading fake news is nothing but an abuse of such power.

Any regulation on fake news affects all sides of the political spectrum. More than fake news and false information, however, the greater debate should focus on ideas and opinion. I do not believe that the free marketplace of ideas should be a venue that tolerates misinformation. Instead, it should be a place where people can freely express their opinions and ideas on subjects that matter to the lives of the Filipino. 

I believe that the best way to combat fake news is through the truth. Ultimately, Filipinos will know the truth, our truth. However, we will never get there if those who are brave enough to speak are silenced on the pretense that they spread fake or false information. – Rappler.com

Gil Anthony E. Aquino is a lawyer from the Center for International Law (Centerlaw). He is also affiliated with the Advocates for Freedom of Expression Coalition in South East Asia (AFEC-SEA). Research materials were provided by law students Hussein Balt and Christopher Alcantara. 

If you are confused about where the federalism/Cha-Cha train is going, you’re not the only one. Its main proponents are themselves confused. They certainly are working at cross purposes.

Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez wants a new Constitution ready for a plebiscite by May, 3 months from now. Senate President Koko Pimentel says that’s too early, he supports his Senate colleagues’ demand for separate voting in a Con-Ass or Constituent Assembly. Former Supreme Court chief justice Renato Puno, chair of President Rodrigo Duterte’s long delayed consultative committee on charter change, does not want a Con-Ass, he prefers a Constitutional Convention.

Speaker Alvarez and Senate President Pimentel have provided the opposition with its two main issues, “no elections (No-el) and the extension of President Duterte’s term. Opposition to past attempts at Cha-Cha, under presidents Fidel Ramos, Joseph Estrada and Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, mobilized precisely around these two issues. Duterte has denied wanting his term extended. They’ve tried to explain away these tactical errors by saying these would be the “logical consequence” of Cha-Cha. What cannot be explained away is the “political intent” underlying Cha-Cha justifications.

The most obvious is Speaker Alvarez. He has locked horns with the two strongest political clans in his province, the Del Rosarios and Floirendos. He may not get reelected in the 2019 elections, thus “no-el”.

Together with the PDP Laban Federalism Institute, he has crafted a proposal for a new parliament which will be composed of members from existing single member districts and party representatives elected in regional proportional representation elections. The current members of the House of Representatives, party list and district members are thus assured of retaining their seats, especially if there’s “no-el” in 2019.

The Speaker also has goodies in his political cookie jar for senators. He proposes that senators whose terms end in 2019 would have their terms extended. His problem is that he cannot be sure he can get the ¾ vote (18 ) in the Senate to get a new draft constitution approved. With a solid 5 opposition votes, the most number of votes Cha-Cha advocates can get is 17 since there are only 23 sitting senators. If Senator Leila de Lima is allowed to vote, and minority senators manage to win over other senators, Cha-Cha advocates cannot get the votes they need.

PDP Laban Federalism Institute Executive Director Jonathan Malaya once told me that Senate President Pimentel and Speaker Alvarez had a “gentleman’s agreement” that the Senate would get to vote separate from the House. The Speaker, it turns out is not a gentleman. He now wants joint voting. He has gone even further, now saying that he can get amendments passed by the House without Senate concurrence, a legally ridiculous position.

The Senate is just as determined to vote separately. All senators understandably oppose joint voting which would render their 23 votes irrelevant against the House’s 292 votes. After the Speaker rammed through a Con-Ass resolution early in January, the Senate is now moving to have their own Con-Ass. To prevent a House maneuver where even one senator present in the House Con-Ass would be used to say there is “joint voting”, Senator Ping Lacson is proposing that any senator attending a House Con-Ass would be expelled from the Senate!

Confident of support in the Supreme Court, the Speaker is pushing to have the issue raised there. The 1987 Constitution does not specify whether there should be separate or joint voting. But if the legal issue is posed as whether the Senate can be forced to join the House Con-Ass, the SC would be hard put to justify that this is not a “political question” that it cannot touch. Three former Supreme Court chief justices, all active members of the Constitutional Commission that drafted the 1987 Constitution, and most constitutional law experts support the Senate position.

There is no way Speaker Alvarez can get a new constitution approved in a plebiscite at the time of the May 14 barangay elections. Rules require that the subject of a plebiscite must be approved at least 60 days before; this would place Alvarez’s deadline to mid-March, a little over a month away. Resolving the dispute with the Senate, especially if the issue is brought to the Supreme Court, will certainly take more than two months. No May plebiscite, no “no-el”.

If the Speaker cannot get a plebiscite in May, the next electoral exercise that he can piggy back a plebiscite on is the May 2019 midterm election. If he decides to appropriate money for a separate plebiscite, it would remove his excuse for a Con-Ass instead of a Con-Con, that it would cost too much. If there is no resolution of these issues until after the October 2018 filing of candidacies for the 2019 elections, politicians will be too preoccupied with election campaign work.

For now the main arena of contestation on federalism/Con-ass has been the Senate. Substantive issues are only now coming out.

Vice President Leni Robredo has already protested against plans by the House to remove the vice presidency. There are proposals for the abolition of the Ombudsman, and for limiting freedom of speech to its “responsible exercise”.

The accumulation of these issues, on top of “no-el” and term extensions and the attempt to muzzle Rappler and other media will result in snowballing opposition. From the Senate to the streets. It should be an interesting next few months. – Rappler.com

Joel Rocamora is a political analyst and a seasoned civil society leader. An activist-scholar, he finished his PhD in Politics, Asian Studies, and International Relations in Cornell University, and had been the head of the Institute for Popular Democracy, the Transnational Institute, the Akbayan Citizens’ Action Party, and member to a number of non-governmental organizations. From the parliament of the streets, he crossed over to the government and joined Aquino's Cabinet as the Lead Convenor of the National Anti-Poverty Commission.

The result of the latest Open Budget Survey (OBS) is certainly encouraging for the Philippines. Since the report has come out, the report has been covered by media and has been hailed by the government as an affirmation of its efforts on budget reform.

In a statement, Budget Secretary Benjamin Diokno said: "We very proud of what we've accomplished to date. In surpassing our Asian neighbors, we have further cemented our position as a global leader in Open Government. It encourages us to persevere, to do even better, in the years ahead."

The OBS report is best appreciated in context and with the proper nuancing of its details and the implications given the current situation. This is not being captured in the reports and statements to date.

Timeframe of OBS 2017

Spearheaded by the International Budget Partnership (IBP), the OBS started in 2006 and is described as "the world's only independent, comparative assessment of the 3 pillars of public budget accountability: transparency, oversight, and public participation."

The OBS report is "produced by independent budget experts around the world, using internationally-accepted criteria developed by multilateral organizations." 

The 2017 OBS is the 6th round that evaluated 115 countries across 6 continents. For this round, according to the report's methodology, the data collection took place from September 2016 to December 2016.

"Thus, the OBS 2017 assesses only those events, activities, or developments that should have occurred up to 31 December 2016; any actions occurring after this date are not accounted for in the 2017 survey results," reads the Methodology section of the OBS report.

In the Philippines, September 2016 to December 2016 was a transition period. The Duterte administration assumed office on June 30, 2016. This means that the report covers the 3rd to 6th months (4 months) of the new government. During this period, it is safe to assume that the same policies and programs of the previous government were in place, unless they were explicitly zeroed in for scrapping from the onset by new government. 

This is an important detail of the context of the 2017 OBS report. Given this context, the report hardly reflects what has been achieved by the new government. Instead, it covers what has been sustained immediately after the assumption of office of the new government and largely reflects the practices and policies adopted by the immediately preceding government. 

Constant transparency 

The Philippines' 2017 scores in transparency or Open Budget Indicators (OBI) show improvement compared to the country's standing in the last OBS in 2015. The Philippines' score increased to 67 (out of 100) from 64 in 2015. Its score on transparency is the highest in Asia and far higher than the global average of 42. 

However, according to the report, "the Philippines' score of 67 on the 2017 Open Budget Index is largely the same as its score in 2015." This is a detail that is not mentioned in the statements. The Philippine summary of the report did not elaborate on this, but this is likely in account of its methodology and scoring.

The OBS summary report on the Philippines also listed down budget information disclosure practices that started in 2015 that are presumed to have been continued in 2016 and noted an instance when a document (Mid-Year Review) was not made public on time.

Concerning participation score

On participation, the Philippines scored 41 out of 100. This translates to limited opportunities for the public to engage in the budget process. 

This is viewed positively by the Philippine budget department in its statement because "the Philippines ranked first in ASEAN" and the country's score is "3 times the global average at 12... and one of only 4 countries to achieve a moderate score in the category, sharing this distinction with New Zealand, Australia, and the United Kingdom." 

However, in a tweet, the IBP stated that the global trend is bleak: "Amid declining public trust in government and increasing inequality, progress toward global budget transparency has stalled for the first time in a decade." This makes the global average not exactly the best benchmark for comparison. 

This round's score is also below the Philippines' 2015 OBS of 67, which translated to the presence of "adequate" mechanisms for citizen participation in the budget. Though the OBS explains that there has been changes in its methodology and indices on this pillar this round in consideration of other global standards, the drop from 41 to 67 is something that is better underscored.

For the Philippines, more importantly, getting a score that means "limited opportunities to engage the budget process" should merit concern across all sectors, especially from civil society. This is the country that prides itself on mainstreaming participation on all fronts of governance. The immediate previous administration won on the platform of participatory governance and had consistently claimed achievements in advancing and deepening citizen participation through its programs and policies. 

It is not stated in the Philippine summary report, but the question that needs to be asked is whether the Duterte administration's termination of the national participatory budgeting program of the Aquino government, called Bottom-Up-Budgeting (BuB), made a big difference in the score. The scrapping took place during the period the OBS survey was being conducted. Meanwhile, while the participation of the Philippine government in the Open Government Partnership (OGP) was sustained in the transition of 2016, this did not happen without difficulties due to threats of backsliding. Had this been factored in too?

Puzzling findings on accountability

The Philippines' standing on oversight in the 2017 OBS has improved on legislative oversight from limited and weak in 2015 to adequate and limited in 2017. Its score on oversight of the supreme audit institution went down 9 notches from 92 in 2015 to 83 in 2017, though still the same equivalence of "adequate budget oversight." 

This finding seems undramatic, though it is good to understand the reason for the improvement on legislative oversight and the slight decrease of the score of Philippines' supreme budget institution. The Commission on Audit (COA) has sustained its Citizen Participatory Audit, hence it is puzzling why the score went down.

Finally, this part on the summary must be an error: "The head of the institution is appointed by the legislature or judiciary and cannot be removed without legislative or judicial approval, which bolsters its independence." In the Philippines, the COA chairperson is appointed by the President as per the 1987 Constitution. In fact, this has been raised as one institutional flaw that poses potential danger to the independence and autonomy of COA.

Communication, communication

We have seen the impact of international recognition in legitimizing reforms undertaken by governments. This is a double-edge sword; it may or may not be beneficial to a country's effort to open government and deepen democracy. 

The usual danger is oversimplification in communicating the key findings of an international assessment, especially in the case of indices that rank countries according to numerical scores. The devil is in the details, yet the details of the context are often left hidden, buried in the loudness of numbers that say very little, hence can easily be misrepresented, even manipulated, by whoever is presenting the figures. 

A critical question needs to be raised: shouldn't it be the responsibility of international bodies doing global assessments and rankings to ensure that their findings are communicated properly and that the conclusions of their research are not misrepresented in a way that is detrimental to the very reason they are doing what they do? Ranking may motivate better performance from governments. Or, real status of government performance can be muddled by bad communication. – Rappler.com

Joy Aceron is convenor-director of Government Watch (G-Watch), a social accountability program. She is also an advisor and research fellow of the Accountability Research Center  based at the American University, Washington DC, and currently the national researcher for the Independent Reporting Mechanism (IRM) of the Open Government Partnership (OGP). 

If you believe in the rule of law, the recent controversy in the Office of the Ombudsman involving the suspension of a deputy ombudsman is more than enough to agitate and enrage you. It is a blatant disregard and violation of the law.

No less than the Supreme Court ruled that the power previously granted to the president to discipline deputy ombudsmen is unconstitutional because it impinges on the independence of a constitutional body. Promulgated on January 28, 2014, the High Court’s ruling became final and executory 4 months later, on May 7, 2014.

But Malacañang ignored this completely and went ahead like a bully and a bulldozer, and ordered the suspension of Overall Deputy Ombudsman Arthur Carandang for allegedly disclosing “unauthenticated” documents about bank transactions of President Rodrigo Duterte and members of his family.

The law doesn’t matter to supposed lawyers in this administration – the President himself, who is supposed to abide by and protect the Constitution, the Executive Secretary Salvador Medialdea, the Justice Secretary Vitaliano Aguirre II, the Solicitor General Jose Calida, Chief Presidential Legal Counsel Salvador Panelo, and even the Presidential Spokesman Harry Roque.

What the President wants, the President gets.

Who cares about the rule of law?

But, wait, isn’t the rule of law one of the defining characteristics of a democracy, which the Philippines claims to be? In free democracies, the law is supreme and is equally applied to everyone. Government officials, including the president and others who wield power, are accountable under the law. Individual fundamental rights are guaranteed and everyone – even the most powerful leader of the land – recognizes that the law is paramount. (READ: PH ranking in global rule of law index sinks under Duterte)

In defiance of the Palace order, which is a shameless and brazen malfeasance, Ombudsman Conchita Carpio Morales declared: “In a society founded on the rule of law, the arbitrary disregard of a clearly worded jurisprudence coupled with a confident stance that it will be changed should never be countenanced.”

In no uncertain terms, she said that the Ombudsman cannot “seriously place at risk the independence of the very Office which she has pledged to protect on the strength of the constitutional guarantees which the High Court has upheld.”

Unlike the men in the Palace, she is saying, stop, this is illegal! She put it well when she said the act of the Office of the President is a “clear affront to the Supreme Court and an impairment of the constitutionally enshrined independence of the Office of the Ombudsman.”

What are the men of the Office of the President thinking? That because they are in power they can do as they please? Have we turned into a monarchy overnight where the king’s wishes must be fulfilled, no matter what?

The perils to democracy are often insidious. Lines are repeatedly crossed by people allowed to get away with it – they jail enemies without due process; kill drug users on the basis of suspicion rather than hard evidence; intimidate and harass critics to muffle, if not silence, dissent. Before we know it, what is abominable is acceptable, and what is wrong is suddenly right, because those in power say so. This is thug rule.

When thugs rule, everything is arbitrary, depending on dominant interests that need to be protected. Yesterday, corruption was a sin; today, it’s all right because it will benefit many who are loyal and pliant. A compromised democracy results from laws arbitrarily interpreted according to the ruling thugs’ standards of what is right and just.

Despite a Supreme Court ruling, Mr Panelo insisted: “Every official act is accorded the presumption of regularity. Until a competent court declares that such official act is in violation of the law and the Constitution, President Rodrigo Duterte’s order of preventive suspension is presumed to be valid and legal.”

Assuming this case is brought to the Supreme Court and the esteemed justices change their minds, the presumption of regularity in the President’s act cannot precede the change in the law. Or can it now, because anything goes under a compromised democracy?

This gradual and sustained erosion of democratic values can only be stopped by a critical mass of citizens who are determined to resist it. Lawyers, constitutionalists, law-abiding citizens, those who believe in the rule of law: where are you? – Rappler.com