Some legal analysts contend that I should have exhausted legal remedies in the Philippines before I went to the ICC. They faulted me for failing to exhaust domestic legal remedies. Some even misleadingly said that I should have resorted to a legal remedy before the courts.

But the prevailing system in the ICC is “complementarity.”  It is not “exhaustion of legal remedies.” Exhaustion of legal remedies is completely different from complementarity. To say that there should have been an exhaustion of legal remedies in the domestic front by me is to betray a complete ignorance of the true nature of complementarity. (WATCH: The International Criminal Court process)

Complementarity places the primary obligation on the State party to investigate. This obligation exists even if no person asks for an investigation. In other words, the State party must investigate with or without any person seeking an investigation. It is, therefore, the Duterte government that must pursue an investigation against Duterte himself for crimes against humanity, with or without me or Edgar Matobato seeking an investigation.  

Exhaustion of legal remedies is a familiar legal concept in domestic law, imposing on a person a legal duty to first exhaust administrative remedies. Corollarily, the failure to do so will result into a rejection of a subsequent resort to judicial action. In effect, a court cannot intervene if there is no prior resort to and exhaustion of an administrative remedy.

However, such familiar concept has nothing to do with the ICC. If that concept were to be applied in the ICC, an absurd situation will arise where the ICC cannot exercise jurisdiction simply because a State party permanently fails or refuses to investigate. This can happen in a situation where, as in our case, the government itself is complicit in the crime. Since the ICC has to wait for the state party to act, which could take an eternity, there is no possible way that the  ICC can intervene.   

Complementarity is precisely meant to avoid a legal paralysis on the part of the ICC. While the ICC respects state sovereignty which includes primarily the power to punish crimes, state sovereignty must be balanced with the goal of ending impunity. Thus, by way of compromise, if the state party fails or refuses to investigate, then the ICC need not wait for eternity, but rather can immediately intervene in the exercise of its complementary jurisdiction.

Complementarity has already been settled by the ICC in an early case. The settled meaning of complementarity in the ICC is that (1) when there is an absence of a national investigation, or (2) when the investigation is rendered “inactive,” or (3) when the action of the state party is meant to enable the ICC to come in – all for the purpose of shielding the person being charged before the ICC, in this case Duterte, from criminal liability – the ICC must exercise its complementary jurisdiction.

It is true that when the criminal justice system of a state party is completely non-functional, the ICC is justified in its complementary jurisdiction. But this legal standard applies only in times of war and armed conflicts where understandably a shooting war will scare judges, lawyers, and court personnel, and prevent the courts from functioning.  

In times of peace, like ours, the standard is whether or not the state party is unwilling or unable to investigate. If it is any indication, in certain situations like in Uganda, Democratic Republic of Congo, Ivory Coast, and Kenya, the ICC exercised its jurisdiction even if national courts were functioning.

In the specific case of Uganda, the ICC exercised jurisdiction because an earlier amnesty posed a legal bar to a domestic prosecution. This could be akin to a presidential immunity in favor of a sitting president in our legal system, which is a similar bar to domestic prosecution. This therefore justifies the exercise of an ICC jurisdiction.

It is argued that the ICC case is barred by certain cases in the domestic front, namely: the case on the Oplan TokHang pending in the Supreme Court, amparo proceedings filed by private individuals, and criminal investigations against policemen. 

This is erroneous, because these cases do not target the criminal liability of Duterte himself who bears the greatest criminal responsibility as mastermind of the death squad killings. These cases are, therefore, not legal obstacles to the case in the ICC which specifically pertains to Duterte’s criminal liability itself.

The Senate rendered “inactive” its inquiry on extrajudicial killings. It could have referred, but did not refer, the matter to the Department of Justice. Duterte’s supermajority allies were acting like Pontious Pilate who, out of fear, washed his hands by letting the mob decide instead the fate of Jesus Christ.

By their inaction, the Duterte allies appeared to enable an investigation to be done by the ICC instead. By and large, it was a national cover-up to shield Duterte from criminal liability in the domestic front.

Congressman Gary Alejano filed an impleachment complaint against Duterte. A political process, they could have investigated Duterte and eventually opened a national criminal investigation.  But his allies in Congress just unceremoniously threw out the complaint, with the same intention of cover-up.

In short, there is an absence of political will to investigate, because Duterte himself is the mastermind of the death squad killings, which stands as the ultimate reason for the failure, up to now, of the present Duterte regime to even just commence any genuine investigation against Duterte himself.  

Duterte is the head of a death squad regime which includes the Department of Justice headed by Secretary Vitaliano Aguirre II, the long-time lawyer of Bienvenido Laud, along with now Executive Secretary Salvador Medialdea in the Ernesto Avasola case. 

These two key supporters of the Davao Death Squad obstructed the search of human skeletal remains in the Laud quarry. Dante Gierran, the head of the National Bureau of Investigation, and Philippine National Police chief Bato de la Rosa are also complicit in the Davao Death Squad.

When a group including Arturo Lascañas fetched Aguirre at the Davao airport to represent Laud, Aguirre reminded Laud to clear the quarry of all the skeletal remains, but Laud said not all skeletons could be located anymore. Aguirrre suggested to just claim those skeletons as being from dead Japanese soldiers in World War II.   

This is not to mention that in a meeting in Duterte’s house in Davao attended by Lascañas himself, I was told that then mayor Duterte shelled out a very substantial amount to pay for heavy equipment intended to clear the Laud quarry of the human skeletal remains buried by the Davao Death Squad in the said place.

Indeed, in a regime made up of key supporters of the Davao Death Squad, it is well-nigh impossible for Duterte to be investigated. How can this regime investigate Duterte himself who will, in the first place, simply obstruct any such investigation, just like what he did in Davao City? 

How can this regime investigate Duterte himself when he instigated police killings, scoffed at calls to investigate, issued public threats to slap Agnes Callamard whom he described as “undernourished,” and even demeaned ICC prosecutor Fatou Bensouda whom, in a supreme racist slur, he called a “black lady”?

It is the height of wishful thinking for anybody to even think that Secretary Aguirre will investigate Duterte himself, considering that he has been a long-time lawyer of Duterte and his Davao Death Squad. Up to now, despite urgings from different sectors, including the European Parliament and the UN Human Rights Council, there is no national criminal investigation launched by Aguirre against Duterte himself. In fact, there never will be one.

Under this reprehensible situation where we have a president protected by his minions in a death squad regime, complementarity clearly applies as a matter of justice. If the ICC has to wait for the Duterte regime to investigate – which is not forthcoming at all – the ICC will never be able to act.

There is no other way for international criminal justice, therefore, to move forward. In the absence of any national criminal investigation against Duterte himself, the ICC is duty bound, and will have, to exercise its complementary jurisdiction to attain international criminal justice. – Rappler.com

Lawyer Jude Josue L. Sabio filed a mass murder complaint against President Rodrigo Duterte before the International Criminal Court in The Hague, The Netherlands, in May 2017. He is the lawyer of self-confessed Davao Death Squad hitman Edgar Matobato.

A ghost from the recent past comes to haunt the Senate as it faces a challenge to its jurisdiction over Maria Lourdes Sereno.

As an impeached chief justice, Sereno, by normal operation of law, stands trial at the Senate, where, she says, she feels "confident" she will get the justice denied her in the House of Representatives.

But the House is in no hurry to declare her impeached and send her to trial; it wants to give the state prosecutors time to work their desperate representation and get the Supreme Court to find her unfit to be chief justice. If that happens, Sereno is fired outright, and the Senate robbed of its constitutional mandate to decide her case.

What, then, does the Senate do?

It should be reminded of its own Leila de Lima, who surely deserved more than she got from her own colleagues when her own dignity and freedom came under attack from the Duterte regime.

A consistent critic of Duterte's, De Lima was implausibly implicated in drug trafficking by convicts enlisted by his regime to testify against her. Despite a patently precooked case, the traditionally reasonable-minded Senate practically abandoned her; the majority went fully along, and the minority, overwhelmed as it was (and still is) one to four, raised no more than a timid protest.

De Lima walking out of the Senate to oblige her waiting arrestors was the saddest sight. She has been in jail for more than a year now, her trial delayed by her persecutors' inability to decide what crime to charge her with; they have only recently settled for conspiracy, withdrawing the initial straightforward charge of trading in illegal drugs, a charge requiring concrete evidence, of which they have absolutely none.

About the only senator who from the beginning has fought constantly and vigorously for De Lima is Antonio Trillanes IV. He spent 7 years in prison himself, for rising, as a navy officer, against corruption in the military under President Gloria Arroyo.

Her successor, Benigno Aquino III, granted him amnesty, although his election as senator while serving time, unable to campaign, had been some sort of vindication.
Trillanes knew the stakes then, and knows the stakes now. He was also the first to protest a preemption of Sereno's trial by the Supreme Court. But this time not only his oppositionist colleagues but the Senate president himself has joined him in speaking out, boldly. They all declare the state prosecutors and the Supreme Court, which has begun to entertain their wish, out of line, asserting at the same time the Senate's exclusive role as the impeachment decider.

But how far will the Senate carry the fight?

To be sure, it’s up against a power structure led by a president openly, and proudly, predisposed to dictatorship: “Yes, I am a dictator.” Maybe not yet, not officially, not in the sense that he has replaced the law. But De Lima and Sereno make for illustrations of the insane lengths to which he has advanced on his predisposition.

De Lima was taken to jail and denied her right to bail on the word of convicts who, being life-termers, could only have been too willing to say and do anything for anyone showing any promise of any power to make life easier for them. And who could have been a more desirable prospect for such patron than their herder – the justice secretary himself?

Sereno’s case is not much different in the way it was put together, particularly in the way witnesses were herded. But it has graver implications, especially as they affect the chances of Duterte furthering his dictatorial designs.

And the factor that makes the difference is the Supreme Court.

Sereno is being impeached chiefly on the testimonies of justices who belong in a Supreme Court majority that has been ruling for interests Duterte is known to favor, justices who, moreover, betrayed their resentment toward Sereno by airing petty prejudices at the impeachment hearings. Their appearance in the House as witnesses – not to say against a colleague and under one-sided rules that, for one thing, disallowed rebuttal by her and her lawyers – by itself raises questions of decency. Now, the anomaly is rounded off by the Supreme Court’s readiness to sideline the Senate and usurp its role to pass final judgment on Sereno.

In any case, a judicial robe has been reserved for De Lima for Sereno’s impeachment trial. A cute gesture, but no redeeming value. It does not raise the chances of De Lima tasting freedom again, if only to wear that robe, or of Sereno getting her fair share of justice.

But it is precisely such dim prospects that should incite the Senate, possibly the last political institution managing to stand. – Rappler.com

Nasa 30% ka ba ng pinakamahirap sa Pilipinas? Ikaw ang pangunahing tatamaan ng hagupit ng mataas na presyo ng krudo at pagkain.

Ang inflation ay ang bilis ng pagmahal ng presyo ng batayang produkto. Ayon sa datos ng Philippine Statistics Authority o PSA, mas apektado ang “bottom 30% households” o ’yung pinakamahihirap.

Sa pangkabuuan nasa 4.5%% ang inflation rate nitong Pebrero. Ito na ang pinakamalalang antas sa loob ng 3 taon.  

Miscalculation?

Inaasahan ng mga opisyal na magkakaroon ng inflation, pero hindi ganito kabilis.

Nang naupo si Rodrigo Duterte bilang pangulo, nasa 2% lamang ang inflation rate – ngayon, 19 buwan pa lamang ang nakalilipas, halos sagad na ito sa target ng gobyerno na 4%.

Maraming middle class na natuwa sa Tax Reform for Acceleration and Inclusion (Train) Law, lalo na ang mga empleyadong sumailalim sa bagong income tax rates. Pero nilusaw rin ng inflation ang ibinaba ng income tax dahil nagmahal ang kuryente, krudo, at grocery. At simula pa lang ’yan.

Habang may bahagyang pag-amin ang Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas at ang National Economic Development Authority sa sipa ng Train, kumakambyo ang Department of Finance (DOF) at wala raw itong epekto sa inflation, maliban sa matatamis na inumin.

Ayon sa dean ng UP Diliman School of Statistics na si Dennis Mapa, kinompute lamang ng DOF ang direktang epekto ng Train sa mga bilihin at hindi ang iba pang madadamay sa epekto nito.

Masahol pa sa college freshman mag-isip ang mga opisyal ng DOF kung hindi nila nakitang ipapasa ng mga negosyante sa mga mamimili ang anumang pagtataas ng materyales sa produksyon.

Isang taong kalbaryo

Ayon kay Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Ernesto Pernia, “minimal and temporary” lang ang epekto ng Train sa inflation.

Pero ayon sa ekonomistang si JC Punongbayan, maaaring manatili ang mataas na presyo sa buong 2018.

Isinaalang-alang niya ang iba pang kadahilanan, tulad ng pagsadsad ng piso, ang patuloy na pagtaas ng presyo ng langis sa pandaigdigang merkado, at ang problema sa loob ng National Food Authority na nagbubunga sa kakulangan sa murang bigas.

Idagdag pa rito ang profiteering – inuunahan ng mga negosyante ang pagtaas ng presyo ng mga produkto. Aminado ang Department of Energy na walang mekanismo upang mahuli ang pang-aabuso ng gas retailers.

Kakayanin ba ng mga naghihikahos ang isang taon ng patuloy na pagtaas ng mga presyo ng bilihin?

Hagupit sa wage earners, informal sector

Layon ng Train na gawing “mas simple, mas mababa, at mas patas” ang pagbubuwis sa bansa.

Pero paano na ang minimum wage earners na dati nang libre sa sa pagbabayad ng buwis? Paano na ang mga walang trabaho at kabilang sa informal sector– ’yung mga hindi suwelduhan? Lumolobo ang presyo ng bilihin nila, pero hindi naman sila kasama sa nakinabang sa bumabang buwis.

Ang safety net dapat ng mahihirap ay ang perang ipamumudmod sa ilalim ng unconditional cash transfers.

Pero. puna ni Mapa, di sapat ang P200 kada buwan sa bawat mahirap na pamilya sa ilalim ng umiiral na inflation. Ang P200 ay nakabatay sa 3.3% na inflation rate at hindi 4.0%.

Inamin din ng DBM na para sa 2.6 milyon na mahihirap na pamilya – o 26% ng kabuoang benepisyaryo – sa Agosto pa nila matatanggap ang kanilang cash transfers. Paano ang pamumuhay nila ngayong sumisipa na ang mas mataas na presyo ng bilihin?

Dobleng sampal

Sa kabila ng paggiit ng gobyerno na hindi kontra-mahirap ang Train, natatastas na ang pagtatakip ng pamahalaan.

Malinaw sa estadistika na mas matindi ang sampal sa mga dukha na wala namang tax cuts at di na sumasapat ang kinikita dahil nagmahal ang bilihin.

Ngayon, kailangan pa silang dumulog sa Department of Social Welfare and Development para sa kakarampot na P200 kada buwan.

Sampung milyong mahirap na pamilya ang inaasahang benepisyaryo ng ayuda sa Train, pero ilan kaya sa kanila ang hindi maaambunan nito dahil sa korupsiyon at palpak na burukrasya? Higit kailanman, sumpa ang maging mahirap. Dahil tila nakaprograma ang sistema na lalo kang mabaon sa hirap. – Rappler.com

Much has already been said about Billy Crawford and Colleen Garcia's scandalous shoot in Ethiopia – from issues of cultural appropriation (it is), to debates over whether netizens were just being hypersensitive and woke for wokeness' sake (uh, I'm pretty sure you can never want too much human dignity for others, so this debate is ridiculous). 

The worst reasoning for me is that the Ethiopians in the shoot were amenable to the project anyway, and that this would help boost the African nation's tourism. It must be understood that oppression is at its most despicable when it is seamlessly ingrained into how the oppressed themselves think. For some Fiipinos not to understand this is what upsets me most, especially since our own country has long run on this kind of programmed self-loathing. If they can't see what's wrong with the Ethiopia issue, what more the many issues in their own backyard?

In Ethiopia, Billy and Colleen served as preening, pompously garbed foils for the locals, who in turn are styled as simple, humble, and unable to participate in this Westernized fantasy, relegated as they are to bare-bones lives in a land known for great drought and famine. 

What if the shoot were set instead in the Philippines, specifically in spots that highlighted our own country's sore points and setbacks?

Location 1: Hacienda Luisita

Plantation chic. Sugar baron and baroness Billy and Colleen sport crisp, short-sleeved white polos, khaki shorts, and loafers without socks, and top their look off with blonde rattan fedoras. Behind them are 4,000 hectares of farmland baking in the Tarlac heat, dotted with weary farm workers who have spent decades fighting bureacracy and the oligarchy to get what they deserve.

A special touch: 7 tombstones sit along the horizon, one for each of the 7 workers who died at the hands of police and soldiers during the massacre of 2004. 

Location 2: Marawi City

Why jet off to exotic Syria when we have an Islamic war zone to call our own? Billy and Colleen wear matching ruby red silk malongs with 24k-gold thread embroidery – Billy's slung regally over his shoulder, Colleen's wrapped tight around her tiny waist. Behind them are the smoking ruins of a grand mosque, a ratty ISIS flag fluttering from the brass crescent up top. If you look closely, you can spot government soldiers and Muslim rebels pointing firearms at each other from their respective dilapidated school buildings. 

Location 3: The Cordillera Administrative Region

Move over, Carrot Man! A bahag with the words "Will you marry me" intricately woven down its front makes for a powerful statement outfit for Billy, while Colleen shows off some prime Eat Bulaga-style choreography while balancing clay pots filled with Cristal champagne. Behind them sit Ifugao tribespeople with spare traditional outfits, waiting for the occasional tourist to "play Ifugao" and depreciate their culture on Instagram, all in exchange for a few hundred pesos – barely enough for these tribespeople to support their own family and community. 

Location 4: Tacloban City 

It's the ultimate seaside escape. In this particularly risqué shoot, Billy and Colleen wear nothing but strategically placed gold and silver salbabidas (inner tubes). Behind them is a breathtakingly barren seaside village dotted with broken fishing boats and decapitated palm trees. Unlike the other shoot locales, there are no villagers posing in the background, as they have been either killed by Super Typhoon Yolanda or are off to neighboring provinces to seek food and shelter. 

Location 5: Caloocan City

This is a homage to Mugatu's Derelicte campaign from the film Zoolander. Billy and Colleen are dressed head to toe in Kanye West's latest Yeezy line, known for its flimsy, holey fabrics, drab, sewage-water color palette, and sky-high price points.

They stand in the middle of a cramped, dimly lit alley in the city most recently known for its bloody drug raids, the alley's residents standing by their doors anticipating the next round of policemen to come a-knockin'. When it comes to poverty porn, Caloocan truly serves the money shot. 

Third-world problems

On the outset, the above 5 scenarios may seem like an exaggeration. Well of course, some people reason, Billy and Colleen's party wouldn't dare do something so insensitive, regardless of whether it was readily orchestrated with the locals' consent and assistance. But what right do these people have to consider the Ethiopia shoot any different from the ones set here? 

Ethiopia is one of the poorest countries not only in Africa, but in the entire world, and the fact remains that a young and wealthy couple fetishized this by posing before locals in clothes and at angles that clearly suggest a difference in social status. (Regardless of the fact that the Philippines is itself a developing nation! The glaring irony in their actions is a whole other article in itself!)

To hide behind the excuse that the locals weren't forced and that it could boost tourism is not only cowardly and ignorant, but destructive, enabling the oppressed to unwittingly harm themselves over and over. 

Consent, in the end, does not override context. It does not a pretty picture make. 

Comelec lang naman yata ang naniniwalang 90 araw ang panahon ng kampanya para maging senador, 45 araw para sa lokal na posisyon, at 10 araw pababa para sa opisyal ng barangay. Ang buong sambayanang nakakakita at nakakabasa ng nakaiiritang tarpaulin sa paligid nila, hindi. 

Matagal nang nagsimula ang kampanya. Mula pa noong naiproklama ang nanalo (at nandaya, dahil sa eleksiyon sa bansa natin, walang natatalo nang lubos, panalo o nadaya lang) sa eleksiyon noong 2016, simula na ng kampanya ng sandamakmak na politiko patungo sa 2019 o, kung matutuloy, halalang pambarangay ngayong taon.

Hindi ko na matandaan kung kailan nagsimulang maglipana ang mga tarpaulin sa bansa. Dati, masaya na sa streamer ang mga politiko. Iyong streamer na gawa sa katsa, walang mukha at puro mensahe lang, kung mensahe ngang matatawag. Ngayon kasama na sa campaign war chest ng kahit pang-SK kagawad ng barangay ang magpaimprenta ng tarpaulin.

Maaaring dito natin matugis ang dahilan kung bakit tayo patuloy na babahain ng tarpaulin lalo’t napipinto ang makulay (laging makulay!) na halalang pambarangay. 

Sa ating bansa kasi, madalas iugnay ng mga politiko ang kanilang sarili sa tao. Kinakasangkapan ng mga politikong ito ang media – mapa-telebisyon, radyo, patalastas, hanggang sa kaliit-liitang poster o tarpaulin – upang maging madali ang kanilang lapit sa publiko. Bakit kailangang mapadali? Dahil ang karaniwang politiko, ayon kay Benedict Anderson sa kaniyang sanaysay na “Cacique Democracy in the Philippines: Origins and Dreams,” ay nagmumula sa mataas na saray ng lipunan. At ang karaniwang mambobotong Filipino ay, well, nasa kabilang dulo, sa mababang antas. 

Kung paano magagawang makalapit ng politiko sa mga tao ay pinadadali naman sa pamamagitan ng media.

May namamagitan sa ugnayang politika at tao. Tinatawag itong mediated politics na, ayon kina W. Lance Bennett at Robert M. Entman, ang mga nagpatanyag sa konseptong mediated politics, nagsisilbing clearing house ng dapat ikonsumo ng tao. Sa pambansang politika, hindi na lamang ang kakayahan ng nagnanais mamuno ang binibigyan ng lubhang atensiyon. Pati postura, pati imahen. Brand na ang maging politiko.

Alam ng mga nagnanais mamuno na kailangan din nilang buuin at pangalagaan ang kanilang imahen/brand upang kalugdan ng tao. Kung paano makikilala at matatandaan ang imahen/brand ito ay siya namang mahalagang ginagampanan – conscious man o hindi – ng media. 

Mura ang tarpaulin kung ihahambing sa pagbili ng air time sa radyo o telebisyon. Hindi na rin nito kailangan ng adminstrator kung sa social media o internet naman iiral. At dahil hindi pa naman kasing-complex ng kampanya ng halalang pangsenador ang eleksyon sa barangay, magkakasya na lamang muna sina aspiring kagawad at kapitan sa polusyon na kung tawagin natin ay tarpaulin. 

Tarpaulin na kayang magtaglay ng maangas na mukha at gasgas na salita at pangako, mga standard na imahen.

Lumalagpas ang imahen na ito sa hindi lamang popular na midya kundi sumasabay na rin sa paglawak ng spatial dimension gaya ng teknolohiya at ekonomiya. Papamura nang papamura ang pagdidisenyo at pag-iimprenta ng tarpaulin habang papagaling nang papagaling ang teknolohiyang kayang pagandahin ang pagmumukha at isara ang pores sa noo at pisngi ng kandidato. 

Samantala, kahit sinong tambay ay puwedeng utusang magkabit ng tarpaulin sa bawat kanto at bawat exposed na kawad ng kuryente. Malinaw naman kasi sa atin na hindi na lamang plataporma at kakayahan ng isang nagnanais maglingkod ang mahalaga upang manalo. “Winnable” din ang may maayos na kara na kaya ngang ilagay, kahit pa pineke, sa tarpaulin.

Tarpaulin lang kasi ang makakakuha sa pagmumukha – na malaki ang tsansang hinagod nga at niretoke ng design software tulad ng Photoshop – at sa kunwari ay mensahe ng mga politiko. 

Hindi pinatatawad ng politiko ang kahit anong okasyon. Babatiin ka lagi ng tarpaulin paglabas mo pa lang ng bahay. Ultimong lamayan sa patay, sinasabitan na ngayon ng tarpaulin taglay ang karakas at kunwaring pakikiramay ni politiko. 

Karamihan, kung hindi man lahat, ganito ang ayos: babati ng “Maligayang Pasko” o “Happy Fiesta,” pero halos hindi na ito mababasa sa kaliitan; sa halip, prominente ang mukha at pangalan, posisyon kung may posisyon na sa pamahalaan, at iyong posisyong tatakbuhan kung kakandidato pa lang. Para makalusot sa Comelec – dahil napakadali namang lusutan talaga ng Comelec – ilalagay sa tarpaulin ni politiko ang mga sumusunod: “Bokal sa puso ang paglilingkod” kung tatakbong board member ng lalawigan. O kaya ididikit ang pangalan sa salitang “mayor” o “vice mayor” o “konsehal” na parang mayor o vice mayor o konsehal na kahit malayo pa sa putok ng kanyon ang halalan. 

Mayroong ang gimik ay isusulat ang “Register and exercise your right to vote,” malaki ang sulat sa salitang “vote” na halos kalapit na ang pangalan. Na parang “Vote <insert pangalan ng kandidato>”. Lusot nga naman kasi nananawagan lang daw magparehistro kahit hindi na mabasa sa malayuan ang iba pang nakasulat. Gimik nga naman. Epal. Talagang epal.

Napakarami ng mga tarpaulin na ito. Walang lugar na mamumukod kung paramihan ng tarpaulin ang labanan. Dahil hindi na maiiwasan ang pagdami ng tarpaulin, ganito na lang ang isaisip ’nyo sa susunod na pagtingin ninyo sa mga mukha at angas ng mga pabibong kandidatong ito: tandaan ang mukha nila. Pagdating ng oras ng kampanyahan, ikompara ang mukha ng politiko sa tarpaulin at mukha sa personal. Kapag mas pangit sa personal kesa tarpaulin, huwag nang iboto. Bakit? Sa hitsura pa lang, manloloko na. Paano pa kapag nanungkulan?

Sa usapin ng pagliligtas ng kalikasan, hindi ko alam kung may pag-aaral na kung ilang toneladang tarpaulin ang nagagawa sa bansa kasama ang tarpaulin ng mga billboard sa haywey at mga karakas nga ng mga politiko. Pero nakatitiyak akong tonetonelada ito. Hindi ko alam kung paano ang proper waste disposal ng tarpaulin. Pero nakatitiyak akong hindi ito biodegradable tulad ng papel. Sana man lang, may magpakabayaning ahensiya, lokal man o pambansa, sa pagre-recycle ng tarpaulin. Puwede itong pangunahan ng lokal na pamahalaan sa Metro Manila, tutal, sila naman ang pinakamaraming magprodyus ng nagpapangitang tarpaulin. 

Sa tibay ng tarpaulin (at sa tibay ng mukha ng mga politiko), baka magamit ang materyal ng tarpaulin para gawing bag, gaya ng mga bag sa mga mall. Puwedeng ipamigay sa mga palengke ang mare-recycle na bag. Nagkatrabaho pa ang ilang kababayan natin dahil sa pagtabas at pananahi ng mga tarpaulin.

Kaso, may ibang politikong talagang walang puso. Ang gagawin sa tarpaulin habang nakadispley, hihiwa-hiwain para lagusan ang hangin at hindi nakawin at gawing bubong ng traysikel o lona. Tsk tsk. Dahil hiwa-hiwa na nga ang tarpaulin, wala na. Wala nang malinaw na pakinabang matapos malaos ang mukha. Patay na naman si Mother Earth. – Rappler.com 

Bukod sa pagtuturo ng creative writing, pop culture, and research sa Unibersidad ng Santo Tomas, writing fellow din si Joselito D. Delos Reyes, PhD, sa UST Center for Creative Writing and Literary Studies, at research fellow sa UST Research Center for Culture, Arts and Humanities. Board member siya ng Philippine Center of International PEN. Siya ang kasalukuyang tagapangulo ng Departamento ng Literatura ng UST.

I suppose I should be angry at Harry Roque’s comment about “expiring women”.

Sixteen years ago when I first became a single mother after walking out of my marriage, most of what I heard from people were tongue lashings of pity and mild condemnation.

Well-meaning relatives and tactless friends would offer unsolicited commentary about my future or lack of it. The most common line was that I was now “damaged goods” and that no man would ever want me and my baggage.

I will begrudgingly admit that for a time, I let that get to me. I entertained thoughts of: What if they’re right?

Over the years, I realized that the comments didn’t stop at being labeled as damaged goods. There was always something to highlight, to warn me about, to admonish. Some flaw that supposedly spelled my doom.

“Too ambitious.”

“Too intimidating.”

“Too young.”

“Too old.”

“Too smart for your own good.”

The last comment is one that is especially memorable because it came from the judge at my annulment hearing. According to him, my being too smart for my own good was the reason why my marriage failed. There was a lot of other evidence to the contrary, but the good judge thought otherwise.

I don’t remember exactly when my turning point was. I only remember that I got tired of hearing some version of why I was not enough – or maybe to align it with the superlatives used – too excessive. I simply got tired of letting other people’s opinion influence my life. My life, at least as I saw it, was full and complete in its imperfection.

So I decided I had two choices: I could get angry. Or I could get busy.

I decided on the latter.

I have stories to write, goals to achieve, men to fall in love with (maybe I should include women? It is 2018, after all), memories to make and many hearts to break along the way. My to-do list is a long one.

The path will be riddled with disappointment and failures but, in equal measure, it will be filled with joy and fulfillment. I’m sure my heart and my ego will become battered and bruised when they refuse to stop at speed bumps, but so what? So the fuck what? Life should be lived with a sense of openness to adventure and a healthy dose of optimism. It shouldn’t be wasted worrying about what other people think and letting that dictate my decisions.

I have my stilettos, sneakers, and flip flops at the ready for whatever adventure presents itself. Hell, I’ll even go barefoot if that is what the occasion calls for.

Of course, this won’t deter the detractors, the cynics and the naysayers. And that’s totally fine. I know that when I get to where I want to be, I will look back at them with...gratitude. Their discouragement and their skepticism made me work harder, aim higher, and do better.

Whenever someone labels you some version of “expiring women” and warns you about your limited shelf life, thank them. They just reminded you that time is the most precious asset we have been given in this lifetime. Time is also the greatest equalizer – it is the only thing that none of use will ever have enough of.

Don’t waste time getting angry. Get busy.

I have and I’m still not done. I won’t stop until my work and my achievements stand out over minor details like my age or my gender.

To the most callous and insensitive of detractors, I have my two tall (wo)men on standby. Right now, I am running my tongue over both of my middle fingers and using it to blow them a kiss.

The best revenge is a life well lived. It is also the best comeback to being called an “expiring woman”. – Rappler.com

In a previous piece, we explored President Rodrigo Duterte’s tendency to threaten, harass, and extort the private sector, especially big business.

Here we explore yet another aspect of Duterte’s relationship with markets: his penchant to ban, prohibit, or crack down on economic activities he deems inappropriate, repugnant, or simply bad.

II. Bans, prohibitions, crackdowns

Duterte is a big fan of bans. As long-time mayor of Davao City, he was famous for his draconian crackdowns on public smoking, fireworks, and illegal drugs.

Since becoming president, he has applied the same bans nationwide, and extended them to other things like those he deems harmful to the environment (like business in Boracay and open-pit mining) or exploitative (like “endo” and OFW deployment to Kuwait).

Banning things is a quick and easy policy. Sometimes it may actually work for the best (as when the government curbs pollution).

But when misapplied, bans tend to create unintended consequences. Most famous of all was America’s Prohibition from 1920 to 1933. It aimed to reduce the dangers of alcoholism, but instead it led to the creation of black markets, a substantial rise of alcohol substitutes (like tobacco, marijuana, and narcotics), a flowering of organized crime, and a cat-and-mouse chase between authorities and illegal suppliers.

Given this tricky balancing act, which of Duterte’s blanket bans are justified? Which are not?

1) Public smoking and fireworks

Products and activities that harm the environment usually inspire bans.

Owing to the air pollution and health hazards caused by public smoking, Duterte issued last year an executive order banning it nationwide and setting strict rules for designated smoking areas. In January, roughly for the same reasons, Duterte also called for a nationwide ban on all fireworks and pyrotechnics.

In economics, pollution is a sign of a “market failure” where society at large bears the costs of some people’s consumption of goods like cigarettes or fireworks. There’s more of these products than what society wants, so government might step in to curb them.

But blanket bans are hardly the only available option. Government can opt to tax these products instead to discourage people from buying and consuming them.

The new tax reform law (TRAIN) did exactly this: it raised the prices of cigarettes, petroleum products, and automobiles to help reduce the pollution and congestion they create.

Bans, after all, cannot realistically reduce use of cigarettes and fireworks to zero. If you take them away from people altogether, it might even lead them to undesirable behaviors or alternatives that could harm them more.

Research, for example, tells us that smoking bans may simply displace smoking from outdoors to indoors, working little to protect children from the risks of second-hand smoking. Bans on fireworks may also lead to the proliferation of black markets that produce louder and even more toxic wares.

2) Boracay and open-pit mining

Widescale environmental degradation has also led to a crackdown of businesses on Boracay Island, which Duterte has branded a “cesspool.”

Reportedly amiss in their compliance with building and sewage regulations, hundreds of businesses have already been ordered closed by the environment secretary.

The tourism and interior secretaries, meanwhile, are mulling a total closure of Boracay for up to a year to allow its “rehabilitation”. A similar ban is being considered for tourism hot spots like Panglao, El Nido, Coron, and Puerto Galera.

Before stepping down from office, former environment secretary Gina Lopez also banned new open-pit mining operations owing to the risks they pose to host communities. Earlier, the President also told the mining sector “the Filipinos will survive without you.”

Boracay and open-pit mining illustrate the harms caused by the private sector to society and the environment, and this could again justify government intervention.

But in all likelihood Duterte is overstating the environmental impact of these markets on the environment, and he therefore risks imposing equally overbearing or exaggerated government policies.

The Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) itself cited studies saying water pollution levels in Boracay are actually lower now than in 2012, despite record-high tourist arrivals.

A year-long ban will also needlessly hurt tourism there: following Duterte’s statements, some tourists have already cancelled bookings. You can’t really blame them when Spokesperson Harry Roque says, for instance, that Duterte wants to “blow up” illegal structures there using dynamites.

The risks of open-pit mining also seem overblown. In other countries, for example, new technologies allow mining operations to be environmentally sensitive or even friendly. Harmful mining, in other words, is not an unavoidable outcome, and possibly reflective of bad, inadequate, or incompetent regulation.

Mining and quarrying also play key roles in our economy, and a blanket ban will harm regions like Mimaropa and Caraga the most.

Finally, cracking down on mining needlessly threatens the livelihood – and harms the reputation – of professionals such as geologists and metallurgical engineers.

3) Endo and OFW deployment

Duterte also likes banning contractual arrangements he deems exploitative.

For instance, ending contractualization – or “endo” from “end of contract” – was one of his key campaign promises. In his mind, such a policy will ensure job security for ordinary workers.

Hence, March last year the labor secretary ordered the regulation of contracting via manpower agencies. This proved lacking, however, and Duterte is soon set to sign a new EO totally ending endo.

Duterte also recently ordered a total ban on new deployment of OFWs (overseas Filipino workers) to Kuwait, following the tragic and gruesome death of a Filipina there. Concerned for other OFWs in the Middle East, the labor secretary also raised the possibility of a similar OFW deployment ban in other countries in the Middle East.

In economics, an imbalance of information held by buyers and sellers – known as “asymmetric information” – is also a sign of market failure. When workers are exploited by their employers – say, by not informing them of their rights or the full terms of their contracts – government might intervene to correct this imbalance.

Yet banning both endo and OFW deployment to the Middle East may hurt workers more than it will help them.

For example, banning contractualization in all its forms could be an overreaching policy that denies its flexibility as a labor arrangement in certain legitimate settings.

Economists in the government’s think tank warn, for instance, that such a ban could add to our overly restrictive labor laws, which have already hurt job growth and economic growth in the past. Ending endo, in other words, could hurt the very people it intended to help.

In February, Duterte seems to have changed his tune and called instead for a compromise on the issue – much to the chagrin of labor groups. But such wishy-washy policymaking raises the question: does Duterte really grasp the issues at hand and what’s at stake?

Meanwhile, although a ban on OFW deployments in the Middle East is well-meaning, will it truly eliminate any and all harm that could come to the 250,000-odd Filipinos working there?

Not all foreign employers are abusive murderers, and a blanket ban on everyone’s deployment – aside from being an impulsive and thoughtless policy – will deny good, legitimate job opportunities to thousands of Filipinos wanting to work there.

Government could instead exert stronger diplomatic efforts to protect our workers in the Middle East. Some militant groups claim that enough safeguards are, in fact, already in place, and Duterte just seems to be “making trophies out of every OFW's miseries.”

Bans are a dictator’s best friend

Bans, prohibitions, and crackdowns are some of Duterte’s favorite economic policies. We haven’t even talked about his ban on 5-6 moneylending, the upcoming one on late-night videoke, and his war on drugs.

In some cases – as when pollution or exploitation occurs – bans might be justified. But bans are the ultimate form of market regulation, and government should use them cautiously, not rashly.

Aside from displacing thousands of people from their jobs and livelihood, blanket bans also inspire changes in people’s behavior – often unpredictable ones – and these could lead to unintended consequences.

If the government really wants to control people’s economic activities, there are alternatives. Government can impose high taxes instead (as TRAIN did on cigarettes, petroleum, and automobiles) or impose caps or limits on economic activity (like what the LTFRB did on Uber and Grab).

Some of Duterte’s bans also seem reactionary and whimsical. If government could provide greater, more detailed (even scientific) justification for such bans, all the better. 

Most importantly, bans curtail people’s liberties and freedoms in a powerful way. In the hands of a self-confessed dictator, bans – whether justified or not – can be a pervasive means to regulate Filipinos’ economic activities, and we can expect to see more of them rather than less.

But how do we guard against brash and abusive bans? Again, where do we draw the line? – Rappler.com

(To be concluded. Part 3: Duterte’s populist promises of 'free' things)

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.

On March 6, Senator Vicente “Tito” Sotto III gave a privilege speech, accusing the Commission on Elections (Comelec) and Smartmatic of electoral fraud, which he claims would constitute “a case of electoral sabotage.”

His cheating allegation came after losing vice presidential candidate Bongbong Marcos also accused the Comelec of electoral fraud on the basis of squares and missing ovals on the ballot images, which later turned out to be just the new features of the 2016 vote counting machines (VCM). (READ: What Bongbong Marcos should understand about ballot images)

The accusation from the Marcos camp triggered public exchanges with the camp of Vice President Leni Robredo, prompting the Supreme Court to issue a gag order on both parties.

Senator Sotto claimed in his speech that “a concerned and impecably reliable source” handed him confidential information on certain irregularities that transpired during the May 9, 2016, national and local elections, which allegedly “altered” the results. He alleged that:

• There was an early transmission of votes – before the elections even started.
• The election server was accessed remotely.

In his followup privilege speech on March 14, Sotto made two more allegations:

• There were 4 “queueing servers” through which transmissions from vote-counting machines went instead of going straight to the consolidating canvassing system (CCS).
• The Comelec Transparency Server received only 96.14% of election returns, and that there were “untransmitted” 3.86% of election returns, equivalent to 1.7 million votes. He said this would be “very crucial to ongoing electoral protests.”

Let me address the points the senator raised. 

Untransmitted results

It is already 2018, and Senator Sotto is still talking about 3.86% of election returns not transmitted to the Comelec Transparency Server. This issue has long been answered by the Comelec.

First, it bears reiterating that the votes transmitted from the VCMs straight to the Comelec Transparency Server are unofficial – they were not used in and has no bearing on the official count. The official results are those that go up the “ladderized system” of canvassing: starting with the VCM to the Municipal Board of Canvassers (MBOC), then to the Provincial Board of Canvassers (PBOC), and ultimately to the National Board of Canvassers (NBOC).

Second, the Comelec has been repeating in the last two years that 100% of the votes cast during the 2016 elections have been accounted for and credited to the right candidates. Sotto's “impeccably reliable source” should have advised him that while it is true that 3.86% of clustered precincts were not able to transmit electronically, this does not mean that they have not been transmitted at all.

Under the contingency plan laid down by the Comelec in Resolution Number 10101, it provides that “[i]f the transmission fails, the [Boards of Election Inspectors] shall transport the VCM to the canvassing center for manual uploading of data from the main SD card to the CCS laptop.” This means that those 3.86% untransmitted electronically were nonetheless manually uploaded to the CCS laptops of the Municipal Board of Canvassers and thus accounted for.

Early transmission of votes

Sotto also alleges that there were “early transmission of votes” by certain VCMs to Municipal Boards of Canvassers (MBOC). He specially mentioned that there was early transmission activity on May 8, 2016 (a day before the elections), involving the Consolidated Canvassing System of the municipality of Libon, Albay, and in the morning of May 9, 2016, election day, in the CCS of the municipality of Angono, Rizal.

It is very important to note that while he claims that there were “early transmission of votes,” the senator has not shown a single vote that has prematurely been transmitted. In fact, this could never have happened. Senator Sotto and his “impecably reliable source” may have missed the presence of a “firewall” on the servers, acting like a flood gate, that prevents the reception of results before the closing of the polls in the evening of May 9, 2016.

This feature has been added to prevent that experience in 2010 elections, where many Boards of Election Inspectors (BEI) accidentally sent Final Testing and Sealing (FTS) information, causing the server to subsequently reject the actual vote results, since the CCS laptops had been programmed to receive results only once.

Comelec nonetheless admitted that the “transmission activities” in Libon and Angono flagged by Senator Sotto may have indeed happened. The commission, however, explained that these are just FTS activities, where the connectivity of the VCMs to the server was being tested and that there was nothing anomalous about them. The senator, however, dismissed the explanation, claiming that the “the last official testing was made on April, 23, 2016,” and thus the ones transmitted on May 8 and the morning of May 9 could not have been from the FTS activities.

Although the date mentioned by Senator Sotto was inaccurate, it still deserves some clarification. Under Comelec Resolution Number 10057 or the “General Instructions for the Boards of Election Inspectors (BEI),” the date set for the Comelec for the testing and sealing of the VCMs was between May 2 and 6, 2016, on the date chosen by the Election Officer. So why were there activities detected in Libon, Albay, on May 8, when all FTS activities should have been completed by May 6, 2016? Or in the morning of May 9 in Angono, Rizal, when the VCMs are supposed to be offline during voting hours?

The reason can easily be explained. There are 92,509 VCMs that were used for the 2016 elections and all of them had to undergo final testing sealing ideally between May 2 and 6, 2016. However, considering the sheer number of the machines and our complex geography, there were cases where the FTS were not conducted on the designated schedule. Logistical and technical problems could exist where the VCMs were not delivered before the FTS dates, were broken, or when they malfunctioned. For any of those reasons, FTS may not be completed within the May 2 to 6 schedule, and replacement parts or intervention had to be wait. In anticipation of that eventuality, the Comelec issued Resolution Number 10101, laying down a contingency plan, one of which was to mandate and to authorize the BEI to still conduct the FTS even outside the designated dates but before the actual election.

Understandably, Senator Sotto may dismiss this explanation as well since it has become clear by now that the thrust of his “bombshell” is to paint a really bad picture of the last election, with the senator even claiming “electoral sabotage.” 

This exposé interestingly came after the February 13, 2018, “gag order” issued by the Supreme Court, directing the camps of Vice President Leni Robredo and losing candidate Bongbong Marcos  to refrain from discussing their respective poll protests in public. What is more interesting is the allegations came from a sitting senator and the exposé was made through a “privilege speech” in the halls of the Senate, clearly to take advantage of parliamentary immunity.

Was there electoral fraud?

People must understand that electoral fraud, or sabotage for that matter, is all about the numbers. Following the definition in Section 42 of Republic Act Number 9369, the essence of fraud is increasing (vote padding) or decreasing (vote shaving) the votes received by a candidate such that it adversely affects the results of the election and a losing candidate is made to appear the winner. Now, did Sotto claim any changes in the number of votes that favored any elected official?

Read both privilege speeches of Senator Sotto, and see that, while he has thrown in all those technical jargons and whatnots, he failed to show any increase or decrease in the votes of any candidate caused by those early transmission activities, by the alleged remote access to the Comelec server, or by the presence of the supposed 4 “queueing servers.”

How to detect election fraud during transmission?

As I have been repeating for the longest time, if someone claims that votes have been padded or shaved in the transmission phase either by early transmission, remote access, or mysterious queue servers, then there's a simple yet most effective trick to detect fraud. We only need to compare the election results generated at the precinct level with the results received on the other end of the transmission chain, starting with the MBOC, then the PBOC, and ultimately the NBOC. If one can show discrepancy in the numbers, even a single vote, then that is proof of election fraud.

If it is this easy to confirm to fraud, then why not do this?

In every precinct, there are 30 copies publicly distributed, including to the parties of Senator Sotto and former Senator Marcos. The same case at the level of the boards of canvassers. In other words, the very documents that Sotto or Marcos would need are already in their possession. (READ: What Marcos Jr should do to prove election fraud)

To me, the only reason they have not shown any discrepancy in the votes is because there was none. Despite the rabid attacks thrown against the 2016 automated elections, no one has yet to show any discrepancy between the precinct results and the transmitted results as received by the MBOC, PBOC, or the NBOC – not even Marcos, who also claimed transmission fraud in the Transparency Server in 2016, only to find himself eating his words.

In the end, we should be wary of Senator Sotto’s accusations. Even if miserably unsubstantiated, they have an overreaching consequence on the public’s perception of the election system. Elections are founded on the people’s trust in the electoral system. Every accusation that can erode the people’s faith in elections has to be answered and explained adequately by the Comelec. This is also a call for greater transparency and for wider and deeper engagement with the public and external stakeholders as regards the technical side of the automated election.  

This is also a call for prudence on the part of government officials like Senator Sotto: before making wild accusations, they have to vet their information and their informants very carefully; otherwise, they end up “burnt,” just like losing vice presidential candidate Bongbong Marcos and the many fearmongers before him. – 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. 

How do we clean up after Duterte?

It may seem premature to deal with that question since there's no telling when he will leave power. But it's precisely because he is power mad, and because we're surely in for a horrific time, that we need to be forewarned early.

To have some idea how wrecked we may have become once he's through with us, and what capabilities will have been left us, if any, for rebuilding and restarting our national life, we must know how this man got past us in the first place; we must first recognize and accept our failings, as psychologists might prescribe.

In fact, our case must belong in the realm of pathological politics. No one like Duterte could have risen to the presidency without a constituency of like mentality.

It's happened in America, too, although that's no consolation. What the American experience offers, rather, is a broad instruction on the benefits and perils of the style of democracy common to both nations – after all, the Americans were its originators and we their colonial inheritors.

I wonder whether there's anything to gain from any further character comparison between Rodrigo Duterte and his American counterpart, Donald Trump. The more useful study seems to me that which tracks how our democracies failed to see those two aberrant pretenders coming.

Trump's slip is ascribed chiefly to a failure of his party to screen him out in the way it and its rival party succeeded with unsuitables before – demagogues, extremists, plain crazies. Foremost among levels of checks, the American two-party system has been designed precisely to do that within a construct of laws and norms and institutions intended from the start to save the impressionable electoral masses from themselves through an educated, nationalistic, and trustworthy class. 

The system had more or less worked – until Trump, thanks to a Republican Party concerned more about party victory than anything else, no matter who bore the party's standard. (Released just this year is a book that examines the Trump case and puts it in the context of its title – How Democracies Die, by Harvard University professors Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt. It’s a read close to home.) 

In comparison, our failure with Duterte might be easier to understand, though unforgivable all the same, given the stakes, no less than our very survival. As a nation, we did not go through such crucibles as the Americans did – a war of independence, a civil war, a depression, battles among a racial and cultural mix of immigrants for a place in a continent of frontier lands.

We ourselves had been originally an archipelago of numberless small dominions of kings, subjects, and slaves, or patrons, lackeys, and beneficiaries. In colonial times we were taken over politically and economically by foreign powers who, ruling by patronage themselves, did little to reform our native parochial habits and cultures. 

That was the unconducive land in which the Americans planted the seed of their democracy and, on their own terms, tried to grow it – the same land that Ferdinand Marcos seized for himself as a dictator for 14 years, that Joseph Estrada plundered, and that Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo took over on a rigged presidential vote.

Now, it’s Duterte’s turn – with yet Arroyo, Estrada, and the Marcos heirs as his accomplices.

With flying colors, Duterte passes the test of authoritarian behavior (devised also by the authors of How Democracies Die, which, for good measure, should be read alongside the daringly prescriptive On Tyranny, by Yale University professor Timothy Snyder; published last year). The test turns on 4 "key indicators":

"1. Rejection of (or weak commitment to) democratic rules of the game

"2. Denial of the legitimacy of political opponents

"3. Toleration or encouragement of violence

"4. Readiness to curtail civil liberties of opponents, including media"

Duterte need not be tested really. He is proud to declare himself a dictator, does it all too often, and illustrates it egregiously. But, again, how far he has actually gone with his authoritarianism gives us some sense of his pace and where he might be taking us. And it's decidedly a fast and determined pace, made possible by a coopted legislature and an agreeable majority of the Supreme Court.

Upon taking office, he launched a war on illegal drugs. Its rate of deaths alone has provoked reasonable suspicions of summary executions — "extrajudicial killings," or "EJK," has become the common term for them. The number has reached 16,000, and the International Criminal Court is onto it.

Within half-year of his presidency, he fought a war against a mixed band of separatists, plain brigands, and terrorists in Marawi City. He declared victory after 5 months but kept the entire main island of Mindanao, where Marawi is situated, under martial law and warns of a creeping terrorist menace that may force him to extend the emergency across the whole country.

Within 8 months of his accession to the presidency, his regime put in jail an arch-critic among the few oppositionists in the Senate on the incredible charge of drug trafficking and without concrete evidence. She remains detained. 

The steadfast ombudsman has been threatened with impeachment, and the assertive Chief Justice actually put through the process in the House of Representatives and also taken to the Supreme Court for a quicker judgment than the Senate, as an impeachment court, normally delivers.

After a summary inquiry this news organization, Rappler, was sued under the securities law, and, preempting the courts, Duterte banned it from covering him.

To crown all that mess, he has practically ceded Philippine sovereignly over certain strategic and potentially resource-rich waters to China, and intends to take out loans from, again, China on rates 12 times the offer of another creditor, not to mention other lopsided terms, and also engage it as an infrastructure builder, despite its poor record as one.

From all that, we can only imagine what cleanup job awaits us at the end of Duterte’s term, 4-plus years yet from today – that is, if he does not decide to overstay. – Rappler.com

"I always wanted to be part of a small rebellion."

That line from Steven Spielberg's The Post brought me back in time, when I was in elementary. 

Weeks before our graduation, one of my teachers gave me a copy of the speech I had to deliver as welcoming address.

For the first 3 days of our practice, she allowed me to bring the copy on stage. There, she would correct where I should pause, and note the emotions I should express when delivering the speech.

She took away my copy on the 4th day, saying I should have memorized the speech by then. I stuttered many times.

Realizing that I hadn't memorized the speech yet, she told me to see her after the practice, but I did not come. The next day, she scolded me for not going to see her. Still, I wasn't able to memorize the speech.

The practice intensified days before the graduation. Not a day passed without me getting a serious scolding for not delivering the speech the way they wanted it.

The day before graduation, I did not attend the final practice. I called my teacher, saying I'm not feeling well.

"Basta dapat memorize mo na ang speech mo ha. Nakakahiya kung magdadala ka ng kopya (It's fine as long as you memorize your speech. It's shameful if you bring a copy on stage)," my teacher reminded me. I just said yes.

The next day, my family and I arrived at the venue 30 minutes before the graduation. My teacher asked me if I already memorized the speech. I just nodded in response.

"Ayusin mo ha, ikaw ang mapapahiya kung magkakamali ka (You should do it right, you'll be embarrassed if you don't do it properly)," she warned.

The program started on time. Parents marched with their kids bearing wide smiles.

Moment of truth

In my seat, I was shaking and trembling, I didn't know what to do. Many things were going through my mind. I don't have stage fright, but I guess it was the circumstance that made me nervous. I was doubting my courage to do it. I looked at my parents sitting at back with all smiles. I asked myself, "Would they be ashamed of me?"

As the emcee called my name, I immediately stood in confidence to hide my true emotions. I grabbed the microphone from the mic stand and walked to the middle of the stage.

"Today marks the end of yesterday, and the beginning of tomorrow," I started. This is it, I told myself. The moment of truth. I won't let go of this opportunity.

In the middle of my speech, there was a complete silence from the audience. I saw my mom crying at the back. From there, I knew I "ruined" the graduation rites.

I delivered a different speech, different from the one my teacher gave me. 

I was convinced I can't deliver a prepared speech containing praises and sweet-sounding words especially if they're not true. I've been waiting for that day to express everything I haven't been able to say, because I knew they can't humiliate me during our graduation – not in front of many people.

I decided to air my disappointment toward my teachers in many instances that I really felt I had been taken advantage of. 

One example was when some teachers in our school connived to rig the students' elections to favor my richer classmate by allowing him to distribute things of monetary value just to get votes. They wanted him to win, for he can give more projects to the school from his pocket. Why not me? Because they knew they can't get something from me financially. 

I also mentioned the unnecessary collections ranging from 5 to 10 pesos almost daily for whatever reason. Each year, the Department of Education allocates enough funds for every school to cover teachers' materials. I don't see any problem if it happens only once or twice, but if the unnecessary collection becomes habitual, then there must be something wrong.

Add that to the unfair treatment toward students like me who were always out for academic and journalism contests. I always had to pass "special projects" just to cope with the quizzes I missed while I was out there representing our school in different competitions. 

That's why I decided to rebel against them, during what was supposed to be a day of celebration. I couldn't think of a better way to do it. I really did not memorize the prepared speech for a reason – I already had mine.

From the moment I was hailed as the class salutatorian, I already had the idea of doing it during our graduation. Even if I was the valedictorian, I would still do it, and it would be much longer than I delivered. This is one of the first decisions I've made without consulting my parents because I knew they would be against it.

"To incoming Grade 6 pupils, beware of crocodiles," I ended. 

I heard loud cheers from the audience. My classmates were all shocked. I can still remember our district supervisor back then hugging me after my speech. Our division superintendent, who was also present that day, commended me during her message right after my speech. From there, I knew I did nothing wrong.

I will never regret doing that rebellious speech. After that incident, the school administration became aware of these issues. They addressed it accordingly to prevent it from happening again – or at least for the next batch. 

It took a small act of rebellion to create change, and I think that's what really matters. 

I realized that sometimes, people with small voices have to shout to be heard. – Rappler.com

It didn’t come like a thief in the night, this new law signed by President Rodrigo Duterte in March that gives subpoena powers to the chief of the Philippine National Police (PNP) and the top two officials of the PNP’s Criminal Investigation and Detection Group (CIDG).

The House committee on public order and safety submitted its committee report on a consolidated bill proposing this more than a year ago, in January 2017. Days after that, the Senate already passed its version of the bill on final reading. Ten month laters, in November, it was the turn of the House to pass it. By December 6, both chambers had passed the measure, and Republic Act 10973 was ready for the President’s signature.

Between late 2016, when the original bills were filed, and various months of 2017, when these were deliberated upon and finally passed, the media missed how the proposal could be prone to abuse, given the impunity displayed by the police force under the Duterte administration, and especially in relation to its war on drugs. 

Equally guilty, however, were the opposition lawmakers, whom the public would’ve expected to flag such potentially dangerous proposals. In the Senate, for example, Bill 1239, was approved on final reading without a hitch; the Senate secretary only had to read the title of the bill. Only Senator Ralph Recto objected to it. The usually vocal oppositionists – Bam Aquino, Leila de Lima, Franklin Drilon, Risa Hontiveros, and Kiko Pangilinan – voted for it.

Without the press and the political opposition making any noise about it, the human rights advocates were understandably silent or unaware. 

The fact is, when the original bills were filed, the watchdogs were preoccupied: drug-related killings were happening left and right, and getting to the bottom of these cold-blooded murders could be taxing on anybody’s resources and willpower. Every day, it seemed, the most determined human rights defender was jolted by the brazenness of the President’s disdain for due process and the rule of law, empowering abusers among the uniformed ranks. 

The bills were also presented in a rather benign way. This is not new, the Philippine Constabulary and the Integrated National Police (PC-INP) – forerunners of the PNP – already had this power, and we’re just returning it to them. This will strengthen the capacity of the CIDG to get witnesses and documents when investigating high-profile or big crimes since its current “invitations” could be ignored by the subject without the latter suffering any consequences. 

Now that concerns are being raised about the law, PNP chief Ronald de Rosa says there’s no need for guidelines on how he and the CIDG bosses would use their subpoena powers – their conscience will dictate on that. These will be used only in extreme circumstances, Malacañang guarantees, and the poor shouldn't worry, this is just intended for the “well-learned” and the wealthy.

This is where the problem begins.

When Congress, during the administration of then president Corazon Aquino, passed the law creating the PNP, these subpoena powers were removed from the police precisely because they were abused by the PC-INP during Ferdinand Marcos’ time. These powers were utilized to round up activists. 

Conscience? Who would find it easy to give the top cops the benefit of the doubt after thousands have been killed in the police’s anti-drug operations, the drug war, mostly those who had supposedly fought back? Surveys show most Filipinos believe extrajudicial killings are happening. In fact, 7 out of 10 are afraid they or people they know could become the next victims of EJKs.

And when cops are known to demand money from drug suspects so their names could be removed from the list of targets, or when barangay officials turn out to be submitting drug lists containing the names of political rivals and not actual drug suspects, how can we trust that the PNP bosses are making decisions based on sound information from the ground? 

Then what makes for extreme circumstances? In the past, the police had moved in and killed suspected drug lord mayors Rolando Espinosa Sr and Reynaldo Parojinog in dawn raids. Would bloody encounters like these be avoided now that the PNP chief and the CIDG honchos can compel people to come to them and testify or provide documents? Or would we be seeing more such messy operations?

Would this power result in more airtight cases against big time criminals, like drug lords Kerwin Espinosa and Peter Lim, whom the justice department had just cleared? Or will this be used to create a semblance of a diligent probe to lend credibility to the dismissal of their cases? 

And with the recent move of the Duterte government tagging dozens of activists, including a United Nations rapporteur, as terrorists, why would it be any comfort that the subpoena powers of the PNP would be used “only” on the “well-learned"? It could very well be a convenient legal cover for arbitrary arrests – just like during the time of Marcos, who had the PC-INP at his disposal. 

And the wealthy? Let us see. We know what happened to suspected drug lord Peter Lim: cleared by the justice department, which did not bother to tell the PNP that their evidence was supposedly insufficient. 

We wonder how they can even deliver the subpoena in gated subdivisions. While cops’ inspections of poor communities had led to deadly shootings a number of times, their “Tokhang” in Forbes Park and Magallanes Village reduced them to distributing flyers that listed the effects of illegal drugs and the contact numbers of authorities to reach for emergency cases.

But if and when the subpoena powers are indeed used to go after the big fish, or if they lead to abuse against the wealthy, we await how the well-off will take this. Amid the killings in the poor communities, the ABC classes have been consistently satisfied with Duterte’s performance, and their trust in him has remained at “excellent” levels. 

Right now, we cannot just be decrying the possible return of despotism. We cannot just be urging vigilance and waiting for abuse to happen before we issue statements of condemnation and calls for demonstrations. The law got past us. Let’s get ahead and ask the Supreme Court, if it finds merit, to strike it down. – Rappler.com

There is great dismay in Philippine feminist circles these days. It seems a week doesn’t pass when some government official and especially the President makes some appallingly misogynistic statement.

This in itself is a matter of outrage. After all, we do have several laws that prohibit these utterances like, for example, the Magna Carta of Women. It is even more egregious that our leaders get away with these violations of the law with such impunity.

We are in a state of shock, those of us who have been fighting for women’s rights and dignity. We are shocked whether we are old women who have been fighting for decades or millennials who, because of the successes of feminist fore mothers, are even more astounded by what these old and hoary men have been saying.

Misogyny

Wasn’t it just two years ago when people dared not say these things in public? I am sure that they had these attitudes. In this new and “permissive” environment, the foulest things keep coming out of their mouths. What is worse is people actually laugh at these jokes in what I can only describe as a weird display of collective self-stimulation. But at least men were supposed to keep these sentences among themselves and tell them to women only in beer gardens and brothels.

But then again, I am firmly convinced that the halls of Congress and Malacañang are fast-becoming brothels and the Philippines is now a huge beer garden. And lest you think my analogy is going too far, think about it. Many men who do drink in beer gardens dislike all the denigrating comments of women they hear from (usually) older men. And women who are in the beer gardens either dislike the misogyny and have various forms of resistance, or have internalized misogyny so deeply they passively accept the sexism.

And so, because the Philippines has been turned into hostile territory for any woman who has a modicum of self respect, I decided to review psychological studies on misogyny. The studies clearly define misogyny and there is abundant proof that it is a problem. One review summarizes the literature:  “Misogyny is a cultural practice that serves to maintain power of the dominant male group through the subordination of women." (Piggot, 2004)

"Women, and their role in society, are thus devalued to increase and maintain the power of men, which results in a fear of femininity and a hatred and devaluing of women and female related characteristics (Burch 1987; O’ Neil 1981; Worell and Remer  2003). The negative impact of the devaluation of something as central as gender is perpetuated not only by men but also by women who reinforce the central male culture of devaluing women through acts of horizontal oppression and omission resulting from internalized misogyny (Piggot 2004; Saakvitne and Pearlman 1993).”

So when someone says, “shoot them in the pussy so that they will be rendered useless”, that, dear reader, is a misogynist statement that aids in subordinating women. And when women themselves reinforce this culture by downplaying, excusing, or applauding it, they participate in their own oppression.

And the studies show

I now present the 5 reasons in the literature that show why all these statements are bad for women and Filipinos in general. Reasons why we should not tolerate, minimize, or encourage misogyny.

1) Misogyny includes verbal remarks of the “I will give tourists 42 virgins” kind. These are not to be seen as jokes, eccentricities, or signs of sincerity – unless we mean sincerely hateful and abusive. They have serious psychological effects. That is why these types of remarks are against the law.

2) Even if it was a small victory, being able in the past to keep such remarks out of the hearing of the general population, especially children, is beneficial. Thus the argument that those of us who like “disente” (decency) and therefore are merely hopelessly elitist and hypocritical is not supported by the studies. It has been shown that even just hearing degrading remarks is detrimental to a person’s psychological well-being.

It has also been shown that men who are inclined to sexual harassment are more likely to harass women when social norms condone or permit these. Such men are likely to engage in similar behaviors when they see their peers doing it. (Parenthetically, my dear women friends, this is why we are seeing so many instances of public self stimulation among the President’s men.)

3) Men as well as women experience the stress and harmful effects of misogynist statements – unless, of course, you happen to be the President, the Speaker of the House, a certain Senator who seems to be “na-ano” lang, the President’s spokesperson, and all those people who laugh at their harmful statements. The studies show, however, that if you are a woman who defends, minimizes, or enables this language by saying such traitorous things like “as a woman I am not offended” you are likely to suffer even more harmful psychological effects.

4) Authoritarian men are more likely to engage in sexual harassment. This is in the nature of “we told you so” to all those people who did not take the “mayor mauna” (mayor first) joke as an indicator of someone’s being unfit to lead. Some of these people even understood the necessity of democracy to a free and prosperous society. So how many times do we have to prove the point that there can be no real social transformation if you leave women behind? Mirese. Martial Law in Mindanao. Extrajudicial killings. The suppression of dissent. Mirese.

5) Speaking out against sexual verbal abuse is good for your psychological health. There is this loony claim going around that women who stand up against this regime’s  human rights violations, including the violation of women’s rights, are “expiring women”.

Well..duh! This indeed is a misguided statement made about women who stand up for themselves. By the parameters of evidence-based science this idea stands in the category of “were you on shabu, Fentanyl or something?”

There is something wrong with you if you do not stand up for yourself and others against this abuse. One of the hallmarks of a normal and healthy person is to see injustice, whether it is against you or another, and resist.

This is also why men and women who witness sexual slurs against women, even if it is not directed at them, experience psychological distress.

So, this is not just about women being prudes, prissy, insecure, easily offended, needing attention. It is about fighting because we are normal. Speaking of needing attention, it has also been shown that sexual harassers consistently misjudge their attractiveness to women. That is, they tend to think that women need attention from men like them, when in truth, women wouldn’t touch them with a 10-foot pole. (There are also psychological theories that men who engage in this level of misogyny are suffering from homosexual panic. But that, dear LGBT friends, will require another article on this administration’s hatred of gay people.)

Which is why the Philippine Dispensation Upholding Total Sexism (PDUTS) movement will never succeed in normalizing misogyny even if their principal doesn’t seem capable of putting a sock in it.

6) The correlation between resistance and mental health is so well established that in feminist counseling, which is now recognized as a major and established approach, part of the professional responsibility of a counselor is to engage in some activity for social change and to encourage her counselees to do the same.

So, dear reader, to uphold my professional integrity, I hereby request that you check out the Bantay Bastos campaign. – Rappler.com

Sylvia Estrada Claudio is a doctor of medicine who also holds a PhD in psychology. She has been giving free psychological services to women and men victims of violence for the last 30 years. She believes in evidence-based discussions. She firmly believes that what is popular is not necessarily moral and what is immoral will eventually be unpopular. For this article, she trusts that the reader can tell the difference between her description of findings and conclusions, her application of these to our current situation, and when she is merely engaging in stress relief by giving back to misogynists that which they seem to enjoy putting out.

“In a highly politicized context as in the Philippines, appointment to the office of the Chief Justice based on seniority is a tradition that minimizes the jockeying for appointment within and outside of the Court. The tradition of seniority has a way of muting political ambitions and insulates to some degree the office of the Chief Justice from the patronato system.”

These were the words of Raphael Lotilla, a former law professor at the University of the Philippines, in a letter he wrote declining his nomination for chief justice in 2012. The country had just witnessed a first in its history, the impeachment and conviction of a chief justice, Renato Corona, and the search had begun for his replacement.

Hierarchy is king in Padre Faura. You could feel this as you step into the Court and witness the 15 justices descend into the session hall for the occasional oral arguments. The most junior enter first and occupy the seats in the half-moon table that are farthest from the center where the chief justice sits. The most senior sit to the left and right of the head of the Court. 

In weekly en banc meetings, the same rule applies. There was a time when the joke was: by the time the bowl of peanuts that was passed around reached the most junior, there was hardly anything left. And since only the 15 justices attend these meetings – there is not a single staff member present – the most junior, who sits nearest the door, is tasked to open it whenever the coffee server knocks. 

You could also see the hierarchical nature of the Court in the titles of the justices: there is a senior associate justice and there is, simply, an associate justice. Such is the lay of the land in the 3rd co-equal branch of government. 

In Malacañang, President Benigno Aquino III was impervious to the more-than-a-century history of the Court where tradition reigned. Aquino picked one of the most junior justices, Maria Lourdes Sereno, to lead the Court at a time when the institution was still gathering its bearings after the historic impeachment of its chief justice. 

This was the context of Lotilla’s letter. A Court of Appeals justice, shared Lotilla’s view. He told me in an interview for my book, Hour Before Dawn: The Fall and Uncertain Rise of the Philippine Supreme Court, that after shaking up the Court, it was time to restore stability and the equilibrium in the balance of power. “By allowing tradition to take hold, the President allows the theoretically weakest [branch of government] to regain its self respect. In other words, by restraining himself, the executive provides strategic stability.”

Midnight appointment 

President Gloria Arroyo broke this tradition twice. The first time was in 2005, when she appointed Artemio Panganiban, the second most senior on the court, as chief justice. This was a short-lived arrangement as Panganiban served only for 11 months after which Reynato Puno, the most senior, was named chief justice. The disequilibrium that Panganiban’s appointment caused seemed innocuous. 

It was Arroyo’s midnight appointment of Renato Corona as chief justice in 2010 – during the election period wherein appointments were banned – that shook the judiciary. The Constitution (Article 7, Section 15) is explicit: “Two months immediately before the next Presidential elections and up to the end of his term, a President or Acting President shall not make appointments, except temporary appointments to executive positions when continued vacancies therein will prejudice public service or endanger public safety.”

The Supreme Court reinterpreted the Constitution and overturned an earlier decision that the ban covered the judiciary. In 1998, the Court, in a unanimous vote, found the appointments of two regional trial court judges to have been “unquestionably made during the period of the ban.” The Court said that the President was “neither required to make appointments to the courts nor allowed to do so” during the ban which takes effect only once in every 6 years.

Amid the highly-charged political atmosphere in 2010, the Court allowed Arroyo to name the next chief justice. They declared the judiciary special, exempting the institution from the ban.

The most senior on the Court, Antonio Carpio, accepted the nomination of the Judicial and Bar Council for chief justice on one condition: that the shortlist be made by the next president. In effect, he opted out of the midnight appointment process.

What we see today are the aftershocks of Arroyo’s appointment of Corona and Aquino’s choice for his replacement. These have caused tectonic shifts in an institution which is still trying to rise from the conviction of Corona.

The Corona trial brought to the fore issues of corruption in the most secretive branch of government. It was part of a cleansing process that began at the top, jolted the Court, and pushed it to be transparent. 

What is most unfortunate is that the impeachment of Sereno is taking place under a strongman who undermines institutions and wants to control the judiciary. 

History has its own momentum, and the Court is caught up in its force. – Rappler.com 

The tide has shifted.

In a matter of years public opinion has changed in favor of legalizing divorce. In 2005 only 43% of adult Filipinos agreed that separated couples should be allowed to divorce. At that time 45% disagreed. In 2017, those who agreed increased to 53% while those who disagreed went down to 32%. SWS describes the net agreement of +21 as moderately strong.

Although 15% remain undecided there is no indication that public opinion will roll back. Since 2011 surveys have consistently shown that there are more people who want divorce legalized in the Philippines.

Good thing or bad thing?

How the trend is interpreted depends on one's moral or religious worldviews.

For some people, that the Philippines does not have a divorce law is a badge of honor it shares with the Vatican. And it must remain like this at all costs.

In their view it reflects our society's moral standing. We may not be as developed as other countries but this is our way of resisting moral decay. Recently one bishop even proclaimed that "the destruction of families by divorce is indeed a project of Satan, the enemy par excellence of God."

(For the record the Philippines has a very specific provision for divorce under the Code of Muslim Personal Laws.)

For others, however, divorce is very much needed in the Philippines. Legal separation and annulment are provisions that are not only expensive and tedious. They also have their respective limitations.

Legal separation does not allow for remarriage while annulment places a lot of burden to show that the marriage that took place was void to begin with.

With justification, divorce addresses the limitations of these provisions. It recognizes that marriage existed and that divorced individuals can marry again.

Violence and betrayal

What is interesting is that even Filipino Catholics themselves agree with legalizing divorce. 54% of adult Catholics agree as opposed to only 31% who disagree.

Clearly, these figures fly in the face of the Church's official teaching that marriage cannot be dissolved. What accounts for the discrepancy?

Ordinary Filipino Catholics, in my view, do not entertain divorce just because they want to contradict their clergy.

They know that the Church values marriage. They do too. This is the reason getting married remains an ideal in Philippine society. In 2015 more than 1,000 marriages were solemnized on a daily basis.

At the same time, our society treats the abiding family as a source of happiness and meaning. This will make it difficult for divorce to become a quick legal remedy, as others might fear.

But ordinary Filipinos also know that not all marriages are made in heaven. Violence and betrayal are realities on the ground.

For these individuals divorce is needed not because they want to destroy families or their children's future. They are simply aware that not all conflicts can be resolved in the context of marriage.

Religious response

Today whenever divorce is brought up in church communities it is treated either as taboo or as moral depravity.

What exacerbates the problem is this: Too often a romanticized image of the family is used against even the most dysfunctional relationships. Passages from the Bible are even carelessly invoked in the name of marital sanctity.

Asserting it in this way neglects completely the realities that necessitate divorce: violence, infidelity, and abandonment. Instead of providing comfort, religion brings only oppression.

Hence for the religious to focus only on the divorce law is inadequate. Already the bigger issue is the reality of broken families in our society.

How then can separation and its consequences be dealt with? How then can separated individuals be assisted? How about their grieving children?

These are just some of the big questions at hand. Surely, religion, as an institution of hope, has something concrete to offer. – Rappler.com

Jayeel Cornelio, PhD is a visiting professor at the Divinity School of Chung Chi College at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. He is on leave from the Ateneo de Manila University where he is the Director of the Development Studies Program. Follow him on Twitter @jayeel_cornelio.

MANILA, Philippines – We always thought unalloyed nationalism was ideal, but historian Leloy Claudio shatters the misconceptions and lists down 5 ways can be a bad thing.

He walks us through the pitfalls of rabid patriotism and protectionism, all offshoots of nationalism.

He points to one of the most tragic lows of humanity – Adolf Hitler’s Third Reich – that was powered by ultra-nationalism and the delusion of a master race.

Watch and learn. Tonight, at 9pm. – Rappler.com

Boracay Island is now ground zero for tensions between the Duterte government and the private sector. 

On the one hand, President Duterte wants to shut down the “cesspool” that is Boracay Island for up to a year, ostensibly to allow it to rehabilitate. Spokesman Harry Roque even said Duterte wants to “blow up” using dynamites all structures and businesses that have thrived there illegally and at the expense of the environment.

On the other hand, the private sector dreads the economic blowback of such a closure. Last weekend, Boracay residents and business owners held a symbolic protest at Station 2 – using lights and sand castles – denouncing the President’s threat to their jobs and livelihoods. For them, a year-long shutdown is just too much.

But why is Duterte suddenly hot on the heels of Boracay? Why is he pursuing regulation as unprecedented and extreme as a total ban?

There’s no doubt that Boracay’s environment needs fixing. Yet a number of glaring double standards in Duterte’s Boracay policy betray the fact that his interest in the island may be less about the environment and more about politics and the accommodation of certain private (Chinese) interests.

Pollution

The Boracay brouhaha started when Duterte declared in a forum that Boracay is a “cesspool” that “smells of sh*t” and therefore needs to be closed.

There’s a grain of truth to this. Some establishments have indeed built illegal structures for many years, and not all are connected to the sewage and drainage system. The unsightly green algae that teem during the summer, although not unnatural, is also fed by phosphates and nitrates that leak from households and establishments.

In other words, Boracay has fallen for a problem called in economics the “tragedy of the commons”: people, following their self-interest, end up overusing and depleting a shared resource like Boracay’s environment.

But a total shutdown – which will inevitably kill business and tourism there – is hardly the best option on the table.

For starters, Boracay’s coastal waters are safer and less polluted than Duterte is wont to claim.

The Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) regularly monitors pollution levels in Boracay. In 2017 they recorded coliforms in the coastal areas to be at just 8 MPN/100 mL (MPN stands for “most probable number”).

This is lower than the danger threshold of 100 MPN/100 mL, and also lower than the 101.2 MPN/100 mL recorded in 2012. In other words, Boracay’s waters are even safer for swimming today than several years back.

Only in certain areas – like Sitio Bulabog – are coliform levels off the charts. In general, however, Boracay is not a “cesspool.”

Even with the presence of coliforms, government has no excuse to cordon off the entire island. With this logic, other tourist hotspots like Panglao and Coron should also be shut down because of high coliform levels found in certain areas there.

Although the DENR is indeed mulling such actions, where do we draw the line? How much tourism and local business is the government willing to sacrifice in the fight against pollution?

At the same time, a shutdown spree would imply that all of Davao City’s beaches should also be closed down immediately, since in 2016 the DENR found some beaches there to have fecal coliform levels 110 to 617 times the acceptable level.

Duterte’s singular focus on Boracay – and the lack of commensurate attention on other, more polluted tourist hotspots – suggests the presence of a double standard.

Congestion

Second, if Duterte were really concerned about congestion and excessive commercial activity in Boracay, why did he just allow the construction of a new megacasino and megahotel there?

In late December, Macau-based Galaxy Entertainment Group Ltd revealed its plan to construct a $500-million casino-resort in Boracay. Galaxy’s officials – including their billionaire chairman Lui Che Woo – even paid President Rodrigo Duterte a courtesy call in Malacañang to discuss their investment.

Hotel of Asia, Inc – a subsidiary of DoubleDragon Properties – will also start construction there of a 1,001-room beachfront hotel, set to be the largest in the country.

Note that the construction of both these investments will proceed despite Boracay’s impending shutdown. 

Last Monday, Leisure and Resorts World Corp – the local partner of Galaxy – said they already bought a 23-hectare property south of the island for their megacasino. They also secured a provisional license from the Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corporation (Pagcor) that will allow them to begin construction.

Asked if Galaxy need worry about Boracay’s impending closure, the Pagcor chair simply said, “No, they have to build. Opening is at least after 3 years.”

Meanwhile, one official of DoubleDragon said, “I think the cleanup is gonna be a win-win for all the developers in the island…It’s very good for us because when it reopens we’re gonna come back with a stronger and world-class island.”

Investments, whether local or foreign, are not bad at all. But allowing the construction of major projects in Boracay – while closing down local business and tourism for a year – also reeks of a double standard.

Moreover, won’t a megacasino and megahotel just attract more tourists and, hence, just worsen congestion in the island? In 2017 tourist arrivals in Boracay hit a record high of two million, a 16% growth from 2016. Among foreign visitors, the most numerous – for the first time – were the Chinese.

Competition

Finally, it turns out that Galaxy’s Boracay megacasino is linked to China’s global infrastructure push called the “Belt and Road Initiative.”

Said Galaxy’s deputy chairman, “As you know, China’s relationship with the Philippines has been improving…Galaxy would like to play a role in the One Belt One Road initiative and we strongly believe the Philippines has great potential and offers attractive opportunities.”

This is a very telling statement. In a previous article, I explained that the Belt and Road Initiative is China’s way of pushing its political and economic power worldwide through the construction of infrastructure projects in developing countries (and the issuance of loans therefor). (READ: What scares me the most about China’s new, ‘friendly’ loans)

As Belt and Road projects spread worldwide, China’s private sector is positioning accordingly, and this includes the gaming industry: last year, another Macau-based casino hub revealed that it is building a $275-million casino complex in Cape Verde, off Africa’s west coast.

Casinos are prohibited in many Asian countries, and the Philippines may yet be one of the best growth areas for Macau-based casinos, not just for our robust economic growth but also Duterte’s wholehearted pivot to China.

In January, Duterte even went on to order Pagcor to stop the entry or creation of new casinos in the country to avoid “crowding” or “oversupply” in the industry. When asked if the incoming Boracay megacasino is covered by this ban, Pagcor said, “[Galaxy] met all the requirements before the President announced the moratorium.” What luck!

This is not the first time Duterte has pushed for the entry of a Chinese firm in the country: last year he pitched the idea of bringing in a Chinese telco to break the duopoly between PLDT-Smart and Globe, ostensibly to promote competition in that sector.

But as shown by his Pagcor directive, Duterte is also capable and willing to kill competition on a whim. How will we attract investments in other sectors if Duterte’s competition policy is stamped by double standards?

More than meets the eye

Environmental problems have hounded Boracay Island for many, many years, with little action from the local government. Hence many can’t help but see President Duterte’s recent interest in the island as a show of his strength and political will.

Yet Duterte’s policies in Boracay are full of double standards. If the problem is pollution, why the singular focus on Boracay? If the problem is congestion, why allow the construction of new, giant commercial developments? If the problem is lack of competition, why allow entrants in some industries like telco but not in casinos?

Finally, the growing influence of China on Duterte’s policymaking is also striking. Just how beholden is Duterte to the Chinese? How many more of his future decisions and policies will be tinged by Chinese interests? What’s in it for him? – 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. Thanks to Kevin Mandrilla for useful comments and suggestions. Follow JC on Twitter: @jcpunongbayan.

In July 2017, the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) revealed that there was a possibility for China to hire Filipino household service workers (HSWs) with a high salary of up to P100,000 per month. China is indeed likely to open its doors to Filipino HSWs, but there will be challenges and restrictions.

In August 2017, the Department of Trade in Service and Commercial Services, Chinese Ministry of Commerce, released what by far is the most updated and official source of information on the service industry. In 2016, it was estimated that there were up to 25,420,000 workers in China's HSWs sector, yet there remain huge gaps to be filled across the major and medium-sized cities in China.

In Beijing alone, there is still a demand for 200,000 to 300,000 more HSWs. Around 30.2% of HSWs in China were needed for maternal care and child rearing, while 16.3% were required for elderly care. These two areas had the greatest need for HSWs, given China's aging problem and the recently enacted Two-Child Policy.

The majority of Chinese domestic HSWs lack professional training. In the past two years, there were appalling cases of the maltreatment of elderly and babies by HSWs in their homes, in care houses and kindergartens. In June 2017, a household helper set fire to her employer's apartment in Hangzhou in the middle of the night, causing the death of the employer and her two children in a case that shocked the general public. The helper was sentenced to death in February 2018.

Around 90% of HSWs in China are at or below high school education level; the majority are females from rural areas in their 40s and above, usually with little or no training. In comparison, Filipino HSWs are popularly known for their professionalism, which means they would be expected to provide more professional and specialized care that the Chinese HSWs cannot.

The English language capacity of the Filipino HSWs would also be a great added value for middle-class families eager to create an English learning environment for their children at home. According to The Economist, the number of middle class population in China had reached 225 million by 2016, and is expected to outnumber Europe by 2020. The majority of the middle class belong to the generation of the One-Child Policy, which means they have received good education, pursue better quality of life, and seek quality education for their children. They also demand better quality service and are capable of paying for it.

Market analysis conducted in Guangzhou shows that maternal matron and baby carers were paid 7,493 RMB (about P61,000) on average in 2017, compared to the 3,536 RMB for the household cleaners. According to online agency Aiyilaile, the salary range is from 3,500 RMB to 22,800 RMB per month. The monthly salary of P100,000 (approximately 12,200 RMB) as suggested by DOLE last July will thus depend on the skills, experience, and professionalism of the Filipino HSWs. 

However, the Chinese household service industry is not yet legally or institutionally well developed. Unlike in Hong Kong, there are no industry systems and standards, or well-established and functioning rules and regulations to effectively regulate the industry.

Rights of household service workers 

It is not uncommon to find that there is no contract between HSWs and employers, leading to a lack of clarity regarding protection of rights or the mutual obligations of employer and HSW.

For example, the HSWs may leave any time they want without notifying the employer. They might not get their medical and social insurance covered. Or they might be taken somewhere else to work, such as a relative's house.

In August 2017, Filipino HSW Lorain Asuncion, who was taken from Hong Kong to work for her employer's relative in Shenzhen, jumped off from the Shenzhen apartment where she worked and died. The Chinese news coverage did not reveal what the exact cause was.

Although the Chinese government has been actively pushing for policy reform in this field, enforcement and implementation remain rudimentary. The lack of well-functioning systems, standards, and rules/regulations for the HSW industry could also easily lead to disputes between employers and the HSWs, with particularly grave consequences in the case of foreign HSWs.

In addition, if a Filipino HSW were to enter a regular Chinese family, there are likely to be issues such as communication difficulty, political, social, and religious differences. Foreign HSWs in China should expect to work with family members, particular the elderly who do not speak English at all.

Political circumstances between the Philippines and China, although gradually improving under the Duterte administration, remain unstable in the long run because of the territorial disputes between the two countries. Preventing overseas workers from suffering possible negative impact of future political tensions between the two countries should be an issue of mutual concern.

Moreover, in China, religious freedom is relatively restricted and churches are also limited in number, which may cause difficulty for the religious life of Filipino HSWs in China. 

Thus far, China has technically opened the market of only 5 major cities – Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, and Xiamen – as well as the entire Guangdong Province to foreign HSWs. But the right to employ foreign HSWs has been restricted to high-level expats from overseas, including those from Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Macau who have already been granted Chinese permanent residence or a work permit. This policy and strict requirements have therefore limited access to the China market by foreign HSWs. The bigger market of the regular Chinese families, particularly the middle-class families, remains technically closed.

In summary, there is a clear demand in China’s household service market that Filipino HSWs could help meet, given their comparative advantage in the industry. But the Philippine government should be aware of the current situation of the development of the Chinese household service industry, particularly the problems and possible consequences for foreign HSWs.

To pursue cooperation in this area, a comprehensive system of rules, regulations, and mechanisms needs to be included in the official discussions between the two governments, and ideally implemented before actual deployment to China. This is to ensure protection of the Filipino HSWs and to avoid potential conflicts between the two sides.

The two governments moreover need to work together to make arrangements for the reported 200,000 Filipinos HSWs who have been working illegally in China. – Rappler.com

Dr Meiting Li is assistant professor of international relations at the Department of Political Science of the University of the Philippines.

As weighty as it sounds, the legal phrase "quo warranto" is easy enough to grasp in its basic sense: It's a court proceeding undertaken to resolve a challenge to a government official's fitness to keep his or her position. 

But, as may be expected of any legal concept, once deployed, it becomes oversimplified or complicated for expediency. In this case, it is deployed against Chief Justice Maria Lourdes Sereno as an alternative to impeachment, the obvious process by which impeachable officials like her are dealt with. That quo warranto is swift and impeachment could be long-drawn-out and difficult to manage should make for a broad-enough hint why.

Given the dubious circumstances in which quo warranto was sprung, my first thoughts were of a contrivance extracted from some secret depths and exploited to serve intents not only malignant but also immediate – or it would not have been resorted to in so sudden and egregious a fashion. True enough, quo warranto comes from the medieval Latin, and it is being brought down, guillotine-like, on the neck of another Marie, this one wholly undeserving. 

Surely, a Herculean stretching of the imagination will be required to make all this wash: If an impeachable official may be removed by any means other than impeachment, what judicious purpose does the alternative serve? And especially since the process of impeachment has moved well along for Sereno – the House of Representatives has decided to impeach, and the Senate is ready to try – where lies the sense of it all?

But then, neither legality nor credibility nor shame seems a consideration here. If any of that had been a consideration at all, it went out the window when justices from the Supreme Court majority – classified as such by their pack vote on issues known to be of interest to President Duterte – testified at the House hearings of their minority chief's impeachment case.  

By taking part in the hearings, they were understood to have recognized impeachment as the proper process by which Sereno should be judged, and, by testifying against her, they proved themselves unworthy to judge her. In fact, they proved themselves petty, airing resentments– ill feelings conceivably borne from 4 years ago, when a young outsider came to preside over their court for the next 18 years, frustrating the ambition of any older justice to rise to chief. 

The dangers of quo warranto actually lie far beyond the hijacking by the Supreme Court of the Senate's constitutional mandate to decide whether Sereno is guilty, and therefore ought to go, or not guilty, and therefore should stay; the dangers go beyond her ouster even. If that happens, she herself has warned, "No one will be safe....Everyone will have to look for a political patron to save [themselves] from incessant harassment, threats, and bullying." 

The ultimate danger is in fact far worse, and that is the very fulfillment of Rodrigo Duterte's long-standing, no-secret wish – authoritarianism. 

Once this conspiracy by quo warranto succeeds – and all indications are it will – the signal is out for the complete cooptation of the Supreme Court, enlisted on the cheap bargain that its disliked chief would be delivered to it for judgment. In return, it could supply Duterte with the trappings of constitutionality he will require for the supression of rights and freedoms, for arbitrary arrests and imprisonment, for summary executions, for the murder of democracy itself.  

The arrangement also decidedly improves Duterte's standing with the military. While deservingly proud of its swing role in bringing down Ferdinand Marcos at the Edsa people power revolt of 1986, the military has shown some coziness to Duterte, a Marcos idolater himself – a coziness that a word of approbation from the highest court could transform to unquestioning obedience.

But how could such momentous  consequences of quo warranto loom undetected by a nation that already came under Marcos – for 14 years – and now comes under a president even easier to read given his conspicuous pathological disorder? For all the fervid protests being mounted here and there, how could they remain divided by individual causes, shooting buck shots at all manner of enemies, instead of concentrating collectively on the most dangerous enemy among them?

I only hope Duterte has not found in enough of us his perfect pathological match. – Rappler.com

It is Holy Week. God made these days holy – but not by His pains and sufferings. Pain alone cannot save us. God made these days holy by pouring much love into the sufferings He endured. Only love can save us and wash our sins away.

Holy Week is about what Christ has done for humanity. Let the memory of God's mercy sink in without any compulsion to do something. Just relish His mercy and bask in the radiance of His love. During Holy Week, tell God, "Thank you."

Holy Week is not what men and women do to make these days holy. It is not about what Catholics must do, nor is it about religious traditions and pious practices done to "feel good" after.

Fasting is good, but without malasakit (concern) for others, it is nothing. Prayer is good, but without remembering others and laying aside personal comfort, it is just an ego trip. Helping the poor and giving alms are good, but if you do it for show or to get a "feel good" reward later, it is just a noisy bell.

Can we go to the beach during Holy Week?

If it will help you love like Jesus, yes, you can. But if it will distract you from the story of His love, please don't. The highest law is not silence but love. Silence speaks only if that silence is loving.

Do we need to visit churches during Holy Week?

That is good practice, but you might want to visit 7 patients in the charity ward of a hospital instead, and bring them some food. Choose to love.

Tradition of love 

Do we need to scourge our backs until they bleed to show atonement for our sins?

Instead of spilling your blood on the streets, why not walk into a Red Cross office and donate blood? Choose to share life. Share your blood.

Do we need to walk barefoot till our soles get blisters as a form of penance for our sins? Why don't you buy a pair of slippers and give it to a child who goes to school dragging his torn footwear?

Do we need to sing the "Pasyong Mahal" as an act of devotion to the story of Christ’s sufferings and death? Why don't you buy a Bible instead and read one chapter a day with your family for the rest of the year?

Do you need to get the flowers from the Holy Week carrozas to bring home and adorn your family altar? Why don't you bring flowers instead to a home for abandoned seniors and brighten the faces of lonely grandparents with the love you bring?

Must the face look sour and gloomy during Holy Week? Love begins with a smile. Make someone happy this Holy Week. Make someone feel loved. With your smile, show that God is love.

Holy Week traditions vary from country to country. Holy Week practices evolve with time. For 2,000 years now, only one tradition has remained – the Christian tradition of love. It is really not just a tradition. The first Christians were known to be the most loving of all. Love is our identity. This week is holy because of love. Love alone can make us holy. – Rappler.com

Photos in composite image courtesy of Mavic Conde (Jesus crowned with thorns), Ben Nabong (devotees wiping handkerchiefs on Jesus' image), Jun Malig (flagellants), and Wikimedia Commons (Manila Cathedral exterior and Boracay tourists). Photo of Archbishop Villegas by Angie de Silva.

It was 2014 when I first set foot on an island community called Nasingin in Bohol. Nestled just below Banacon island, Nasingin is home to at least 2,400 people. The whole community stretches 1.7 kilometers long, and I was able to walk around in less than 15 minutes. The ground, made of dirt and coral, disappears twice a day when high tide comes in.

I visited Nasingin on a research mission to get the locals' notions of climate change. Constantly battered by fierce typhoons, sea surges, and strong winds, the community knows that nature's course has changed drastically in the last few years.

Artemio Vergara, chief of the peoples' organization, eagerly showed me around. It didn't take long for me to realize that the community lives in poverty – freshwater supply is scarce, livelihood options are limited to fishing, and household heads usually go to neighboring towns in search for jobs and better opportunities.

But despite these conditions, Nasingin has something that they consider a treasure: the 300-hectare mangrove forest cover that frames their island, protecting it from harsh winds and the unfriendly sea.

According to Mr Vergara, the mangrove forest is a result of collective community action.

"I was 12 years old when we started planting mangroves. Local chieftains here consider this as a priority and as years passed by, we were able to grow this mangrove forest," he said.

Touring the forest cover aboard a motorize banca, the community members proudly show the massive mangrove trees that expand well beyond the island's horizon. These forests have always been there for them, the community members said.

Nasingin often faces destructive typhoons along with sea surges and strong winds. When disaster strikes, nobody could go fishing. Economic activities are disrupted and most families are forced to go hungry. During these trying times, they turn to their mangroves.

"It has always protected us. The mangroves act as a barrier between us and strong waves. That's why we're still here. When we couldn't go out to fish, we usually find shellfish in the mangroves and that’s enough to help us survive," Maria Luz Sagarino, a community member and a mother of four shared.

The 300-hectare mangrove that cradles the community does not only provide valuable protection against the forces of nature, it is also a lifeline for residents of Nasingin. The forest cover served as a breeding ground and nursery for various species of fish, shellfish, and marine animals – most of which can be viable sources of livelihood and sustenance.

And with climate change increasing the likelihood of extreme weather disturbances, Nasingin's mangrove forest will prove to be a valuable resource not only to the community but to its neighboring towns as well.

Nasingin is just one of the communities in the Philippines that greatly benefits from its mangrove ecosystem. Across the country, these marine reserves present viable blue carbon solutions to mitigate and adapt to the effects of climate change.

Philippines and blue carbon solutions

The Philippines, as an archipelago, hosts a significant portion of the world's mangrove stocks. According to this report by PEMSEA, the East Asian region alone accounts for 4 million hectares of mangroves – roughly 30% of the global total. The country has the third largest mangrove ecosystem at 0.26Mha, after Indonesia's 2.71Mha and Malaysia’s 0.56MHa.

These mangrove cover are extremely important in addressing climate change. In a research conducted by the Nature Conservancy and IHCantabria for the WAVES program of World Bank, it was found out that mangroves helped reduced flooding for 613,000 people annually, 23% of whom are living below the poverty line. Mangroves are also responsible for saving as much as US $1 billion in residential and industrial property damages. If mangrove forest cover can be reverted back to their 1950s level, added benefits will be felt by 267,000 people, 61,000 of which are living in extreme poverty condition.

On top of these, mangroves are efficient in sequestering CO2 from the atmosphere. The PEMSEA report underscored that East Asia’s mangrove stocks hold 8.8 billion tons of CO2 and collectively, these mangrove ecosystems sequester 22.4 MMt CO2 from the atmosphere.

In terms of adaptation, mangroves protect coastlines and its communities by absorbing wave energy, providing protection from storm surge, and preventing coastal soil erosion. In some cases, mangroves can also double as seawalls, protecting communities from sea level rise.

Mangroves are part of coastal blue carbon ecosystems – an umbrella term used to describe mangroves, tidal marshes, and seagrass meadows that can sequester carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and store these for hundreds of years. These ecosystems, aside from sequestering carbon, provide rich breeding grounds for fish stocks, contribute to the filtration of sediment, and ensure the protection of coral reefs from erosion and flooding.

It is essential to unlock blue carbon solutions to help cool down the planet. Experts agree that for humanity to survive, global temperature levels should not increase by more than 2⁰C. As such, a 1.5-degree increase in global temperature still brings in catastrophic events: more frequent extreme weather disturbances, sea level rise, stronger and longer spells of drought and El Niño, and the extinction of flora and fauna. Mangrove ecosystems, with its proven capacity for carbon sequestration, can be leveraged in a way that strongly supports a country's achievement of its NDC towards meeting this global goal.

The Philippines, as one of the countries that ratified the Paris Agreement in 2016, has identified the potential of blue carbon solutions in climate change adaptation and mitigation. In fact, the country is one of the 5 countries that explicitly used this term in its Nationally Intended Contribution (NDC).

In its NDC, the Philippines agreed to "about 70% of emission reductions by 2030 relative the business-as-usual (BAU) scenario." To achieve this, the country highlighted the role that marine ecosystems play, citing blue carbon potentials.

Threat to blue carbon solutions

Despite their valuable contribution to climate change mitigation, coastal ecosystems around the world are threatened by anthropogenic activities, with over 800,000 hectares destroyed per year. When these ecosystems are destroyed, they release enormous amounts of CO2 in the atmosphere, further contributing to the rise of Earth’s temperature.

According to this policy brief by Nature Conservancy, if half of the annual loss in coastal ecosystems are addressed, it will reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 0.23 GT per year – an amount equivalent to the 2013 emissions of Spain. Further, if wetlands are to be restored to their 1990 cover, potential carbon sequestration can amount to 160Mt CO2 per year – enough to offset 77.4 million tons of coal burned. In terms of protecting communities against climate-related disasters, the paper posits that 100 meters of mangroves are enough to reduce wave height by as much as 66%.

Local communities and blue carbon solutions 

The 2020 deadline for limiting global temperature increase to 1.5^o C is fast approaching, and there is a need to act now. The Philippines is strategically endowed with massive assets towards blue carbon solutions.

Measures should be in place to ensure that local communities take the center stage in managing and protecting their resources. In the case of Nasingin, the community is awarded a certificate of stewardship from the Department of Environment and Natural Resources, granting them the authority to plant, manage, and protect their mangrove forest. The agency and the community also entered into a Community-Based Forestry Management (CBFM) contract to ensure that the community will always have the agency and power over their resources.

Aside from safeguarding the rights of local communities, it is also imperative to establish an incentive mechanism for those who are heavily dependent on mangrove ecosystems. In Banacon Island, a larger neighboring island of Nasingin, experts estimated that the 40-year mangrove plantation can store as much as 370.7 tons of carbon per hectare. This capacity can pave the way for incentive programs to further stimulate the community’s buy-in and provide an economic benefit for their resource management efforts.

Communities should always be in the spotlight in scaling up blue carbon solutions. Technical assistance through capacity building and livelihood programs should be made available to them. As such, the government, together with the academe, should identify and value indigenous approaches to blue carbon solutions and develop these for replication.

Collaboration amongst local government plays a key part in scaling up blue carbon solutions as well. A good example for this is the enforcement of the Verde Island Passage Marine Protected Area Network, a 1.14-million hectare marine ecosystem formed by the waters of Romblon, Occidental Mindoro, Oriental Mindoro, and Batangas. The network aims to strengthen enforcement of marine protection laws to ensure the protection of the "center of the center of marine biodiversity."

Lying in the Pacific Ring of Fire, the Philippines is constantly battered by nature's forces. Climate change continues to threaten the country's vulnerability and proves to be a multiplier in the social pressures that it is currently experiencing. However, the Philippines has a lot of solutions under its belt – blue carbon solutions being one of these. Addressing climate change lies in ensuring the well-being of our people and making sure that they have the capacity to survive and thrive in these trying times. – Rappler.com

Val took up BS Development Communication at University of the Philippines Los Baños and is finishing her master's degree in Community Development at the University of the Philippines Diliman. Her work with various communities focuses on environmental justice, sustainable livelihood, and community-based resource management.