Is the UN sneaking an RH program in Mindanao?

SHOOTING STRAIGHT By Bobit S. Avila (The Philippine Star)

Year in and year out, the first news reports of the New Year that we get are about the hundreds of victims that got hurt during the New Year’s Eve revelry. This year more than 700 were hurt and one died due to pyrotechnics. But then as we said... this happens every New Year’s Day celebration. When we were kids, our father would drive the family in our black Dodge car along Magallanes street where the Chinese merchants who lived above their stores would throw firecrackers to the street below and hit the car. It was fun because in those days, cars used very thick steel.

As expected, Health Secretary Enrique Ona wanted a total ban on firecrackers in order to curb the number of casualties. He is joined by fellow Cabinet (DENR) Secretary Ramon Paje who complained that pyrotechnics caused the smog over Metro Manila... which he said is an environmental hazard. Come now, do you think that a total ban on firecrackers could be enforced? P-Noy signed an Executive Order for a total log ban, and if that was enforced to the hilt, storm Sendong could not have caused so much devastation in Northern Mindanao.

Whether we like it or not, exploding firecrackers has become a Filipino tradition. It is a matter of personal responsibility to stop using them. I stopped buying pyrotechnics more than 20 years ago because I realized that we should not be exploding “money” to start the New Year. If you ask me, the DOH and the LGUs have already issued more than enough warnings against the use firecrackers... but people just don’t listen. Government should never come up with laws that they cannot enforce anyway. All I can say to those people who got hurt last New Year’s Eve is a Cebuano word, “Mayra!”

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If you lost family or children due to the flash floods that devastated Cagayan de Oro City, Iligan City and Dumaguete City and are still able to have children, chances are, you will have more children to replace the ones who perished in that flood. I’m writing this because of the thousands that perished in that flood, many of them small children. Of course, we know well enough that making babies is not a priority for the victims as of now.

This is why I was appalled by a report that came from another paper last Monday that the Manila office of the United Nations (UN) Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (Ocha) proposed an allocation of $1.76 million (P77 million) to address the “Reproductive health needs of displaced populations, as well as the monitoring, prevention and containment of possible outbreak of disease.” Say what?

This only proves to you that the UN attached agencies just want to pursue their own abortion agenda even if the Philippines has not yet approved the RH bill. This should trigger the question: can this UN agency pursue its own RH agenda whether the host country allows it or not? Perhaps a bigger question we ought to ask is, “whether or not this program has the blessings of the Aquino regime.” Knowing how badly P-Noy wants to pass the RH bill, I wouldn’t be surprised if what Ocha is doing in Mindanao has the President’s imprimatur. Could this be the President’s way of shortcutting the Legislative process?

Perhaps the UN Ocha does not realize (but I think they know this too well) that the priority of the displaced people now living in evacuation centers is not to have sex with their partners and make babies... rather their priority is to put a roof on their heads. We already heard on TV many victims being interviewed that most of their basic needs have already been addressed by the tons of donations given by the Filipino people. Most complain about not having a house to return to. Many are asking if they can find work. The priorities of the calamity victims are very clear to us and we should help them get back on their feet as soon as possible.

But obviously the Manila office of Ocha has a hidden agenda when it launched the “Philippines (Mindanao) Humanitarian Action Plan 2012” purportedly to raise $28 million (P1.26 billion) to help the hundreds of thousands of victims of Sendong... supposedly to give them drinking water, food and an emergency shelter. But in truth, they are mere smokescreen for their real objective, and that is to distribute reproductive health kits and cull the population in Northern Mindanao.

I dare say that the UN Ocha office should back down with their sinister plans. They should use that money to help the victims get back on their feet. At this point, we ought to ask Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile (JPE) to conduct a Senate investigation as to whether or not this UN agency is implementing an RH program even if the Philippines has not yet approved the law on RH. What does the Catholic Bishop’s Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) say about sneaking this RH program into the country?

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For e-mail responses to this article, write to vsbobita@mozcom.com orvsbobita@gmail.com. His columns can be accessed throughhttp://www.philstar.com.