Tuesday, June 3, 2014
Monsod: Don't blame slow economy on Yolanda
ABS-CBNnews.com
MANILA -- The government should not blame super typhoon Yolanda for the slow growth in the economy during the first quarter of the year.
In an interview with radio dzRB, economist Solita Monsod said the government’s excuse “does not hold water,” noting that Yolanda wreaked havoc last year and not during the first quarter of 2014.
“This national income growth is for the whole country, [Yolanda] happened in Eastern Visayas,” she pointed out.
“Did investments really come in? The government is such a braggart. The government talks too much,” she continued. “Were expenditures really there? The private sector is even confident of the Philippine economy.”
The Philippine economy grew by only 5.7 percent in the first quarter, with the government saying it continued to feel the lingering effects of super typhoon Yolanda. This was much lower than the 6.4 percent median estimate of 20 Reuters analysts.
"The relatively slow growth is expected, given the magnitude of the destruction in production capacity. In agriculture, permanent crops, notably coconuts, were felled. Damage to agricultural output also disrupted supply chains, which may partly explain why food manufacturing output also declined. The tourism and insurance industries likewise slowed down in the first quarter as they are still reeling from the impact of natural calamities last year," National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA) director general Arsenio Balisacan said.
Monsod could not even pinpoint what could have caused the tapering of the economic growth, saying the government usually has detailed explanations as to which sectors contributed to or affected the economy.
“But this one, I did not see,” she said, as she urged the government to fast-track the public-private partnership (PPP) programs to bolster economic growth.
The illusion and tragedy of our educational system
by RIGOBERTO TIGLAO
A week before school opening, our “live-out” domestic help requested her month’s salary in advance. She needs to pay for the school uniforms and other school expenses for her three children, she said. I can’t imagine where she’ll get money for her family’s food that month. I guess she will be borrowing from friends or from the friendly neighborhood “5-6” usurer.
She has been doing this for the last three years since we contracted her, and as far as I can remember, all our house helpers have always borrowed around this time of the year for their children’s expenses. While tuition in public school is free, most of the other expenses for the students are not, including the uniforms, school supplies, lunch money, and transport fare.
Next to food and housing, schooling is the biggest expense for the Filipino poor. It is such a struggle that many of them even ask their children to drop out at some point in primary school—about half of those who enter elementary, according to education department surveys.
It’s very sad, as it means that our poor, their children, and their children’s children are condemned to remain poor under our inequitable system.
For the poor, providing for the education of their children makes up the sole meaning of their lives. They believe that if only they could have a child “na nakapag-kolehiyo” (one who has been to college) they and the rest of their family would be able to live a life out of poverty.
Unfortunately, this is an illusion. Ask your domestic help or any poor people you know: their parents and grandparents, as far back as they can remember, have been poor.
Today, about 21 million kids from kindergarten, grade school, to high school will rush out to their schools with the dreams of their parents on their back. Some will make it, by dint of luck and hard work. Most, however, are consigned to the fate that goes with an economic and social system that favors the moneyed class.
Passion for education
The Filipinos’ passion to get their children educated is a noble one, at the very least the rational response to an underdeveloped, overpopulated capitalist economy where the laborer’s wage is a commodity, which means that the surplus of laborers reduces that commodity’s price.
For the poor, and for our nation, this is a tragedy. Education for all is an illusion even in, or because of, a capitalist system.
Indeed, two surprise bestsellers in the US, and using mountains of data, Capitalism in the 21st Century by Thomas Piketty and The Son Also Rises by Gregory Clark, have demolished the myths of meritocracy and social mobility under capitalism even in the richest nations.
How much worse it is in such a country such as ours, which has been in the tight grip of a rapacious oligarchy that pays so little taxes that the state can’t fully subsidize the poor people’s education?
I extracted data from National Statistics Office’s 2009 Family Income and Expenditures Survey (FIES), the latest that had information on the educational backgrounds of the head of families by income class. I then made the assumption that this predicts the educational level a member of one of our three main socio-economic classes can attain.
That is, it could show the chances of completing school for the children of the poor classes, in contrast to children of the elite.
The class divisions I have constructed are admittedly crude, as our National Census Office has not changed its stratification method since the 1970s, so that the people in the richest stratum are those who earn annual incomes of just P250,000 and more. This means then that a monthly salary of P21,000 – which could be the salary of a clerk in a Makati company–makes the clerk belong to the richest stratum.
Thus, NSO data allows us only to divide Philippine families into three: The poorest or families with a monthly income of less than P8,000, which make up 35% of the population; the poor-to-middle class, 41% of the population or those who earn more than P8,000 but less than P20,000 a month, and the middle-to-upper class or those with income of more than P20,000.
The last class make up 24% of the population, although using data from the 2003 FIES, those earning more than P42,000 a month make up 2% percent of total population, or the real upper class, the elite in our society.
Based on these data, it would be a herculean effort bordering on a miracle for our poor domestic help to get her children to finish college.
Only 1 will finish college
Among the poor, only 1.3 % finished college. An additional 4.5% had gone to college but didn’t finish, as in the case of my domestic help.
The overwhelming majority of the poor, or 94% only have education at the high school level and below, with only 24% finishing elementary.
Translate my calculation to chances for my house-help’s children finishing college, and it’s 1 out of a hundred.
My household help actually has already beaten the odds by having a child in college now. The figures would indicate that the chances are 94 out of 100 that a poor Filipino finishes only high school.
The obstacles are nearly insurmountable. Without money to buy uniforms and schools supplies, the poor parents would probably just give up along the way. The child, if he is lucky, will enter the informal work force, such as helping in the farm or tending a sari-sari store in the slums.
It has been a vicious cycle. A parent in one generation can’t get out of poverty since he doesn’t have the qualifications a college education could give. But he himself cannot provide his children a college education.
Contrast this with the situation in other countries where the government subsidizes the schooling of all underprivileged children, from primary education to high school (and some, up to college), at roughly the same quality as those provided in schools for the children of the rich.
UP boasts that anybody can enroll there as long as the student passes its qualifying exams. But how can a poor boy who could study only in the elementary and high schools in a far-flung village in Samar have the mental skills and knowledge of somebody who studied at P200, 000-per year La Salle or Ateneo? The UP system of tuition fees even subsidizes the children of the rich, even the billionaires who study there (see my column “Stop subsidizing the rich at UP”, Manila Times, March 26, 2013.)
Our educational system therefore ensures that the millions who are poor continue to be poor through the generations. Yet at the same time, it creates a working class with a level of education capitalists require, so much so that we have been trying to convince foreign investors that the country is an ideal place to build factories because we have an English-speaking working force.
Within the Marxist and even the school of sociology called structural functionalism, that situation isn’t at all a surprise.
With Philippine unemployment at 7.5% or about 3 million individuals, there is no need after all, no pressure for the state to bring the education of the working class to college levels. Where would those with college education find jobs anyway, other than overseas employment? That level of the unemployed working class, in fact, is a boon for capitalist as it means more supply of laborers than the demand for them, which translates to low wages.
Based on a March 2012 Department of Education briefing and on 2008 Commission on Higher Education data, and my analysis of the FIES 2009 survey, the reality of our educational system is as follows:
Out of 100 who enter Grade 1:
51 finish, and enroll in high school; the 49 who drop out will make up the vast army of poor farmers, unskilled laborers, domestic help, and the unemployed.
43 complete high school, with eight dropping out.
23 enter college; the 8 who dropped out of high school and the 20 who didn’t enter college will be, if they’re lucky, the blue- and white-collar workers, clerks and other office staff.
14 graduate, with just 1 from the poor. The 9 who don’t graduate would be lucky if they can run a micro-business, work as a service crew, become an SM saleslady, or the most popular option now, go abroad to be an OFW.
A college degree is an asset, a critical one. Our capitalist system gives this privilege almost entirely to the elite, perpetuating its assets and power. The few from the poor who do attain an education provide the illusion that it is possible to cross the class divide. But in the end, judging by the numbers, it is a myth, to keep the masses in their places.
Corruption, pork barrel scams, and government inefficiency—these only scratch the surface of our country’s quagmire.
tiglao.manilatimes@gmail.com
FB: Rigoberto D. Tiglao www. rigobertotiglao.com
Today, about 21 million kids from kindergarten, grade school, to high school will rush out to their schools with the dreams of their parents on their back. Some will make it, by dint of luck and hard work. Most, however, are consigned to the fate that goes with an economic and social system that favors the moneyed class.
Passion for education
The Filipinos’ passion to get their children educated is a noble one, at the very least the rational response to an underdeveloped, overpopulated capitalist economy where the laborer’s wage is a commodity, which means that the surplus of laborers reduces that commodity’s price.
For the poor, and for our nation, this is a tragedy. Education for all is an illusion even in, or because of, a capitalist system.
Indeed, two surprise bestsellers in the US, and using mountains of data, Capitalism in the 21st Century by Thomas Piketty and The Son Also Rises by Gregory Clark, have demolished the myths of meritocracy and social mobility under capitalism even in the richest nations.
How much worse it is in such a country such as ours, which has been in the tight grip of a rapacious oligarchy that pays so little taxes that the state can’t fully subsidize the poor people’s education?
I extracted data from National Statistics Office’s 2009 Family Income and Expenditures Survey (FIES), the latest that had information on the educational backgrounds of the head of families by income class. I then made the assumption that this predicts the educational level a member of one of our three main socio-economic classes can attain.
That is, it could show the chances of completing school for the children of the poor classes, in contrast to children of the elite.
The class divisions I have constructed are admittedly crude, as our National Census Office has not changed its stratification method since the 1970s, so that the people in the richest stratum are those who earn annual incomes of just P250,000 and more. This means then that a monthly salary of P21,000 – which could be the salary of a clerk in a Makati company–makes the clerk belong to the richest stratum.
Thus, NSO data allows us only to divide Philippine families into three: The poorest or families with a monthly income of less than P8,000, which make up 35% of the population; the poor-to-middle class, 41% of the population or those who earn more than P8,000 but less than P20,000 a month, and the middle-to-upper class or those with income of more than P20,000.
The last class make up 24% of the population, although using data from the 2003 FIES, those earning more than P42,000 a month make up 2% percent of total population, or the real upper class, the elite in our society.
Based on these data, it would be a herculean effort bordering on a miracle for our poor domestic help to get her children to finish college.
Only 1 will finish college
Among the poor, only 1.3 % finished college. An additional 4.5% had gone to college but didn’t finish, as in the case of my domestic help.
The overwhelming majority of the poor, or 94% only have education at the high school level and below, with only 24% finishing elementary.
Translate my calculation to chances for my house-help’s children finishing college, and it’s 1 out of a hundred.
My household help actually has already beaten the odds by having a child in college now. The figures would indicate that the chances are 94 out of 100 that a poor Filipino finishes only high school.
The obstacles are nearly insurmountable. Without money to buy uniforms and schools supplies, the poor parents would probably just give up along the way. The child, if he is lucky, will enter the informal work force, such as helping in the farm or tending a sari-sari store in the slums.
It has been a vicious cycle. A parent in one generation can’t get out of poverty since he doesn’t have the qualifications a college education could give. But he himself cannot provide his children a college education.
Contrast this with the situation in other countries where the government subsidizes the schooling of all underprivileged children, from primary education to high school (and some, up to college), at roughly the same quality as those provided in schools for the children of the rich.
UP boasts that anybody can enroll there as long as the student passes its qualifying exams. But how can a poor boy who could study only in the elementary and high schools in a far-flung village in Samar have the mental skills and knowledge of somebody who studied at P200, 000-per year La Salle or Ateneo? The UP system of tuition fees even subsidizes the children of the rich, even the billionaires who study there (see my column “Stop subsidizing the rich at UP”, Manila Times, March 26, 2013.)
Our educational system therefore ensures that the millions who are poor continue to be poor through the generations. Yet at the same time, it creates a working class with a level of education capitalists require, so much so that we have been trying to convince foreign investors that the country is an ideal place to build factories because we have an English-speaking working force.
Within the Marxist and even the school of sociology called structural functionalism, that situation isn’t at all a surprise.
With Philippine unemployment at 7.5% or about 3 million individuals, there is no need after all, no pressure for the state to bring the education of the working class to college levels. Where would those with college education find jobs anyway, other than overseas employment? That level of the unemployed working class, in fact, is a boon for capitalist as it means more supply of laborers than the demand for them, which translates to low wages.
Based on a March 2012 Department of Education briefing and on 2008 Commission on Higher Education data, and my analysis of the FIES 2009 survey, the reality of our educational system is as follows:
Out of 100 who enter Grade 1:
51 finish, and enroll in high school; the 49 who drop out will make up the vast army of poor farmers, unskilled laborers, domestic help, and the unemployed.
43 complete high school, with eight dropping out.
23 enter college; the 8 who dropped out of high school and the 20 who didn’t enter college will be, if they’re lucky, the blue- and white-collar workers, clerks and other office staff.
14 graduate, with just 1 from the poor. The 9 who don’t graduate would be lucky if they can run a micro-business, work as a service crew, become an SM saleslady, or the most popular option now, go abroad to be an OFW.
A college degree is an asset, a critical one. Our capitalist system gives this privilege almost entirely to the elite, perpetuating its assets and power. The few from the poor who do attain an education provide the illusion that it is possible to cross the class divide. But in the end, judging by the numbers, it is a myth, to keep the masses in their places.
Corruption, pork barrel scams, and government inefficiency—these only scratch the surface of our country’s quagmire.
tiglao.manilatimes@gmail.com
FB: Rigoberto D. Tiglao www. rigobertotiglao.com
Tax credit cases take too long–dementia hits accused
By Cynthia D. Balana
Philippine Daily Inquirer
Sandiganbayan building facade. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO
MANILA, Philippines—Former Finance Undersecretary Antonio Belicena has been declared “incompetent to stand the rigors of a court trial” on some 550 charges in connection with the P5.3 billion Tax Credit Certificate (TCC) scam due to dementia, a mental disorder usually associated with old age.
The cases have been in the legal mill for the past 15 years.
A four-page report signed by a team of five doctors from the National Center for Mental Health (NCMH) said that Belicena, now 81, was suffering from dementia, which is characterized by impairments in memory, orientation and judgment.
“Although the patient has demonstrated an appreciation of the charges against him and of the possible consequences of his cases, it is our opinion that his impairments in cognition will render him incapable to testify in court,” said the report of the medical team led by Dr. Edison C. Galindez, chief of the NCMH forensic psychiatry section.
Belicena, who used to head the DOF One-Stop Shop Inter-Agency Tax Credit and Duty Drawback Center (OSS-Center) during the term of President Fidel Ramos, faces multiple suits in connection with the TCC scam from 1995 to 1998. TCCs are government refunds of duties and taxes given to manufacturing companies that produce local goods for export.
The medical report was attached by lawyer Jose Flaminiano, counsel for Belicena, to the motion that he filed on Monday in the Sandiganbayan’s Second Division, seeking to terminate, suspend or archive 47 charges pending in the court.
Belicena’s medical evaluation was ordered by the court’s First Division in 2013 to determine his fitness to stand trial on all the charges.
Flaminiano said there were still 550 cases, including for graft, estafa and falsification of public documents, against his client pending in all five divisions of the antigraft court.
Between P5.3 billion and P6 billion worth of illegal TCCs were issued by the OSS-Center before the scam was uncovered during a 1998 Senate investigation.
Since 1999, over 700 cases have been filed in court in connection with the TCC scam.
The medical team recommended that Belicena be referred to the care of a neuro-psychiatrist with further regular monitoring at the NCMH.
The First Division had already ordered seven of Belicena’s cases archived pending treatment of the defendant subject to revival if and when his condition improved.
But the court proceedings for Belicena’s coaccused will continue, said the Sandiganbayan.
Read more: http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/607313/tax-credit-cases-take-too-long-dementia-hits-accused
Assumptions in the order of society
President Noynoy Aquino at the World Economic Forum in Makati said that good governance results in good economics. The problem however is it is easier said than done because the “sound bite” is nothing more but for propaganda than for real. In fact, what he said is no different from his debut slogan that “kung walang kurap, walang mahirap.” Aside from the hard truth that corruption has nothing to do with poverty, still many of our people after four years remain deeply mired in poverty, and corruption having seemingly overtaken us.
If one will analyze what PNoy said, he might just think PNoy is some kind of a nut. His sloganeering of good governance equals good economics is nonsense because he simply lifted that from basic philosophy called syllogism. We know that syllogism will not help us solve our problems occurring in real life. While the two premises are logically correct, that would not necessarily result in a logical conclusion or be taken as true. We say this because good governance and good economics have their respective parameters to arrive at their respective objective. More often they clash because they are incompatible.
Take the Pareto principle. That principle lays down the premise that the advantage of one could result in the disadvantage of the other. That principle has partly been influenced by the Marxian economic principle about the growth of capital. A good case is the theory of freedom. Unequivocal freedom in politics is interpreted by most libertarians as an inalienable right that cannot be taken away from us. While applying freedom to certain economic principles may be good to a handful few, that may not necessarily be good to many of our people because of its tendency to deny many of the things they need for their basic survival.
As bestselling author Ha-joon Chang wrote in his book Bad Samaritans, the egalitarianism of socialism deprives one of the initiative and the incentive to be creative. It may result in good governance, but certainly bad to economics. The same can be said of absolute freedom stretched to the realm of economics, for ultimately it is bound to end up in a dysfunctional political freedom.
In our recent history, we saw the intense clash of paradox ideologies. The ideology of Marxist socialism advocated for the observance economic equality through the state ownership of the means of production. It is to them a good economic principle that could lead to good governance. However, that attempt to justify the imposition of a regimented society to keep itself intact failed to bring about good governance because it failed to satisfy the dynamic needs of the people in a society they envisioned. The opposite are those advocating for free enterprise. They believe that freedom is the key to good governance, and it is likely to end up in good economics. They would not care less about the inequality it would entail because the success of democracy would usher in economic success. It is this economic policy that is being advocated by the theologians of neoliberalism.
Alas, the Soviet Union would not have imploded, and China would not have survived to become the most successful economy in our modern time had it not revised its Maoist version of egalitarianism. The United States, for all its arrogance as the bastion of freedom today, stands as the biggest debtor state in recorded history. In other words, its formula of good governance failed to bring about good economics. Those countries that remain beguiled to the neoliberal ideology like the members of the European Union (EU) are today on the precipice of economic collapse. Spain, Portugal, Greece, and Italy saw their economy sliding fast despite the belief that privatization, deregulation and free trade were good to their economy. Thousands were thrown out of work, stripped of their welfare, and saw their standard of living reduced by one third.
Even if we give it to President Aquino that because of his good governance he managed to come out with good economics, many are asking, what is good governance if the majority is deprived or has no access to enjoy the bounties of his so-called economic success? We are not exposing the fallacy of his syllogism, but simply requesting him to stop insulting our people by his cheap propaganda antics only his yellow claptrap could appreciate.
Even if the country’s GNP grew by an unprecedented rate of 7.7 percent, that good economic point has become one of bad governance because alongside with it, poverty remains at 24.89 percent. The same can be said of the P2.265 trillion budget that was appropriated in 2014. What good would that be if the country was saddled up with a P164.1 billion deficit that pushed us deeper into foreign debt? For that matter, our foreign debt of $127.67 billion jumped by 4.5 percent or equivalent to P5.681 trillion in 2013. These figures betrayed the logic, for normally, increased government budget is assumed to be the result of increased productivity.
The increased GNP was further exposed as plain nonsense because labor surveys as of January 2013 showed that 7.5 percent or an estimated 2.9 million individuals are unemployed. Many were astounded because 41.7 percent of our workforce in agriculture, 41.1 percent in the service sector and 17.2 percent in the industry sector are underemployed. Stated differently, more than one half of our labor force is now paid below the minimum wage, thereby making a sham of the law on minimum wage.
On the other hand, while our non-agricultural workers in the national capital region are getting P466.00 a day and P429.00 for the other private sector that does not mean anything if one will add by pro rata his 13th month pay, SSS, PhilHealth, employees’ compensation, Pag Ibig Home Savings Fund. That will chalk up to about P550 daily wage which our employers will have to scrounge just to pay their employees.
Because our workers have to hurdle more to pay for their rent, electricity and water bills which now stand as the highest in the world, that certainly has the effect of bad governance to fallacious economic success, but wholly good to the few who savor with much gusto the blessings of economic freedom which PNoy claims to be the result of his “good governance.”
(rpkapunan@gmail.com)
Monday, June 2, 2014
MIND DA NEWS: More questions than answers
By Patricio P. Diaz on June 1 2014 9:15 pm
GENERAL SANTOS CITY (MindaNews/ 01 June) — The “Luy Files,” the 2002-2012 transactions of the JLN Corporation of Jane Lim-Napoles kept in computer hard disk by whistleblower Benhur Luy, appears to have lost much of its evidentiary value to pin down the accused in the plunder of the Priority Development Assistance Funds (PDAF) or pork barrel in corroboration with the audit reports of the Commission on Audit (COA. Then viewed as having the vital answers to the pork barrel scandal, it is now besieged by damning questions.
The disk was given to the Philippine Daily Inquirer on April 27, 2013 and, later, to the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) on January 27, 2014. Shortly after receiving the disk, the PDI exposed the scam and last month, in a series of special reports, much of the content of the Files, particularly listing the senators and House representatives implicated in the scam.
Napoles, known as the brain of the PDAF scam, came out with her own versions of the scam – one in Pilipino, the other in English — together with a list of participants from the Congress, the Cabinet, the local governments and private sectors. But the Files, as exposed by PDI, has remained credible. Napoles’ version and list, as admitted, are based on recollections; the PDI exposé from the Files is documentary.
But the NBI copy of the Luy disk submitted to the Senate last Wednesday, May 28, and released to the media, to the Congress and the Palace immediately after, showed deletions which the NBI was able to retrieve and restore. To defend the integrity of its exposé, the PDI published the deletions which it had found intact in its own copy. Who deleted the files and why? For nine months after PDI had copied it, the disk was in Luy’s possession until given to the NBI and for four months with the NBI until submitted to the Senate Blue Ribbon Committee.
The deletion could have happened inadvertently, as explained by Luy’s first counsel, lawyer Levito Baligod. But, questions on the integrity of the disk cannot just be dismissed by this possibility. They can create the doubt enough to acquit the accused from the Sandiganbayan.
Many of the deleted files were irrelevant to the scam. However, PDI has shown deletions which could pin down the three senators now facing plunder charges before the Sandiganbayan but for one flaw: authentication –letters unsigned; no proof of the accused having received kickbacks
With the release of the NBI copy of the disk to media, The Philippine Star published retrieved and undeleted fileswhich also suffer the flaws shown in the PDI publications.
Both the PDI and the NBI copies of the Files reveal the PDAF scam as established in the COA audit reports. However, those implicated have claimed their signatures on official documents presented by the COA had been forged. They question the veracity of the projects and the corresponding appropriations from their PDAF allocations. And they deny receiving kickbacks.
Yet, the Files does not tie up the loose ends or provide the missing links.
But the Files affirms an intricate network of conspiracy since 2002, though since 2000 according to Napoles, robbing the people’s money in the guise of development. The conspiracy could have been still intact and flourishing had trust between Napoles and Luy, his most trusted finance officer, not broken down. As it turned out, Luy had loyal co-employees. With the Files in their possession they blew the whistle on Napoles.
In reality, as seen in the Files and their sworn statements as state witnesses, Luy and the other whistleblowers are as guilty as Napoles and her loyal allies. Napoles alone could not have steered smoothly the JLN Corporation, their conspiratorial boat, without Luy and his group. In trying to extricate herself from the Files and the whistleblowers’ testimonies, Napoles can only hit the rocks harder and sink together with Luy and the other whistleblowers.
To recapitulate, hundreds of senators, House representatives, cabinet officials, local government officials, other private persons and members of the media have been implicated in the raid of government coffers according to the Files and to Napoles’ sworn statements resulting in the loss of billions of pesos. The COA confirmed the raid — the misuse of PDAF allocations. But the lawmakers have challenged the COA audit reports and the Files and Napoles, already lacking the evidence that can stand in court, have undermined each other’s credibility.
Could PDAF allocations have been appropriated for projects without the knowledge and consent of the lawmakers concerned?
Luy and the other whistleblowers are master forgers according to their sworn statements. They must have forged signatures in request and endorsement letters and in project proposals. Could the forgeries have been undetected for 14 or15 years that the DBM (Department of Budget Management) had issued the SARO (Special Allotment Release Order) and the NCA (Notice of Cash Allotment) to consummate the raids?
Napoles must have had well-embedded co-conspirators in the Congress and in the DBM. Who? How was she able to maintain with impunity such inside connection for a decade and a half?
These are questions the Files has not answered.
In a PDI report, May 31, Sen. Aquilino Pimentel III considered the Files as “useless nonsense, not evidence” and suggested to disregard it. Instead, to build airtight cases against those implicated in the scam, collate official documents. In a later PDI report, June 1, Sen. Francis Escudero urged the Department of Justice and the Ombudsman should begin filing charges against those responsible for the P10-billion pork barrel scam to stop all the speculations.
Are these the answers to the unanswered questions and will they put a closure to the PDAF scandal?
[Author’s Note: Mind da News, the alternate of COMMENT, is a comment on current news. The author may be contacted at patponcediaz@yahoo.com.]
Read more http://www.mindanews.com/mindaviews/2014/06/01/mind-da-news-more-questions-than-answers/
Cebu Pacific…again? Father of girl who suffered burns in flight eyes suit
By Kristine Angeli Sabillo
INQUIRER.net
INQUIRER.net file photo
MANILA, Philippines – The father of a six-year-old girl who sustained first-degree burns after a Cebu Pacific flight attendant accidentally poured hot water on her arm is considering filing charges against the employee and her company.
“I will be filing a negligence case dun sa (against the) flight attendant,” Ryan Rey Quilala told INQUIRER.net on Sunday.
Quilala, who works as a prosecutor for the Office of the Ombudsman, said he will also file a claim for damages against Cebu Pacific for the “anxiety” and “trauma” their family experienced during the incident last May 27 while they were on flight 5J 8974 from Davao City to Manila.
The lawyer said the flight attendant not only spilled “steaming hot water” on the right arm of her daughter Reanne but also did not know how to apply first aid.
Quilala said the flight attendant “simply asked for an apology instead of immediately administering first aid treatment” as his daughter cried in pain.
“Had it not for the request of my wife for any medication the entire flight crew will just watch in vain,” he said.
He claimed that the flight crew was not properly trained and equipped to handle emergency situations.
“Di ba, ang first aid treatment ay running water? Ang ginawa nya linagyan nya kaagad ng plastic bag. Hindi pa iyong ice bag…plastic talaga na puno ng ice. In-apply nya directly sa skin ng anak ko,” he said.
(Isn’t it that first aid treatment for burns is running water? What she did is she took a plastic bag. Not an ice bag…but a plastic bag filled with ice. She applied it directly to my daughter’s arm.)
Quilala said they had to stop the flight attendant because it was “erroneous” for her to do so. He said they instead used the child’s towel to wrap the ice.
According to the World Health Organization, ice should not be directly applied on burns because “it deepens the injury.”
The lawyer said they also asked for a burn ointment, which was handed to them after 20 minutes.
“Yung burn ointment na dinala pa nila in Deutsche. Sabi ko paano ko malalaman kung pang-burn? Tinignan pa namin yung box for English translation. Tsaka lang nya chineck kung expired,” he added.
(The inscription on the burn ointment they gave us was in Deutsche. I asked them how will we know if it is indeed for burns. We had to check the box for the English translation. And it was only then that they checked if it was expired.)
He pointed out that such medication should always be readily available since flight attendants regularly serve hot beverages and food.
After verifying that it wasn’t expired, they applied the ointment on the child’s skin. When they got home, they had the family doctor attend to Reanne. The doctor confirmed that it was a first degree burn.
No response
Amid handing over a handwritten complaint to Cebu Pacific, Quilala said they have yet to receive an acknowledgement from the company.
“Sabi nung senior flight attendant nila mag-iemail sa akin the next day so I gave them enough time. Wednesday, Thursday, hindi nakipag-communicate sa akin so Friday I decided susulat na ako sa Cebu Pacific,” Quilala said.
(The senior flight attendant assured me that they will e-mail the next day so I gave them enough time. Wednesday and Thursday came and they have yet to communicate with me so I decided to send a letter on Friday.)
A copy of the letter was also sent to the Civil Aeronautics Board and the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines.
“In view of your seeming indifference to this incident please be advised that I will pursue all means and legal actions to protect the rights of my daughter and that of my family under Section 15 of the DOTC-DTI Joint Administrative Order No. 01 (Series of 2012), Articles 1170, 2217, 2219(2), 2221 and 2229 of the New Civil Code, and other pertinent laws, rules and regulations,” Quilala said in the letter.
He said he never wanted media attention but after a television network saw his Facebook post, he decided that he “might as well tell the truth.”
Quilala said he is hoping that their case would be an example for other disgruntled passengers of Cebu Pacific.
“Kasi baka may ibang biktima na tumatahimik na lang syempre yung hassle, yung gastos. Some of them cannot afford yung abugado to protect their rights,” he said.
(Perhaps other victims don’t do anything because of the hassle and the expenses. Some of them cannot afford a lawyer to protect their rights.)
INQUIRER.net attempted to get the side of Cebu Pacific but the lines were busy. Initial media reports said the company is still investigating the incident.
Read more: http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/607384/cebu-pacificagain-father-of-girl-who-suffered-burns-in-flight-eyes-suit
Saved from the death squad – by street children
What should be a matter of outrage and great moral concern of every Filipino and decent human being is the very recent, well documented revelations by Human Rights Watch, alleging the actions of a death squad in Tagum City, Mindanao, where hundreds have been murdered including street children as young as 9 years old. The killings were allegedly carried out by hit men allegedly on orders of the former mayor. Each person was killed for a payment of only P5000.00 (US$110).
“One Shot to the Head: Death Squad Killings in Tagum City, Philippines” (see www.preda.org) is a 71 page report released on May 22, 2014, with damning evidence and interviews with former hit men who allegedly said they were paid by former Mayor Rey “Chiong” Uy to kill anyone they were told to. One text message allegedly set them in motion. They were paid US$110 for every killing and they divided it among themselves, one former hit man said in a taped interview posted on Youtube. The former mayor has denied the allegations.
“Tagum City’s former mayor helped organize and finance a death squad linked to the murder of hundreds of residents,” said Phelim Kine, deputy Asia Director at Human Rights Watch. “Rey Uy called these citizens ‘weeds.’ He and other city officials and police officers underwrote targeted killings as a perverse form of crime control.”
Such revelations are not new in the Philippines. Other city officials throughout the Philippines have been accused of using death squads to kill street children and anyone considered a threat or critic of local government. As many as 298 victims have been documented in this Human Rights Watch Tagum report. The report said . . . ”Targeted killings have continued but with less frequency since Uy stepped down as mayor in June 2013.”
The Human Rights Watch press release said that “On April 28, 2014, the media reported that the Philippines National Bureau of Investigation had recommended the prosecution of four security guards employed by the Tagum City government for their alleged role in the abduction, torture, and murder of two teenage boys in February 2014. The current Tagum City mayor, Allan Rellon, reportedly told the media that he was “bewildered” by the allegations, saying that, “as a local chief executive, I abhor any form of summary killing.”
This is not the first report documenting the dark side of the Philippines where government officials, have been accused of using private assassination squads of hit-men that go around on motor bikes killing children, priests, missionaries, pastors, church and human rights workers. This column has documented many of these murders. The Sun Star of Davao has bravely documented many of the death squad murders over the years. Investigations by the Philippine Commission on Human Rights have failed to uncover the killers or those behind the murders.
A prominent columnist in The Philippine Daily Inquirer last May 24, 2014 defended the death squads and the actions of Mayor Uy and the Mayor of Davao Rodrigo Duterte saying no one in the Philippines is complaining about them except Human Rights Watch. Citizens would have benefited too, he wrote, if the police in Manila had implemented a plan to organize a death squad to eliminate alleged corrupt judges and prosecutors.
The killings are done to drive away begging street kids, create fear and silence critics and defenders of human rights on the pretext of preserving law and order by killing people said to be suspected criminals. Anyone can denounce their neighbor as a drug pusher and it’s likely that person would be killed. This is how the tiny minority of wealthy Filipino elites use fear, force and murder to intimidate the people, eliminate rivals, cheat at elections and stay in power through family dynasties. Thus, the one percent can rule the nation as they have always done. The hit-men do it for money and the elites do it for political and economic advantage. They act with total impunity.
The Human Rights Watch report gives credence to the many allegations made by Filipino human rights workers for many years including this writer who exposed a Davao death squad and was sued by the former Davao Mayor De Guzman in 1999, although no allegation was made against him personally. It was a harrowing, dangerous year of legal defense, and a scary visit to Davao where a group of street children formed a protective cordon around me at the airport lest the death squad would kill me. I was trying to save them, but they saved me.
Mayor De Guzman withdrew the allegation on the day when I was to be arraigned in the Davao City Regional Trial Court. The intervention of Archbishop Fernando Robles Capalla of Davao persuaded the Mayor to withdraw the charge. The Archbishop’s brother Romy Capalla, a human rights defender was assassinated with a bullet to the head last March 2014 in Iloilo for his work defending the rights of small farmers to organize independently of land owners and practice Fair Trade. The sugar mill they operated was burned down destroying their livelihood. No one has been caught for the brutal murder.
A survey by the Ateneo De Davao University says 98 percent of those polled support the mayor, government and 77 percent support the police. Perhaps the survey respondents dared not say otherwise. Western embassies have warned their citizens not to visit Mindanao due to the crime rates. The death squads have not deterred lawlessness, only added to it.
The report is available on www.hrw.org/node/125247. Email shaycullen@preda.org and visit www.preda.org.
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