CAGAYAN DE ORO—As a kid growing up in the Philippines in the 1980s, I was vaguely conscious of government exhortations on belt tightening due to an ongoing economic crisis. Then I learned about inflation and constantly worried over the cost of goods rising in perpetuity. Would my generation be able to afford anything in the...
With Covid-19 continuing to pose a threat to life and health, some kind of hush has fallen over the Little Sisters for the Abandoned Elderly home in San Juan City. The community singing and merrymaking that the residents enjoy have been put on hold as health protocols are strictly observed in the home for almost...
On June 10 this year, the government’s Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP) reached its 34th year of implementation. If we were to include the dictator Ferdinand Marcos’ “Tenant Emancipation Act” of September 1972, agrarian reform as a major government program in the Philippines has been around for 48 long years. The Marcos version was an...
Like many Filipinos in the ‘80s and ‘90s, I looked forward to each new installment of “Slice of Life,” the long-running and much-loved cartoonist Larry Alcala. The thrill was in searching for and spotting his image with the trademark mustache and black-rimmed eyeglasses hiding somewhere in the crowd, in a busy street, or in an...
As if Covid-19 were not enough to worry about, now comes monkeypox. For pandemic-fatigued Filipinos, it comes across as another point of concern, especially because it causes flu-like symptoms as well as horrendous-looking rashes that can spread across the body and form large blisters filled with white pus-like fluid. It does looks biblical, like something...
The apparent Senate president in the 19th Congress makes no bones about his wish fo form a “supermajority” in the chamber. The other contender to the post, Sen. Cynthia Villar, having expressed an absence of desire to complicate her life, Majority Leader Juan Miguel Zubiri appears well on the way to build a constant consensus...
President-elect Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s designation of known technocrats to manage the Philippine economy raises the issue of whether continuing to rely on this particular group of experts can actually do good for the Filipino people and the country. The rise of technocratic management of the world’s economies over the last 70 years has spawned studies...
With Covid-19 continuing to pose a threat to life and health, some kind of hush has fallen over the home run by the Little Sisters for the Abandoned Elderly in San Juan City. The community singing and merrymaking that the residents enjoyed have been put on hold as health protocols are strictly observed in the...
Interviewed on May 25 after the proclamation of the winning presidential candidate, the President-elect’s sister, Sen. Imee Marcos, described the victory as a “second chance” for her family. In ordinary circumstances, people are generally wont to give others a second chance. Why not? Everybody deserves a second chance to make amends, to do better. As...
Nuclear energy first came to the Philippines in 1958 when the United States gifted the Philippines with a nuclear fission reactor. The government then established the Philippine Atomic Energy Commission (Paec) on the University of the Philippines’ Diliman campus. The Bataan Nuclear Power Plant (BNPP), on the other hand, was approved by the Marcos regime...