Relatives of 13 journalists slain in the Nov. 23 massacre in Ampatuan, Maguindanao filed on Tuesday a landmark suit before the newly established ASEAN Intergovernmental…
Making life worth living.
Year: 2010
Statement of Sen. Benigno Aquino III on the Pulse Asia survey results in the comments section.
With about four months to go before the May 10, 2010 elections, presidential candidates Senator Benigno “Noynoy” C. Aquino (Liberal Party) and Senator Manuel “Manny” B. Villar (Nacionalista Party) are tied for the presidency, with Senator Aquino registering 37% of voter preferences and Senator Villar 35%, the latest Pulse Asia survey showed.
The nationwide survey conducted Jan. 22 to 26, among 1,800 respondents has a margin of error of +/-2%.
The only other presidential candidate with a double-digit preference is former President Joseph Estrada (Pwersa ng Masang Pilipino) at 12%.
The other candidates register voter preferences of at most 5%. Less than one in ten Filipinos (6%) does not have a preferred presidential candidate at this time.
Update: Martir,Preztosa and Paez were all confirmed.
Gloria Arroyo’s penchant for midnight deals seems to have rubbed on with some members of the bureaucracy.
Victoria Bataclan, president of the Union of Foreign Service Officers wrote to Senate President Juan Ponce-Enrile in his capacity as chair of the Commission on Appointments to convey the grievance of the members of foreign service corps, this time not about another political appointee in violation of foreign service law but about another career foreign service officer, Patricia Ann Paez.
The CA is scheduled to meet today.
Brig. Gen. Jonathan Martir and Brig. Gen. Romeo Prestoza are also among those whose promotion to Major General are for confirmation today.
Martir’s name was included at the last minute. There is something wrong here because Martir is due to retire March 5. There’s a rule in the military that one cannot be promoted within one year to retirement.
We are told that a very influential member of the CA is pushing for Martir’s confirmation even if it’s in against the law because a security agency identified iwht the general supplies the guards for his son’s business. Talk of ethics!
Prestoza is lucky because Sen. Panfilo Lacson won’t be here to block his promotion. Prestoza, it will be recalled, was the one who enticed Mancao to implicate Lacson in the Dacer-Corbito double murder case. Success!
Paez, who holds the rank of career minister and is currently detailed in Malacañang as special assistant, is being promoted to Chief of Mission I. If promoted she would qualify for an ambassadorial assignment.
Question: Why is former President Joseph Estrada not being charged when he was also named in the case?
by JP Lopez
Malaya
Sen. Panfilo Lacson yesterday admitted that he left the country early last month to evade what he called an “evil conspiracy” against him.
“As I had correctly suspected, the harassment by the DOJ upon the order of Malacañang will never stop. I am a victim of a conspiracy of whispers between Mrs. (Gloria) Arroyo and her stooge in the Department of Justice,” Lacson said in a statement.
Lacson said the Arroyo administration has employed “even the most tenuous of evidence to justify their own interpretation of probable cause to satisfy their political vendetta against my person.”
by Victor Reyes
Malaya
An Army lieutenant colonel is being tried by a court martial for the alleged sexual molestation of the wife of his classmate at the Philippine Military Academy.
A copy of the charge sheet against Lt. Col. Marlo Guloy showed the incident happened about two years ago in Zamboanga City.
Guloy, of PMA Class `90, is facing violation of Article of War 66 or conduct unbecoming of an officer and a gentleman and violation of AW 97 or conduct prejudicial to good order and military discipline. The violations carry the penalty of imprisonment and dishonorable discharge.
Guloy was last assigned with the Army’s Intelligence Security Group based in Fort Bonifacio.
Mukhang may niluluto na namang isang midnight deal itong administrasyong Arroyo. Ito ang kasunduan sa Moro Islamic Liberation Front na magkakaroon sila ng sariling nilang bansa sa ilalim ng Pilipinas.
Sariling bansa sa loob ng bansang Pilipinas? Hindi tama dahil kung magkaroon ng Bangsamoro substate, ay parang nagtanggal ka ng parte ng Pilipinas at binigay sa MILF.
Di ba yan ang ginawa ni Gloria Arroyo noong isang taon sa kamuntik lang matuloy na MOA-AD (Memorandum of Agreement-Ancestral Domain) na ipinabasura ng Supreme Court dahil labag ito sa Constitution?
Nagkita noong isang linggo ang GRP (Government of the Republic of the Philippines) panel at ang MILF sa Kuala Lumpur at nagpalitan sila ng oputline ng kanilang proposal. Sabi ni Presidential Peace Adviser Annabelle Abaya na 17 pages daw ang sa kanila at 31 pages naman daw ang sa MILF.
Highlights of SWS survey conducted last Jan. 21 -24 commissioned by Businessworld:
• Aquino lead over Villar down to 7 per cent
• Roxas widens lead over Legarda by 21 points; Binay improves numbers
• Revilla,Estrada, Cayetano, Defensor-Santiago post early lead in Senate race
Villar gains ground versus Aquino … while Erap stays in third
Liberal Party standard-bearer Benigno Simeon “Noynoy” C. Aquino III remains the top pick among the 10 presidential aspirants green-lighted by the Commission on Elections (Comelec) but the Nationalista Party’s (NP) Sen. Manuel “Manny” B. Villar appears to be fast catching up.
With the campaign period yet to officially start, a new BusinessWorld-Social Weather Stations (SWS) survey found 42% of respondents saying they would vote for Mr. Aquino, four points down from the 46% who said so in an early December poll that was also commissioned by this newspaper.
Over the period Mr. Villar, Mr. Aquino’s top challenger, picked up eight points to secure the nod of 35%, up from 27%.
1. This is NOT my fight and this should not be the people’s fight as well. Our fight should be with Gloria Macapagal Arroyo and we should not be distracted from this. She’s about to appoint a new AFP Chief of Staff and a new Chief Justice in March. These appointments and how they will be done (particularly for the CJ) would be indicators of whether she has plans of stepping down or not. Aside from these, the prospect of the failure of elections scenario is still up in the air. In short, anything that deflects attention from her is playing according to her script. We must always remain vigilant and must never underestimate her.
2. It is a graft case and not an ethics case. Bulk of the evidence presented dealt with acts committed as early 1999 when Sen. Villar was still a congressman and during his first term as Senator. I believe that ethics cases should only cover acts committed after the mandate was given which, in this case, is 2007. With that, the only evidence left would be the double insertion in the General Appropriations Act (GAA). The problem is, the draft of the GAA was approved and presented to the plenary by the Finance Committee which was then headed by Sen. Juan Ponce Enrile. Said GAA was later on approved by the majority in the Senate. Therefore, assuming there were double insertions, it was the responsibility of Sen. Enrile’s staff to scrutinize the GAA and correct all anomalies and typo errors before being approved by Sen. Enrile. When it was approved by Sen. Enrile and presented to the plenary, it now became the responsibility of each Senator to scrutinize it again before approving it. Therefore, all those who voted for the approval of the GAA became equally liable for that double insertion.
Former Defense Secretary Avelino “Nonong” Cruz was not one of the speakers in last Friday’s forum of the “The Powers of the Presidency: Preventing Misuse and Abuse” but he was asked to say something when the issue of the Ampatuans’ private armies came up inthe question and answer portion.
Cruz gave a two- word advice for the coming May elections: “Choose well”. He said it will go a long way in instituting reforms in governance if we have a president that will lead by example.
He, of course, didn’t ask to vote for the presidential candidate he is advising: the Liberal Party’s Benigno Aquino III.
Karina Constantino-David, former chair of the Civil Service Commission, also stressed the importance of choosing a president with integrity because she said, “in the final analysis it is the character of the President, his/her honest dedication to public service and not just to power that will speall the difference between decency and judiciousness on the one hand and mis-use and abuse on the other.”
Kumambyo na ngayon ang Malacañang at pipirmahan na raw ni Gloria Arroyo ang batas na nagbibigay ne exemption sa mga senior citizens sa 12 per cent na Value Added Tax. Pipirmahan na raw ni Arroyo ang btas sa susunod na linggo.
Noong Miyerkoles kasi ng ipinasa ng Kongreso ang batas, sinabi ni Deputy presidential spokesman Gary Olivar na baka raw i-veto ni Arroyo ang batas dahil mga P54.4 million raw ang mawawala sa pamahalaan.
Dios mio, naman walang patawad itong administrasyon ni Arroyo sa huthuthutan. Pati ba naman ang mga matatanda, hindi na pinapalampas. Ano ba naman ang P54.4 milyon sa P1.54 TRILYON (“T”yan ha, hindi Bilyon or Milyon) na kanilang budget.