Category: Malaya

Gloria Arroyo’s vision for the Philippines is to turn it into one big factory of supermaids.

She unveiled this vision last Thursday in a televised roundtable discussion on the evacuation of more than 30,000 Filipinos in Lebanon, almost all of them working as domestic helpers. This was after it was reported that two Filipina maids jumped to their death from a high-story building fleeing their Lebanese masters.

A number of the returning Filipino maids had related to media their harrowing experiences with their Lebanese employers. Many of them were raped and were not paid their salaries, which were low: $200 (P10,000) a month. There was even one who was getting only $150 (P7,650) a month. They were prevented from leaving even as Israeli bombing of Lebanon intensified.

While Juris Soliman, chief of staff of Mike- Arroyo, was telling media that her boss and wife, Gloria, are lovey-dovey celebrating their 38th wedding anniversary last Wednesday, the combative Tulfo brothers – Ramon, Raffy, and Erwin – said in press conference that the woman Mike was romantically linked to is engaged in smuggling activities.

Mon , the eldest of the three who writes a column in the Philippine Daily Inquirer, said that his exposés on the alleged smuggling activities of Vicky Toh and her brother, Tom, had the blessings of Gloria Arroyo.

This is fun.

A case against former Transportation and Communications secretary Josie Lichauco dismissed by the Ombudsman eight years ago has been resurrected by the Supreme Court.

It’s strange. Could it have something to do with the fact that Josie Lichauco is in the forefront in the search for truth in the 2004 elections and justice for the Filipino people?

Lichauco, who has an unblemished record as a public servant, is one of the complainants in the second impeachment complaint against Arroyo.

The military is bringing the battle for the Filipino people’s hearts and minds into cyberspace.

Last week, the Sundalo website debuted in cyberspace (www.sundalo.bravehost.com). The site’s title is “Sundalo:Tagapagtaggol (sic) ng Pilipino”.

Anti-crime crusader Tessie Ang-See was angry when I saw her on TV last Wednesday.

Ang-See, spokesperson for Citizens Against Crime, finds it incomprehensible that Judge Agnes Reyes-Carpio didn’t see the role of actor and former Quezon City representative Dennis Roldan (real name: Mitchell Y. Gumabao) as mastermind in the kidnapping of three-year old Kenshi Yu last year, in her decision the other day to grant bail to him.

Kidnap for ransom is a heinous crime and is supposed to be non-bailable but Roldan walked out from his detention cell yesterday after posting a P500,000 bail bond.

After surviving Gloria Arroyo’s more-than-one-hour state of the nation address the other day, I feel confident I can survive anything.

The trick is to do a constant reality check. Or else you will be sucked into her Enchanted Kingdom and you’ll end up with the likes of Raul Gonzalez, Luis Villafuerte, Monico Fuentevella, Hermogenes Esperon, Jovito Palparan. You would rather be disenchanted, wouldn’t you?

Here’s the reality check (RC):

Today, while more than 30,000 Filipinos who tried to escape the grinding poverty in the Philippines are scampering for their lives in war-torn Lebanon, 16,000 Filipino troops are making sure that Gloria Arroyo will be able to deliver her State of the Nation address telling us that life has been great in her Enchanted Kingdom.

To stress her point, she will present boxing champion Manny Pacquiao, Miss International Lara Quigaman, the gold medalists of Southeast Asian games and the Filipinos who made it to Mt. Everest.

While those Filipinos trapped in Lebanon have to endure the endless firepower of Israel pounding Hizbollah targets, Filipinos here will have to endure a different kind visual assault.

More than 30,000 Filipinos in Lebanon are caught in a war, most of them have no idea what it’s all about.

The Israeli attack on Lebanon, which is on its 10th day, was precipitated by the capture of two Israeli soldiers by Hizbollah fighters in a cross-border raid last July 12 which was immediately answered by Israel with a bombing of Beirut airport. From then on, the destruction of Lebanon has not stopped.

Two weeks earlier, Hizbollah kidnapped an Israeli in the Gaza strip. That makes three soldiers in the hands of Hizbollah, whose recovery is the primary objective of this latest war in Lebanon which has caused mass evacuations of innocent civilians of all nationalities, the likes of which the world community has not witnessed in recent years.

What is Hizbollah and why is Israel out to crush them?

But even here in the Philippines, Filipinos are not safe. Look at what happened to Karen Empeño and Sherlyn Cadapan, UP students who remain missing after they were abducted, together with a farmer, Manuel Merino, in Bulacan by unidentified men believed to be soldiers last June 26.

Karen will turn 23 on July 22 and Sherlyn is pregnant.

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It’s ironic that the Filipinos in Lebanon, who now are scampering for safety amidst the Israeli bombing of Hezbollah places in the war-torn country, went there because they were escaping poverty in the Philippines.

The Department of Foreign Affairs places the number of Filipinos in Lebanon at 34,000. Majority, some 25,000, are domestic helpers while the rest are employees in hotels, UN organizations or married to Lebanese nationals.

Other countries, mainly the Americans,Australians, and Europeans are evacuating their nationals. Yet Philippine officials are still talking of moving Filipinos to “pre-designated safe areas.” It’s pathetic.