Category: Commentary

, ,
Please forgive me, Professor Teodoro

Time has a way of teaching you the lessons you missed when they were first taught to you, right? I’ve found myself staring out of windows a few times, wondering what went wrong and what I could have done differently and how else I could communicate what I think people need to understand. In the few years since our democracy started to decline, I’ve been in a constant rage, wanting to both embrace and destroy this heathen generation that can’t seem to recognize its own good.

Read the rest of this entry

, ,
Vantage Point | Hazing and the culture of violence

The death of Adamson University student John Matthew Salilig at the hands of his presumptive fraternity “brothers” is a wake-up call to everyone, especially those with a relative in a college or university, that hazing is a continuing problem in many schools as well as in other Philippine institutions. Salilig’s case is in fact provoking other citizens who had so far been silent to reveal how their own kin were similarly victimized.

Read the rest of this entry

Vantage Point | PHL’s ‘improved’ human rights situation

As the visiting European Union (EU) parliamentarians were declaring that the human rights situation in the Philippines has “improved,” a 17-year-old male and two others had apparently been abducted in a Batangas town. Very few details were available as this column was being written, but it was only one of the many abductions that are still happening despite the change in administration last July, 2022.

Read the rest of this entry

Vantage Point | Foreign policy predicament

The Marcos II administration has declared that part of its foreign policy is strengthening Philippine relations with other ASEAN countries and with China. But it is still the US on which the country has to depend for its external defense because, despite the billions spent on its supposed “modernization,” the Armed Forces of the Philippines cannot even protect Filipino fisherfolk from Chinese harassment and is most expert only at the suppression of dissent and social unrest. No government is to blame for this predicament except the Philippines’ own.

Read the rest of this entry

At Ground Level | US touts its aid to boost AFP modernization plan

Last month, the Philippine Navy acquired its first ground-based air defense system (GBADS), consisting of Israeli-made SPYDER missile batteries. Objective: to “neutralize” any potential aerial threat or foreign aircraft intrusion in the country’s airspace. However, this system is categorized as a secondary air defense cover after the PAF’s FA-50PH light jet fighters, earlier acquired from South Korea. This acquisition – costing P6,846,750,000 – is not mentioned in the USSD report.

Read the rest of this entry

Vantage Point | Corazon Aquino’s legacy

Should Congress decide to either convene itself into a constituent assembly or to call for elections for delegates to a constitutional convention, the citizenry must closely monitor the process — not because the 1987 Constitution is Corazon Aquino’s most outstanding legacy, but because, at this critical stage in the country’s history, it is among the people’s few remaining means of defense against the return of authoritarian rule and the further ruin of this country.

Read the rest of this entry