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The accreditation of bloggers that Marcos Junior’s choice for Press Secretary (she will also head the Presidential Communication Operations Office or PCOO) is planning is not new. It was also considered by her predecessor, but abandoned because of problems over which bloggers would join the Malacañang Press Corps in covering the President.
But this week, international attention has turned to the Philippines as Ferdinand Marcos Jr. prepares to become the country’s next president. Instead of stamping out reminders of tyranny, will there be a restoration? With an ousted dictator’s son taking power, will historical documents be destroyed? Will the memories of victims be forcibly erased?
Dear friends, what will you do in the next six years?
When disinformation is widely shared at a dizzying realtime speed by paid cyber mercenaries, can fact-checking stand a chance? There are short-term and long-term interventions that may require the enforcement of technical and regulatory mechanisms. For our part, we must not lose sight of the political solution because the roots of the information disorder are also linked to deeper structural infirmities in society.
...[t]he task of shaping the “new normal” should come from the actions of the people; it should be the outcome of our political organizing. We should claim the narrative of the “new normal” in order to reclaim our right to enjoy a better future.
But the combination of a campaign of historical distortion, vote buying, a Duterte-appointed COMELEC, red-tagging and relentless attacks on critics and opposition has created an election result that would bring a Marcos back to
Malacanang 50 years after the declaration of martial law.
The Easter Sunday Moreno-Lacson-Gonzales debacle is making it clear to anyone with at least a double-digit IQ who the true candidates of the opposition are, and, incidentally, who is succeeding in convincing the electorate that the right leaders are those who can competently address the many problems of the terrible present and lead this country to a hopeful future. It could be a major turning point in one of the most crucial Philippine elections in decades.
President Duterte has just over a month to go in his six-year term. He could help much in enabling the succeeding administration to resume the GRP-NDFP peace talks, by removing a number of obstacles that his presidency has put in place.
Jesus, you chose the lowly Lake of Galilee to meet your successor who would continue your mission, please do the same for our country. Please choose the humblest yet most capable of running the country. The Filipinos deserve a better leader, one who relates with the poor, loves the poor and is poor. Amen.
The strength of Pink Rallies relies on the practical wisdom of its participants who maximize various internet platforms to build anticipation, exhibit the broad character of the event, and sustain the message of the political action for several days.
From where I sit, I turn my gaze to these saints, these holy ones. They too have had their share of their own passion, death and resurrection. They have followed Jesus’ path unto death. We too are called now. This is our time
If there is any lesson to be drawn from PDP-Laban’s morphing into its very opposite and from the distinct possibility of Mr. Duterte’s eating his own words once he endorses Marcos Jr., it is how totally without principle and self-serving is the ruling elite — the handful of families and their clones that have monopolized political power in this rumored democracy for nearly a hundred years, and for whom changing sides and parties has been as easy as changing clothes, cars, and residences.
What is behind all these is the unarticulated but nevertheless all-encompassing determination to once more, as during Marcos Sr.’s benighted rule, make the democratization that has been long in coming to this country as difficult if not as impossible of an achievement quite simply because its realization would be contrary to dynastic interests.
Dubbed by the media as the “Batasan 6,” the accused (I was one of them) asked the Supreme Court to throw out the case for lack of probable cause. Meantime, under House protection, they stayed within the premises of the Batasang Pambansa for 71 days and nights, and continued to perform their official duties and functions.
For the Filipino masses, especially the farmers, Kerima Lorena Tariman is a hero. No amount of terrorist-tagging can erase that.
Para labanan ang pagkalat ng kasinungalingan, kailangang isulong ang sistematikong paglalahad ng katotohanan. Dito pumapasok ang tinatawag na fact-checking. Ipinapaliwanag sa simpleng salita kung bakit kasinungalingan ang kasinungalingan at kung bakit katotohanan ang katotohanan.
The electoral watchdog Kontra Daya (literally, Against Cheating) has found that seven out of 10 groups running for party-list seats in the House of Representatives are in the hands of far from marginalized and far from voiceless sectors and interests.
Going into his final three months in office, President Duterte apparently realized he was far from achieving another one of his 2016 campaign promises: to achieve peace and end the 50-years-plus armed conflict with the underground Left revolutionary movement.
A Bulatlat journalist writes: Solidaridad provided something different. Something unusual in a society flooded with mainstream books that evoked emotions and contributed to the art of writing, but failed to reflect the true people’s stories.
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