By Pam Galisim

I spent the first couple of minutes trying to figure out a connection between our asymptotic views. Thought I’d tell you what I was thinking that day and you replied to me by telling me of your passionate hatred towards my country…then I realized, “Simply Dear Expat, It’s the Philippines and you are from a different country, don’t take it any seriously ok?!”. I’m hoping that by thinking like that all diversified disconnections, like our cultures (or the lack thereof) suddenly will be justified. But on one end, maybe you just wanted a spontaneous sharing of thoughts. I don’t claim to be an expert but having lived here for the past 28 years spurred me to share this to you, my dear transient friend.

In this spirit, I’d say that I have no further reaction than an insight of your hatred being a function of such “familiarity- breeding contempt”. I have a friend who has gone to a marriage counseling session over her “defunct” marital relationship. Their counselor told her and her husband that you can tell if a couple will last a year, two or so by observing how they are with each other for the next 15 minutes. The observer would just have to take note of facial expressions, sighs which convey hints of contempt. Basically to see how much the couple can stand each other. At this, they would be advised if the relationship is still healthy of not.

My point? In “‘Expat time scale”, a year or a little over is probably enough to render all the signs of contempt (should there be any) from a love-hate relationship that you’ve built with this country through time. Indeed , it is also possible that you haven’t stayed in another country (other than your home) long enough to say it is better or, you have probably stayed in this country far too long to see so much of its flaws and realize how you just can’t live with it. At which case, like any couple with such contempt, your relationship with this country is no longer healthy (for you, at the most part). So before even nudging a nonchalant comment about this country to any Pinoy or Pinay, think, think and think…how long have you been here? [Read the rest of this entry »]

REACTING to government’s call for the MILF to surrender Kato and Bravo, Murad said: “It is not logical for the GRP to tell us to surrender Commander Bravo and Commander Kato because they are not bound by Philippine laws.” How come Mr. Murad is saying that the MILF men are not “bound by Philippine laws?” Does this mean that when he goes to Malaysia, he does not use the Philippine passport or is he dreaming of pledging allegiance to Malaysia? Another question is: Is he anticipating of incorporating the Bangsamoro land into a federation with Malaysia? Wow, what an unfortunate page in our history had the MOA been pushed through. I think the Mr. Esperon would have been the national hero of the MILF men. Mr. Murad can migrate to Malaysia where he can be happy in his own right and forget dragging others to be with him.

Anthony Benavidez, Zamboanga City (via e-mail)

THIS refers firstly to your news report “‘Abadilla 5′ take case to victim’s family” by Julie M. Aurelio (PDI, 8/23/08, p. A4). The headline is correct. But the report is not accurate in saying that only three (Lenido Lumanog, Augusto Santos, and Rameses de Jesus) of the A5 signed the Open Letter to the Abadilla Family on 21 August 2008 at New Bilibid Prison, Muntinlupa City, while the two others (Joel de Jesus and Cesar Fortuna) did not. They actually did, by writing their names and affixing their corresponding signatures on to copies of the printed out Open Letter which was originally prepared for the first three who were assisted in this by the undersigned as counsel for Lumanog and Santos and by PAO lawyer Abraham C. Ong as new counsel for Rameses de Jesus.

Your reporter apparently based her information about the Open Letter on an electronic copy posted on the website of the Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) in Hong Kong. Indeed, the electronic copy reflected the Open Letter originally prepared for only the above-mentioned first three. Just the same, we are grateful for her report which calls attention to the plight of the A5 who have consistently claimed innocence for the Sparrow unit-style ambush-killing of former PC Metrocom Col. Rolando N. Abadilla on 13 June 1996.

The Open Letter itself calls the attention of the Abadilla Family to two of his personal objects (and thus familiar to them), which were taken by and recovered from a source evidently responsible for his killing, the old Alex Boncayao Brigade (ABB). These were his Omega wrist watch and .45 caliber pistol, now respectively with the Court and the PNP Crime Laboratory, which the family should check out for themselves to get to the truth about who were really responsible for the murder of their loved one.

It is perhaps providential that on the day that the A5 signed the Open Letter, 21 August 2008, which is the 25th anniversary of the 21 August 1983 assassination of former Sen. Benigno “Ninoy” Aquino, Jr., your newspaper started the first of an intrepid front-page two-part series by Fe Zamora which named Col. Abadilla among the core of five persons evidently behind that assassination. How uncanny this link between two assassinations, 13 years apart but both involving Col. Abadilla, first as a plotter and second as the victim. How uncanny also that the convicts in both cases have been asking the respective victim’s families to take a better closer look at certain pieces of evidence that would point to those really behind the respective assassinations. But will they take heed?

Soliman Santos Jr., Cubao, Quezon City (via e-mail)

By Erika Tapalla
INQUIRER.net

Apart from the congested traffic during the daily rush hours, a normal sight along Katipunan Avenue in Quezon City would be the colorful tricycles that quickly traverse down the streets against monstrous trucks, missing nearby vehicles by mere inches.

But the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority (MMDA) has banned tricycles from the area, drawing complaints from transport operators, students and residents.

The MMDA has claimed that they only did this to ease traffic in the area.

In the video below, INQUIRER.net multimedia reporter Izah Morales went to Katipunan to find out what people in the area think of this issue.

But what do you think? Tell us how you feel about this issue! Send us a video. We invite our viewers to send video on what you think about this issue. Grab a camera, have someone film you and speak your mind — this is your chance to be both seen and heard. Video clips should not be more than 1 minute long. Send video to http://dropbox.yousendit.com/inquirerbox. In the message field, please indicate the names of the people in the video, names of people who took the video, and the place where the video was taken.

INQUIRER.net will only accept videos in the following formats: .MPEG, .MP4, .AVI, and .MOV.

Jose Ma. Montelibano

THEY SAY that when anxiety deepens, people pray more and the sales of candles increase. They say when people are depressed, people drink more and the sales of liquor go up. Frankly, I have not seen statistics to prove these assertions, but I have not heard much argument to the contrary either. Let me proceed, therefore, assuming that there is truth to them, enough to stimulate our minds to reflective, if not critical, thinking.

The agitation caused by the proposed Bangsamoro Judicial Entity (BJE) brings to fore old wounds which have never healed well. The heart of the controversy is not the terms in the proposed agreement but in the hearts of prejudice and historical animosity. After a thousand years when conflict first broke out between Christians and Moors in North Africa and Iberia, a great distrust has grown between three religions that all came from Abraham — Judaism, Christianity and Islam.

[Read the rest of this entry »]

By Soliman Santos, Jr.
Contributor

IN the first five of the eight paragraphs of the Terms of Reference (TOR) at the start of the unsigned final draft of the Government of the Republic of the Philippines (GRP)-Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) Memorandum of Agreement on Ancestral Domain (MOA-AD) are stated as TOR six prior peace agreements, four with the MILF and two with the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF), including the 1996 Final Peace Agreement (FPA). This indicates a building on and need for harmonizing with the peace settlement already achieved with the MNLF.

Then, in the sixth and seventh paragraphs are stated as TOR three Republic Acts (RA 6374, 9054 and 8371), three specific international treaties (ILO Convention No. 169, UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, UN Charter, and Universal Declaration of Human Rights) and, in general terms, “International Humanitarian Law (IHL), and internationally recognized human rights instruments.” So, while there is no direct or express mention of the Philippine Constitution, there is reference to three national laws which carry that framework, as in fact so does the abovementioned 1996 FPA make reference to it.

RA 6374 and 9054 are the previous and current Organic Acts for the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM). RA 8371 is the Indigenous Peoples’ Rights Act (IPRA) of 1997. This as well as ILO 169 and the new UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples provide for the protection and promotion of such rights. The TOR of “International Humanitarian Law (IHL), and internationally recognized human rights instruments” is also significant because “the generally accepted principles of international law [are adopted] as part of the law of the land” under the Philippine Constitution. But it is international law, not the Constitution, that has become a hopeful common ground or lingua franca between the GRP and MILF, they of their radically different paradigms.

Finally, in the last of the eight paragraphs is this TOR found for the first time ever in any of the peace agreements involving the GRP and the various rebel groups: “Compact rights entrenchment emanating from the regime of dar-ul-mua’hada (or territory under compact) and dar-ul-sulh (or territory under peace agreement) that partakes the nature of a treaty device. For the purpose of this Agreement, a ‘treaty’ is defined as any solemn agreement in writing that sets out understandings, obligations, and benefits for both parties which provides for a framework that elaborates the principles declared in the Agreement.”
[Read the rest of this entry »]

By Atty. Soliman Santos, Jr.
Contributor

IS the Bangsamoro Juridical Entity (BJE), proposed in the unsigned Government of the Republic of the Philippines (GRP)-Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) Memorandum of Agreement on Ancestral Domain (MOA-AD), a sovereign independent nation-state separate from the Philippine state? Will it mean the territorial dismemberment of the country? These are among the worst fears about the MOA-AD and its BJE splashed or aired over the Philippine media. Let us try to “tackle this issue in an intelligent and dispassionate manner,” guided by truth, reason and justice.

Under the terms of the MOA-AD, the BJE is clearly not a sovereign independent nation-state separate from the Philippine state and, therefore, whatever territory pertains to it would not constitute dismemberment of the country. We shall deal more with statehood rather than territory here. It is not enough to recall the old political science or Philippine political law definitions of the state and its four essential elements of people, territory, government and sovereignty, then say that since the BJE seems to have all these, ergo it is a “state,” and then raise hell about it as if there were a declaration of war.

Other juridical entities (if I may also use the term), including my city of Naga and province of Camarines Sur easily have elements of people, territory and government, so it is usually sovereignty or a certain level of it that makes the difference between statehood and non-statehood. This refers to sovereignty that is independent of external control that has absolute power to govern, unlimited power to make laws, as manifested by power to make and change the fundamental law, which usually resides in the people. Then also does international recognition. Sovereignty at the country level has traditionally been deemed absolute and indivisible but this notion has changed over several centuries due to both external and internal entities that countries have to deal with.

Anyway, long before there was a Philippine state in the 20th Century, there were already in these islands sovereign independent nation-states that were the sultanates of Sulu and Maguindanao, beginning in the 15th and 17th centuries, respectively. The relevance of this is indicated in the MOA-AD, “Concepts and Principles,” paragraph 4, with the Parties, to their credit, reaffirming certain historical truths: “Both Parties acknowledge that the right to self-governance of the Bangsamoro people is rooted on ancestral territoriality exercised under the suzerain authority of their sultanates and the Pat a Pangampong ku Ranaw. The Moro sultanates were states or karajaan/kadatuan resembling a body politic endowed with all the elements of nation-state in the modern sense.”
[Read the rest of this entry »]

By Ted Regencia
Contributor

AT the height of the US presidential primaries that pitted Chicago’s very own Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, one Filipino American social butterfly emphatically said, “Ay, ayaw ko kay Obama! Baka yung White House magiging Black House (Oh, I don’t want Obama! The White House might turn into a Black House).”

It’s a sentiment not so few of Chicago’s Filipino-Americans feel towards their very own senator who is an African-American. Now that he is the Democratic nominee for president, a historic achievement for a black candidate, the antagonism has only intensified.

It all started when Obama won the Iowa caucus on January 3. Shortly after, an online group of Filipinos received a forwarded email attacking Obama’s “Muslim upbringing.”

The email asked, “Are you aware that Obama’s middle name is Mohammed (It’s actually Hussein, which means “the handsome one” in Arabic). Strip away his nice looks, the big smile and smooth talk and what do you get?” It warned that Obama is “possibly a covert worshiper of the Muslim faith, even today.”

[Read the rest of this entry »]

I think this kind of agreement should be done through a plebiscite and various consultations with the Filipinos, both Muslims and Christians. The government should publish the whole agreement (nothing hidden) so the people can form their educated opinion on this very important matter. Congress, both houses, should approve this agreement too. The executive branch cannot do this by itself unless our country is no longer democratic.

Ruben Lacap, Daly City, California (via e-mail)