China’s President Xi Jinping welcomes Pres. Duterte to Beijing in October 2016. Malacanang photo by Toto Lozano.
All these efforts and pronouncements about joint exploration with China in Philippine territory is in connection with the state visit of China’s President Xi Jinping in November.
Xi is expected to proceed here after the summit of Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation leaders in Papua New Guinea on Nov. 12 to 18.
This was confirmed by Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque in his briefing yesterday. Asked how soon the PH-China joint exploration agreement would be signed, Roque said: “No time frame. But of course because of the impending visit of President Xi, I would say that it is anytime between now and the visit of President Xi. But it was not expressly stated as such.”
A twide-a-month gathering of friends of eminent writer Carmen Guerrero Nakpil at Havana Restaurant.
I have received three gifts from two persons I truly admire which have become even more meaningful now.
One is a black cashmere blouse and another is a pair of black leather gloves which came from Mrs. Carmen Guerrero Nakpil.
The third item is a silver rosary blessed by the Pope from Ambassador Jun Lozada.
We were in Portland, Seattle on Nov. 4, 1993 to cover the first summit of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation at the Tillicum Village in Blake Island, Washington State the next day. I was part of the Malacañang Press Corps and the president then was Fidel V. Ramos.
That is what Malacañang is doing in the case of the undeclared wealth of President Duterte which was exposed by Sen. Antonio Trillanes IV way back in April 2016, less than two weeks before the May 9 elections.
Last Monday, July 30, Malacañang released the order signed by Executive Secretary Salvador C. Medialdea dismissing Overall Deputy Ombudsman Melchor Arthur Carandang from service after Palace investigation found the latter “liable for graft and corruption and betrayal of public trust.” Overall Deputy Ombudsman Melchor Arthur Carandang
15 years ago at the Oakwood Hotel in Makati.(AP Photo/Bullit Marquez)
Related article:
https://ph.news.yahoo.com/blogs/the-inbox/magdalo-10-years-oakwood-224739924.html
When Sen. Antonio Trillanes IV, Rep. Gary Alejano and some 100 officers and soldiers were preparing to mark the 15th year of the life-changing decision they made when they went out to denounce the corruption in the dubious presidency of Gloria Arroyo, little did they know that she would be installed as Speaker of the House, third in the line of succession to the presidency.
The irony was not lost on the officers and soldiers who spent seven years of their lives in detention for what they did on July 27, 2003.
“Critics of the Magdalo point to the fact that we once broke the military chain of command, and in the process found ourselves in the crosshairs of the State. We faced the consequences of the stand we made fifteen years ago, and we accepted the fate that the Arroyo regime imposed upon us”, said Ashley Acedillo, who was then a 26-year old first lieutenant in the Philippine Air Force.
Just retired Ombudsman Conchita Carpio-Morales
By Ellen T. Tordesillas, VERA Files
In the seven years that Conchita Carpio-Morales was Ombudsman – investigating and prosecuting corruption cases against government officials – the ones that gave her the biggest headaches were those involving former president Gloria Arroyo, who was elected speaker of the House of Representatives last Monday.
In an interview by VERA Files days before she retired on July 26, Carpio-Morales described the cases involving Arroyo as “very, very complicated.”
Among those cases are the misuse of the intelligence funds of the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office amounting to more than P300 million; the questionable transfer of P530,382,445 from the OWWA Medicare Fund to the Philippine Health Insurance Corporation; the P728 million Fertilizer Fund that was allegedly used in the 2004 elections; and the P16.4 billion ($329 million) NBN/ZTE deal.
Gloria Arroyo – in a red- orange dress taking control of the situation at the Batasan Session Hall last Monday- was a personification of what German philosopher, Friedrich Nietzsche said,“That which does not kill us, makes us stronger.”
It is shuddering to imagine what a re-invigorated GMA can and will do.
She stayed in Malacañang for ten years with a dubious mandate. A vice president in 2001, she grabbed power from then President Joseph Estrada by installing herself to the presidency that was not declared vacant. She cheated, using the Commission on Elections and the military, in the 2004 elections.
In the unforgettable words of Susan Roces, the widow of her victim, Fernando Poe, Jr: “… you have stolen the presidency, not once, but twice.”
Months before the second anniversary of the Arbitral Tribunal’s decision on the case filed by the Philippines to nullify China’s nine-dash line map and other issues in the South China Sea, China commissioned a study which was completed in December 2017.
Published by Oxford University Press, “The South China Sea Arbitration Awards: A Critical Study” is an intimidating 548 page assertion by China of its ownership of the waters, reefs, shoals, rocks in the Spratlys as part of its claim over almost the whole of South China Sea. Front page of study
What struck me in the Pulse Asia’s latest survey on Charter Change was how uninformed we are about our Constitution, which we all approved in 1987.
The nationwide survey with 1,800 registered voters 18 years old and above as respondents was conducted June 15 to 21, two weeks before the consultative committee formed by President Duterte to draft a federal Constitution submitted its finished product to Malacañang.
Pulse Asia found out that about three-quarters of Filipinos (74%) have little/almost no/no knowledge at all about the 1987 Philippine Constitution.). Of the total figure (74%), 43% have little knowledge while 31% know practically/completely nothing about the document that spells out the basic laws that govern us.
Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque last Friday when he was asked by broadcaster Erwin Tulfo about the tarpaulin declarations that the Philippines is a province of China sounded like the Harry Roque of the good old days.
He didn’t mince words. He cursed abundantly. In one paragraph, he said “loko-loko”, “baliw”,”sira-ulo”, traydor”, and “walang-hiya” – words used by people feeling miserable about what is happening in the country to refer to President Duterte.
Asked about the red tarpaulins hung in strategic places in Manila and Quezon City with words, “Welcome to the Philippines, Province of China” on July 12, the second anniversary of the Philippines’ victory in the case filed against China at the Arbitral Tribunal, Roque went ballistic: “Kung Hindi na naman sila loko-loko ay bakit nila sasabihin iyong ganoon. Kung ikaw po ay tutol sa Presidente, okay iyon, tutol ka sa polisiya; pero para bastusin mo yung bansa natin mismo ay talagang kalokohan iyan. Baliw lang ang gagawa niyan dahil araw-araw ay tinuturuan natin ang ating mga kabataan na kumanta ng Lupang Hinirang, tapos sasabihin mo na tayo magiging kaparte ng isang dayuhang bansa. Iyan po ay talagang hindi lang mga sira-ulo; iyan po ay walang pagmamahal sa bayan, mga traydor, mga walang-hiya, mga –hay naku, gigil na po ako.(If you are not crazy, why would you say that. If you are against the President, that’s okay, [you] oppose his policy; but to bastardize our country, that’s foolish. Only a fool would do that because every day we teach our children to sing Lupang Hinirang, then you say we are part of a foreign country. That really is not only mentally deranged; they have no love for the country, traitors, shameless, — (sigh) I’m so pissed off.)”
Well-chosen words that fit perfectly Duterte, who spoke about joint exploration in the South China Sea last Feb. 29 at the 20th Founding Anniversary Celebration of the Chinese Filipino Business Club in the presence of Chinese ambassador Zhao Jianhua: “Yung oil dito ang pinakamarami. Two-third sa amin, one third kayo, mayaman naman kayo eh. Sus, at probinsya na kami. Oh, province of Philippines, Republic of China. (The oil here is so much. We get two thirds, you get one third, you are rich anyway. And we are a province. Oh, province of Philippines, Republic of China)”
Pres. Duterte dares religious believers to show him a selfie with God at the opening of the National Science and Technology Week Celebration in Mindanao at the SMX Convention Center in Lanang, Davao City on July 6. Screengrab from RTVM footage.
Beneath all his bravado- the curses and the profanity –President Duterte is really confused. He can’t even decide whether he believes in God or not.
At the opening of the National Science and Technology Week in Mindanao at the SMX Convention Center in Lanang, Davao City July 6, Duterte said, he actually believes in God even if two weeks ago he called God “stupid.”
Last Friday he said: “By the way, I believe in one Supreme God. I never said I do not believe in God. I am not agnostic. I am not an atheist. I just happen to be a human being believing there is a universal mind somewhere which controls the universe.”
In the next breath, however, Duterte said he needs of someone with a selfie with God to prove the Higher Being’s existence.
