If there’s anything that President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo would pay for $1 billion, it would be a photo opportunity with President Barack Obama.   Just imagine a picture of the two presidents side by side with the flags of their respective countries in the background.  That would be awesome!  It would be worth billions of dollars in extreme makeover for Gloria.  

           It could change her image from an international pariah to a “partner” in the war against global recession and terror.  And perhaps — cross your fingers – it could even convince the World Bank and other international lending institutions that the Philippines is not a corrupt banana republic but a bastion of democracy and freedom where citizens can freely express their opinions without getting killed by motorcycle-riding assassins.

            It could make her political party KAMPI the most powerful party in Philippine history and control all the congressional seats which will soon be transformed to parliamentary seats. 

           It could bring in military aid from the United States that would be used  in the fight against the communist rebels, terrorists, pro-communist peasants, and anti-government journalists.

          It could be used as an “endorsement” for her to stay in power beyond 2010 to pursue her dream of an “Enchanted Kingdom” where the Filipino people will live in peace and prosperity for the next millennium.

          The opportunities are endless.  And all Gloria needs is just one phot0 opportunity with President Obama.   C’mon President Obama, give Gloria a break.

Perry

DURIAN
By Amina Rasul
Manila Times

Losing international support

The spectacle of Mrs. Gloria Arroyo snubbed repeatedly by another head of state made even me cringe. After US President Barack Obama adroitly escaped photo opportunities with her in Davos, her handlers should have advised her against going to the National Prayer Breakfast (NPB) in Washington, D.C. on February 5.

The prayer breakfast, organized by US lawmakers, is annually held on the first Thursday of February. Since this is a major occasion for networking with the leaders of the US government, especially the American president, guests from around the world are invited early. It seems Sen. Chiz Escudero had received his invitation months ago. Mrs. Arroyo’s invitation, however, came on January 31, a mere five days before the event. (Malacañang had been trying to wangle an invitation since October). And still Press Secretary Cerge Remonde tells media that “This is a signal, honor and recognition that the US and international community are acknowledging the leadership of President Arroyo.”

At great expense, Mrs. Arroyo and her entourage detoured from a state visit to Bahrain to fly to DC, stayed at the most expensive hotel there (Four Seasons), only to be snubbed yet again by President Obama. If this invitation is to be regarded as recognition of the leadership of Mrs. Arroyo from the international community, then she should fire her handlers.

Meanwhile, back home, more international recognition. The International Red Cross team has been held hostage by a band of thugs for over a month now. The Philippines has the dubious distinction of being the only country where Red Cross workers have been kidnapped. Their safety assured by both sides in war-torn countries, it must boggle the world’s imagination that a Red Cross team could be kidnapped after visiting a Sulu jail just 5 meters away from the provincial capitol!

The military has bombed the lair of notorious kidnapper Albader Parad to no avail. In building up Parad’s alleged Abu Sayyaf/Jemaah Islamiah role, the government attains more legitimacy for its ongoing military operations in Sulu. Terrorist kasi. If Parad had been billed as a kidnapper, like the Kuratong Baleleng gang, the failure of governance under the Arroyo administration would be glaring.

While Mrs. Arroyo was waiting to ambush President Obama for a photo, more international recognition was being given to her administration. Headlines: corruption and collusion in the bidding for World Bank projects, based on a leaked World Bank report. The report had been provided to Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez, a classmate of President’s husband Miguel Arroyo. The detailed report tracked the corruption all the way to the President’s husband. The WB report stated that a Japanese contractor linked a former senator and the President’s husband to manipulation of bids. The contractor even said that the two had a “rough approach.” In Tagalog, we would say “garapal.”

The Bank report, conducted by a crack international team of investigators, details what many Filipinos already suspect. Or know. The WB gave its sensitive report directly to the government offices duly authorized to receive such: the Department of Finance and the Ombudsman. It did not hold a press conference to deliver the bombshell.

The Arroyo allies in the Senate want to grill World Bank Country Director Bert Hofman. I would have asked the Ombudsman what steps were taken after receiving the WB report in 2007. Instead of investigating the Ombudsman, the Department of Public Works and Highways and other involved government institutions, the Senate chose to run after the World Bank Country Director. Instead of investigating the accused, the Senate has chosen to run after the accuser for adhering to his duty to safeguard funds entrusted to the Bank by member countries and for observing protocol in releasing sensitive information.

The World Bank, in a diplomatic statement issued on February 12, welcomed the “Philippine Government’s initiative to follow-up on the World Bank’s decision to debar several foreign and Philippine firms on the basis of collusion,” stressing “our shared goal of improving governance and fighting corruption in the Philippines.”

Further, the Bank offered to help government conduct its own investigations.

According to the WB statement, together with the “Referral Report, issued in November 2007, was also an offer to begin a cooperative relationship between the Bank and the investigative agency, if the investigative agency so desires. A member country government that has received a Referral Report and is seeking to investigate the case can always ask the Bank for additional information. In this case, the World Bank has offered follow-up assistance to the Ombudsman in conducting her investigations.”

Ombudsman Gutierrez, dressed aggressively in battle red, therefore mesmerized me as she pointed her guns at the WB. She and Sen. Miriam Santiago were fascinating to watch, their hackles raised by this institution “squatting” in the country. Wish we had more such squatters, who support infrastructure projects all over the country, who hold annual “markets” to encourage civil society organizations to participate in peace and development, which very quietly investigate corruption and provide the report to the government in spite of the well-known suspicion that government is at the center of corruption.

Madame Arroyo, so sorry. I don’t think President Obama would be eager to have his photo taken with a leader of your international recognition. Best to stay home and have your photo ops with captured criminals brought to Malacañang. Now if you can only capture Albader Parad . . .

Sometimes a President Is Just a President
By Judith Warner
New York Times

The other night I dreamt of Barack Obama. He was taking a shower right when I needed to get into the bathroom to shave my legs, and then he was being yelled at by my husband, Max, for smoking in the house. It was not clear whether Max was feeling protective of the president’s health or jealous because of the cigarette.

The other day a friend of mine confided that in the weeks leading up to the election, the Obamas’ apparent joy as a couple had made her just miserable. Their marriage looked so much happier than hers. Their life seemed so perfect. “I was at a place where I was tempted daily to throttle my husband,” she said. “This coincided with Michelle saying the most beautiful things about Barack. Each time I heard her speak about him I got tears in my eyes — because I felt so far away from that kind of bliss in my own life and perhaps even more, because I was so moved by her expressions of devotion to him. And unlike previous presidential couples, they are our age, have children the same age and (just imagine the stress of daily life on the campaign) by all accounts should have been fighting even more than we were.”

As we all know, in journalism, two anecdotes are just one short of a national trend. I figured that my friend and I couldn’t possibly be the only ones dreaming, brooding or otherwise obsessing about the Obamas. Were other people, I wondered, being possessed by our new first family?

I launched an e-mail inquiry. And learned that they were. Often, in strikingly similar ways.

Many women — not too surprisingly — were dreaming about sex with the president. In these dreams, the women replaced Michelle with greater or lesser guilt or, in the case of a 62-year-old woman in North Florida, whose dream was reported to me by her daughter, found a fully above-board solution: “Michelle had divorced Barack because he had become ‘too much of a star.’ He then married my mother, who was oh so proud to be the first lady,” the daughter wrote me.

There was some daydreaming too, much of it a collective fantasy about the still-hot Obama marriage. “Barack and Michelle Obama look like they have sex. They look like they like having sex,” a Los Angeles woman wrote to me, summing up the comments of many. “Often. With each other. These days when the sexless marriage is such a big celebrity in America (and when first couples are icons of rigid propriety), that’s one interesting mental drama.”

Most dreams, however, were, like mine, more prosaic.

There was a dream, sent from Minneapolis, about buying Barack the perfect sandwich, and a dream from Westport, Conn., about inviting Michelle and the girls over for lunch and a play date: “I told her I’d make tuna fish sandwiches and cupcakes, and told her that she didn’t need to worry about the kids, no need to hire a sitter or extra secret service, that I had a nice basement/playroom for them. I explained how hard it was to move to a new home, and to take her time if she needed to unpack or run to Costco or something. She asked me about other supermarkets, and I told her that Stop & Shop had a sale on tuna fish and paper towels.” And one woman in Wisconsin had frequent daydreams about having the Obamas over for a glass of wine.

One woman wrote that when she couldn’t get to sleep at night, she “lay in bed and thought about the Obama girls in their rooms at the White House. I thought about Marian Robinson up on the third floor. And about Barack and Michelle, a couple who clearly have a ‘thing’ for each other, spooning together in bed. It helped me relax.”

I understood perfectly where these cozy dreams of easy familiarity came from. It was that sense so many people share of having a very immediate connection to Barack Obama, whether they’re black or biracial, or children of single parents or self-made strivers; or they’re lawyers or community organizers or Ivy League graduates or smokers or basketball players or Blackberry users or parents or married or Democrats. A lot of people share the fantasy that having the Obamas over for “dinner and a game of Scrabble,” as one daydreamer put it to me, is something that really could just about happen.

“This is the first president I’ve known who looks, talks and acts like a peer,” is how one Washington man explained it to me. “Notwithstanding his somewhat exotic life story, I feel like I understand what he’s like and where he’s coming from. And despite his incredible achievements, he still seems like a lot of people I know. If you stopped the clock in 2004, in fact, or maybe a couple of years earlier, he’d feel roughly like a peer in terms of accomplishments, too. Of course I know nobody with his political gifts, speaking skills and confidence, and he’s also a gifted writer and thinker. But I feel like one or two different turns for Obama or me and he could have been someone my friends and I wouldn’t think it extraordinary to have in our circle.”

Sometimes this sense of close identification turns a bit dark. There’s a subcategory of people who feel that they really should have true intimacy with the Obamas. Because they went to school with them. Because they used to dream like them. Because, with one or two “different turns,” they maybe could have been them.

These are not the people made most happy by thinking about the Obamas.

“They do seem to have it all together — a great marriage, beautiful children, a modern day Norman Rockwell family,” said a divorced Harvard grad with children in a top D.C. private school. “Why them, not me?”

These are people for whom the Obamas are not just a beacon of hope, inspiration and “demigodlikeness,” as a New York lawyer put it, but also a kind of mirror. And the refracted image of self they see is not one they much admire.

“I keep thinking about how I squandered my education and youth,” the New York lawyer wrote to me. “I went off to college from high school being completely community-minded, doing a lot of volunteer work for the homeless and for hunger and tutoring poor kids. Then I got to college and forgot my ideals. Barack was my year at Columbia. Why wasn’t I hanging out with him and being serious and following my ideals instead of hanging out in clubs? Same with law school. I partied my way through instead of taking advantage of all that I could have. Both Obamas were there when I was. I feel like if I’d been a better person I would have gotten to know them.”

A Washington lawyer expressed similar sentiments: “I feel like I know Barack, that I have worked grassroots and have created change in the way that he has. I [also] have feelings of a mom who had possibility but ended up running school auctions and mediating family business matters rather than having the opportunity to be out there on a national level creating change. So when I watch Barack I feel like: I can do that … and what am I doing with my life? Even though he is way smarter and more articulate than me.”

Another Washington woman, a global health care consultant, expressed her sense of Obama-inadequacy in a dream: “I dreamed I was an Obama girl. I had a chance to be in the same room with him for the first time. There were dark velvet chairs and he was standing there with all this dark and mist around him. His lips so purple and sensuous as if to be otherworldly,” she wrote to me. “I moved gently toward him and then I said the wrong thing. Obama tamped it down like some vapor that didn’t register. He wasn’t even flattered.”

(“Like a lot of folks, I have anxiety about being outside of the Obama administration universe right now,” she then explained to me. “Even though I was at the ‘it’ ball of inauguration balls, I still felt like other balls were greener, or more purple, or with credentials completely out of my control — more young. I really feel like I’m scrambling internally … to deserve Obama cred and all I’ve got is this over-my-head wonder for the man that amounts to being an Obama girl.”)

For some, not knowing the Obamas has almost turned into a feeling of being snubbed or excluded. Like in middle school. It’s funny. Almost.

“Why won’t my kids be sleeping over at the White House? And as my daughter noted, why couldn’t she get to sit front and center and see the Jonas Brothers and Miley perform at the kids’ inaugural concert? If she went to Sidwell, then she might have these chances, she said …” wrote a mother whose kids are not at Sidwell Friends school with Sasha and Malia.

“Will Michelle stay down to earth? She could prove it by joining our book club,” wrote a Sidwell mom.

This is, perhaps, the price of faux-familiarity. If I were Barack Obama (or Michelle, for that matter), I’d be a little scared. After all, when people are wearing their egos on their sleeves, it’s so easy to bruise their feelings. What will happen if fantasy turns to contempt?

Ever since Gloria Arroyo became president in 2001, I don’t remember her going on a junket abroad without her husband, Mike.  Why not?  After all, it’s free — paid for by Juan de la Cruz.

However, ever since Joc-joc Bolante was deported by the US, Mike had been avoiding going to the US.  He even missed the Pacquiao-De la Hoya boxing bout — a “no miss” event for an aficionado like Mike.  Makes me wonder if Joc-joc had spilled the beans on his pal Mike to the US authorities. 

The rumor that has been going around that Mike is “wanted” by the US government has been fueled lately when he didn’t accompany Gloria to Washington, DC for the National Breakfast Prayer.  

What Mike could do to dispel this nasty rumor is for him to go on a short ”getaway” trip to  San Francisco and stay in his mansion at the Marina for a weekend or, perhaps, even longer.  In that case, he would avoid appearing before the Senate investigating the bid fixing of projects funded by the World Bank in which he was linked by a Japanese contractor.  If he did that, then we would all shut up and move on.  What says you, Mike?

 Perry

On Target
Why is FG not with Arroyo in US trip?

President Gloria flew to the US after attending a world economic meeting in Davos, Switzerland.

She was scheduled to meet with top officials of President Barack Obama and possibly even the new US president himself.

Top officials of the Obama administration, probably yes. But having an audience with Obama himself was doubtful.

Obama has not met with GMA even during the US presidential campaign.

If he doesn’t want to see you, Madame President, please don’t insist.

If you have lost your pride, the Filipino people have not.

* * *

By the way, why is the President’s husband, Mike Arroyo, not with her on this US trip?

Hmmmmm.

Perhaps he doesn’t want to have another heart attack again that would have necessitated landing the presidential plane at an airport outside US territory.

Aw, c’mon guys, don’t look at me like that!

I didn’t say Mike Arroyo was going to be arrested the moment he stepped on US soil.

I’m just saying we should stop speculating on why he’s not with the President on this trip to the US.

* * *

If Mike Arroyo is not investigated on allegations his friends rigged bids to corner multimillion-peso public works projects, then we can kiss goodbye assistance from the World Bank and other international agencies.

Who will investigate Mr. Arroyo?

That’s the problem of Malacañang.

But he should be investigated and the investigation should be made public to avoid speculations that it’s just going to be a moro-moro.

On Mike Arroyo’s possible claim he cannot be investigated because he’s not a government official but a private person, how come he has an office called Office of the First Gentleman or some other name with a full staff headed by an undersecretary?

* * *

When Mike Arroyo filed charges for libel against this writer and other journalists for criticizing him, his claim that he was a private person and that he never interfered in government didn’t hold water.

Now, how could Mr. Arroyo explain the claim by a Japanese contractor, Tomatu Suzuka, to the World Bank that he allegedly demanded money from the foreigner in order to do business in the Philippines?

Arroyo’s lawyers, however, deny the serious accusations against him.

Now, it’s the word of the Japanese, who comes from a land where honesty is a national virtue, against Mike Arroyo.

As expected, President Gloria Arroyo failed to meet with President Barack Obama during the National Breakfast Prayer in Washington, DC.  Arroyo should know by now that Obama had been avoiding her for obvious reasons — she’s ‘bad news.’  Once again, Arroyo’s unscheduled ‘spur of the moment’ junket to the US manifests her desperate attempt to connect with Obama at all cost.

With the scandal involving fraud and corruption in the bidding of construction projects funded by the World Bank, there are reasons why Obama shouldn’t touch Arroyo with a ten-foot pole.  And what makes the matter worse is that the First Gentleman, Mike Arroyo, has been linked to the bidding anomaly by a Japanese contractor. With World Bank money involved, Obama should know that any personal contact with Arroyo would only draw criticism from Americans particularly the Filipino-American community.  

What Arroyo is thirsting for is a photo opportunity with Obama that she could use to prop her image back home.  But Obama can’t afford to tarnish his image at a time when Americans are looking up to him as their leader for ‘change.’   What would the Americans think of Obama when they saw a photo of him with Arroyo — the most corrupt president in Philippine history – in the newspapers?   Horrible!

Perry

Arroyo hit for ‘wasting public funds chasing Obama’
abs-cbnNEWS.com | 02/07/2009

President Arroyo should stop using taxpayers’ money to go after United States President Barack Obama, United Opposition president and Makati City Mayor Jejomar Binay said Saturday.

While thousands of Filipinos lose their jobs daily with the impact of the global economic downturn, Binay said the President has made use of public funds for a “very expensive hunt for a photo opportunity” with Obama in her US trip.

Even if she does get around to getting the much-sought after photo opportunity with the US president, the halo of purity will not rub off on her,” Binay said in a statement.

Binay said no amount of face time with Obama will reverse Mrs. Arroyo’s unpopularity, and her administration’s “tarnished international reputation as a violator of human rights and a den of corruption.”

No snub

Malacañang on Friday clarified that President Arroyo was not snubbed by Obama during the National Prayer Breakfast meeting held Thursday in Washington D.C. This was the third time that she failed to personally meet the US President.

President Arroyo took a sidetrip to Washington D.C. after attending the economic summit in Davos, Switzerland, and her trip to Bahrain. Press Secretary Cerge Remonde said the Mrs. Arroyo attended the prayer meeting to meet with congressional leaders regarding pending bills in US Congress affecting the country.

However, Binay said the only thing the President accomplished on her sidetrip was that she managed to evade questions on the findings of the World Bank (WB) implicating her husband in bid-riggings for road projects.

A testimony in the WB inquiry linked First Gentleman Jose Miguel “Mike” Arroyo to the bid-rigging controversy which led to the blacklisting of seven firms and one individual for alleged collusion in WB-funded road projects worth $33 million.

Mr. Arroyo has denied such allegations, saying that he has never met and discussed bribery with any contractor.

Binay said the US government may begin to scrutinize the Arroyo administration for the WB report linking the First Gentleman to high-level corruption, as well as the regime’s human rights record.

“Democratic administrations have traditionally tied a regime’s human rights record to the level of assistance extended by the US government,” he said.

A few days ago, the Republican Party elected Michael Steele as their first African-American national chairman. That the good news. The bad news is: at about the same time, Carol Carter, a county Republican official, distributed an email mocking African-American victims of Hurricane Katrina. It seems to me that every time the Republican Party makes one step forward, it takes two steps back.

It doesn’t matter if an African-American is at the helm of the party as long as its base is still controlled by people who don’t believe in inclusion. The defection of a large number of long-time Republicans during the last presidential campaign should serve as a wake-up call to the party.

While electing Michael Steele as national chairman is a positive direction, the state parties should follow the lead by opening membership to minorities. Delegates to the Republican national and state conventions are predominantly white people. Until the Republican national and state parties open their doors to minorities, they will remain a minority party.

With the election of President Barack Obama, it is anticipated that more minorities would be registering as Democrats. Assuming that the Republicans are really serious about opening their party to minorities, how are they going to attract minorities to join their party? A tough question with no easy answer. Well, Mr. Michael Steele, what says you?

Perry

GOP board member quits after sending racial e-mail
The chairman of the Republican Party of Florida said he had ‘no tolerance’ for a racially charged e-mail sent by a board member.

By BETH REINHARD
breinhard@MiamiHerald.com

A longtime Republican party leader from Hillsborough County who distributed an e-mail mocking black victims of Hurricane Katrina resigned Thursday, just hours after the message was sent to the media and the state party chairman.

Carol Carter, a member of the party’s executive committee for much of the past 30 years, sent the e-mail Friday to less than a dozen people on her personal account.

Referring to the record-setting crowd at President Barack Obama’s inauguration, it reads: “I’m confused. How can 2,000,000 blacks get into Washington, DC in 1 day in sub zero temps when 200,000 couldn’t get out of New Orleans in 85 degree temps with four days notice?”

The e-mail became public Wednesday night, less than one week after GOP leaders elected their first black national chairman, Michael Steele, and heralded the party’s commitment to inclusion and diversity.

`UNFORTUNATE’

Jim Greer, chairman of the Republican Party of Florida, helped Steele get elected and was appointed to his transition team. One of Steele’s competitors drew criticism from some party leaders, including Greer, for distributing a song called Barack the Magic Negro.

In a news release, Greer called Carter a ”loyal, hard-working Republican” but said he had chastised her.

”I appreciate her many notable contributions to our party, but this action I have no tolerance for, regardless of the circumstances or intent,” Greer said. “It is unfortunate that these types of e-mails, spread by just a few, distract others and dilute the message of the vast majority of Republicans throughout Florida and across the nation who are working hard to build and grow our party.”

Since he was handpicked by Gov. Charlie Crist two years ago to lead the GOP in the nation’s largest battleground state, Greer has frequently emphasized minority outreach. He organized the state party’s first conference for black Republicans in 2007 and recently hired a Hispanic outreach director.

APOLOGY

Before she resigned, Carter followed up the e-mail with an apology, but added in the message, ”I do hope that we are going to be allowed to keep our sense of humor.” Later in a telephone interview, she said she regretted that the e-mail became public because she realized it “could be taken as very racial.”

”I would never take something like this to the media,” she said. “It’s like what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas.”

In a spur of the moment change in her itinerary, the junketing Philippine President, Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, is heading to the U.S. again for another chance to meet President Barack Obama.  Obama will be the guest speaker at the National Prayer Breakfast on Feb. 5, 2009, in Washington, DC.

Gloria had been trying to connect or meet with Obama since the U.S. presidential campaign. If I were Gloria, I would stay close to the men’s room during the event. I am pretty sure that Obama would be visting the men’s room at some point. Gloria can then corral him when he leaves the men’s room. She did that to Bush a few years ago so she’s already an expert in doing it.

Perry

Palace confirms President’s trip

By Angelo S. Samonte, Manila Times

President Gloria Arroyo will add to her itinerary a trip to the United States, where she is to attend the National Prayer Breakfast on Thursday ‘ in Washington, D.C., before flying home.

Press Secretary Cerge Remonde confirmed Tuesday that the President has accepted the invitation from a group of legislators to attend the meeting.

The President is now in Bahrain and was supposed to be en route back to Manila, before the itinerary changes. She came from Milan, Italy, after attending the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland over the weekend.

The National Prayer Breakfast is a yearly event held in Washington, D.C., on the first Thursday of February. This year’s event will be on February 5, Thursday (Friday in Manila).

The event, which has been taking place since 1935, was founded by Frank Carlson, a former US legislator and governor. The National Prayer Breakfast gathering includes meetings, luncheons and dinners that normally attract 3,500 guests, including international dignitaries from more than 100 countries.

The event is designed to be a forum for political, social and business leaders of the world to assemble together and build relationships.

Remonde said President Arroyo could have a chance to meet US President Barack Obama for the first time, because the US leader will be the guest speaker in the event.

Mrs. Arroyo tried to set up a meeting with Obama during the US electoral campaign last year, but she was only able to meet with the Republican standard bearer, Sen. John McCain.

Varied guest list

While US lawmakers, Cabinet secretaries and foreign diplomats posted at Washington, D.C., are included in the event’s guest list, a number of the attendees come from a variety of sectors.

Last year, six heads of state attended the breakfast activity. Joining them were members of the European parliament, diplomats at the United Nations diplomats; European, Asian, African and Latin American politicians; missionaries working in various countries; US and foreign business leaders; and students.

After the US meeting, President Arroyo will return to the Philippines, where she is scheduled to arrive Saturday, Remonde said.

By Maloney L. Samaco
PhilBoxing.com
Sat, 31 Jan 2009

It was officially announced by the administration of the Southwestern University that the world’s number one pound-for–pound boxer Manny Pacquiao will be awarded the degree Doctor in Human Kinetics, “Honoris Causa.” The conferment will be done on February 18, 2009.“Honoris causa” is a Latin phrase which means “for the sake of the honor” and it is an academic degree conferred by a university in which the usual requirements such as matriculation, residence, lessons and the passing of examinations are waived.Usually the degree is conferred as a way of honoring a distinguished person’s contributions to a specific field of endeavor or to the society in general. The university often derives benefits by association and alliance with the person being honored.

This is one of the most blatant display of arrogance and abuse of power.  The World Bank did its own investigation of collusion among these three contractors before they wer banned.  For the House Committee on Public Works and Highways to ignore the evidence presented by the World Bank once again manifests how deep corruption is in the Philippines.  What the House committee did was pure “lutong macao.”

If the House committee members believe that the World Bank would exonerate the three contractors “cleared” by the House committee and lift the ban, they’re dreaming.  On the contrary, the World Bank would probably put every project they funded in the Philippines under closer scrutiny. 

Perry

House body clears banned contractors
By Lira Dalangin-Fernandez
INQUIRER.net

Filed Under: World bank road mess

MANILA, Philippines — The House committee on public works and highways on Wednesday cleared three Filipino construction firms banned by the for alleged corruption.

After two hearings, committee chairman Southern Leyte Representative Roger Mercado said the inquiry had ended.

“Walang collusion, walang collusion [No collusion, no collusion],” he told reporters after the hearing, pointing out that no proof was presented during the hearings to back the World Bank’s charges against E.C. de Luna Corp, Cavite Ideal International Construction and Development Corp. and CM Pancho Construction Inc [...]

 To read more, click here

http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/breakingnews/nation/view/20090128-186112/House-body-clears-banned-contractors

 

Amador Bernabe fired for ‘un-Australian toilet habits’
January 24, 2009 
Townsville Bulletin

A MAN who uses water instead of toilet paper says he was sacked for his “un-Australian” toilet habits.

Amador Bernabe, 43, is a machine operator in Townsville on a working visa from the Philippines, the Townsville Bulletin reports.

On Thursday, he claims his foreman followed him into the bathrooms questioning his toilet hygiene.

Mr Bernabe said his employer, Townsville Engineering Industries (TEI), sacked him yesterday for not going to the toilet the Australian way.

“I went to go to the toilet and I took a bottle of water when my foreman saw me and he said, ‘you can’t bring the water in there’,” Mr Bernabe said.

The foreman followed Mr Bernabe into the toilet despite his protests.

“I said it’s my personal hygiene. I didn’t break any law, I didn’t break any rules of the company, why can’t I do this, and he said he would report me to the manager.

The next day, Mr Bernabe says he was called into the manager’s office.

“He asked me what had happened and I explained to him and he said if I didn’t follow the Australian way I would be immediately terminated and I said ‘sir, then you better terminate me’.”

The move has angered union bosses and politicians on the Australia Day weekend.

Australian Manufacturing Worker’s Union state organiser Rick Finch said the incident was shocking.

“I think it is atrocious, an invasion of a person’s rights and cultural beliefs,” he said.

“If it wasn’t so disgusting it would almost be laughable.”

Greens spokeswoman Jenny Stirling praised Mr Bernabe for standing up for his rights.

“I commend the man for standing up for himself and I encourage the employer to have further talks with the union and the employee and I am sure commonsense will prevail,” she said.

“I would like to see how Australians feel when they go to Europe where in places they don’t have toilet paper.”

TEI could not be reached for comment.