FOR the first time on live TV, I saw Senator Lito Lapid speak in the Senate for a purely self-serving reason. It was to air his disgust over a vlogger who had allegedly besmirched his reputation by naming him owner of the 10-hectare site of the 46-building Lucky South 99 POGO hub
July 1, 2024
“NOT in my mind,” former senator Leila de Lima answered the press people who had been asking whether she would run for senator in 2025. Foremost in her mind is to file charges against President Rodrigo Duterte as the mastermind behind the three dismissed illegal drugs-related cases which put her under detention
June 28, 2024
NO matter how we look at it, the “modernized jeepney” is not a jeepney but a mini-bus. It insults Filipino intelligence that the government has to lie to implement its so-called “jeepney modernization program” that would wipe out what used to be the “king of the road.” As mandated by the previous
June 26, 2024
SOMETIME last week, I read a newspaper article about a doctor belittling the wild plant “tawa-tawa” for giving “false hope” to dengue patients, for which there is no effective drug, given the failure of Dengvaxia to deliver its healing promise. But since there are townsfolk who swear they have been cured by
June 24, 2024
AT this time when most distribution utilities charge electricity consumers ₱14 per kilowatt-hour, MORE Electric and Power Corp. (MORE Power) will be billing Iloilo City residents only ₱8.7749/kWh within the billing period of June 18 to July 12, 2024. It’s a big fall from the previous rate of ₱11.32/kWh. Contrary to the previous
June 21, 2024
IF Dr. Jose P. Rizal were alive today (June 19, 2024), he would have turned 163 years old. He died very young at 35, executed by the Spanish colonial government on December 30, 1896 in Bagumbayan Field (what is now Rizal Park) for the crime of rebellion. He could have opted to
June 19, 2024
WHY only now? This was the question that bothered me yesterday upon reading the news that the Presidential Anti-Organized Crime Commission (PAOCC) was looking into Philippine Offshore Gaming Operations (POGO) sites at the Multinational Village in Parañaque City, where suspected sleeper agents of China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) reside. They should have
June 17, 2024
WE heard Rep. France Castro (ACT Teachers) loud and clear: The only way to eliminate the criminal activities of the Philippine Offshore Gaming Operators (POGOs) is to revoke all licenses granted to them. In House Bill 10525 filed to that effect, Castro correctly blamed the Chinese POGOs for routinely violating Philippine laws
June 14, 2024
SENATOR Lito Lapid was reported to have asked the Senate to go deeper in probing the raids done by elements of the Presidential Anti-Organized Crime Commission (PAOCC) and the Philippine National Police (PNP) last Friday and Saturday in the suspected hub of Lucky South 99, a Philippine offshore gaming operator (POGO) in Porac, Pampanga. To
June 12, 2024
IT HAS BEEN one week since the Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical, and Astronomical Services Administration (Pagasa) declared the rainy season this year “open”. Yesterday, I woke up to the “tune” of a drizzle. The rainy season is most welcome because the heat index now feels like hell while our faucets belch air instead
June 7, 2024
POOR distribution utilities (DUs), are now on the anvil of critical blows from consumers who complain about hiked rates and frequent brownouts. Yesterday, we heard our friends from the broadcast media taking up the cudgels for Iloilo City consumers who often agonize for as long as 12 hours of brownouts. Why now
June 5, 2024
JOY to the world, June has come. This month comes with the opportunity for nubile women to earn the tag “June bride.” Alas, however, applying the June wedding tradition to Filipinos does not make sense. It stems from the superstition that marriages in June are blessed. There is nothing “Pinoy” in the
June 3, 2024