By Ellen Tordesillas www.ellentordesillas.com June 9, 2009 Bukas, magkita-kita tayo sa Ayala ng ika-lima ng hapon. Ipakita natin ang ating pagtutol sa panloloko na ginagawa ni Gloria Arroyo sa pamamagitan ng Con-Ass na kanyang isinusulong pra siya manatili sa kapangyarihan habambuhay. Sabi ni Rep. Mauricio Domogan, isa sa may-akda ng nakakadiri na House Resolution 1109, na kahit mag-ngangawa ang mga tao sa kalsada, wala silang paki-alam. Itutuloy nila ang kanilang ilegal na gawain. Sabi niya sa susunod na buwan bubuu-in na ng mga congressman ang Constituent Assembly. Sabi niya kina-calibrate o tinatanya nila ang mga pangyayari. Tama yun, sa isip nina Gloria Arroyo, hindi na mangyayari ang people power. Magra-rally man ang mga tao, isang araw lang yun. Sa hirap ba naman ng buhay ngayon, sino naman ang magtityaga na magprotesta. Kaya, maari nilang gawin ang ano man na pambabastos ng batas, alam nilang hindi mangyayari ang nangyari noong 1986 kay Marcos at noong 2001 kay Estrada. Hawak ni...

By Mon Casiple www.moncasiple.wordpress.com The congressmen who voted for the holding of the GMA constituent assembly feel the universal heat. Putting up a brave face, many of them contemplate the possible impact of their decision on their candidacies and political future. Some even blamed the Senate (?) for the HOR Con-Ass decision. There is a miscalculation of the public’s anti-GMA sentiment–it’s transferable. In the 2007 elections, it translated to losses of erstwhile high-rating senatorial candidates. It also led to Senator Trillanes’ victory who ran only on this single issue. The GMA kiss of death, despite Secretary Gilbert Teodoro’s optimism, is a major factor in the coming 2010 elections, particularly if GMA continues at the helm of the current government. The congressmen went out on a limb when they–for their own reasons–chose to push forward with the Con-Ass initiative. In many places, even in their own dynastic heartlands, GMA is the current issue. Combined with the rising an...

We have to thank the Arroyo administration for making it possible for the Catholic, Protestant, Born-Again, Muslim leaders and followers to close ranks. As Barack Obama said, let us listen to those who have faith -- and to those without faith. I am sure the agnostics, atheists, and those in the balag ng alanganin are also agitated, angered, even insulted by the nerve of Congress to push for a Con-Ass resolution near midnight. They always do it in the dark: the proclamation of GMA as president, her visit to Boao in China to witness the signing of the NBN-ZTE deal, the banishment of Joe de Venecia from his lofty perch as speaker of the house. On second thought, I am happy that Ang Ladlad was not allowed to run in the last elections. I am sure we would have won two seats, but that meant sharing space with the vomitable amongst us. And my foreless forecasts: 1. Lakas-Kampi-CMD will have wider and deeper cracks and will not be the behemoth party it is being touted to be. Blame it on human n...

BIG DEAL By Dan Mariano The Manila Times June 8, 2010 Dan Mariano is a friend of mine and one of the most astute political analysts in town. Read most especially the list of congress people who voted for the pro-GMA bill. For that is what it is, a pro-GMA bill. A few of those in the list are friends of mine. I am sure the political wind will blow another way in November of 2009, when we have filed our certificates of candidacy and the GMA ship of state would be shot full with holes, the rats scampering away from the sinking ship. But by that time, will I still take the phone calls of my so-called friends? *** Flashback to January 2001. The opposition walks out of the Senate impeachment trial of then-President Joseph Estrada. Filipinos, first, by the hundreds, then by the thousands and finally by the hundreds of thousands, gather in protest and indignation at the EDSA Shrine. Then-Ambassador Ernesto Maceda pooh-poohs the significance of the daily demonstrations at EDSA. Give those pe...

Aba'y dapat naman. The posturings of the two Arroyo sons in Congress remind me of Bongbong during the heyday of the Marcos dictatorship. So cocksure, so arrogant, even if their brain cells are melting. I think it will a go for the elections. And who are running in the administration slate for senators? Recycled losers, has-beens, people who do not even know what a blog means. Some dum-dums will bite the dust in 2010. *** by Karen Reyes-Caringal, ANC | 03/25/2009 10:31 PM www.abs-cbnNEWS.com Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile said on Wednesday he is ready to take members of the House of Representatives to the Supreme Court if they insist on amending the 1987 Constitution without senators' participation. "The House of Representatives is not the Congress of the Philippines, and the Constitution speaks of the power of Congress to amend the Constitution by three-fourths vote of all its members, meaning three-fourths of the House and three-fourths of the Senate," Enrile sa...

BY CARMELA FONBUENA, abs-cbnNEWS.com/Newsbreak Senator Manuel “Mar” Roxas, in a newspaper paid advertisement on Monday. reiterated his rejection of convening Congress into a Constituent Assembly. He instead called for the holding of a Constitutional Convention (Con-Con) in 2010. “Instead of pushing for charter change through a Constituent Assembly, the Liberal Party (LP) will sponsor a bill in Congress calling for a holding of a Constitutional Convention in 2010 with elections of delegates to be done simultaneously with the 2010 elections,” said the advertisement of the Liberal Party entitled “Stop the Gloria Forever Constitution.” The ad was signed by Roxas along with two other LP stalwarts, former Senator Franklin Drilon and LP secretary-general Joseph Abaya. The advertisement comes a day before the scheduled hearing of the House committee on constitutional amendments. At least one resolution calling for Constitutional Convention has been filed in the lower House. House Resolution 8...

I agree with my friend Mon Casiple. The Cha-Cha forces only have from now until April 2009. By May 2009, the campaign season would begin. It is only one more year before the elections. Have you seen those horrid tarpaulins of the politicians? I live in District 3, QC, and the tarpaulins range from free vaccination for your dogs, to the search for the cleanest barangays (without even giving the barangays a single walis tingting). They will do everythin got put their bloated, oily, uber-ugly faces on those toxic tarpaulins. But this morning, in front of my building, hangs a simple white tarpaulin with the face of Ninoy and a line about being a hero. Now that is a real hero, in my book and I am sure in yours as well. *** BY Mon Casiple Institute for Political and Electoral Reforms (IPER) www.moncasiple.wordpress.com It is now joined. The battle on Charter change to enable President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo to stay in power–whether as president or prime minister–starts now. At stake here is...

BY Ellen Tordesillas Ang Pahayagang Malaya www.malaya.com.ph THIS is what the five bishops warned about just three weeks ago: Gloria Arroyo will ram Charter Change down the people’s throats. A report from the House of Representatives yesterday said House Resolution 737 amending the economic provision of the Constitution has been signed by 163 congressmen. House Speaker Prospero Nograles, who authored the resolution, needs only 15 more signatures to meet the required 175 signatures, representing three-fourths of the House of Representatives membership to bring the resolution to the Committee on Constitutional Amendments, then to the plenary. The Cha-Cha train is cranking up. Destination: Beyond 2010. This is what Press Secretary Jesus Dureza prayed for last Tuesday at the start of the Cabinet meeting: That Gloria Arroyo “have forbearance, good health, and tolerance to lead this nation until 2010, and who knows, perhaps even beyond.” It was not a slip of the tongue. It was an announcemen...

SKETCHES By Ana Marie Pamintuan Wednesday, August 13, 2008 Philippine STAR www.philstar.net Give the administration an A for audacity. Or maybe it’s plain cluelessness, born of long years of insensitivity to public sentiment. I don’t know how the administration intends to sell two unpopular ideas at the same time to Filipinos: Charter change to shift to another form of government, plus a deal with a bunch of violent hooligans that will reward their banditry with vast tracts of Philippine territory, and without consulting affected communities. Shifting to a new system of government elicits passionate debate in this country only when Filipinos see the initiative as a mere smokescreen for the real agenda: the perpetuation of public officials in power. In this case, the intended principal beneficiary of a shift to federalism looks too much like President Arroyo – the most unpopular chief executive so far since Ferdinand Marcos, according to independent surveys. Fidel Ramos, who brought the...

Opinion SKETCHES By Ana Marie Pamintuan Wednesday, August 6, 2008 Philippine Star www.philstar.net There were many horror stories about Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo from people who worked for her before she rose to power. Some of their complaints Filipinos have become familiar with in the past seven years: this President is too demanding and unreasonable, she lacks charm, she lacks empathy. The President has admitted a number of her faults, some of which she attributes — like her good skin to her genes — to a rigid upbringing. Yet those same traits made her look like the antithesis of Joseph Estrada. And back in 2000-2001, with Filipinos suffering from an overdose of President Erap’s natural charm and empathy, the possibility of his workaholic though crabby vice president replacing him seemed like a godsend. People power 2 succeeded in part because people saw Erap’s constitutional successor as a far more competent and palatable alternative to the incumbent. A similar sentiment helped fuel t...