By Satur C. Ocampo At Ground Level | The Philippine Star Whatever may be the reason(s), 90 percent of Filipinos welcome 2016 with hope, per the surveys by Pulse Asia and Social Weather Stations. Here’s wishing one and all a happy and exciting new year! Before midyear, we’ll know the results of the national and…
Category: At Ground Level
For the children, books make good Christmas gifts
By Satur C. Ocampo At Ground Level | The Philippine Star Having been introduced early to children’s books, our four preschool grandchildren – two boys and two girls – have shelves full of them. Reading has become such a habit that at bedtime each child can’t seem to fall asleep without one. Roald Dahl is…
Far-right party sustains rise in France
By Satur C. Ocampo At Ground Level | The Philippine Star Since France’s anti-foreigner far-right party, the National Front managed to reach a second-round presidential run-off election in 2002 – when its founder Jean-Marine Le Pen was trounced by Jacques Chirac with 82 percent of the votes – it hasn’t really alarmed the political establishment…
Revisiting the 1950s: A military round-up
By Satur C. Ocampo At Ground Level | The Philippine Star In a single day, military intelligence operatives rounded up over 50 suspected “subversives” in Manila, herded them inside a military camp’s officers’ clubhouse, and subjected each one to prolonged interrogation. Those who resisted answering or wouldn’t provide the desired information were physically tortured. A…
Stop the killings, stop the lies!
By Satur C. Ocampo At Ground Level | The Philippine Star Last September, at the onset of the “ber” months which usually evoke happy thoughts of Christmas, I wrote here about the dark prospects shadowing the yearend instead – intensifying militarization, political repression, extrajudicial killings, and other human rights violations. Twin calls were then raised…
Economic, not military, rivalry for US and China
By Satur C. Ocampo At Ground Level | The Philippine Star No matter the military muscle-flexing both by China and the United States (along with Japan and other US regional allies) in relation to the ongoing maritime dispute in our part of the world, all parties concerned must emphasize the primacy of resolving the disagreement…
APEC has contributed to global inequality
By Satur C. Ocampo At Ground Level | The Philippine Star In the early 1990s, the mantra of neoliberal economic globalization was “prosperity to the people of all nations without exception.” The Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum has fostered the mantra in the region in the same way that the World Trade Organization has been…
Will EDCA lead to war?
By Satur C. Ocampo At Ground Level | The Philippine Star Soon after the Supreme Court began en-banc deliberations on two petitions urging it to declare as unconstitutional the Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement (signed between the Philippine and United States governments last year), two interesting actions – both supporting the petitions – came up. First,…
Arbitration ‘privatizes’justice system in the US
By Satur C. Ocampo At Ground Level | The Philippine Star Privatization is one of the three elements (along with liberalization and deregulation) of neoliberal economic globalization that has immensely contributed to mass impoverishment and gross income inequality worldwide. Now, it turns out that in the United States even the judicial system is being privatized,…
Big plantations create big problems in Mindanao
By Satur C. Ocampo At Ground Level | The Philippine Star “In the name of development, the nexus of state and TNCs (transnational corporations) has dispossessed people of their lands, resources and rights, captivating the whole island and enslaving people in TNC-led plantations and mines. The original masters of the land have become slaves in…
Lower income taxes now
By Satur C. Ocampo At Ground Level | The Philippine Star Aiming to convince President Aquino to drop his opposition to lowering income taxes, Speaker Feliciano Belmonte Jr. told journalists the House leadership is determined to legislate such reduction – at least one of the pending proposals – before the 16th Congress winds up next…