Starting Monday the 15th annual US-Philippine joint (Balikatan) military exercises under the 1999 Visiting Forces Agreement will roll out in various sites in the country. Nearly 10,000 American and Filipino soldiers will undergo 10 days of training in warfare. This is a massive exercise for the US, which will deploy 55 aircraft, including its much-touted…
At the Senate tribute to Jovito R. Salonga, who passed away last week at age 95, Senate President Franklin Drilon recalled how in 1991 Salonga, then the chamber’s head, had firmly but politely refused President Cory Aquino’s plea that the Senate ratify the extension of the RP-US military bases treaty. “Ka Jovy held his ground,…
For two days recently, violent clashes broke out between the police and informal settlers resisting the demolition of their homes (about 100 families) in a privately claimed lot in Culiat, Quezon City. These were but the latest of similar scenes in the metropolis and elsewhere in the country. Demolition – or the threat of it…
Six years ago, when President Aquino was still campaigning for the presidency, his platform had already adopted the recommendations of the Joint Foreign Chambers of Commerce, which were formally presented to his administration in a 400-page paper titled “Arangkada Philippines.” This week the JFC issued its fifth assessment of the government’s performance on those recommendations…
Two weeks ago in Dakar, Senegal a special inter-African court appointed by the African Union wound up the trial of Hissene Habre, the former president/dictator of Chad (1982-1990), for crimes against humanity, war crimes and torture. International legal observers say the prosecution, which urged life imprisonment for the dictator and confiscation of all of his…
By Satur C. Ocampo At Ground Level | The Philippine Star For several years now, multinational corporations – including the biggest in the United States – have resorted to various schemes to avoid paying the right taxes. They thus defraud the governments, and the peoples too, in their home countries and the nations hosting them.…
By Satur C. Ocampo At Ground Level | The Philippine Star Raise the minimum wage, create jobs, cut the perks of the rich. Decisively punish big corporations or their executives for breaking the law. These anti-poverty calls are being raised as vital issues in the United States presidential elections next November. (No, folks, it’s not…
By Satur C. Ocampo At Ground Level | The Philippine Star The 2008-2009 global financial and economic crisis – euphemistically billed as the Great Recession – has hardly been licked. Yet financial reportage and analyses in the past week, and the financial-business elite’s discussions at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland focused on fears…
By Satur C. Ocampo At Ground Level | The Philippine Star Two months ago, as the Supreme Court deliberated on the two petitions urging it to declare the Phl-US Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement unconstitutional, I wrote about former US Senator Mike Gravel’s warning, via his petition-in-intervention filed through Filipino lawyers, that the EDCA could lead…
By Satur C. Ocampo At Ground Level | The Philippine Star “The United States won a significant victory on Tuesday in its effort to counter China’s rising influence in the South China Sea, as the highest court in the Philippines cleared the way for American troops to return to the country on a regular basis.…
By Satur C. Ocampo At Ground Level | The Philippine Star Last December 22, a major daily published (as full-page ad) an appeal titled “Cease all hostilities until the 2016 elections.” It’s addressed to the Government of the Philippines (GPH) and the Communist Party of the Philippines-New People’s Army-National Democratic Front of the Philippines (CPP-NPA-NDFP).…