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“The age-old problem of classroom and facilities shortage refuses to be obscured.”

By JANESS ANN J. ELLAO
Bulatlat.com

MANILA – Last week, at least 27.2 million Filipino students returned to schools all over the country. No less than Education Secretary Leonor Briones addressed students, saying that it will take a whole community to prepare them for the journey ahead.

The journey, however, has been perennially hampered with problems such as lack of classrooms and poor salaries and benefits for teachers. Recent news reports on toilets being turned to faculty rooms have been, instead, dismissed as “isolated” and as a “drama.”

Government data showed that from 2015 to 2017, the Department of Education has garnered the highest budget appropriation. Its share, on the other hand, in the 2019 budget has been described in media reports as a “lion’s share,” with about P501.12 billion.

Being one of the biggest government bureaucracies, its budget appropriation on personnel services contains the biggest chunk amounting to P374.4 million. This will be used to cover salaries and hard-earned benefits of nearly a million teachers and staff employed by the government.

Except for Caraga region, nearly all divisions will each receive a budget amounting to a measly P1 million for its capital outlay.

With school buildings waiting to be constructed and renovated, the Armed Forces of the Philippines, on the other hand, is set to receive about P13.4 billion for its Maintenance and Other Operating Expenses and P3.5 billion for its capital outlay.

ACT Teachers Partylist, in a statement last year, assailed the budget appropriation of the defense department and other state security forces, adding that this must instead by rechanneled to the budget for books, classroom materials, and classroom construction.

The DepEd’s Office of the Secretary in the 2019 budget has been increased by more than P31 million, which is a six-percent increase compared to last fiscal year.

With already a low budget, the Commission on Audit reported that DepEd has been underspending from 2015 to 2017, which Briones claimed to be addressing by speeding up the process and making budget utilization efficient.

However, the Alliance of Concerned Teachers pointed out that the “age-old problem of classroom and facilities shortage refuses to be obscured.”

Among the problems they have identified are the continuing classroom congestion, and insufficient educational materials, including usable textbooks for its K+12 program that added two more years of Senior High School to the country’s basic education.

As such, the teachers’ group pointed out that DepEd officials have been attempting to cordon off media coverage while at the same time threatening those who dare to expose the real situation, such as in the case of Bacoor teachers using toilet rooms as faculty rooms.

The group said, “The DepEd’s revered 21st century education is a farce. It only has a few for-show modern facilities above the sea of the outdated, rotting, problem-infested system of public education. Their stance to deny and hide this reality will bring them nowhere in really addressing the crisis that hounds the education system.”

The post Back to school? Bleak conditions likely to remain under 2019 budget appeared first on Bulatlat.

“All these are patent acts of tyranny, and we urge our fellow journalists, human rights advocates, and the public to continue resisting these abuses.”

By ALYSSA MAE CLARIN
Bulatlat.com

MANILA — The Philippine police claimed that the arrest of Davao Today columnist Fidelina Margarita Valle is but a case of mistaken identity. Her family and various media groups, however, are not buying it.

Valle, who writes as Fides Avellanosa, was arrested on Sunday by police officers at the Laguindingan Airport in Cagayan de Oro while waiting for her flight home to Davao City.

She was reportedly taken to the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group (CIDG) where she was held incommunicado for almost ten hours.

Also a writer for independent and award-winning online news service MindaNews, Valle wrote reports on various issues such as human rights, women, indigenous people, among others.

Her reports and opinion pieces are also being published by a local daily, SunStar.

Valle, in her reports, has called out the government for its abuses and blunders such as in her Davao Today column dubbed as Kanak Gamay na Kyatigaman (My Little Understanding).

In her recent column, she had given tribute Datu Kaylo Bontolan, where she showed her support to the Lumad’s plight for justice by saying “It is the ultimate curse of despotic regimes that choose to silence peoples’ voices rather than peaceably resolve internal conflict, to see the exact opposite of their intended effects. Propelled and emboldened by insatiable greed, the wicked never learn and are always condemned to repeat history.”

Before that, Valle had written numerous columns about the gross human rights violations against Lumad, and said that “the military complex against the indigenous communities all over Mindanao could never be justified by the Duterte administration that has finally succumbed to the dictates and the whims of its military masters.”

The Valle family, in a statement, said the journalist had been targeted because of her active work as a human rights defender standing up against the countless state-sponsored attacks in Mindanao, and condemned the case of ‘mistaken identity’ and called it nothing but the government’s ploy.

“Gingging’s case is not one of mistaken identity at all. She was a clear state target. Mistaken identity is but a ludicrous propaganda of the PNP in the advent of the public outrage and pressure to surface and release our Nanay Gingging,” said Valle’s son, Rius Valle in the family’s released statement.

Davao Today, along with other media groups, also condemned her arrest and the CIDG’s claim of ‘mistaken identity’ and believed that Valle’s arrest was only a part of the government’s plan of silencing those who continuously fight for rights and democracy.

Another form of attack on press freedom

Alternative news Davao Today said, in a statement released earlier today, that the climate of impunity has worsened in the Philippines. The online news site also said Valle’s arrest could also be another of the administration’s way of repressing and silencing its critics.

“Such moves would lay the ground for attacks against the media and community development workers,” said Davao Today.

National Union of Journalists of the Philippines, and the College Editors Guild of the Philippines cried foul and called out military personnel’s ‘inexcusable’ arrest of Valle and demands for the authorities to explain the unnecessary detention of Valle, especially since CIDG has admitted that Valle’s arrest was a case of ‘mistaken identity.’

NUJP called Valle’s excessive detention as an ‘abduction’ and said in their statement that, “This is the equivalent of ‘shoot now, ask questions later.’ And the truth is that Ms. Valle’s abduction could have had dire, even fatal, consequences. There is no lack of victims of extrajudicial killings and enforced disappearances to drive home this point.”

CEGP pointed out that incidents like Valle’s arrest happen to members of the press, and human rights defenders as a way for state agents to exert their dominance, “This government will not stop in intimidating and harassing individuals because they are thirsty for power and they are afraid of those who are willing to offer their lives for the sake of the truth.”

Alternative media groups also believe that the arrest was a ‘clear case of harassment’ against Valle, and an obvious demonstration of how state agents in Mindanao abuse their power, ignoring due process and said that the arrest ‘sends the message that they (state agents) can take anyone prisoner.’

“We condemn these attempts to intimidate critical media into silence and instill fear among various sectors including human rights defenders. All these are patent acts of tyranny, and we urge our fellow journalists, human rights advocates, and the public to continue resisting these abuses.”

The post Mistaken identity? Arrested journo writes to advocate for human rights appeared first on Bulatlat.

By JANESS ANN J. ELLAO
Bulatlat.com

MANILA – A women’s group has welcomed the temporary release of Hedda Calderon, a political prisoner who had spent at least eight months in detention for trumped-up charges, following the decision of a Laguna court to grant her bail plea.

Calderon, a human rights defender and licensed social worker, was among those arrested at gunpoint along with peace consultant Adelberto Silva after a consultation in October 2018. Women’s group Gabriela said the consultation was a part of the continuous effort among progressives to build peace based on justice “even after the government of Duterte had unilaterally suspended the peace talks.”

The Free our Sisters Free Ourselves campaign said Calderon and the four other arrested activists were told to drop face down in the scorching heat of the sun for two hours while the combined forces of police and military “searched” their vehicles and allegedly found firearms and explosives, which served as basis for the charges against them.

“Her fervor to serve the people has never faltered despite some limitations in her physical mobility. Yet, the government sees this fervor as a threat to its national security,” said the Free our Sisters Free Ourselves campaign in a Facebook post earlier this year.

Gabriela said that Calderon’s case has become a “norm” these days, following the vilification of leaders and members of progressive organizations, and those who are active in criticizing and exposing the corruption in the country.

The women’s group called for the release of all political prisoners languishing in jail.

The post After 8 months, political prisoner released appeared first on Bulatlat.

We in the alternative media denounce the unlawful arrest of Margarita Valle, veteran Mindanao-based journalist and a columnist of Davao Today.

Valle was arrested at the Laguindingan airport on June 9 by the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group (CIDG) reportedly based on two arrest warrants dated 2006 and 2011. She was forced to come with the arresting team without counsel and was held incommunicado for eight hours. Later that day, the CIDG released Valle and said that she was mistaken for a suspected member of the Communist Party of the Philippines wanted for arson and multiple murder.

We believe that despite these convenient claims of blunders by the police, Valle’s arrest was a clear case of harassment. The lame excuse of mistaken identity does not mitigate the illegal and preposterous arrest of Valle, and the numerous violations of due process by the CIDG. If anything, the arrest only demonstrates the rampant abuse of power and impunity by state forces in Mindanao, and sends the message that they can take anyone prisoner.

The arrest was a clear attempt to silence journalists like Valle. A long-time reporter for MindaNews, Sunstar, and Davao Today, Valle is also active in research and advocacy work on human rights, indigenous people’s issues, and the environment, among others. Before her arrest, she reportedly attended a training-workshop with the Rural Missionaries of the Philippines, a group recently tagged by the military as a communist “front.”

The attempt to intimidate Valle is not an isolated case in Mindanao under Martial Law and elsewhere in the country. We have not forgotten the harassment against her fellow Mindanao columnists Arnold Alamon and Cong Corrales, who last year both figured in a list that named them as alleged members of the CPP. In Northern Luzon, columnist Sherwin De Vera was also arrested without warrant in 2017 and charged with rebellion. And just last month, Malacanang came out with the notorious matrix that named several Manila-based journalists as alleged destablizers.

All these abuses in Mindanao and the rest of the country are part of calculated attacks by the administration against its perceived critics. We condemn these attempts to intimidate critical media into silence and instil fear among various sectors including human rights defenders. All these are patent acts of tyranny, and we urge our fellow journalists, human rights advocates, and the public to continue resisting these abuses.

The post Pooled Editorial | On the malicious arrest of Mindanao journalist Margarita Valle: STOP HARASSING JOURNALISTS appeared first on Bulatlat.

The petition demands a thorough review of MMDA Regulation No. 19-002 which revokes the permits to all provincial public utility bus (PUB) terminals and operators along EDSA.

By JOHN AARON MARK MACARAEG
Bulatlat.com

MANILA — In the wake of the Metro Manila Development Authority’s (MMDA) rush to ban provincial buses along Edsa, the Makabayan bloc filed a petition on June 7, Friday, against it before the Supreme Court.
Composed of Bayan Muna party-list Chairperson Neri Colmenares, Bayan Muna Partylist Rep. Carlos Isagani Zarate, Anakpawis Partylist Rep. Ariel Casilao, Gabriela Women’s Party Rep. Emerenciana De Jesus, Gabriela Women’s Party Rep. Arlene Brosas, ACT Teachers Partylist Rep. Antonio Tinio, ACT Teachers Partylist Rep. Francisca Castro, Kabataan Partylist Rep. Sarah Jane Elago, and Cleto Villacorta III, the group ask for a preliminary injunction or a temporary restraining order from the high court.

The petition demands a thorough review of MMDA Regulation No. 19-002 which revokes the permits to all provincial public utility bus (PUB) terminals and operators along EDSA.

Terrible consequences

“Closing bus terminals along Edsa and forcing passengers, including senior citizens and persons with disability, to alight in faraway Sta. Rosa, Laguna, and Valenzuela City will cause terrible consequences, as to cost, convenience, and even safety,” the petitioners said.

Arvin Tumaliuan, a Polytechnic University of the Philippines (PUP) student who lives in Bulacan but studies in the City of Manila, said that he travels to Bulacan every weekend
by riding a bus in Cubao from his dorm in Sta. Mesa.

He then returns to Manila Monday morning.

If the provincial bus ban pushes through, he said that he would have to be dropped off at the Valenzuela Terminal first to get to PUP.

Contradicting the gov’t’s own transport policy

“What is disturbing with MMDA’s insistence to rush the implementation of this new scheme is that the scheme is not even in consonance with the very National Transportation Policy issued by the government,” the petition said. They stressed that the National Transport Policy states that public transportation in urban areas shall be given priority over private motor vehicles in the use of road space and all legal easements.

According to the MMDA data, public utility jeeps and buses’ road share is only 40% compared to the 60% of private cars and utility vans.

The MMDA was supposed to conduct a dry-run after the Holy Week and then implement the ban on June 1 but these did not push through.

Aside from the Makabayan bloc, Ako Bicol party-list and Albay Rep. Joey Salceda also filed petitions to stop the MMDA provincial bus ban on April 29 and May 27, respectively.

The post ‘What’s the rush?’ | Makabayan bloc files petition vs MMDA provincial bus ban appeared first on Bulatlat.