Let’s move on to the next agenda

“Every day is a new day, and you'll never be able to find happiness if you don't move on.”
--Carrie Underwood

By Alex P. Vidal

NEW YORK CITY -- If both the winning and losing candidates in the recently held Sangguniang Kabataan (SK) and barangay elections in the Philippines can immediately bury their hatchet and move on to the next phase of their life, progress and development in the countryside won’t be hampered.
There is no other direction but to tackle next the other major national agenda in the lineup.
Filipinos don’t live and survive by politics alone.
We also have economic, cultural, and environmental concerns; foreign affairs, infrastructure, unemployment, oil and energy price hike, the dilemma of our OFWs especially in the Middle East.
The myriad of problems we face everyday is so thick and loaded we can’t afford to be stuck in one undertaking.
If winning bets can be sworn into office soon, the better for the local government in particular and the country in general.
An essential event involving the right to suffrage in a politically fragmented country like the Philippines isn’t supposed to drag on; it’s not supposed to linger in the Agora after it has reached the pinnacle.

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I beg to disagree with some pro and anti Ma. Lourdes Sereno lawyers that because we are not lawyers, our views and observations about Sereno’s ouster don’t matter anymore.
We don’t necessarily need to be lawyers to understand what is going on in the Supreme Court, and what is happening in our country.
While non-lawyers are not supposed to interpret the now popular quo warranto (the petition used as the basis by the Solicitor General to seek the removal of the lady chief justice), they can still air their opinions independently without prejudice to the 8-6 verdict of SC justices and make a stand on the subject matter’s political component.
Once the SC has spoken, the issue has become a national interest, not just an internal debate of the case’s merits among our brilliant court justices that should not be discussed by other parties outside the court for risk of sub judice.
Airing an opinion about the issue for non-lawyers is different from joining the mind-boggling and confusing interpretations by those in the legal profession of the legal claptrap.

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BEWARE THE DEADLIEST NATURAL TOXIN. Botulinal toxin, produced by the bacterium Clostridium botulinum, is the most potent poison for humans. It has an estimated lethal dose in the bloodstream of 10-9 milligrams per kilogram. Death occurs when the respiratory muscles are paralyzed…TO ALL LOVERS OF CIGARETTE. Cigarette smoke contains about 4,000 chemicals. Carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, methane, and nicotine are some of the major components, with lesser amounts of acetone, acetylene, formaldehyde, propane, hydrogine cyanide, toluene, and many others…WOMEN DRIVERS ARE MORE CAUTIOUS. Women drive and cross the street more safely than men. Men account for 70% of pedestrian fatalities since 1980. Between the ages 18 and 45, males outnumber females as fatal crash victims by almost three to one according to the Nat'l Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

Journalist Herbert Vego and the New York Parade

“And when it rains on your parade, look up rather than down. Without the rain, there would be no rainbow.”
-- Gilbert K. Chesterton

By Alex P. Vidal

NEW YORK CITY -- I’m glad to know that a legitimate and truly respected veteran journalist from Iloilo City, Philippines will be coming to New York City to chronicle the 120th Philippine Independence Day Parade on June 3, 2018.
Herbert Vego, 68, a columnist and editor since obtaining an AB-Journalism course at the Manuel L. Quezon University in 1971, will also actually join the Philippines’ official representative, 2018 Dinagang Festival grand winner Tribu Panayanon of Iloilo City National High School, in the celebration for the Filipino American community held every year at Madison Avenue.
In New York, Mr. Vego is expected to meet and interview philanthropist Loida Nicolas Lewis, the Parade’s chief supporter and the most influential leader, among other celebrities, in the Filipino American community.
Mr. Vego, who hails from San Pedro, Antique, is one of the only few living, most active and highly respected Ilonggo journalists today who emerged unscathed from the dark years of Martial Law in the 70s.

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He is also expected to reunite and interview New York-based Filipino president of the World Youth Alliance (WYA), Lord Leomer Pomperada, 26, son of Vego’s friend, Merlyn Bayombong, of San Jose, Antique.
More importantly, Mr. Vego will finally have a chance to embrace his only son, Norberto, a nurse, who has been based in upstate New York, after a long time.
Tribu Panayanon has received invitations to join the parade from the Philippine Independence Day Council, Inc. (PIDCI) through past president Joji Jalandoni, who graced the 2018 Dinagyang Festival together with liaison officer Jay Balnig in January.
Iloilo City Mayor Jose Espinosa III, Iloilo Dinagyang Foundation, Inc. (IDFI) chairperson Ramon Cua Locsin and City Tourism Office chief Junel Ann Divinagracia are expected to spearhead the Dinagyang entourage.
The tribe was expected to hurdle financial difficulties that nearly stymied its participation in the 2018 Aliwan Fiesta in Manila, an annual competition of the country’s best festivals, from April 26 until 28.

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SERENO AND THE ILONGGO LAWYERS. On-leave Supreme Court Chief Justice Ma. Lourdes Sereno, who has been busy attending graduation ceremonies all over the country, was recently seen in several photo-ops with prominent personalities in the Integrated Bar of the Philippines (IBP) Iloilo Chapter.
She seemed to be “at home” with her companeros and companeras in that part of the country.
Integrated Bar of the Philippines (IBP) national president Abdiel Dan Fajardo, incidentally, is an Ilonggo who has been consistently calling for independence among government branches and the respect for law in the country.
Fajardo urged President Rodrigo Duterte and other public officials in September last year to not be “onion-skinned” as “a government official holds his life open to public scrutiny.”
Fajardo has been standing firm that the Supreme Court en banc has no jurisdiction over the integrity issue of a chief justice even as he echoed the assertion of Sereno's camp that the correct way to remove a sitting chief justice is through the process of impeachment.