Monthly Archives: March 2010

COLLEGES and universities can increase their tuition as much as they want but should get the nod of students and their parents first, according to the Commission on Higher Education (Ched).

MANILA, Philippines – The establishment of the Central Credit Information Corp. (CCIC) has remained in limbo more than two years after the passage of the Credit Information System Act (CISA) or Republic Act 9510.

MANILA, Philippines – The integration of the Cost of Living Allowance (COLA) and other allowances of government workers into their standardized salary rates is legal, the Supreme Court (SC) ruled.

MANILA, Philippines – Government offices and private establishments may soon have “lactation stations” where mothers can breastfeed their babies or store their breast milk in refrigerated containers.

TACLOBAN CITY – Commission on Elections (Comelec) Chairman Jose Melo yesterday reassured the public that a failure of elections on May 10 is “pure fantasy.”

MANILA – The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) will not support a bill seeking to cap credit card interest rates, one of its officials said.

A SENIOR British migration official has raised concern on the rising fraudulent visa applications from the Philippines, particularly on the abuse of student visas being used by unskilled workers seeking jobs in Britain.

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Filipinos, much like the Chinese, are probably among the most ubiquitous nationalities in world. They are scattered around the globe and are found practically every where, even in such unlikely places as Maputo in Africa, where a friend of mine, a Filipino lawyer, lives; Somalia and Afghanistan. Once, while I was in the washroom of…

The government will force protesting workers at the North Harbor to vacate the port, a top official of the Philippine Ports Authority said on Friday.

MANILA, Philippines–The government is pushing through with its ‘export replacement’ scheme where 90,000 tons of sugar exported last year would be imported by concerned traders to boost local stocks.

When I was a college student, I, like my fellow students, romanticized revolutions. We read Paulo Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed and Nicolas Poulantzas’ Power and Social Classes. Che Guevara was our hero. Communism was Heaven on Earth, and bourgeois capitalism, with its profit orientation at the expense of the welfare of the workers, was…

UNITED NATIONS – More people die from unsafe water than from all forms of violence, including war, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Monday in a message to mark World Water Day.

DO we really need two more years of basic education? The proposal to add two more years to the 10-year basic education curriculum is not new to the education agenda. It has been discussed and debated for some time and I first came across the proposal as a member of the Congressional Commission on Education…

KUALA LUMPUR – Six Filipino workers died at a water treatment plant in Malaysia’s eastern state of Sabah after they inhaled poisonous gas while cleaning a tank, according to reports Tuesday.

The country will be leading the formulation of Southeast Asia’s new medium-term tourism strategic plan, the Department of Tourism said on Monday.

Newly appointed Education Secretary Mona Valisno has expressed support for Health Secretary Esperanza Cabral’s program that aims to include sex education in the basic curriculum to help curb the rising cases of sex-related diseases among the youth.

(Q&A) The path for labour markets to return to pre-crisis levels remains long and signs of recovery in the economy are yet to be translated into jobs, says a new study by the ILO. The paper also shows how job losses are unequally distributed across regions and economic sectors, and between developed and developing countries.…

When she was named as the new Health chief early this year, Esparanza Cabral was introduced to a shocking figure on HIV-AIDS infection in the Philippines.

CEBU, Philippines – The growing support of the youth sector along with the political machinery of Lakas-Kampi-Christian Muslim Democrats (CMD) is expected to further boost the ratings of presidential aspirant Gilbert Teodoro Jr., an independent research firm said.

MANILA, Philippines – The Alyansa Agrikultura, a farmer-fisherfolk coalition of 42 national and local federations and organizations representing all the major agriculture sector, has submitted a “wish-list” for an agri-fishery action agenda to all presidential candidates in the May elections.

WASHINGTON (AP) – The current account trade deficit widened in the fourth quarter, reflecting an improving economy, but the imbalance for all of 2009 fell to the lowest point in eight years.

MANILA, Philippines – With barely two months left before election time, the government still has not come up with concrete plans to solve the Mindanao power problem.

BEIJING (AP) – The International Monetary Fund (IMF) warned the world’s wealthiest nations Sunday to watch their surging levels of government debt, saying it could drag down the growth needed to ensure continued economic recovery.

(Third of five parts) D. Macroeconomic benefits of privatization A World Bank report in July 1992 reported that “8,500 enterprises in over 80 countries have been privatized in the past 12 years.” The privatization bandwagon virtually started in the early 80’s when Great Britain, under then Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher started selling off major government…

MANILA, Philippines – The government is spending P100 billion this year to pump prime the economy that was battered by the full impact of the global economic crisis last year, Finance Secretary Margarito Teves said yesterday.

Twice last week, thugs were in the streets, upholding pigheadedness over reason, substituting demonizing in place of civil dialogue, replacing name-calling for abiding by procedures. Incidents like this can only impoverish our civic culture.

SKIP PARTY-LIST: Postscript presses its suggestion for voters to skip the Party-list part of the ballot on May 10 — if they are not sure FOR WHOM (referring to a person or nominee) they are voting.

MANILA, Philippines – Hospitals and other health care services greatly endanger the country’s diminishing water supply because of improper disposal of infectious waste and toxic chemicals in canals and other bodies of water.

MANILA, Philippines – The World Health Organization (WHO) yesterday came to the rescue of Health Secretary Esperanza Cabral by giving assurance that condoms can prevent the spread of HIV/AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases.