Palace: No suspension of govt work Tuesday

March 10, 2008

 
Malacañang announced Monday that government offices in the National Capital Region will remain open Tuesday despite the scheduled Metro Manila-wide transport strike.

"There are no plans to cancel work tomorrow (Tuesday)," Anthony Golez, deputy Palace spokesman, said in a text message to ABS-CBN News.

Police and military units in Metro Manila, meanwhile, will be on full alert as groups of drivers and operators of public utility vehicles go on strike.

The Philippine National Police said it is prepared to assist motorists and the public who may find themselves stranded as a result of the transport holiday.
 
PNP Director General Avelino Razon Jr. said transport and mobile assets of the national headquarters, as well as the 17 regional offices will be available to help commuters.

"All the PNP and AFP mobile assets combined will not be enough to fill the transport requirements of the commuting public, but certainly this will be of help," said Razon.

Razon said that only the National Capital Region Police Office will be on full alert on Tuesday. The rest the PNP units nationwide will remain under normal alert.

"I leave it to the discretion of the concerned regional directors to raise their alert conditions as they see fit," Razon said.

Senior Superintendent Nicanor Bartolome, PNP spokesman, said the police will conduct normal law enforcement and public safety operations.
 
"The general guidelines on mass actions under Batas Pambansa 880 will be strictly observed. Barricades, street bonfires, coercion of non-participants and other similar actions bordering on violence and anarchy are definitely illegal and will be addressed with appropriate police action," Bartolome said.

The Armed Forces of the Philippines-National Capital Region Command, meanwhile, said several military trucks will be deployed in areas expected to be affected by the transport strike to offer commuters free ride through the “Oplan Libreng Sakay”.

Maj. Gen. Fernando Mesa, NCRCOM chief, likewise announced that they will go on red alert at 6 p.m. Monday in anticipation of the transport strike.

“This will allow our forces to be on call, to augment the NCRPO [National Capital Region Police Office] when needed to maintain peace and order and we will likewise be implementing our ‘Oplan Libreng Sakay’ and we will be able to deploy some of our transport vehicles to provide free ride to would be stranded communist just in case the transport strike will push through tomorrow,” Mesa said.

Mesa said the NCRCOM will be in constant coordination with the NCRPO and the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority to assist commuters and ensure their safety.

 
(ABS-CBN News) 
 

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Tibet exiles protest Beijing Olympics

DHARMSALA, India (AP) — Indian police barred several hundred Tibetan exiles from starting a march to Tibet on Monday to protest Beijing hosting this summer’s Olympic Games, as Tibetans marked their uprising against Chinese rule.

Other demonstrations were held in New Delhi and Katmandu, Nepal, where 10 activists were detained after hundreds clashed with police.

Meanwhile, the Dalai Lama, the Tibetan Buddhist spiritual leader, speaking at a separate event, accused China of "unimaginable and gross violations of human rights" in the Himalayan region.

The planned six-month march from India to Tibet began Monday to coincide with the anniversary of a failed uprising against Chinese rule in Tibet that forced the Dalai Lama into exile in 1959.

Local police chief Atul Fulzele said an order banning the marchers from leaving the area near the northern Indian city of Dharmsala, the seat of the Tibetan government in exile, had been issued following a recommendation from the Indian government.

India, which has been sympathetic to the Tibetan exiles in the past, has clamped down on such protests in recent years, fearing they could embarrass Beijing and damage burgeoning ties between the Asian giants.

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War Cost: $12B per Month

 

(ABC News) The flow of blood may be ebbing, but the flood of money into the Iraq war is steadily rising, new analyses show. In 2008, its sixth year, the war will cost approximately $12 billion a month, triple the "burn" rate of its earliest years, Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph E. Stiglitz and co-author Linda J. Bilmes report in a new book.

No wonder why America is on financial crisis right now. The country spends much on the the warfare rather than on the country’s economic gains. Well, if this circumstances will continue, surely USA would be in great trouble.

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Arroyo endorses Lakas-Kampi merger

   

Politics is always politics. Yesterday, President Arroyo endorses the new merging parties into one difinitive "colossus". The mergers aimed to dominate the 2010 elections and a win-win solution for all of them. Lakas-Christian Muslim Democrats and the Kabalikat ng Malayang Pilipino (Lakas-CDM, Kampi), are about to create an ultimate powerhouse for the much awaited national election in 2010.

But, what strikes me most is about the newly proclaimed head of the party Lakas. It has been years that former House Speaker Jose de Venecia stayed as its leader and has been loyal to its founded party (Lakas-CMD) and now declared Speaker Prospero Nograles as its new President after the resignation of the former one.

   

Maybe the chronicles and nature of politics is just like that. We could not predict what would be the next headlines of our newspapers. For whatever it is, I hope that what they have been aiming for in common is for the betterment of our country.

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