kalalakihan – Page 5 – Katrina Stuart Santiago

In January this year, Budget Secretary Ben Diokno, faced with queries about the contradiction between what was promised by Rodrigo Duterte during the campaign and what he has ended up doing as President, thoughtlessly made this distinction: “Iba ‘yung candidate Duterte sa President Duterte. <…> May napapangako ka na kapag nakita mo ‘yung datos, hindi pala pwede.”

It was a most convenient excuse for the unfulfilled promises of the President – in this instance about the SSS pension increase that he had yet to sign at that point.

It also inadvertently highlighted the way in which this government has operated the past year: one the one hand as if they are merely speaking to their supporters, on the other as if they are still wanting to win an election. Either way this makes for the past year’s tragedy: a government taking discourse down to the level of campaign rhetoric, where it is always about black and white, pro- or anti-, friends and enemies. (more…)

Walang paglagyan ang disgusto at galit sa ipinalabas na video ng Presidential Communications Office (PCO) nitong May 31.

And then you realize that this is also absolutely no surprise. Under Martin Andanar, I went from being hopeful about the PCO (not once, but twice!), to utterly and absolutely dismayed and disgusted by the lack of vision, intelligence, smarts, and all-around common sense.

Early into this government, say August 2016, the policy seemed to be radio silence. I thought it was just Andanar trying to figure out what to do, two months in. At the same time, he needed to rise to the occasion of someone like President Duterte, who hit the ground running. Or whose mouth was — is — faster than his brain. (more…)

For a government – and a President – that has had a tendency to blame media, local and international, for covering only the drug war and not much else about what else is happening in the Philippines, it surprises that government even engaged at all with the Time 100 poll and the President’s inclusion in that list.

Because Time Magazine – as expected – has been at the forefront of putting the drug war in international news, and has been very very critical of it, too. Their articles on the drug crisis, and ultimately on President Duterte, both online and in print, have been far from flattering.

This is the frame against which the President is being measured by an international media outfit, and it should’ve been clear from the beginning that if and when he is included in that final list, it will only shine a harsher light on the drug war and its victims, and the summary executions on our streets. (more…)

A direct translation wouldn’t capture how offensive this rhetorical question is, coming from the mouth of any man or woman, as it normalizes and rationalizes the practice of infidelity and polygamy, because look, all men are doing it! And as long as these men can take care of the children they sire, from one, two, three women they keep in their beds, then they are doing the decent thing, they are doing what is right.

Wrong. Especially when these words come from the President’s mouth, and these statements that condone and justify men’s alleged precondition to treat women as objects to be collected – because women are their kaligayahan (happiness), because there are so many women so little time – are spoken publicly, to the laughter of a necessarily captive enamored audience. (more…)

On Wednesday, March 29, GMA News Online ran a story about a UP teacher claiming two things: that Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) employees were ordered by an undersecretary to “find fault” in mining operations, and that students will not find good jobs in the mining industry after graduation.

These are University of the Philippines students, ones this same professor has taught, ones that taxpayers’ money has put through university education, and they are being told they will have no options outside of the current mining status quo.

The thoughtless statements, the baseless nameless accusations, this doomsday scenario, is unexpected coming from a teacher of the State University. But then again, we have heard this same professor at the Commission on Appointments (CA) caucus standing against the confirmation of environmentalist Gina Lopez as DENR Secretary, as we have heard him countless times defending the mining industry, while always falling silent on irresponsible mining projects and how these have wreaked havoc on communities and the environment.

I guess these statements shouldn’t have been such a surprise. (more…)

Katrina Stuart Santiago

Katrina Stuart Santiago

Category Archive for: kalalakihan

TIME 100 and Duterte’s communications

Duterte chauvinism: Sino bang walang babae?

Portrait of a UP teacher as mining lobbyist