MONEYED LAND specu-lators numbering about 50 now have bought

lands, portions of them still forestal areas, within the watershed area in purok Diolo in Manuel Guianga, a barangay in Tugbok district, Davao City.

The buyers, mostly belonging to prominent families, business-

men and even police officers of To-ril, who reportedly buy the land for

as low as P50,000 per lot of 1,000 square meters.

Reports reaching the Davao City Watershed Management Coun-cil (WMC) headed by Mayor Sara Duterte-Carpio, indicated that a syndicate headed by a lumad who

OFFICIALS of the Ateneo de Davao University (Addu) yesterday denied rumors

that an order to suspend classes was given following the mass food poisoning that occurred July 29

(Sunday) at the College campus.There were shortened class

schedules on July 30 and no classes July 31 (yesterday), but Addu as-sistant to the president, Bong Eliab, explained this was because the uni-

versity was in observance of St. Ig-natius Day.

“It’s not true classes were sus-pended because of the unfortunate incident. We regularly celebrate the St. Ignatius Day which is set on

July 31,” Eliab said in an interview.The suspension talk came out

in social networking sitesMeanwhile, university

president Fr. Joel Tabora SJ, who

Page A1Indulge

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VOL.5 NO. 107 • WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 1, 2012

FSQUATTERS, 13

FATENEO, 13

EDGE

Follow Us On

Sports

Science/Environment Page 4

Page 15

n Buying spree of land speculators in sitio Diolo alarms Watershed Management Council

Apil watershed iskwaton na.

The Economy Page 6

Squatters invade watershed areaBy ANTONIO M. AJERO

Ateneo denies class suspension rumors

Serving a seamless societyDAVAO

DIMENTIONAL MAP. Members of the Watershed Management Council (WMC) yesterday indicate the watersheds of Davao City that need to be protected using the 3 dimensional map at the People’s Park. [LEAN DAVAL JR.]

By Jade C. Zaldivar

VOL.5 NO. 107 • WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 1, 2012

THE Department of Science and Tech-nology (DOST) will

spend an additional P1.6 billion for research and development (R&D) in 2013, Davao regional di-rector Anthony C. Sales bared yesterday.

“This is part of the government’s support for scientists and engineers in the country for local technology generation,” he told reporters.

Noting that more R&D funds will produce more researches and inven-tions, he said this will help the county develop more local talents to pro-duce technology from lo-cally available resources.

He said several Fili-pino inventions were commercialized abroad in the past due to failure to protect their intellectual property rights.

However, he added that in the region, the In-novation and Technology Support Office, which will be launched on August 6 at the University of South-

eastern Philippines, will provide patenting servic-es for local inventors and innovators.

“Under the Magna Carta for scientists and engineers, they are pro-vided with hazard pay that ranges from 15% to 30% of their salary,” he said, adding that subsis-tence allowance and lon-gevity pay are also pro-vided by the law.

He mentioned that with the Techno Transfer Act, developers are given a percentage of the sales of their product/s should they be adopted by busi-ness enterprises.

The DOST continues to advocate its campaign against “brain drain” or the tendency for Filipino scientists and engineers to leave the country for greener pastures with its “Balik Scientist” program.

Through this program, Sales said, Filipino scien-tists overseas, including those who are already citizens of other coun-

THE BIG NEWS2 EDGEDAVAO

FMORE, 13

FDFA, 13

ONE soldier died following an en-counter with ele-

ments of the New Peo-ple’s Army (NPA) at 5 a.m.Tuesday (yesterday) in Barangay Parasanon, Maragusan, Compostella Valley Province.

The military is yet to provide the name of the soldier fatality.

“We’re withholding his identity as his fam-ily is yet to be informed,” said Lt. Col. Antonino Florendo, commander of the 66th Infantry Battal-ion in a statement.

He identified the

enemy as members of the New People’s Army (NPA).

Florendo said his battalion had received reports from civilians of the presence of the en-emy in Barangay Para-sanon who initiated the firefight and immediate-ly withdrew.

“Despite attempts of the enemy to prevent the unit from bringing peace and development into Maragusan, the men and officers of this unit re-main the people’s part-ners for peace and devel-opment,” Florendo said.

One soldier dies in Comval clashBy Jade C. Zaldivar

HELMET LAW. Motorcycle riders cruise E. Quirino Avenue wearing non-standard protective helmets yesterday. Starting today motorcycle riders need to have their helmets inspected and tagged with an Import Commodity

Certificate (ICC) seal by the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI). [LEAN DAVAL JR.]

PHILIPPINE officials Tuesday summoned Cambodia’s top dip-

lomat here but he failed to show up.

He was supposed to explain his published criti-cisms of the Aquino admin-istration’s stance on its ter-ritorial disputes with China in a new side dispute to the long-simmering territorial conflicts in the West Philip-pine Sea.

Cambodian ambassador Hos Sereythonh was sum-moned by the foreign office to ask him to explain his statement.

It said saying the “in-flexible and non-negotiable position” of the Philippines and Vietnam resulted to the failure of the 10-member As-sociation of Southeast Asian Nations to issue its tradition-

al joint communiqué at the end of its ministerial meet-ing in Phnom Penh, Cambo-dia two weeks ago.

The non-issuance of the statement was unprecedent-ed in the regional bloc’s 45-year history.

However, Hernandez said Sereythonh did not show up because he was “in-disposed” and instead sent his deputy and embassy sec-ond secretary Tan Chandara-vuth on his behalf.

Chandaravuth was hand-ed a note verbale by Foreign Undersecretary Erlinda Basilio to express Manila’s displeasure over his ambas-sador’s comments and de-manded that he explain his comments published in a lo-cal newspaper.

The meeting lasted about 30 minutes.

The Cambodian diplo-mat was “quiet” and was seen taking notes during the meeting with Basilio, Her-nandez said.

Hernandez said the diplomatic note sought the ambassador’s explanation on his statement that the Philippines and Vietnam, two claimants with the most number of confrontations with China in the West Phil-ippine Sea, are playing “dirty politics.”

“We want to know where the ambassador obtained the information on the events as narrated in his letter since these are not consistent with the records of the ASEAN meetings,” Hernandez told a press briefing.

The rift started when ASEAN failed to come up with the joint statement as

Cambodia, a known Chi-nese ally, insistently blocked moves to mention the Bajo de Masinloc or Scarborough Shoal standoff between the Philippines and China in the proposed communiqué.

Vietnam also wanted to include in the document re-cent incidents of China’s in-cursions in its waters.

“In contradiction, we understand that the chair appointed a committee, in-cluding the Philippines and Vietnam, which had full au-thority if it could reach a consensus on the final draft,” Hernandez said.

Yet even after five final drafts had the approval of all nine ASEAN members, it was disapproved by Cambodia, he said.

ASEAN groups Malaysia,

DFA summons Cambodian diplomat over published criticisms on dispute

MALACANANG wel-comed the Supreme Court’s (SC) affirma-

tion of the constitutionality of Pantawid Pamilyang Pili-pino Program (4Ps) program of the government saying the move will bolster the antipoverty initiative of the Aquino administration.

“We welcome the unani-mous decision of the Su-preme Court upholding the constitutionality of the Pantawid Pamilyang Pili-pino Program (4Ps) of the Aquino administration,” said Deputy Presidential spokesperson Abigail Valte in a statement.

“The affirmation of the government’s flagship anti-poverty initiative comes at

an important time, as the House of Representatives begins its deliberations on the General Appropriations Act (GAA) for 2013.”

Valte said that in the proposed budget submitted by the President to Congress the allocation for social eq-uity -- which covers invest-ments in education, health, and welfare -- has increased by P85 billion to P698.4 bil-lion from last year’s outlay of P613.4 billion.

The move is in line with the administration’s com-mitment to increase the number of 4Ps household beneficiaries from 3.1 mil-lion this year to 3.8 million next year -- for which the ad-ministration has increased

the allocation from P39.4 billion in 2012 to P44.3 bil-lion in 2013, she said.

“The 4Ps program is a realization of our commit-ment to inclusive and equi-table economic growth. At its core is the partnership between government and families, and the fulfillment of a pledge that as many Fil-ipinos should benefit from the fruits of our reforms,” she added.

Citing a record from the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD), Valte reported a decline of 1,000 household beneficiaries under the con-ditional cash transfer (CCT) program.

Some of the beneficia-

ries were delisted from the DSWD after a cleanup of its database, discovering that they were not qualified for the program and after the DSWD has cleaned up of its database.

There were some ben-eficiaries whose benefits have been frozen pending full compliance with the conditions set by the DSWD.

As of May 31, 2012, the total disbursement of the government is more than P9 billion for cash grant pay-ments, P4.6 billion in health grants; and P4.4 billion in education grants.

The CCT is implemented in 138 cities, 1,261 munici-palities, and 79 provinces in the country. [PNA] 

SC’s affirmation of 4Ps program hailed

THE Phoenix Founda-tion Philippines will stage a Fun Run as part

of the Kadayawan Festival 2012 on August 12 whuch will start from Open Park C, SM City Davao.

The event has four cat-egories: 10 kilometers, 5 ki-lometers, 4 kilometers, and 500 meters only for kids 12 years and under.

Registration centers are at DCWD Bajada, Duaw Davao Office, Phoenix Da-mosa, and Phoenix Acacia until August 3.

120,000 pesos worth of prizes will go to the win-ners.

Profitd from the event will be for the benefit of the Talomo-Lipadas watershed, which is one of the two main sources of water supply in Davao City. One tree will be planted for every registered runner. The run is also an encouragement for runners to practice the 3Rs (Reduce, Re-use, Recycle) aside from being a tribute to Ninoy Aquino and his ideals of freedom and love of country.

Phoenix to stageKadayawan RunBy Maybelle Anne C. Yutiamco

More funds setfor R&D in 2013

By Lorie Ann A. Cascaro

VOL.5 NO. 107 • WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 1, 2012 3EDGEDAVAO THE BIG NEWS

SENATOR Loren Le-garda yesterday un-derscored her com-

mitment to seafarers’ rights by sponsoring the Senate Resolution to con-cur in the Maritime La-bour Convention (MLC), 2006.

“The Philippines is famed for the quality and competitiveness of its seafarers. Filipinos ac-count for an estimated 30% of the 1.2 million seafarers in the global shipping fleet today. In 2011 alone, the country deployed 343,587 sea-farers – a number that ushered in $4.3 billion in remittances,” she ex-plained in her sponsor-ship speech.

She added that the trend does not suggest a waning of seafarer de-ployment figures. From 2008 to 2010, the num-ber of Filipino seafarers being deployed overseas increased by an average of 16% every year, and in the domestic front, anoth-er 40,000 seafarers are employed in local ship-ping fleets.

The Maritime Labour Convention, adopted by the General Conference of the International Labour

Organization on 23 Feb-ruary 2006, is the seafar-ers’ bill of rights.

Legarda, Chair of the Senate Committee on For-eign Relations, said that, “It provides comprehen-sive rights and protection at work for 1.2 million seafarers worldwide, in-cluding nearly 400,000 Filipino domestic and in-ternational seafarers.”

“MLC, 2006, is envi-sioned to spur the mod-ernization of shipping fleets to comply with in-ternational standards. By concurring in its ratifica-tion, we will join in the call for governments to effectively enforce its reg-ulatory role in ensuring safer and secure shipping, in preventing marine pol-lution, and in ensuring decent work for seafar-ers,” she stressed.

Furthermore, she stated, “It also erases am-biguity on the definition of seafarer as the Conven-tion covers not just the crew involved in navigat-ing or operating the ship but also, other work-ers including cabin and cleaning personnel, bar staff, waiters, entertain-ers, singers, kitchen staff,

Loren seeks Senate concurrence in treaty

FLOREN, 13

VOL.5 NO. 107 • WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 1, 20124SCIENCE/ENVIRONMENT EDGEDAVAO

A unique social divi-sion among a popu-lation of bottlenose

dolphins in Australia’s Moreton Bay has ended, according to a new study.

The dolphins lived as two distinct groups that rarely interacted, one of which foraged on trawler bycatch.

But scientists think that a ban on fishing boats from key areas has brought the two groups together.

They believe these so-cially flexible mammals have united to hunt for new food sources.

The findings are pub-lished in the journal Ani-mal Behaviour.

The Moreton Bay dol-phins were thought to be the only recorded exam-ple of a single population that consisted of groups not associating with each other.

The split was dubbed “the parting of the pods”.

But since the study that discovered the rift, trawlers have been banned from designated areas of the bay leading to a 50% reduction in the fishing effort.

A key area of the bay to the south, where the social split was first ob-served by a previous study, has been protected.

The changes gave sci-entists a unique opportu-nity to observe the adapt-ability of dolphin society.

The “trawler” dol-phins from Moreton Bay had previously fed on the bycatch from boats while the “non-trawlers” found other sources of food.

“There’s never been really any experiments looking at social struc-ture... where you can compare what it was like before and what it is like now,” said Dr Ina Ans-mann, a marine verte-brate ecologist at the Uni-versity of Queensland and

the study’s lead author.Analysing how the

population interacted before and after trawling meant the team could as-sess how the dolphins’ so-cial network had changed.

“The dolphins had ba-sically re-arranged their whole social system after trawling disappeared so they’re now actually in-teracting again,” Dr Ans-mann told BBC Nature.

The scientists identi-fied individual dolphins by the marks on their dorsal fin and recorded which animals were asso-ciating with which.

“Each dolphin has small injuries like nicks and notches, cuts and things like that on the fin so they all have a very unique looking dorsal fin.”

This technique meant that Dr Ansmann could observe changes in be-haviour, in some cases down to the individual dolphins which had been

studied in the 1990s to reveal the original divi-sion.

“Presumably they’re sharing information, co-operating and things like that.”

Dolphins operate in what is called a fission-fusion society, forming groups and then split-ting up to form different groups.

Through complex communication and so-cial intelligence, bottle-nose dolphins often work as a team when hunting for food and Dr Ansmann believes this may be what lies behind the unifica-tion.

Divided dolphin societies now merge ‘for first time’

Bottlenose dolphins have large brains and quickly learn new behaviors. Using a wide range of sounds to communicate with other members of the group, or “pod”, they have been observed showing remarkable individual and social intelligence:

• One for the team: watch how a single dolphin peels off from the pod to shepherd the mullet into the open mouths of the group.

• Bubble trouble: initially cautious of the new shapes created by the bubble machine, you can see how quickly the inquisitive dolphins turn this experiment into a game.

• Mirror, mirror on the wall: from the reaction of these dolphins to their own reflection, scientists believe the animals have a developed sense of self.

• Thinking out cloud: see how these dolphins off the Florida coast have developed a unique hunting strategy for the shallows off the Florida coast.

Fast Facts

THE world’s most northerly resi-dent population of

bottlenose dolphins is “stable”, according to new research.

Almost 200 dolphins are found in the North Sea and the animals are fre-quently seen in the Moray Firth.

Scottish Natural Heri-tage (SNH) commissions a report on the health of the population every six years.

Researchers from the University of Aberdeen, drawing on about two decades of studies, have deemed the numbers to be stable, or increasing.

The latest research

work was carried out in the Moray Firth Special Area of Conservation (SAC).

Wildlife spotters who come to the shores of the firth to see and photo-graph the bottlenose dol-phins contribute an esti-mated £4m to Scotland’s economy a year, accord-ing to other work by the university.

‘Considered vulner-able’

Morven Carruthers, SNH policy and advice officer, said: “We can say with some confidence that the population of bottlenose dolphins on the east coast of Scotland is stable or increasing.

“And the number of dolphins using the Moray F i r t h

S A C b e t w e e n 1990 and 2010 appears to be stable.

“However, this population is considered vulnerable due to being small and isolated from other populations.”

She added: “The east coast bottlenose dolphins are a special part of Scot-land’s nature and wildlife and a major tourist at-

traction, and it is encour-a g i n g

t o s e e that the p o p u l a -tion is currently stable.”

The Moray Firth SAC extends from the inner

firth to Helms-d a l e

on the north coast and Lossiemouth on the south coast.

Bottlenose dol-phins are protect-

ed under the Eu-ropean Union

Habitats Di-rective.

Bottlenose dolphins are protected by European Union rules.

Most northerly bottlenose dolphin population ‘stable’

Two become one: the unification of these two socially distinct groups of bottlenose dolphin demonstrates the intel-ligence and social adaptability of the species.

The “trawler” dolphins of Moreton Bay benefited from the bycatch thrown back from fishing boats.

VOL.5 NO. 107 • WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 1, 2012

BUTUAN City Mayor Ferdi-nand Amante is looking forward to attracting invest-

ment as the city hosts the 21st Mindanao Business Conference (MinBizCon) this year.

The three-day MinBizCon is set to be held from August 2 to 4 at the Almont Hotel Inland Resort in Butuan City, the gateway to the resource-rich Caraga region in Northern Mindanao.

“We are looking forward to hosting this event and drawing at-tention to investment in Butuan City and surrounding provinces,” Amante said, saying there are sev-eral on-going business develop-ments in the city, including the con-struction of a mall and 150-room hotel and golf course by a nation-wide chain.

“This is a good time for public-

private investment. We are final-izing build-operate-transfer (BOT) schemes for upgrading the ports in the towns of Nasipit and Masao,” he said, adding they have worked with the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR), other government agencies and the local private sector to open up 10,000 hectares of land for devel-opment,” Amante said.

Butuan City, which has five weekly round-trip commercial flights to Manila and three to Cebu, has become known in recent years as a Mindanao convention destina-tion, with accommodations avail-able for more than 2,800 guests.

The MinBizCon is expected to draw 300 participants, including senior business leaders, members of chambers of commerce, govern-ment policymakers, investors and

foreign trading partners.The MinBizCon participants

will have the opportunity to tour Butuan City’s main attractions, which include the Butuan National Museum housing ancient Asian ar-tifacts, and the Balangay Shrine.

They will also have a chance to visit the on-going archaeological excavation of another centuries-old balangay boat used in South-east Asian trade routes.

DTI Caraga Director Brielgio Pagaran said that the region has strong competitive advantages in agriculture in addition to its tour-ism and mining industries.

“Among the newer agri-busi-nesses, we have herbal processing plant for the export market that uses local raw materials, and ven-tures in sago flour and nipa sap sugar production, to name just a

few,” Pagaran said.The MinBizCon will have ple-

nary sessions on current public-private initiatives in the energy sector in Caraga as well as on improved economic integration within the Association of South-east Asian Nations (ASEAN), through the Brunei Darussalam-Indonesia-Malaysia-Philippines East ASEAN Growth Area (BIMP-EAGA).

The business conference is also an opportunity for a broad range of stakeholders to speak with one voice on the region’s most pressing economic policy concerns.

The highlight of the confer-ence is the presentation of the annual Mindanao Business Policy Agenda to President Benigno Simeon Aquino III.

The formulation of the policy recommendations contained in the agenda was initiated through broad-based regional consulta-tions held earlier this year by the Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry (PCCI) in the cities of Zamboanga, Cagayan de Oro and General Santos, in collaboration with Mindanao Development Au-thority (MinDA) and United States Assistance for International De-velopment (USAID).

Organized by the PCCI and the Butuan Chamber of Commerce, with support from MinDA and US-AID, through its Growth with Eq-uity in Mindanao (GEM) Program, the “MinBizCon” is the main multi-sectoral platform for fostering competitiveness and accelerating growth in Mindanao.

The MinBizCon is also sup-ported by Department of Trade and Industry (DTI), the Depart-ment of Tourism (DOT), Depart-ment of Agriculture (DA), and other partners. [PNA]

5EDGEDAVAO THE ECONOMY

MONTHLY AVERAGE EXCHANGE RATE (January 2009 - December 2011)

Month 2012 2011 2010

Average 43.31 45.11December 43.64 43.95November 43.27 43.49October 43.45 43.44

September 43.02 44.31August 42.42 45.18

July 42.81 46.32June 43.37 46.30May 42.85 43.13 45.60April 42.70 43.24 44.63

March 42.86 43.52 45.74February 42.66 43.70 46.31January 43.62 44.17 46.03

Stat Watch5.8%

1st Qtr 2012

6.4 %1st Qtr 2012

USD 4,931million

May 2012USD 4,770

millionApr 2012USD -135

millionApr 2012USD -209

millionMar 2012

P 4,580,674 million

Apr 2012

4.1 %May 2012P131,403

millionMay 2012

P 5,075 billion

Apr 2012

P 42.78Jun 2012

5,091.2May 2012

130.1 Jun 2012

2.8 Jun 2012

3.7 Jun 2012

349,779Apr 2012

18.8 %Jan 2012

7.2 %Jan 2012

1. Gross National IncomeGrowth Rate(At Constant 2000 Prices)

2. Gross Domestic ProductGrowth Rate(At Constant 2000 Prices)

3. Exports 1/

4. Imports 1/

5. Trade Balance

6. Balance of Payments 2/

7. Broad Money Liabilities

8. Interest Rates 4/

9. National Government Revenues

10. National government outstanding debt

11. Peso per US $ 5/

12. Stocks Composite Index 6/

13. Consumer Price Index 2006=100

14. Headline Inflation Rate 2006=100

15. Core Inflation Rate 2006=100

16. Visitor Arrivals

17. Underemployment Rate 7/

18. Unemployment Rate 7/

Cebu Pacific Daily 5J961 / 5J962 5:45 Manila-Davao-Manila 6:15Zest Air Daily Z2390 / Z2390 5:45 Manila-Davao-Manila 6:25Cebu Pacific Daily 5J593 / 5J348 6:00 Cebu-Davao-Iloilo 6:30Philippine Airlines Daily PR809 / PR810 6:10 Manila-Davao-Manila 7:00Philippine Airlines Daily PR819 / PR820 7:50 Manila-Davao-Manila 8:50Cebu Pacific Daily 5J394 / 5J393 7:50 Zamboanga-Davao-Zamboanga 8:10Cebu Pacific Daily 5J599 / 5J594 8:00 Cebu-Davao-Cebu 8:30Cebu Pacific Daily 5J347 / 5J596 9:10 Iloilo-Davao-Cebu 9:40Cebu Pacific Mon/Tue/Thu/Fri/Sun 5J963 / 5J964 9:40 Manila-Davao-Manila 10:10Philippine Airlines Daily PR811 / PR812 11:30 Manila-Davao-Manila 12:20Cebu Pacific Daily 5J595 / 5J966 12:00 Cebu-Davao-Manila 12:30Silk Air Mon/Wed/Sat MI588 / MI588 18:55 Davao-Cebu-Singapore 13:35Cebu Pacific Thu 5J965 / 5J968 12:55 Manila-Davao-Manila 13:25Cebu Pacific Tue/Wed//Sat 5J965 / 5J968 13:35 Manila-Davao-Manila 14:05

Silk Air Thu/Sun MI566 / MI566 18:55 Davao-Singapore 15:20Cebu Pacific Mon/Tue/Wed/Fri 5J507 / 5J598 15:00 Cebu-Davao-Cebu 15:30Philippine Airlines August 15:55 Mani2Mani 16:50Zest Air Daily Z2524 / Z2525 16:05 Cebu-Davao-Cebu 16:45Cebu Pacific Daily 5J967 / 5J600 16:35 Manila-Davao-Cebu 17:05Philippines Airlines Daily PR813 / PR814 16:55 Manila-Davao-Manila 17:45Cebu Pacific Mon/Tue/Thu/Sat 5J215 / 5J216 18:00 Cagayan de Oro-Davao-Cagayan de Oro 18:20Cebu Pacific Daily 5971 / 5J970 18:40 Manila-Davao-Manila 19:10Cebu Pacific Tue/Sat/Sun 5J973 / 5J974 20:00 Manila-Davao-Manila 20:30Cebu Pacific Daily 5J969 / 5J972 20:30 Manila-Davao-Manila 21:00Airphil Express Daily 2P987 / 2P988 20:30 Manila-Davao-Manila 21:00Philippine Airlines Daily except Sunday PR821 / PR822 21:20 Manila-Davao-Manila 21:50Philippine Airlines Sunday PR821 / PR822 22:20 Manila-Davao-Manila 22:50

as of august 2010

HOMEGROWN supermar-ket and department store bran New City Commercial

Complex, or NCCC, will be more aggressive in the next few months in its bid to maintain its status as the top of mind brand among Dabawenyos who are looking for cheap, affordable, but good quality products, as well as among whole-salers.

Last Friday, the home division of the NCCC Department Store kicked off ‘Open House,’ their home accessories and furniture fair, at the atrium of NCCC Mall of

Davao.“This is one of the many events

that we have lined-up for our con-sumers,” Jenny Ang, president of the NCCC Department Store, said in an interview. “The sale will con-tinue until the Kadayawan festivi-ties. Then in September, we will have another fair.”

Ang said that the entry of new players into the city is one of the factors that prodded them to cre-ate more events.

“But most importantly, this is for our consumers,” Ang said.

Aside from selling home ac-

cessories and furniture, the event also showcased several celebrity chefs, a feng shui expert, and an official from the Home Develop-ment and Mutual Fund to explain the several loans that the govern-ment agency extends.

“We do not want to be just another furniture or home acces-sories fair, we want to be different, thus we are offering a new con-cept for our consumers,” Richard Tabaranza, assistant manager for marketing, merchandising, and procurement of the NCCC Depart-ment Store, said. “It’s not just

about furniture, but everything that one might need in a house.”

Tabaranza added that in terms of maintaining the thought leader-ship of NCCC as the go-to brand for cheap but quality pieces, it is im-portant for them to also improve their services, especially now that retail giant Puregold is entering the local market.

“We want Dabawenyos to still think of us when they need some-thing basic, but we also want them to think of us when it comes to their fashion and style needs,” Tabaranza said.

NCCC more aggressive in next few months By Carlo P. Mallo

Fresh investments thru MinBizCon eyed

JUICY. A lady chooses from the different fruit juices that a kiosk along San Pedro Street offers. [LEAN DAVAL JR.]

VOL.5 NO. 107 • WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 1, 20126 THE ECONOMY EDGEDAVAO

MORE hotel and ac-commodation es-tablishments in the

tourism industry are confi-dent on the investment op-portunities in the country in the next five years.

This was indicated by the result of the 2009 Survey of Tourism Establishments in the Philippines (STEP) con-ducted in 2010 on 21,837 establishments in the Philip-pines engaged in tourism in-dustries. STEP was recently released by the National Sta-tistics Office (NSO).

The study reveals that 13.2 percent of the tourism industry establishments plan to expand while 20.9 percent of them reported they have plans to renovate.

Much optimism and con-fidence is seen on hotel ac-commodation with 19.8 per-cent and 31.8 percent have expansion plans and renova-tion plans, respectively.

While for health and wellness, 16 percent; other tourism activities, 14.4 per-cent; food and beverage ser-vice activities, 11.8 percent;

and transport operators, tour and travel agencies, 10.4 percent.

Establishments in tour-ism industries in 2009 re-ported total revenue of P526.95 billion, of which 19.6 percent or P103.40 bil-lion were generated from tourists.

Among the five major tourism industries, trans-port operators, tour and travel agencies contributed the highest revenue gener-ated from tourists amount-ing to P68.40 billion or 66.2

percent.This was followed by

food and beverage service activities with P16.54 billion or 16 percent; accommo-dation with P13.33 billion representing 12.9 percent; health and wellness with P2.84 billion or 2.7 percent and other tourism activities.

The highest number of establishments in the tour-ism industries was engaged in food and beverage service activities with 13,120 estab-lishments or 60.1 percent of the total. [PNA] 

AGRI-TRADE and industry associa-tions have agreed

to partner with the Davao City Chamber of Com-merce and Industry, Inc. (DCCCII) in the conduct of the 14th Davao Trade Expo (DATE) slated Oc-tober 25-27, at the up-coming brand new SMX Convention Center SM Lanang Premier this year.

The parties signed re-cently a memorandum of agreement (MOA) in time

for the Davao City Busi-ness Conference held at The Marco Polo, Davao. Themed, “Building the Fu-ture: Feeding the World through Sustainable Farming”, the three-day event will showcase the role of livestock, poultry and aquaculture in pro-viding food for the table of every family.

The parties agreed to showcase the compara-tive advantages of the Davao region in the ar-

eas of agriculture, trade, commerce, services and industries.

Among the agri groups who signed the MOA are the Davao Hog Farm-ers Association, South-ern Philippines Egg and Poultry Association, Goat Industry Development Council of Davao, Mind-anao Game Fowl Breeders Association, Mindanao Integrated Aquaculture Association, Federation of Cattle Raisers of the Phil-

ippines, Inc., Federation of Davao Dairy Farmers Cooperative and Davao Association of Veterinary Technical Representa-tives, Inc.

DATE 2012 will serve as venue for promotion of the region’s agriculture industry where opportu-nities are created for local community stakeholders to participate in the de-velopment of a progres-sive agriculture industry in the region. [PNA]

Tourism industry players confident about investment opportunities

WAITING. A plant vendor takes a nap while waiting for customers yesterday at City Hall Drive. [LEAN DAVAL JR.]

Davao City chamber gets agri-trade, industry sectors as partners in expo

THE economic perfor-mance of Region 12 or the Soccsksargen Re-

gion significantly improved in 2011 as the area’s agricul-ture and industrial sectors continued to gain momen-tum from their expansions and operational improve-ments in the last two years.

Herlita Caraan, National Statistical Coordination Board (NSCB) Region 12 director, said the region’s increased industrial, agricul-ture and fisheries productiv-ity pulled up its economic growth or Gross Regional Domestic Product (GRDP) last year to 4 percent or up by 2 percent from 2010.

She said the region’s ac-celerated growth was slight-ly higher than the country’s total output last year that reached an average of 3.9 percent.

“(Region 12) was one of the five regions in the coun-try that posted accelerated growths from 2010 to 2011,” Caraan said in a press con-ference here.

She said the region is now drawing closer to its record growth of 4.5 percent that was posted in 2008. Re-gion 12 was then regarded as the country’s third fastest growing region.

Region 12 covers the provinces of South Cotabato, Sultan Kudarat, Sarangani, North Cotabato and the cit-ies of General Santos, Koro-nadal, Tacurong, Kidapawan and Cotabato.

Caraan said Agricul-ture, Hunting, Fishery and Forestry (AHFF), which ac-counts for 30.2 percent of the region’s economy, posted a 2.2 percent growth in 2011 after falling to 2.7 percent in 2010.

She said agriculture and forestry mainly rebounded to a 4.8 percent growth last year from a dismal perfor-mance of -1.3 percent in the previous year.

“The improved perfor-mance of AHFF was due to higher yields from the re-gion’s major crops such as palay, corn, sugarcane, ba-nana, coconut, rubber and cassava. Poultry, as well as, municipal fishery and aqua-culture also turned in better performances in 2011,” she said, citing a report from the Department of Agriculture’s Bureau of Agricultural Sta-tistics.

Caraan said the industry

sector also helped improve the area’s economic perfor-mance after it expanded by 5.5 percent in 2011 from 2.9 percent the previous year.

She said the industry sector, which comprised 31.2 percent of the total re-gional economic output, was mainly carried by the manu-facturing subsector, which posted an impressive growth of 14.6 percent from its pale performance of 0.2 percent in 2010.

The significant growth in the manufacturing subsec-tor cushioned the slump in construction and the weaker growths posted by mining and quarrying as well as electricity, gas and water supply, she noted.

Caraan said construction slowed down to negative 15.2 percent from a positive growth of 14.9 percent in the previous year.

Electricity, gas and wa-ter supply posted a modest growth of 2 percent in 2011 from a 4.3 percent expan-sion in 2010 while mining and quarrying posted slower growth of 6.5 percent from a high growth of 27.7 percent in 2010, she said.

On the other hand, Cara-an said the services sector, nosedived to a 4.3-percent growth in 2011 from the 5.4 percent growth in ported in 2010.

The lump in the servic-es sector, which accounted for the biggest share of the regional economy at 38.5 percent, was brought about by slower growths in trade and repair of motor vehicles, motorcycles, personal and household goods that went down from 9.4 to 3.5 per-cent.

Financial intermedia-tion decreased to 4.7 from 7.6 percent while by public administration and defense, compulsory social security went down to negative 1.7 from a robust growth of 11.2 percent in 2010.

“The aggregate adverse impact of these three sub-sectors was not able to cushion the improvements posted by other services that grew by 3.5 percent from 2.7 percent; transport, storage and communication, posting a growth of 7.4 percent from 1.1 percent; and, real estate, renting and business activity that expanded by 7 percent in 2011 from 4.3 percent in 2010,” she added. [PNA] 

Region 12 economy posts 4% growth

LABOR Secretary Ro-salinda Baldoz has urged returning

overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) from war-torn Syria to stay in the Phil-ippines and avail of the government’s livelihood programs.

“For OFWs in Syria

who will return to the Philippines, we encour-age them to stay put in the country because there are jobs available around,” Baldoz said.

She said there are non-wage employment opportunities for OFWs where the income is

greater than their sala-ries as domestic service workers in Syria.

“If they remain in the country, we could better protect them. It will also minimize the social cost of being away from their homeland which could be higher in vulnerable oc-

cupations like domestic work,” Baldoz said.

At least 100 OFWs, mostly household work-ers, are set to return home from the Middle East country in the next four days starting Tues-day, the Department of Foreign Affairs said.

This will bring the total number of repatri-ates from Syria -- since domestic unrest there erupted in March 2011 -- to 1,993.

Baldoz said once the OFWs have settled here, the DOLE will offer them livelihood starter kits un-

der the Balik-Pinay, Balik Hanapbuhay Program.

The livelihood starter kits are for home busi-nesses like sari-sari store, eatery, rice retailing, pig-gery, fruits and vegetable vending, and other small-scale income-earning ventures. [PNA]

DOLE urges OFWs to avail of gov’t livelihood programs

VOL.5 NO. 107 • WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 1, 2012

GOOGLE asked a US court Friday to put an end to a long-run-

ning lawsuit over the Inter-net giant’s massive book-scanning project, saying the effort is “not a substi-tute” for books themselves.

The US tech giant of-fered its defense by argu-ing that its Google Books project should be con-sidered “fair use” under copyright law, and said the judge should rule in its fa-vor.

“Google Books gives people a new and more efficient way to find books relevant to their interests,” the company said in its petition for summary judg-ment in the case in a New York federal court.

“The tool is not a sub-stitute for the books them-selves -- readers still must buy a book from a store or borrow it from a library to read it. Rather, Google Books is an important advance on the card-cat-alogue method of finding books.”

Google said the effort is beneficial to readers, au-thors and the public.

“Readers benefit by being able to find relevant

books,” Google argued. “Authors benefit because their books can be more readily found, purchased, and read. The public ben-efits from the increase of knowledge that results.”

Google has scanned more than 20 million books so far in the project. Books in the public domain -- without current copy-rights -- are made avail-able online to the public for free. For copyrighted books Google offers a searchable database that

displays snippets of text.The Authors Guild and

the Association of Ameri-can Publishers filed the suit in 2005 alleging copyright infringement.

A tentative settlement in the case was reached in 2008 under which Google would pay $125 million to resolve copyright claims and to establish an inde-pendent “Book Rights Reg-istry.” But a judge rejected the deal.

Opponents of the agree-ment have said allowing

Google to proceed with the project raises anti-trust, privacy and copyright is-sues, while also granting sole rights to Google to digi-tize millions of out-of-print works whose authors can-not be traced.

Others say copyright cannot be waived unless an author expressly opts out of the deal.

Google said in its argu-ment, however, that copy-right is not absolute, and that numerous fair uses ex-ist under the law.

ICT HUB 7EDGEDAVAO

IT took Jason Legate, a Walnut Creek, Califor-nia-resident, all of 10

minutes to connect his computer to a London-based server and access BBC’s coverage of the Olympics Saturday, there-by circumventing NBC’s lock on coverage in the United States.

The 31-year-old system administrator said he has watched at least 12 hours of live BBC coverage (his favor-ite sport so far - judo) since he set up a virtual private network (VPN) connection to send all his Internet traffic to a server in London.

Legate is one of many viewers who, turned off by NBC’s ironclad control of access to Olympics cover-age in the United States and spotty online streaming, has resorted to a workaround--sometimes legal, sometimes not--to watch the Games when and how they want on feeds from countries such as the UK and Canada.

NBC, which spent $1.18

billion for the rights to broadcast the Olympics on the Internet and on televi-sion in the United States, has made it impossible for people without a pricey ca-ble or satellite subscription to watch the Olympics live in the United States. Viewers can receive a complimentary four hours of live content with a temporary pass.

Only those customers who are first “authenti-cated” as paying cable or satellite subscribers have access to live streaming of every Olympic event, a move that has led to a explosion of anger at the network on Twitter under the unofficial “#NBCfail” hashtag.

Other complaints in-cluded NBC streaming that didn’t work and the network bombarded viewers had too much advertising.

For its regular network coverage, NBC, which is owned by cable giant Com-cast Corp, has tape-delayed some of the most popular sports for the U.S. prime-

time audience, meaning they air nearly five to six hours af-ter they have happened.

This helps NBC maxi-mize its return-on-invest-ment by saving the top events for the largest audi-ence and thereby the big-gest advertising pay-off. But it has also led to event spoilers and criticism that the network was putting the interests of its business over those of its viewers.

The tape delay and some glitches in the coverage fu-eled wider criticism of NBC. But NBC spokesman Chris McCloskey, who declined to comment on the matter, pointed to the 7 million live streams, which was a record on the first day of competi-tion. The company is making every event available live online -- except the opening and closing ceremonies.

Enter a small but vocal group of tech savvy Olym-pics fans who are finding new ways to watch the world’s biggest sports event away from their TV sets.

These fans use tech-niques that make it seem like their computers are located outside the United States, giving them access to streaming access to the Games held by companies other than NBC in coun-tries such as Canada or the UK. Think of it as a sporting version of how Internet us-ers in China access banned websites by routing traffic through servers in Hong Kong in order to fool gov-ernment censors.

“Because all of my In-ternet traffic looks like it’s coming from that box in England, the BBC thinks I’m located in England,” Legate said of the workaround he utilizes.

Like NBC in the United States, the BBC’s Olympic rights only allow it to show the games to users in the UK. For example, when from the United States to watch a BBC or CTV stream for example they are greeted with vari-ous messages telling them that they don’t have access.

Olympics fans find ways to circumvent NBC lock

APPLE Inc is gearing up to unveil a new product at a major

September 12 event, a source familiar with the plan said, presaging the long-awaited launch of the redesigned iPhone.

The world’s most valuable technology com-pany typically takes the wraps off its latest smart-phones around the fall, allowing the gadget to hit store shelves in time for the peak holiday shop-ping season.

The fifth iteration of the device that helped revolutionize the mobile industry is expected to sport a thinner, larger screen and a smaller dock connector, among other tweaks, sources and analysts have said.

The company on Mon-

day declined to comment.Apple’s iPhone

launches are among the biggest affairs on Silicon Valley’s calendar, scruti-nized by technology in-vestors, enthusiasts and consumers alike.

The September 12 date may shift, the source said on condition of anonymity.

Samsung Electron-ics launched its latest Galaxy device in recent months, stealing a march on Apple in an intensify-ing battle for mobile su-premacy. The pair now command more than half of global smartphone sales.

Technology blog iMore first reported the debut of the new iPhone at a September 12 event earlier on Monday.

Apple stokes iPhone talk

The screen of a computer features a Google Book search on the home page of Internet giant Google’s website. Google asked a US court Friday to dismiss a lawsuit over

the Internet giant’s massive book-scanning project, say-ing the effort is “not a substitute” for books themselves. [AFP]

Google seeks to close book in author copyright case

THE New York Times, which fa-mously insists on

the accuracy of its re-ports, was red faced Sun-day after being fooled by a hoax online editorial posted under the name of ex-boss Bill Keller.

The editorial, titled “WikiLeaks, a Post Post-script,” was purportedly published over the week-end by the Times and in every way appears to be the real thing from Keller, who until last September was the paper’s executive editor.

The article appeared on a web page built to replicate the Times’ pop-ular website, right down to perfectly working links to the rest of the site.

It was so realistic that none other than the newspaper’s technology editor Nick Bilton posted the link on his Twitter account, calling the ap-parent defense of Julian Assange’s controversial organization an “impor-tant piece.”

Not so.“THERE IS A FAKE OP-

ED GOING AROUND UN-

DER MY NAME, ABOUT WIKILEAKS. EMPHASIS ON ‘FAKE.’ AS IN, NOT MINE,” Keller, now a writ-er on the paper, tweeted to set the record straight.

Bilton followed up, tweeting: “I just deleted a tweet sent late last night that was from a fake NYT Bill Keller account.”

One of the few clues to the forgery was the web address of http://www.opinion-nytimes.com/2012/07/29/opin-ion/keller-a-post-post-script.html,since the real website’s URL begins with www.nytimes.com.

There was no imme-diate word on the iden-tity of the pranksters, though the global hack-ing movement Anony-mous has notched up high-profile hits on American institutions over the last year.

The New York Times is certainly no stranger to WikiLeaks: the US daily has been one of the principal outlets for As-sange’s mass dumping of hitherto secret govern-ment information from around the world.

Fake online editorial fools New York Times

VOL.5 NO. 107 • WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 1, 20128 VANTAGE POINTS

Shallow questions in a transparent processEDITORIAL

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EDGEDAVAO

THE search for the post-Corona Chief Justice revealed a fresh and welcome process that is not only

transparent but also affords the public to take part.

We have seen the 20 candidates for the position as the highest magistrate of the land and they were all outstanding in their fields. Some are constitution-alists, some commercial law experts, some trial practice veterans, and some have track record in the executive de-partment if not law school deans.

The line-up is so deep it’s very hard to say one has the upperhand over the other.

The incorporation of live cover-age and social media in the selection process gave the public a bleacher’s view of the interviews and the chance to pick the judicial brain of the candi-dates.

But while the Judicial Bar Council interviews may have been success-ful in introducing a new dimension in

their unenviable task of selecting the country’s judges and justices, it also exposed an old, shallow yardstick.

The questions of most JBC members dwelt on the expected—an investiga-tive journey into the particular exper-tise of a candidate. The questions were predictable from where the candidates sit. Hence, it became an easy ride save for some very shallow questions bor-dering on very personal inquiries. The public, being a first-time audience in a process like this, and after being ex-posed to the impeachment process, are interested not just on the answers of the candidates but also on the ques-tions of the JBC members.

The process gave us not just the op-portunity to observe and size up the candidates but also to observe how the JBC performs its mandate. Afterall, it is not just the independence, integ-rity and moral fitness of the nominees that’s under strict scrutiny but also the integrity and independence of the JBC.

RMC, next big thing

DON’T look now, but the next big

thing in education in this part of the country is Rizal Memorial Colleges (RMC). RMC, the school founded by the late erudite lawyer Leopoldo “Leo” Abellera with the help of an in-law, the late Dr. Quiambao, a famous medical practitioner who built the now defunct Quiambao hospital in Calinan.

The grapevine has it that Leo A. Mag-no, grandson of Leo Abellera, a former Court of Appeals associate justice and chairman of the defunct Board of Trans-portation, has consolidated hold on the RMC, after buying out the children of Vic Quimbao, his uncle, when the sports-man died recently. After the children, the siblings of Vic reportedly also sold their shares, which come to a total of 40 per-cent of RMC.

Magno, son of Dr. Evelyn Abellera-Magno, who was president of RMC for a longtime, will reportedly introduce a lot of new things in the school, including but not limited to offering doctoral degrees in addition to four masteral courses already existing among the current course offer-ings.

Watch this, Leo will also revived the mothballed RMC college of law. A bril-liant young lawyer who is making good in private practice and one of the out-standing law professors of the Ateneo de Davao law school has agreed to become the dean.

Magno, whose position in govern-ment as head of the Phividec industrial estate in Cagayan de Oro City bars him from continuing to be RMC president, is now chairman of the school’s board. He is now looking for a president to execute his grandiose plans for RMC.

Magno is also said to be interested in entering politics and is rumored to be preparing to challenge Congressman Isidro Ungab in the Third District. Friends like me are however advising him against it, if he is really serious about his grand plans for RMC. Besides, Sid, according to surveys, is unbeatable in the Third Dis-trict, if elections were held today.

The rumors started when it was veri-fied that Leo had registered as a voter in the Third District, transferring from the Second District, where he was first ru-mored to be interested to run against the formidable Garcia clan.

--0—There’s so much ado about the broad-

side that President Noynoy delivered against irresponsible newscasting, zero-ing in on the snide remarks that former Vice President Noli de Castro makes while delivering the news in TV Patrol.

I say the President has every right to do it and the best time to do it was dur-ing the anniversary of the news program because of its impact to both the news or-ganization and its audience. As a practi-tioner for almost half a century now, I dis-approve of the practice of Kabayan Noli of delivering short critical comments dur-ing TV Patrol News. His opinions prop-erly belong in his commentary program in radio which is also being aired on TV.

Also I like the idea of giving our lead-ers a chance to criticize media. We, medi-amen, should be gracious enough to face criticisms which we dish out a lot against politicians, businessmen and community leaders. It is only fair.

VOL.5 NO. 107 • WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 1, 2012

THE recent SONA of the President was observably the longest SONA ever delivered in the country. I

don’t pretend that I was able to capture every bit of the discourse because when the delivery was just starting I found no “message” interesting enough to catch my rather restless attention. A day after the SONA, the transcript was uploaded in the net available for everyone. I tried to go through the transcript but my ear-lier suspicion was further affirmed.

SONAs by leaders in previous years were guilty of either full of statements of accomplishments that are not re-sponsive to the needs and aspirations of people or lacking in development direc-tion for the following year, or both. The SONA for 2012 is far from exception. In fact, for the last 3 years, another char-acteristic of the SONA could be added: pointing finger – in the guise of helping us understand the roots or root causes of our current helplessness and seem-ingly hopeless situation.

The recollection of the President of events that led to where we are now – as manifested in his SONA - is superb yet myopic, superficially analytical yet obviouslyand obnoxiously partial and parochial.

A swift recall on the promises he made in his Inaugural Speech: the wang-wang,the straight and righteous path, corruption and poverty, started the SONA. The Martial Law of 30 years ago was validly yet unfortunately blamed for the persistence of corrupt practices and impoverishment. The dictator at the time has long been dead and many

people have moved on in their respec-tive lives. The “12-year old boy whose father was incarcerated for 7 years and 7 months”, and whose “family was forced to live in exile for 3 years” is now the President of the Philippines. He ap-parently was able to move on – happily! Those in the higher income levels have also moved on for the better. The bitter truth is that majority of our countrymen continue to live in mere subsistence.

I cannot understand how such event in the past could have impacted so much

on our slow paced development. Isn’t it true that the dictatorship had been de-molished, crashed and shuttered – and that democracy was installed more than 25 years ago? Has the power of that iconic democracy and all its promises been so miniscule that it has not been able to respond to the needs of the ma-jority of people? Or maybe that the de-mocracy that we claim to have attained is

not real such that the spirit of the dead regime of Martial Law con-tinues to haunt us with corruption and impoverish-ment? I thought that the EDSA revolution campaign had ultimately changed the kind of society that we have – devoid of malpractices in public governance, and that develop-ment for all had been attained.

It makes sense to understand the root causes of our problems now for as long as it will help us find some worthwhile solutions. It doesn’t make any sense when it is made to insinuate that emerging leaders such as Sena-tor Bongbong Marcos (the son of the dictator) or Senator ChizEscudero (whose father was one of the dictator’s close allies) and many others are all party to that almost forgotten past and therefore are not worthy to serve the people. Fear? Insecurity?Paranoia for revenge?Political positioning for the elections in 2016? I really do not know how to call it; you be the judge.

Up to now, I haven’t read the whole transcript of the SONA; hence, I could not judge its more substantive content – the agenda for the future. But it has been 4 days ago and I hear no claps, no real applause and cheers. Did I miss any-thing? The answer of my friend – who has read the transcript – is negative.

The accomplishments are samples of the promises made; that’s par for the course. But the people expect more.

It’s normal for public officials to wor-ry over negative reports coming out in the media on the economy, peace

and order and other matters concerning governance – or the lack of it. And jour-nalists may not find it worthwhile to be worried about occasional gripes from these officials on the supposed tendency of media to focus on the “negative” news, although I’m not sure if it’s proper to de-fine news as either positive or negative. Problems arise however when a leader, the President in particular, oversteps the thin line between press freedom and censorship.

Last Friday, President Benigno S. Aquino III again chided the media for its “negativity and sensationalism.” There could be no greater irony than the fact that he did it during the silver anniver-sary of ABS-CBN’s TV Patrol news pro-gram where he was the guest of honor. Although directed at news anchor Noli de Castro, who happened to be Glo-ria Macapagal-Arroyo’s vice president, Malacanang’s communication guys were candid enough to say that the target was media itself.

Taking cue from this Palace ad-mission, one may surmise that Aqui-

no delivered his scathing remarks [against media as a whole] with the clear intent to make it come out with sanitized reports about this administration. Why, the President did it not once but twice, to paraphrase Su-san Roces, and on the same day at that. He delivered the same message (read instruction) at the silver anniversary of BusinessWorld.

Aquino’s act was a pathetic case of shooting, I mean shouting at the mes-senger. My initial reaction to it was to say that media simply reports the events using a lens different from those that shape the view of PR people in or out of government. (Of course, there are PR practitioners disguised as reporters or opinion writers who are content with the cut-and-paste brand of journalism.)

It is not for Aquino, or any official for that matter, to dictate how media should report or interpret events. No one may blame the media for keeping some amount of skepticism and doubt on of-ficial statements and statistics on poli-tics, the economy and foreign relations, among others.

Media is not to blame if it cites the growing number of Filipinos going hun-

gry and without jobs amid gov-ernment claims of an improved economy. It is not to blame if it reports that his “matuwid na daan” has several potholes, and that the fight for good governance does not end with impeaching a chief justice with ques-tionable integrity. It is not to blame if it points out the apparent inconsistency in issuing strong pronouncements on Philippine sovereignty over the Panatag Shoal and withdrawing Navy ships from there, enabling China to strengthen its physical control of the disputed terri-tory.

Finally, Aquino’s still high, albeit slip-ping popularity rating does not give him the license to tell the media to do away with skepticism – or “negativism” if you may – as a tool of the trade. He has no right telling the media what to do or not do. If he only wants to read or listen to fairy tales, he must be thinking that he is president of Neverland. [MindaNews/ H. Marcos C. Mordeno can be reached at hm-cmordeno@gmail.com]

9VANTAGE POINTS

Monkey Business

EDGEDAVAO

Britain’s shaken reputation

BY JOHN LLOYDANALYSIS

(1st of 2 parts)

News as PNoy sees it

Par for the course

IT was rude of Mitt Romney to cast doubt on Britain’s ability to successfully host the London Olympics, but it wasn’t stu-

pid. His briefers on the London trip will have had files full of stories from the Brit-ish papers, whose front pages had little else on them for days but forebodings over se-curity lapses because of a screwup by G4S, the company hired to keep the Games safe. Britain hasn’t, in the past few years, been distinguished for excellence: Why assume the Games would be an exception?

For any foreigner, especially any Ameri-can, alert to British events over the past year or two, these stories play against a back-drop of the perception of the British capital as “Londonistan,” a place whose tolerance of radical Islamism spills over into fatally dan-gerous carelessness. A city where, almost exactly a year ago, gangs of young men and women roamed the streets for several days, smashing shops, looting their contents, burning buildings, beating up passersby and isolated policemen. To voice doubts on U.S. television about London’s safety is not stupid, because doubts are in order.

Three institutions central to the world’s opinion of the United Kingdom have been and remain very badly shaken. These are the armed forces, the press and the bank-ing system – three systems that, for two centuries or more, evoked real pride for the British people. The damage done – in two cases self-administered – has project-ed images of Britain that sharply contra-dict the sturdy, trusty, intelligently skepti-cal stereotype that the British like to think is a mirror of themselves.

The military is the outlier: It has not been the author of its own fall from grace, and is still thought of as efficient, well-equipped and well led. The wounds to its pride and efficacy have come from politi-cal considerations, of which the most im-portant was to pull out of Iraq with an unconvincing rationale that the job it was doing, around the southern city of Basra, was done. In fact, its exit meant a U.S. bri-gade had to be deployed to cover the gap in security, despite the U.S. military itself being hard-pressed. In Afghanistan, a Brit-ish withdrawal – this time in step with a similar U.S. exercise – is scheduled to be-gin next year. Several senior officers warn that the Afghan forces cannot provide security. Colonel Richard Kemp, former commander of British forces in Helmand, was quoted as saying in May that the local military “are not close to being able to take over from Western forces unaided, and I don’t believe that they would be able to contain the insurgency unaided by 2014, which is the date we are due to leave.”

Back home, the numbers of military personnel and bases and the ability to project force have been slashed so deeply that a slew of senior commanders have resigned, some remaining tactfully silent, others loud in their protest that the British armed forces now lack the capacity to fight even one, let alone multiple, large actions. Britain, with France, had been an at least partial exception to the somewhat dubious decline of Europe’s ability to pull its weight in military engagements (a cause of in-creasing concern to a vastly indebted U.S.) From having been a partial solution, Brit-ain joins the problem. It will, said a report last autumn from the Royal United Services Institute, “never again be among the global [military] superpowers.”

‘The recollection of the President of events that led to where we are now – as manifested in his SONA - is superb yet myopic,

superficially analytical yet obviously and obnoxiously

partial and parochial. ‘

VOL.5 NO. 107 • WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 1, 201210 COMPETITIVE EDGE EDGEDAVAO

OFFERS P488 all-in introductory seat sale

The Philippines’ larg-est national flag carrier, Cebu Pacific (PSE:CEB) further strengthens its most extensive route net-work in the Philippines, with the launch of 6 more inter-island routes.

Starting October 4, 2012, CEB will launch thrice weekly flights be-tween Cebu and Busuan-ga, and between Tacloban and Legazpi. Both routes will operate on a Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday frequency, using an ATR 72-500 aircraft.

Starting October 5, 2012, the airline will also launch the following flights using an ATR 72-500 aircraft: Davao – Bu-tuan (Monday, Wednes-day, Friday and Sunday), Davao – Dipolog (Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Sunday), and Tacloban – Iloilo (Monday, Wednes-day and Friday).

Meanwhile, CEB will

launch an Airbus A319 service between Zambo-anga and Cagayan de Oro starting October 20, 2012. This will be a thrice week-ly service, every Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday.

“CEB currently offers 63 domestic routes to 32 domestic destinations, providing passengers with the fastest access to key cities and destina-tions in the country. With these six new routes, CEB can offer the best con-nectivity options and the lowest fares to its guests, as well as promote trade and tourism in the des-tinations it flies to,” said CEB VP for Marketing and Distribution Candice Iyog.

“We will accept deliv-ery of three more brand-new Airbus A320 aircraft in the 2nd half of 2012, and 7 more in 2013. We look forward to expand-ing our route network to better serve the ever-growing traveling public in the Philippines,” she added.

CEB launches 6 more inter-island routes to boost Philippines’ most extensive route network

EVEN with more dan-gerous forms of mal-ware created by cyber-

criminals every day, many computer users are still not alarmed enough to secure and protect the data stored in their personal computers.

This prompted Kasper-sky Lab, a leading developer of secure content and threat management solutions, to come up with a free scan-ning tool called Kaspersky Security Scan.

Kaspersky Security Scan is a new utility designed to check a computer’s security status, which is ideal for us-ers who have no software security solution installed in their PCs.

The new product pro-vides a unique scanning feature that allows users to check if their currently in-stalled security software is able to detect all malware. Kaspersky Security Scan is now available for free down-load at Kaspersky Lab’s of-ficial website, www.kasper-sky.com.

“The personal computer is still the primary communi-cations device for the major-ity of consumers. The alarm-ing fact is that millions of PCs around the world have inferior protection installed or use no security software at all,” said Nikolay Greben-nikov, Kaspersky Lab chief technology officer.

“What we offer is a solu-tion that checks the security status of users’ PCs, informs them of any threats discov-ered and helps find the prop-er real-time protection solu-tion from Kaspersky Lab,” he added.

“We encourage PC users in Southeast Asia, particu-larly in the Philippines, to protect their valuable data stored in their PCs by using this new, free scanning tool from Kaspersky Lab,” said Jimmy Fong, Channel Sales Director for Kaspersky Lab Southeast Asia.

“The Kaspersky Security Scan will be very helpful for a lot of Filipino users who doesn’t have security soft-ware installed in their PCs. This will help to give them an idea of the number of vulnerabilities in their com-puter that are exposed to se-rious online threats,” he said.

A consumer survey con-ducted by Harris Interac-tive last March shows that a majority of owners do not use any security software to protect their digital assets. At the same time, 60% of surveyed users are worried about the confidentiality of their most critical financial data, and 80% had directly faced a security threat at least once.

Despite the rise of inter-net-enabled mobile devices, such as smartphones and tablets, the traditional PC is still the number one digi-tal device for the majority of consumers as it is most frequently used to go online and store personal and work data.

Kaspersky Security Scan is a small utility, optimized for quick installation with no additional questions asked and no reboots required. It is also compatible with other security solutions, provid-ing users a second opinion on their computer’s security

status. Right after installa-tion, Kaspersky Security Scan is ready to check the device’s system, scan for malicious programs and the status of Windows security settings and vulnerabilities in popular programs.

By default, a system scan is performed automatically three times a week and twice in background mode, but these settings can be modi-fied by the user. It is also possible to perform either a quick or full scan of the sys-tem.

As soon as the scan is complete, the utility will dis-play all the detected threats in several categories. How-ever, the free scanning tool would not remove the mal-ware. Instead, it will advise the user about the best pos-sible, fully operative real-time security solution from Kaspersky Lab.

As soon as the scan is complete, the tool will display all the detected threats in several categories. Kaspersky Security Scan will then advise the user about the best available fully oper-ative real-time security solu-tion from Kaspersky Lab.

Although the Kaspersky Security Scan is designed only to detect majority of the widespread malicious pro-grams and it cannot detect the most complex malware, such as rootkits and boot-kits. As a scanning tool, it is also not designed to provide a full system protection of the PC.

To learn more about the utility, visit this page: www.kaspersky.com/security-scan

Kaspersky lab offers free tool to double check security

ENJOY the bounties and splendor of nature while stay-

ing at Eden Nature Park and Resort for as low as PhP 288!

Take part of the fes-tivities in the month of the Kadayawan and avail of great deals on select-ed accommodations at Eden Nature Park and Resort’s “Kadayawan Room Sale” from August 1-30.

Simply book and buy a room of your choice and avail them anytime between September 1

and November 30, 2012. You can have a choice

of their Aster Room, on sale for only PhP 288; Begonia Room, on sale for only PhP 668; Holi-day Lodge, on sale for only PhP 602; Vista Cot-tage, on sale for only PhP 708; Gardenia Room, on sale for only PhP 577; Camellia Room, on sale for only PhP 722; and Gardenia Room, on sale for only PhP 772.

Rooms are subject to availability. A maximum of 5 gift certificates is given per individual buy-

er. The room sale is now applicable for seminars, corporate events and weddings. Unused ticket after November 30 will be forfeited.

Book and buy now! For reservations, call or visit the Sales Office at Matina Town Square, Matina or call tel. nos. 299 .0313/299.1020/ 296.0791, mobile no. 918.930.7590, email info@edennaturepark.com.ph. Check out their website at www.edenna-turepark.com.ph. Like us on Facebook.

Kadayawan room sale at Eden Nature Park for low as PhP 288!

VOL.5 NO. 107 • WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 1, 2012 11COMMUNITY SENSEEDGEDAVAO

MEMBERS of the Davao City Wa-ter District’s labor

union Nagkahiusang Mamu-muo sa Davao City Water District (NAMADACWAD) celebrated their 26th found-ing anniversary last July 14, 2012 at the DCWD Talomo Sump.

Attended by the union officers and members, the event opened with a short program wherein NAMA-DACWAD president Rodrigo L. Aranjuez inspired partici-pants with a speech. Aran-juez noted that it was the first time that the union was able to formally celebrate their founding anniversary and they wish to make the celebration an annual event.

“Usa sa mga tumong sa pag saulog sa anibersaryo sa unyon mao ang paghatag ug higayon sa tanan my-embro na makatapok nga dili maghisgot ug problema (Among the objectives of

celebrating the union’s an-niversary is to give members the chance to gather with-out having to discuss prob-lems),” Aranjuez explained.

He noted that for the years that the union has existed, members and offi-cers only meet twice a year during general assemblies scheduled every April and November and discussions often center on issues per-taining to labor and social matters. He continued to explain that the event also served as a form of thanks-giving that NAMADACWAD has stayed strong over the years since it was formed in 1982 and formally regis-tered at the Department of Labor in Manila on July 16, 1986.

The program was then followed by a tree plant-ing activity of 200 Malibago seedlings along the riverbank of Talomo River near DCWD’s meter room in Talomo Sump.

In 2010, NAMADACWAD also planted a total of 300 Maliba-go and Mahogany seedlings in the same area in time for the Earth Day celebration.

A festive boodle fight lunch which emphasized the call for simplicity and equal-ity among members was shared by the participants. All the while, they were en-tertained by a performance of environment and labor themed songs by the union’s Agos band whose players are also NAMADACWAD mem-bers.

To date, NAMADACWAD has 512 members and still growing. Among the mat-ters that the union wants to emphasize on its members is to continue protecting the interest of the employees, consumers and water district and giving sincere service to the people of Davao City by providing sufficient, quality and affordable water. (JOVANA T. DUHAYLUNGSOD)

NAMADACWAD plants trees on 26th anniversary

NAMADACWAD’s tree planting activity. Members and officers plant 200 Malibago seedlings along the riverbank of Talomo Riv-

er during the celebration of NAMADCWAD’s 26th foundation.

General Santos City students train in songwriting, audio recordingTHE city government

through its SHEEP-Computer Literacy Pro-

gram (CLP) is embarking on another training to empower musically-inclined public high school students here.

SHEEP-CLP head Per-cival Pasuelo bared that a two-day training-workshop on digital recording and songwriting was scheduled tomorrow and Monday (July 30) to hone the skills of the participants on the art of music using the latest tech-nology.

“The first day of the training will teach the par-ticipants an idea on how to encode their musical compo-sition into electronic music using the simple-to-under-stand Noteworthy Compos-er,” he said.

“Noteworthy Composer is a Windows-based music notation software that al-lows one to create, record, edit, print and play back musical scores in pure music notation.”

Pasuelo explained that this tool is proposed to be

integrated in a classroom setting under the Music Arts Physical Education and Health (MAPEH) subject.

Meanwhile, a workshop-training on songwriting was also scheduled on Monday with the multi-awarded, songwriter, composer and environmentalist, Joey Ayala as the mentor.

“Ayala is expected to dis-cuss the rudiments of music composition and will tackle the tips and tricks or tech-niques in songwriting,” Pa-suelo disclosed.

VOL.5 NO. 107 • WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 1, 2012

THE United States warned the world was sliding back-

wards on religious free-doms, slamming China for cracking down on Tibetan Buddhists and hitting out at Pakistan and Afghani-stan.

As the State Depart-ment unveiled its first re-port on religious freedoms since the start of the Arab Spring, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Monday said it was a “signal to the worst offenders” that the world was watching.

“New technologies have given repressive gov-ernments additional tools for cracking down on reli-gious expression,” Clinton told a US think-tank, add-ing that pressure was ris-ing on some faith groups around the globe.

“More than a billion people live under govern-ments that systematically suppress religious free-dom,” she stressed.

“When it comes to this human right -- this key feature of stable, secure, peaceful societies -- the world is sliding backward.”

The 2011 International Religious Freedom Re-port noted that last year governments increasingly used blasphemy laws to “restrict religious liberty, constrain the rights of re-ligious minorities and limit

freedom of expression.”Highlighting the situ-

ation in Indonesia and Afghanistan, the report recalled the case in Paki-stan of Aasia Bibi, the first Christian woman to be sen-tenced to death for blas-phemy in the country.

And while in Afghani-stan the constitution says that followers of other religions are free to wor-ship as they please it also maintains “that Islam is the ‘religion of the state,’” the report said.

The Afghan govern-ment’s “failure to protect minority religious groups and individuals limited religious freedom,” it in-sisted.

In China “there was a marked deterioration during 2011 in the gov-ernment’s respect for and protection of religious freedom in China,” the re-port said.

This included “in-creased restrictions on re-ligious practice, especially in Tibetan Buddhist mon-asteries and nunneries.”

“Official interference” in traditional Tibetan re-ligious practices had “ex-acerbated grievances and contributed to at least 12 self-immolations by Tibet-ans in 2011.”

China and North Korea, where the report noted that religious freedom

does not exist in any form, along with Myanmar are among eight nations desig-nated as “countries of par-ticular concern” for failing to accept religious rights.

They are accompanied by Eritrea, Iran, Saudi Ara-bia, Sudan and Uzbekistan.

Much of the focus of the 2011 report however was on the countries involved in the Arab Spring, where popular uprisings have ousted autocratic leaders.

Despite gestures by Egypt’s interim military leaders towards greater inclusiveness, sectarian violence had increased, the report said, denouncing “both the Egyptian govern-

ment’s failure to curb ris-ing violence against Coptic Christians and its involve-ment in violent attacks.”

Clinton, who visited Egypt earlier this month, said she had had “a very emotional, very personal conversation with Chris-tians who are deeply anx-ious about what the future holds for them and their country.”

Egypt’s new leader, President Mohamed Morsi, who emerged from the Islamic Brotherhood to become the country’s first democratically-elected president, had vowed in their talks “to be the presi-dent of all Egyptians.”

12 EDGEDAVAONATION/WORLDNATION BRIEFS WORLD TODAY

Deal

IN its latest efforts to repatriate Over-seas Filipino workers

(OFWs) from strife-torn Syria, the Philippine gov-ernment gained success in negotiating with top Syrian officials to bring back home 140 OFWs, the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) announced in a statement yesterday.

“This is the largest batch of OFWs coming home from Syria since the unrest started in March 2011,” the statement said.

Patrol boats

UNLIKE the decades-old and stripped-down ships the

Philippines gets from the United States, the 12 pa-trol boats the Philippine Coast Guard will most likely get from Japan in 2014 “will all be brand-new”, according to a top official of the Japanese Embassy in Manila.

Minister Shinsuke Shi-mizu, head of the Japa-nese Embassy’s chancery, told the Philippine Daily Inquirer in an interview on Thursday that Japan and the Philippines had begun the paper work for the acquisition of the patrol boats by the Philip-pine Coast Guard.

Left

ONLY two of the 20 Chinese fishing ves-sels that dropped

anchor the other day very close to the Philippine-occupied Pag-Asa island in the Spratlys region remain in the area, according to the military’s Western Com-mand (Wescom).

Wescom spokesman Lt. Col. Niel Estrella said yesterday’s maritime air surveillance over Pag-Asa island showed that most of the Chinese fishing vessels were no longer around.

Cancelled

MALACANANG has suspended classes in college level, as

well as work in government offices in the National Capital Region from 2:30 pm onwards.

Under Circular number 32 issued by the Palace and signed by Executive Secretary Paquito Ochoa, the suspension however excludes agencies “whose functions involve the de-livery of basic and health services, preparedness/response to disasters and calamities, and/or the performance of other vital public services.”

Cracked

THE Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH)

is inspecting the seawall along Manila Bay after receiving reports that cracks were seen on the design of the structure.

DPWH-National Capi-tal Region director Rey-naldo Tagudando yester-day said he has ordered the inspection of the newly-repaired seawall stretching from the Unit-ed States embassy to the Manila Yacht Club.

Visit

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton de-parts this week on a

trip that will take her both to Africa’s newest nation, South Sudan, and on a visit to the continent’s el-der statesman, 94-year-old anti-apartheid icon Nelson Mandela.

While Clinton’s pub-lic focus will be on Africa’s democratic achievements and economic potential, the trip also underscores U.S. security ties in the face of an array of growing threats --from Islamist extremists to narcotics cartels.

Failed

DELEGATIONS from around the world failed on Friday to

agree a landmark U.N. arms-trade treaty to regu-late the more than $60 billion industry, opting for further talks and a possible U.N. General Assembly vote by the end of the year, diplomats said.

More than 170 countries have spent the past month in New York negotiating a treaty, which needed to be adopted by consensus, so any one country effectively could have vetoed a deal. Instead, no decision was taken on a draft treaty.

Drug haul

AUSTRALIAN police on Tuesday seized a record half a tonne

of the drug ice and heroin worth up to A$500 million hidden in a shipment of terracotta pots from Thai-land.

Seven people, including four from Hong Kong, were arrested after a year-long in-vestigation following a tip-off from U.S. authorities, police said. The 306 kg of metham-phetamine, also known as ice, was Australia’s biggest seizure of the drug, while the 252 kg of heroin was the nation’s third largest-haul of heroin.

Sanctions

U.S. lawmakers moved a step closer to final-izing new sanctions

aimed at further restricting Iran’s oil revenues after ne-gotiators from the Senate and House of Representa-tives agreed on a compro-mise bill on Monday.

The bill includes sev-eral new provisions seek-ing to crack down on those who ship or insure Iranian oil cargoes, or who pay for oil using gold. It also seeks to curtail efforts to evade sanctions by reflagging ships or turning off track-ing systems.

Shelled

SYRIAN government forces used helicopter gunships to strafe reb-

el-held districts in Aleppo and shelled the area on the third day of a pitched battle for the commercial capital.

The fighting has sent some 200,000 civilians fleeing the northern city, according to the United Nations, which warned of a looming humanitarian catastrophe, while France said it would call an urgent UN Security Council meet-ing on Syria.

A United Nations team will visit North Korea from

Tuesday to assess damage from recent floods with a view to developing an aid plan, a U.N. official said, although the North’s new leadership is yet to make any detailed response to the disaster.

The team will include some U.N. workers al-

ready in North Korea, Christopher de Bono, chief of communications for East Asia and the Pa-cific for the United Na-tions Children’s Fund (UNICEF), told Reuters on Monday.

The trip follows a meeting between U.N. and North Korean officials on Monday, at which Pyong-yang presented its assess-

ment of the damage, he said without elaborating on the meeting.

“We have agreed to send an inter-agency rapid assessment team to the two most affected counties tomorrow (July 31),” de Bono said in an emailed statement.

North Korea remains one of the most isolated states in the world. That

North Koreans are seen at a flooded village in Anju July 30, 2012 in this picture released by North Korea’s official news agency KCNA in Pyongyang. [REUTERS]

U.N. team to tour flood-hit N. Korea

has not changed since new leader Kim Jong-un took power seven months ago, although floods have in the past provided op-portunities for contact with the outside world.

“A U.N. response will be devised after the inter-agency mission confirms the damages and gauges the immediate require-ments of the affected pop-ulation,” de Bono said.

Initial reports indi-cated the damage to farm-ing areas and its effect on people was devastating.

North Korea’s official media has reported that floods caused by torren-tial rainfalls from July 25 killed 88 people, left tens of thousands homeless and damaged farmlands.

Apart from a brief statement carried by the official KCNA news agency three days ago, there has been no other word suggesting how the North’s new leadership will help the thousands struggling to survive.

Kenza Drider, candidate for the 2012 French presidential election, speaks in 2011 in front of the police tribunal in Paris, after being fined for violating France’s niqab ban. The United States warned the world was sliding back-wards on religious freedoms Monday, criticizing violence against Coptic Christians in Egypt and citing European laws banning Muslim veils. [AFP]

US hits out at Asian nations over religious freedoms

VOL.5 NO. 107 • WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 1, 2012 13EDGEDAVAO

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Ateneo... Loren...

is not from Davao City is be-hind the selling spree in the watershed area to moneyed individuals believed to be speculators who intend to resell their bought lots at much higher prices in the future.

The land-buying spree which began two months ago was first reported during yesterday’s monthly WMC meeting presided by City En-vironment and Natural Re-sources Office (Cenro) chief Dominic Joseph Felizarta, in behalf of Mayor Sara.

The buyers are not or-dinary squatters but astute speculators, the WMC was told.

Purok Diolo, according to WMC member and lumad leader Datu Eddie Rosete, is an elevated rustic place ide-al for vacation houses and could very well be converted into a tourist resort village if not for the fact that it is one of the city’s protected natu-ral sites that ought to be pre-served at all cost.

The report reaching the WMC also indicated that some of the lot buyers have started clearing the lots they have bought by cut-ting the trees therein. It is not known if some buyers have already built horizon-tal structures like houses in the area.

Expressing alarm over the invasion of the water-shed area by speculators, the WMC decided yester-day to ask the Davao City office of the Department of Environment and Natu-ral Resources to act on the problem and treat the mat-ter with urgency in order to prevent further destruction of the protected area by hu-man encroachment.

Meanwhile, Felizarta formed a team from his of-fice headed by forester Christopher Asibal to go to the area and assess the situ-ation before recommending remedial measures to the WMC in its next meeting.

Felizarta is warning the public against buying “rights” in the Diolo water-shed area as it is illegal to do so.

He said buying and in-troducing improvements into a protected area is against many laws already in place, and therefore would be unnecessarily opening the buyers to crimi-nal prosecution, aside from losing the money they used to buy the Diolo lots.

was among the 169 victims of food poisoning, had asked to be discharged from the hospital.

Office of Student Affairs director Ricardo Enriquez yesterday said that Tabora wanted to attend the Eucha-ristic celebration held late in the afternoon of July 30 at the Addu Matina Campus.

The university, likewise, attended the blessing of their new school facilities --the swimming pool and oval track.

Enriquez said most of the students will be released

from the hospital as their 48-hour observation period has ended.

Of the 169 victims, 152 are students while 12 are top administrators of the school, two were from the catering agency itself, while three are utility staffs: an elevator op-erator, janitor, and driver.

The victims were attend-ing the event Sui Generis: Ateneo Student Leaders and had taken their lunch from lunchboxes served by the ca-terer who is now in hot wa-ter and may be facing possi-ble charges for the incident.

casino personnel and es-theticians – positions oc-cupied by thousands of Filipinos in foreign ves-sels.”

“The action demanded of the Philippine Senate is of great consequence to 1.2 million seafarers worldwide, 400,000 of whom are our very own. I fully support the con-currence in MLC, 2006, and urge this Chamber’s immediate concurrence in the ratification of this Convention,” she conclud-ed.

Thailand, Singapore, Philip-pines, Indonesia, Vietnam, Brunei, Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar.

After the Phnom Penh meetings, Philippine For-eign Undersecretary Erlinda Basilio issued a public state-ment explaining that the ASEAN failed to come up with a communiqué due to Cambodia’s firm position not to reflect the recent devel-opments in the South China Sea.

That, despite the view of the majority of the bloc’s members these develop-ments impinge on the overall security of the region.

In response, the Cam-bodian ambassador sent a letter to the Philippine Star accusing the Philippines and Vietnam of “sabotaging” the group statement because of their insistence on inserting the sea disputes in the pro-posed document.

The Cambodian envoy’s biting criticisms against the Philippines and Vietnam are the latest twist in the brew-ing animosity between this year’s host of ASEAN’s re-volving chairmanship and Chinese ally Cambodia on one side and Manila and Hanoi on the other over the territorial disputes that is threatening to divide the re-gional bloc.

While some members like the Philippines and Vietnam are aligned with the United States and other Western countries calling for a rules-based and multilat-eral approach in solving the disputes, others members aligned to China like Cam-bodia and Laos toe Beijing’s line either by not openly backing a multilateral ap-proach or opposing it out-right.

The Philippines and Viet-nam have accused Beijing of becoming increasingly aggressive in asserting its claims in the West Philippine Sea, or also known as the South China Sea.

The vast waters are stra-tegic and resource-rich wa-terway where more than 50 percent of the world’s mer-chant fleet tonnage passes each year.

The area had been a source of conflict among ri-val claimants China, Taiwan and ASEAN members Phil-ippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, and Brunei.

Overlapping claims to the contested waters, is-lands and reefs, where un-dersea gas deposits have been discovered in several areas, has been feared to be Asia’s next potential flash-point for war.

Hernandez challenged

the Cambodian envoy to prove his allegations and asked him to speak the truth on the outcome of the meet-ings in Phnom Penh.

“As a matter of courtesy to our Cambodian friends, we will ask the ambassador if he can kindly authorize the release to the public of evidence which should end all speculation on what re-ally happened in Phnom Penh,” Hernandez said.

He said the department will keep on summoning the Cambodian ambassador “until he is able to come to the DFA.”

“We also intend to show the Cambodian ambassa-dor why the ASEAN chair was being viewed as unduly advancing a NON-ASEAN country’s interest, with a clear prejudice to positions of the Philippines and Viet-nam, members of ASEAN,” Hernandez said.

Asked if there is a pos-sibility that the Cambodian envoy would be declared persona non grata or “un-acceptable” for issuing of-fensive remarks against the host government, Hernan-dez said: “We’re not going there yet.”

“What is important is for him to explain to us what he meant by his statements,” Hernandez said. [PNA] 

tries, are invited to work in the country either for short or long term such as providing trainings and consultancy.

He mentioned that the Davao region had 20 “balik” (home-coming) scientists since the pro-gram started five years ago.

He cited that one of the home-coming scien-tists produced a tech-nology that controls the population of cacao pod borers, adding that the Cocoa Philippine Founda-tion in Calinan, Davao City has already adopted such technology.

HEALTH authorities wartned the public against the danger

of leptospirosis, now re-ported to have reached 2,002 cases nationwide from Jan. 1 to July 7, 2012.

Dr. Eric Tayag, as-sistant secretary and spokesman of the Dept. of Health, cautioned in par-ticular those people who have fever and waded in flooded areas for the past three to seven days to seek medical attention for possible leptospirosis infection.

“Those people need to take prescribed antibiotic to prevent the progres-sion of the infection, Tay-ag said.

He was referring to those who recently wad-ed in flood waters; have had high fever for two to

three days; fever was ac-companied by body pains, chills, headaches, and red eyes (like sore eyes); jaundice (yellowing of the skin); decreased levels of urination; and urine was tea-colored (a dark amber color).

Tayag has yet to give the full details of the lat-est report on leptospiro-sis.

Tayag said the public should consider flooded waters contaminated or danger of catching lepto-spirosis infection consid-ering that garbage is ev-erywhere, dead animals or existence of rats.

Accordingly, lepto-spirosis is an infection caused by direct exposure to bacteria found in ani-mal urine and feces.

Patients can get in-

fected when they swal-low flood water or when bacteria enter the body through open wounds, eyes, nose, or breaks in the skin.

As a precaution, the DOH reiterated calls the public should avoid flooded areas and to re-frain from coming in contact with flood water, to wear protective cloth-ing like pants, rubber boots, gloves or rubber jumpsuits, maintain their home clean and getting rid of rats.

“Those who wade through floods should protect the skin from bacteria by washing with soap and water the parts of the body that have come into contact with flood water, Tayag said. [PNA]

WELCOME ADDRESS. Davao City Police Office chief P/SSupt. Ronald dela Rosa delivers his welcome message during Davao City Police Office fiesta yesterday. [LEAN DAVAL JR.]

DOH warns: Don’t wade in flooded waters

MA L A C A N A N G called on the stu-dents to refrain

from participating in vio-lent activities such as in-flicting harm on others, as another case of suspected hazing resulted in the death of a student from the San Beda law school, recently.

Deputy Presidential Spokesperson Abigail Valte issued the call during the regular press briefing on Tuesday in Malacanang, stressing that no one ben-efits from such kind of ille-gal activities.

“Kung totoo man na ito ay biktima ng hazing,

itigil na po natin ang gani-tong cycle of violence, wala namang nagbe-benefit sa ganito,” Valte said.

She further assured that the Philippine Nation-al Police will be conducting a thorough investigation of the case.

“Nakagugulat po ang nangyari na meron na na-mang victim of alleged haz-ing, wala pa sa atin lahat ng impormasyon… sa aking pagkakaalam ay inutusan na ng hepe ng pulis doon na imbestigahan dahil late yata na-confirm,” Valte said.

Reports revealed that a student of San Beda law

school died after going through a suspected frater-nity hazing rituals in Das-marinas, Cavite on Sunday.

In a post on its Face-book page, Lsghotline Sbc, the San Beda Law Student Government confirmed the death of Marc Andrei Mar-cos.

Pending the comple-tion of investigation, the case is being treated as a “mauling” incident.

If the hazing angle proves true, Marcos would be the second San Beda law student to die from hazing this year after Mar-vin Reglos, who was killed in February. [PNA] 

Students urged to refrain from joining violent activities

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DAYS after launching her book, Philippine Neo-Ethnic Choreog-raphy (A Creative Pro-cess), Agnes Locsin made another mark as a choreographer with her recently con-cluded dance concert entitled “Puno: Ang Pangatlong Galaw.” The “Alay sa Puno” series is a dance composition that explores the literal, physical, and symbolical virtues of texture and strength, garnered from the tree trunks that bear the weight of life.

EDGEDAVAOWOMEN

Agnes Locsin’stribute to trees

Agnes A4 F

VOL.5 NO. 107 • WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 1, 2012

INdulge!

ENTERTAINMENTWOMEN

A2 INdulge! EDGEDAVAO

Her two-by-three meter make-shift tent, or “posting” as they would call it, has frames made up of small tree branches. Ka Lima meticulously layered blue tarpaulins, sacks, and a nylon taffeta fabric with acrylic coat-ing (the same material used in um-brellas) to drive out the cold. “Tugnawonon man gud ko” (I get cold easily), she explains. Tempera-ture at their camp can drop to as low as 15 degrees Celsius at times, so Ka Lima has to think of ways to keep herself warm. Cozy is not the word that one would associate with an NPA camp but this is the feeling one gets upon entering Ka Lima’s tent. Despite their transient and always-on-guard lifestyle, Ka Lima exerted efforts to make her space homey. “Mahilig man gud ko mag kutikuti maong ingon ani ni” (I love to tinker with things that’s why my tent looks like this), Ka Lima says with a laugh. Ka Lima is in charge of the com-pany’s logistical and financial needs, and her tent also serves as her “of-fice” where she makes reports, an-swers phone calls and talks with her fellow cadres on different concerns. A stretcher, made of sacks sewn to-gether, both serves as her bed and chair. Small tree branches tied to-gether with rattan forms her desk. The only touches of modernity per-haps, inside Ka Lima’s tent are the light bulb, cellphones, and a laptop. After getting married in 2005, Ka Lima and her husband decided to join the NPA. She was 26 years old then. Founded in 1969, the New Peo-ple’s Army is the armed wing of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP).  It is the longest-running rev-olution in Asia, waging a protracted “people’s war” from the countryside.Personal Challenges Ka Lima admits that it was very difficult at first. “Physical kayo ang mga kalisdanan—lakawan, kakapoy, bug-at imong  dad-on…Pero madu-gay, maanad ra diay gihapon ka, ma develop ra imong mga muscles hang-tud dili na ka kahibalo na bug-at na diay imong ginadala” (The chal-lenges were very physical at first. You need to endure long walks, fatigue, and carry heavy loads. But you get used to it, until such time you can no longer feel that what you’re carrying is heavy) she says. She also had to adjust to a new culture and a new environment. She

was first deployed to a Lumad (in-digenous peoples) area and by na-ture, Lumads are reluctant to mingle with people coming from the cities so Ka Lima exerted every effort to overcome this challenge. “Ang pakig-relasyon sa mga kaubang Lumad nay gintang. Kung mailhan nila daan na tagasyudad ka, PTB (petty bourgeoi-sie) ka, dili jud mawala na dunay gamay na gap pero sa dagan sa pa-nahon, kinahanglan nimo i-cope up, kinahanglan nimo walaon (There is a gap on your relationship with fel-low Lumad cadres at first especially when they know that you came from the city, that you belong to the petty bourgeoisie. But you need to adjust to this and work on eliminating this gap), Ka Lima says. Adding to these challenges was Ka Lima’s longing for her family, who could not accept her decision then. “Ang acceptance dili dire-diret-so…pero nakondisyon na sila daan sa aktibista pa ko nga diri gyud ko. Kanang makit-an bitaw nila ang con-sistency. Madugay, nadawat ra nila” (Their acceptance was not immedi-ate although they are aware, since I have been an activist, that this is the path that I will eventually take. They saw my consistency. In time, they were able to accept my decision), she said. Ka Lima added:“Naay mga pa-nahon atong mga niaging tuig nga nakauli ko nakit-an nila na nipayat ko, simple na kaayo akong porma. Maluoy sila, kay dili baya ingon ana sa una tapos gina provide nila imong panginahanglan pero nakit-an nila na happy ka tapos tanang kalisdana imong naagi-an imong gibarugan. Madugay, kumbinsi ra gihapon sila” (There had been times before when I was able to come home and see them. They saw that I have grown thin and lived a very simple life. They pity me because I didn’t look like that before. They used to provide me with every-thing. But they saw that I am happy and I stand for what I believe in de-spite the hardships. With that, they were able to accept my decision).Motherhood In 2007, Ka Lima gave birth to a son. But due to the nature of the life she has chosen, she had to leave him with relatives. She left him when he was only three months old. “Lisud gyud kaayo. Kanang effort bitaw nimo nga kanang pugngan ang imong emosyon para makalayo ka sa iyaha labina kay mo smile nabaya

nang three months. Mawili na kayo ka. Pero kay politics in command man lagi, kinahanglan nimo bu-haton” (It was very difficult. I need to contain my emotions so that I’d have the strength to leave especially because at three months, a baby would already smile, and that makes me grow fonder of him. But since politics has to prevail, I need to leave him), Ka Lima said. She gets to see his son or talk to him over the phone once in a while but the child has no idea that she is his mother. It was Ka Lima’s choice to keep it that way though. “Di na-man kinahanglan na ipamugos nimo na ikaw ang inahan. Moabot ra man gyud ang panahon nga ilhon ka niya. Subay pud sa kasinatian sa ubang ginikanan” (You don’t need to force on him that you are his mother. Time will come that he will recog-nize you, based on the experience of other parents), Ka Lima explained. She added: “Para sa ako, wala nay necessity nga ipamugos nimo nga il-hon ka. Para sa ako, bisan kinsa man makahatag ug motherly love sa iyaha. Sa among distansiya, magpakatotoo na lang gyud na dili nako siya ma hug, dili nako siya makit-an pirmi, ihatag na sa uban”(I don’t need to force on him that I am his mother. For me, anybody can give him motherly love. With our distance, I have already accepted that I cannot hug him and see him often. The love and care he needs can also be given by others). His son calls her “nanay” but he

thought that “nanay” is similar to an aunt or older sister. “Dili man pud ko ma-hurt kay kabalo ko nga ingon ani gyud ang dangatan—pwede ko ilhon, pwede pud dili. Ang pinakamaayo kana rang amigohon ka niya, dayon mokatawa siya uban sa imoha kung mag joke ka sa iyaha” (I don’t get hurt because I know this is how things will turn out—he might recognize me, he might not. The best thing is when he befriends me and laughs whenever I crack a joke), Ka Lima said. But Ka Lima admitted that she longs for her son, just like any moth-er would. “Pangita-on gihapon nako siya, labi na kung bag-o lang mi nag-kita. Mingaw kayo na. Pero madugay, mahulipan ra man pud siya sa im-ong ka busy sa trabaho” (I do miss him especially after seeing him. I feel so sad. But in time, the sadness goes away especially when you are swamped with work), she said. In 2009, when his son was only around two years old, Ka Lima’s hus-band was killed during an encoun-ter. They were not together when it happened. She only saw him when they withdrew. She did not expect to lose him that night. “First time nako makakita ug tao nga nabugtu-an ug kinabuhi” (It was my first time to see someone die), she recalled. For others, this tragic experience will most likely break their spirit but not hers. Instead, it strengthened her resolve to continue with the struggle and motivated her to be better at the tasks assigned to her. Challenges to women in the revo-

A revolutionary, a mother,and a womanBy Ruby Thursday More for Mindanews

A plastic bottle of Isopropyl alcohol, ballpens and pencil, cellphone charger, food container, scissor, masking tape, an old issue of a newspaper, and dried wild grass flowers propped inside a rounded cardboard litter the desk of Ka Lima, a 33-year old female New People’s Army (NPA) cadre, as she prepares for another day at their guerrilla base.

lutionary movement In the guerilla movement, there is no strict delineation of tasks between men and women as they are tapped according to their strengths and ex-pertise. But generally, women are involved in medical care, sanitation, education, and organizing. “Depende siya sa imong kakaya-han. Naay mga babae nga kaya nila mag sag-ob, kaya nila pang lalake. Depende man gud na sa iyang na-mat-an pud. Kung ang training niya sa ilang balay, mamugha ang mga babae, magsag-ob ug tubig, diri, wa man nato na ginapugngan kay ang pinakamaayo gyud, kung asa ka mas produktibo” (Your tasks depends on your capabilities, what you are used to, what makes you most productive. There are women who can do manly tasks such as fetching water and chopping wood. We don’t discourage that here), Ka Lima said. But she admitted that it is more difficult for women to adjust to this kind of life than men as by nature, most women are used to light tasks. “Unang-una, ang babae, daan sa kul-tura sa gawas, pinakaulahi niyang buhaton ang pagsundalo. Dapat ang babae naa sa balay, ana man na kasa-garan di ba? Kung wala siya sa balay, naa sa opisina. Anad kana ang imong trabaho gaan, unya diri sundalo ka—naa kay pusil nga bug-at, lakawan…” (In the culture that we have been used to, women are either at home or working in offices, doing light tasks. The last thing that she would do is to become a soldier. But here, women are soldiers--carrying heavy guns and enduring long walks). Women in the guerilla movement also have to contend with the oc-casional patriarchal viewpoints and attitudes of some of their male com-rades. “Dili pa gihapon mawala ang patriarchal na relasyon sa babae ug sa lalaki—na mas superior ang lalaki kaysa babae. Naa man tay polisiya sa pagrespeto sa kababayen-an pero usahay, imo pa gihapon masimhotan ang mga macho na panan-aw ngadto sa kababayen-an” (Here, we cannot completely eradicate the patriar-chal relationship between men and women—that men are more supe-rior than women. Though we have a strong policy on the respect for women’s rights, at times, you can still sense some macho stances against women), Ka Lima admitted. But she explained that they do not magnify this issue since they un-derstand that this is the culture that many of us have been used to. Sometimes though, it is the wom-en themselves who doubt and under-estimate their capabilities especially when it comes to military duties. And when this happens, oftentimes, it is also their fellow women who encourage them and push them to continue. While many would frown at the sacrifices women like Ka Lima has made and endured for the revolu-tion, they completely understand these dissenting viewpoints. “Dili pa man gud nila ma appreciate na ang among pagpaningkamot diri para sa kinatibuk-an kay dili pa man nila mabati karon… wala sila sa base, dili nila makit-an ang kausaban” (They cannot see that our efforts here are for everyone since they cannot yet feel the changes. They do not belong to the poorest of the poor that’s why they cannot see the changes that are happening), Ka Lima said.

VOL.5 NO. 107 • WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 1, 2012

ENTERTAINMENTENTERTAINMENT

INdulge! A3EDGEDAVAO

JUST because they’’re family, don’t think they can drop by un-announced. Michael Jackson’s chil-dren, Prince, Paris and Blanket, are currently stay-ing at Katherine Jackson’s L.A. home. But E! News has learned the kids’ cousin and temporary guardian, T.J. Jackson, has been advised by estate lawyers on who should and should not be allowed into their home. T.J.’s lawyer Charles Shultz tells E! News that a letter was given to security and “that letter was in com-pliance with Judge [Mitch-ell] Beckloff’s order and is not arbitrary.” “As for the family mem-bers who are on that list, they were either at the house on Monday, July 23, 2012, or in some way par-ticipated in the events sur-rounding that date,” Shultz stated. It was then that Jer-maine, Randy and Janet Jackson arrived at Kather-ine’s home and, according to multiple sources, force-fully tried to remove Prince, Paris and Blanket from the house. Sources have told E! News that it’s that mon-ey that motivated Randy,

Jermaine, Janet and sister Rebbie Jackson to separate Katherine from her grand-children in an attempt to modify custody and effec-tively circumvent Michael’s will, which left his estate to his children and provided an ample allowance to their guardian. Since Michael’s death in

2009, Katherine had been receiving a monthly allow-ance of $86,000 as guardian of Prince, Paris and Blanket. For the time being, these funds are going to T.J. While Michael’s four sib-lings behind the failed fam-ily coup aren’t allowed at the house, Shultz said they aren’t forbidden from all

contact with their mother: “In addition, Mrs. Jackson is completely free to talk to whomever she chooses and is free to come and go from the house with any-

one whom she chooses,” the lawyer says. On Friday, Katherine’s at-torney, Perry Sanders, told the Los Angeles Times that the 82-year-old had reunit-

ed with her grandchildren. “[Katherine] is eager to sim-ply enjoy her great relation-ship with these children, while deeding over some of the stressors that go hand-in-hand with being a guardian,” Sanders said. A source told E! News Fri-day that Katherine would be filing for a shared guard-ianship arrangement be-tween herself and T.J. (Tito’s son and Michael’s 34-year-old nephew) this week. And although Katherine was initially “devastated’ to lose guardianship of her grandchildren, a family insider told us T.J.’s tempo-rary guardianship “is good news.” “It is not about taking [guardianship] away from Katherine. They are trying to protect the kids from the other family...T.J. didn’t step in to remove her. He stepped in because she is not there,” the source adds. “He is extremely tight with his grandmother.” For the young kids’ sake, let’s hope the family finds a way to work out this mess.

HARRY Shum Jr. wouldn’t mind see-ing Mike Chang end up in Chicago to study at the Joffrey Ballet School, but that doesn’t mean the Windy City is his last stop on the Glee train. “I think it would be in-teresting if he actually gets into the Joffrey ballet, but I also think it might be fun to make that trip to New York or L.A. to become a dancer,” Shum, 30, told me at the Dizzy Feet Foundation’s Celebration of Dance gala. “Or maybe he wants to be more than just dancing,” he added. “It happens with a lot of dancers. You come and you dance in compa-nies but you see all these other people making mon-ey doing all these things like choreographing.” Dancer or not, Shum in-sists he doesn’t know what producers have in store for Mike. “I think they’re still trying to figure out where everyone else is,” he said. In fact, he’s still waiting to hear what he’ll be doing

in the big second Britney Spears tribute episode. “I wasn’t as much a part of it in the first one so hopefully the second one I can because I’ve got some

Britney Spears moves,” he said, adding, “I’d like to do ‘Sometimes’ or ‘Crazy.’ That’s from when everyone was on the Britney bandwag-on…Those are classics.”

Jackson Family saga:Janet Jackson, siblings barred from mom’s house!

What is Mike Chang’s future on Glee?

VOL.5 NO. 107 • WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 1, 2012

ENTERTAINMENTWOMEN

A4 INdulge! VOL.5 NO. 107 • WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 1, 2012EDGEDAVAO

Her third installment for this series focused on hard and redwood trees such as the Apitong, Yakal, Tugas, Kamagong, Mang-kono, Bagtikan, Caimito, Lechiyas and Bayabas trees --- all of which are found mostly in the vanishing forests of the Philippines. Typical of an Agnes Loc-sin choreographed piece, the neo-ethnic style that is widely recognized as, solely, her own, she de-picted the multifaceted essence and soul of these trees through bold and in-tense movements to illus-trate their strength amidst the fight from extinction. Award winning danc-ers, Gaye Galiluyo and Georgette Sanchez, took center stage and gave life to this visual tribute. Their lithe bodies were flexed to strong defensive stances and powerful pelvic con-tractions, alongside revo-lutionary and techno-rock rhythms. Gaye and Georgette channelled themselves into the dif-ferent aspects of the tree, in multiple portrayals as seen through chapters Tumbang Troso, Bahay-Bahayan, Nakatagong Lakas, Hubog na Dagta, Ugat na Malawak, Kasari-ang Nakabalot, Armas na Magiting, Bawal Kang Tu-mubo, Bunong Braso, and Saan Kita Hahanapin.

Typical of an Agnes Locsin choreographed piece, the neo-ethnic style that is widely recognized as, solely, her own, she depicted the multifaceted essence and soul of these trees through bold and intense movements to illustrate their strength amidst the fight from extinction.

Agnes... A1

VOL.5 NO. 107 • WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 1, 2012 15EDGEDAVAO SPORTS

JASMINE Alkhaldi gig-gled a lot when asked what to expect from

her when she competes in one of seven heats in the 100-meter freestyle on Wednesday morning in the 30th Olympic Games.

Maybe that’s Jasmine

way of saying that her chances are as grey as the London skies.

“It’s soooooo tough,” said Jasmine a little louder, drawing attention from some athletes a table away as fellow swimmer Jessie Lacuna, coach Pinky Bro-

sas, Team Philippines chief of mission Manny Lopez and administrative officer Arsenic Lacson laughed.

The 19-year-old Pinay swimmer, who took up the sport when she was only three, sees action in the third heat against Mylene

Ong of Singapore, Nastja Govejsek of Slovenia, Ester Dara of Hungary, Liliana Lopez of Mexico, Karen Torres of Bolivia and Cielia Tini of Mauritius, with none of them expected to go beyond the qualifying heats.

Phl swimmer shoots for personal best

US fencing coach Amgad Abd El-Halim Khaz-bak is a very busy man

these days. At the helm of the American’s Olympic campaign in fencing, Coach Amgad has a very unenviable task.

But when the subject mat-ter was Lee Oropilla Kiefer, Coach Amgad lights up and says yes to answer a few ques-tions from this exclusive inter-view by EDGE Davao.

A day after the Half-Fil-ipino US’ top fencing bet in women’s foil crashed out in the quarterfinals against a taller and experienced Italian, Coach Amgad answered some ques-tions from a private message sent by this writer.

Here is our Q and A with Coach Amgad:

EDGE: How do you de-scribe Lee Kiefer as an athlete and student of the sport?

Coach Amgad: Lee (is) one of the best fencers I saw in my life, and she did write her name in the his-tory of fencing as youngest fencer (to) have a medal in senior world championships and as Olympic result too!

EDGE: Having guided Lee to the quarterfinals, what lies ahead for Lee? What needs to be improved in her game?

Coach Amgad: Lee (is) still young, doesn’t believe how much she is good! It has affected her fencing! She can easily be the best fencer in the World and get Gold. EDGE: What is Lee’s best at-tribute? Her best move or strong side in fencing?

Coach Amgad: She is great in attacking! When she need to score she score .

EDGE: Let’s break down on the match against Errigo, what is your analysis of that match? Coach Amgad: Errigo is strong fencer, as I said before if Lee have more confidence she can beat her.

EDGE: Three Italians made it to the semis, what is the distinct advantage of the Italian fencers? Coach Amgad: Italians have a great program, we can’t do this ac-cording to our budget! We need in US to put more money in the sport.

EDGE: How do you think you can break that advan-tage by the Italians and go

ahead of them in the team events?

Coach Amgad: Italian will win the Gold! As a team they are very strong against any-one!

EDGE: What are the chances of Lee and her teammates in the women’s team foil event?

Coach Amgad: We have a chance to have medal! We need to work hard and we can do it.

I thanked Coach Amgad for getting back with his answers. He sure found time despite the hectic sked of the US fencing squad.

Good luck, Coach. The US team is fortunate to have a dedicated coach like you.

Notes: The world no. 5 Kiefer will be competing in the women’s foil team event. Join-ing her are world numbers 19, 22 and 26, Nzingha Prescod, Doris Willette, and Nicole Ross. As a team, the Americans are ranked sixth in the world, boosted by a Pan-American Championship win earlier this month. Unfortunately for the Americans, they have not finished better than fifth at a

World Cup this season, a posi-tion they have occupied in the last two tournaments. In the last Olympics, an underdog American squad that had not finished better than seventh at a world cup that season rose to the moment and stunned the fencing world; but that task will be difficult to repeat, es-pecially with the talent-heavy teams that occupy the first four spots on the world rankings.

The American women shocked the world with a sec-ond place finish in the wom-en’s foil team event in 2008, but have since needed to re-place the entire Olympic roster.

According to observers, the Italians are heavily fa-voured to win the gold with Russia and France right be-hind.

One on one with US Olympic coach

DESPITE falling short in her second Olympics, weight-lifter Hidilyn Diaz thanked all her well-wishers, hours after her defeat on Monday night in the women’s 58kg

category in weightlifting at the London Olympics.“Thank you sa lahat nasupporta sakin kahit natalo na ako at

kahit nazero ako nandyan Parin kayo!! Thank u Talaga guys!!,” Diaz posted on her Facebook account according to a report by Spin.ph..

Diaz failed in her attempt to lift 118kg in the clean and jerk three times after successfully lifting 97kg in the snatch. She cried after the failed attempt. Diaz, 21, was obviously the darling of the crowd as she was lustily cheered on in her second and third attempts.

Philippine Sports Commission executive director Atty. Guill-ermo Iroy, Jr. told EDGE Davao in a text message, “Hidilyn is a very promising athlete. She could really make it big but along the way, pressure is just too high for her, including the psychological aspect.”

She will rise where she falls

“She will rise where she falls enrote to the road to Rio,” Iroy added referring to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, venue of the 2016 Olympic Games.

Diaz received an outpouring of support from well-wishers through social media and the words “Hidilyn Diaz” were one of the trending topics worldwide while the competition was going on.

One of her well-wishers was cager Chris Tiu who tweeted: “So proud of Hidilyn Diaz! Watching her represent the PHL in the London Olympics makes me proud already! Great effort! Head up!!”

WORLD No. 1 Roger Federer advanced to the round of 16 with

a 6-2, 6-2 win over France’s Julien Benneteau in Olympic tennis on Monday.

Federer took less than an hour to dispose of his rival at Wimbledon Centre Court and will next take on Uzbekistan’s Denis Istomin, a 6-7, 7-6, 7-5 winner over Gilles Muller of Luxembourg.

America’s Andy Roddick also advanced, winning his first-round match against Slo-vakia’s Martin Klizan 7-5, 6-4 and will next take on world

No. 2 Novak Djokovic, who a day earlier beat Fabio Fognini 6-7, 6-2, 6-2.

Women’s top seed Victoria Azarenka of Belarus advanced with a 6-1, 3-6, 6-1 victory over Romania’s Irina-Camelia Begu.

Venus Williams eased past French Open finalist Sara Er-rani of Italy 6-3, 6-1, while sister Serena scored a 6-2, 6-3 win over Poland’s Urszula Radwanska.

Former world No. 1 Caro-line Wozniacki edged Bel-gium’s Yanina Wickmayer 6-4, 3-6, 6-3.

Federer, Azarenka advance

Hidilyn Diaz in her final attempt at 118 kg.

Roger Federer of Switzerland (top) and Carolina Wozniacki of Denmark were among those who advanced in tennis at the Olympics Day 3.

VOL.5 NO. 107 • WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 1, 201216 EDGEDAVAOSPORTS

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