Category: Development

Members of Philippine Congress shouldn’t have been given the pork barrel to begin with

July 22, 2013 Kate Natividad 12 Comments

If you will pardon me, but I have a very simplistic take on the issue of pork barrel and it revolves around this simple question: Why are legislators involved in the disbursement of development and project funds? After all, we elect legislators to craft laws. But then we also elect our local government officials to…

Development, Politics

MMDA’s Proposed Ban and Bane

July 20, 2013 John Bay 12 Comments

People are outraged by MMDA’s proposed number coding scheme that is set to ban vehicles plying EDSA for two days instead of one. While the movement seems like a legitimate effort to curb vehicle volume, perhaps the same has not been well thought and apparently costing the administration some points especially with the upcoming SONA….

Development, Government, Politics, Society

Detroit bankruptcy under the weight of urban sprawl and poor transport: Metro Manila has a bit to learn

July 19, 2013 benign0 54 Comments

Sad milestone for a once glorious city and a former citadel of American industrial power. Detroit, Michigan — the city itself and its surrounding metropolitan area home to the United States’ “Big Three” car manufacturers, General Motors, Ford, and Chrysler — yesterday filed for bankruptcy following a decades-long decline the sharpest of which was felt…

Development, Economy, Government, Society

Philippine Public Transportation and Metro Manila’s Squatters

July 16, 2013July 16, 2013 P. Farol 27 Comments

On the wayside of an outrage fiesta over Metro Manila’s teeming population of squatters, people seem to have missed a gaily colored solution piñata: public transportation. After people have salved their poverty butthurt and middle-class angst, perhaps it would be a good idea to revisit a column in Manila Standard called “Happy Hour” where it…

Development, Government

A sustainable solution to the squatter problem in the Philippines

July 16, 2013December 28, 2013 Ilda 48 Comments

Judging from the reaction of the readers to previous articles on squatters in the Philippines, there are definitely more decent Filipinos who are fed up with squatters who bite the hand that feed them compared to the number of readers who defended some of the squatters’ parasitic tendencies. After my suggestion that illegal settlers should…

Development, Society

Pork barrel scam probe by NBI implicates 28 members of Philippine Congress

July 16, 2013 benign0 24 Comments

According to an NBI investigator, it is “the mother of all scams”. Allegations that up to Php10 billion was siphoned off by a syndicate into dummy firms is rocking the foundations of both chambers of Philippine Congress. Linked to the scandal are no less than five senators and 23 congressmen. Was it a racket knowingly…

Crime, Development, Politics

Party-List politicians seek audience with Anti-Squatter postergirl Bianca Gonzalez

July 12, 2013 benign0 26 Comments

One wonders what else Kabataan party-list Rep. Terry Ridon wants to discuss with Bianca Gonzalez in a “dialogue” he is reportedly seeking with the famous model-turned-TV-personality. I suppose the question to Ridon is quite simple: What part of Gonzalez’s tweet that “So many people working hard to save to buy a house on prime land…

Development, Glitz and Glamour, Society

A lot of decent Filipinos are getting fed up with arrogant squatters

July 10, 2013March 29, 2022 Ilda 745 Comments

The squatters in the Philippines have wreaked havoc in the country and they are out of control. The problem is quite obvious and the solution is staring everyone in the face; there are just not enough public servants with enough guts to address the issue. But someone has to put an end to the vicious…

Crime, Development, Lifestyle, Society