We beg to differ.
Between Sulu Sultan Jamalul Kiram III and Philippine President Benigno Simeon ‘BS’ Aquino III, who do you think has more balls? At the risk of being labeled biased, I’d say Sultan Kiram has my vote. Don’t get me wrong, not that I condone what he and his followers did – trooped to Sabah, refused to…
Read More “Game of thrones: Sultan Jamalul Kiram III flies the Philippine flag on Sabah soil” »
At the end of the day, what exactly is ‘the Philippines’ to begin with? The way things are going, it seems it will remain no more than the bunch of tropical islands around which the 16th Century Spanish crown drew a ring and named after their king. To this day, Filipinos suffer from the same…
Philippine President Benigno Simeon ‘BS’ Aquino III is reportedly the subject of a complaint filed by officials of Anakpawis party-list to Commissions on Elections (COMELEC) Chairman Sixto Brillantes Jr. BS Aquino is being accused of blatantly using bribes to buy votes for his “Team PNoy†for the coming mid-term elections in May 2013. Apparently, the…
Read More “President Noynoy Aquino shows he is at his best when campaigning and not when working” »
Mediocre political leadership. These are the words Malaysian former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad used to describe a key possible pitfall of “unbridled democracy”. This he said in a speech he delivered on the occasion of his being conferred an Honorary Professor Title by the University of Santo Tomas. Mahathir also added that free-wheeling democracy can…
Introduction When I visited Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia last year, I saw a banner run across the two Petronas towers with the following words in Malay on it: Daulat Tuanku As soon as I could, I searched on Google what this phrase means. It is more or less the Malay equivalent of the English expression…
Read More “Filipinos: like a ship lost at sea searching for a beacon” »
Labels are now the “in†thing among so-called “intellectuals†of the Philippine blogosphere. Some Filipinos who are actively participating in debates are suddenly identifying themselves as either libertarian, conservative, progressive, socialist, communist, etcetera, etcetera. Apparently, there are people who think that you need to identify yourself with a particular ideology. Otherwise, they insist on putting…
Read More “Are Filipinos individualist, collectivist, or just a bunch of moochers?” »
Seeing foreign direct investment, cash handouts, and subsidies as the silver bullet that will cure chronic Filipino poverty? Think again. Lots of lessons are to be learned in what former Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohammad said in a speech at the Harvard Club of Malaysia dinner on 29 July 2002 about how the presence of…