The Four-eyed Journal » De-La-Salle-Philippines

De La Salle Brothers’ Open Letter to the COMELEC

jhay — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 12:38:25 +0000

The De La Salle Brothers in the Philippines have once more stepped up to the plate and made a stand on the upcoming 2010 automated elections. They have voiced their concerns via an open letter to the COMELEC which was published in the Philippine Daily Inquirer last April 8, 2010. I’m publishing, the full text of the said open letter:

De La Salle Brothers’ Open Letter to COMELEC

Philippine Lasallian Family Statement on the Maguindanao Massacre

jhay — Sun, 29 Nov 2009 04:50:43 +0000

I’m reproducing here the statement of the Philippine Lasallian Family on the Maguindanao Massacre.

————-
Brutal, barbaric, and heinous. These were words used to describe the
Maguindanao massacre that has claimed the lives of more than 50 people-the majority of them being political supporters, lawyers and media practitioners in the company of scions of a political clan.

Eyewitness reports from survivors have pointed to the perpetrators responsible for this gruesome mass execution, and while verification of these accounts has yet to be done, there is little doubt that at the core of this barbarism is a politics bereft of principle, a politics that has lost touch with the very foundations of human decency. What happened in Maguindanao was an animal act. The savage atrocities wreaked upon the victims and horrifyingly evident on their mutilated corpses beggars the imagination. This incident is a warning about the depths to which human beings can descend when they allow the lust for power, possessions and prestige to take over their lives.

“God is not mocked. Whatsoever a man sows, so shall he reap”(Gal 6:7). Let us not fool ourselves. The Maguindanao Massacre is not a mere election-related feud. It is a symptom of the moral bankruptcy, lack of accountability, and wanton disregard for human rights that has characterized the culture of the Arroyo administration since consolidating its power in the contested elections of 2004. Such trends, well-documented by various local and international human rights agencies and by no less than the Special Rapporteur of the United Nations Human Rights Commission in 2007, have been tolerated for too long.

The Arroyo administration took a double tack, on the one hand, expressing indignation at “a most heinous crime” that constitutes a “supreme act of inhumanity that is a blight on our nation,´ while on the other hand, dragging its heels in pursuing the capture and detention of a political ally whose fortunes flourished under this administration´s patronage. We note that the administration´s invocation of the rule of law and call for the respect of due process, while appropriate in normal circumstances, sounds mightily suspect coming from an administration that is beholden to the political clan said to be behind this atrocity, an administration that has failed to successfully prosecute any of its allies and supporters for corruption, human rights violations, and other
high crimes. Actions speak louder than words.. Why treat with kid gloves those who use their influence to silence their political opponents and disenfranchise citizens in elections? Why weren’t the alleged murderers at least immediately called in for questioning, if only to answer the charges of survivors or clarify the presence of the local government´s backhoe in the area of the mass grave?

An additional source of discomfort is the clear dereliction of duty of the police and military in the province and region who were informed earlier about the prospect of a violent incident and decided to steer clear of deploying forces to prevent the lawless armed thugs of the political warlord from carrying out their sinister plan. While the military was quickly mobilized to avoid any possible retaliation of the aggrieved clan, the leadership of the Armed Forces at present (with a Defense Secretary that headed an Inter-agency Legal Action Group that prioritized cases of extra-judicial killings perpetrated by “enemies of the state,”) leaves much doubt as to its capacity to effectively defang armed political warlords.

We condemn the Maguindanao Massacre not only because of the brutal and barbaric murder of those who sought only to exercise their political rights, but more importantly because it unravels in a most telling way, the age-old problem of a feeble state that has allowed private armed groups to lord it over territories in exchange for propping up the national leadership and its cohorts at the local and national levels. Whatever blight we now face does not fall simply on the hands of the alleged perpetrators of the Maguindanao Massacre. The blood that flowed in Maguindanao stains the hands of the President who ultimately commands the forces of political control and coercion in this country. We demand that justice be done with all transparency and in the quickest possible time.

We call on Lasallians and all Filipinos to express our indignation at the
moral bankruptcy that has led to this paroxysm of violence. If we are not
to be complicit in this abomination against humanity, we must act now
and demand that this administration be held accountable for the quality
of its stewardship and for its continuing debasement of the political
system.

(Sgd)

Br. Edmundo Fernandez FSC
Brother Visitor

Br. Victor Franco
Auxilliary Visitor

Br. Felipe Belleza FSC
District Council Member

Br. Narciso Erguiza Jr. FSC
District Council Member

Br. Dennis Magbanua FSC
District Council Member

Br. Armin Luistro FSC
District Council Member

Br. Ray Suplido FSC
District Council Member

Br. Jose Mari Jimenez FSC
District Council Member

Tree-planting photos & Bloggers’ Kapihan Round-up

jhay — Sun, 09 Sep 2007 23:18:58 +0000

The weekend has been an exhausting one, evidently from the lack of updates to this blog and my apparent disappearance from the online world. Nonetheless, I have little regrets for the things I’ve done offline were equally important and well-worth their online equivalents. Bawi na lang ako sa susunod na Bloggers’ Kapihan.hehehe

Let’s focus on the Tree-planting activity first. It’s my second under the Lasallian Institute For the Environment and just like the first one, it was fun and totally new experience; a new adventure so to speak.

The contingency was made up of students from DLSU-Manila, the La Salle Professional Schools, DLS-Health Science Campus, La Salle Antipolo, College of St. Benilde and of course from DLSU-Dasmarinas. (Some one please correct me if I’m wrong )

Leading the DLSU-D team was the University Student Council represented by none other than our president Joymay Amihan who came straight from a 5-day seminar on the environment from Subic. Talk about resiliency right?

Of course, the SERVE Volunteers were once more present and so active in this eco-friendly campaign. If I’m not mistaken, they were the first ones to finish planting the seedlings assigned to them. Giving them more time to play around, meet the other La Salle students and become complete camera whores. Just look at the slideshow below.

More photos can be found in Zooomr account. The activity was a success as we were able to plant all of the seedlings we brought with us, 2 of which are endemic to Mts Palay-palay/Mataas na Gulod. This would ensure the growth and survival of the trees and the preservation of the mountain park’s natural ecosystem. I look forward to the next tree-planting activity as we move forward to achieving our La Salle’s goal of planting 1 Million trees by 2011.

So that’s where you’ve been

Yup, that’s why I wasn’t able to join the Bloggers’ Kapihan last Saturday. Nonetheless, I’m proud and happy that the event was a success. Congratulations to my fellow BK Crew who were there and really did the most of the hard work in making the event a success. Kuya Mong, Shari, Sir Martz, Ederic, Sarah, Bikoy and Vencer bawi ako sa inyo sa susunod. Pwamis!

Tons of thanks and link loves to all the sponsors for the first Bloggers’ Kapihan:

Digital Filipino

DigitalFilipino.com is a personal website of Janette Toral that discusses e-commerce developments in the Philippines. She also has a community of e-commerce enthusiasts and software process improvement students.

Philippine Genre Stories

http://philippinegenrestories.blogspot.com/

Minor sponsors

Pinoy Web Hosting Solutions

The AnitoKid Chronikos

And special thanks to:

Google Pilipinas and GMAnews.tv

Now here’s what bloggers have said about the 1st Bloggers’ Kapihan

Bloggers Kapihan + Post-Event @ Giligan’s Trinoma by thE.thumBSuckeR saying that:

Prolly the best bloggers EB that I’ve attended ever!

Bloggers’ Kapihan by Filipino Librarian who says:

the most interesting thing for me was to interact once again with bloggers who have encountered the same problems and difficulties I’ve had as a blogger, and who do not think blogging is merely a fad, or worse, a useless exercise.

Leftovers at Bloggers’ Kapihan by Frances who inspite of being had a great time at the event.

The BK Crew was saved by Ms Noemi who called up Yuga which reminded him that he was a key-speaker for the event. The amazing Pinoy Problogger made it in time for his talk at the Bloggers’ Kapihan. Many many thanks Ms Noemi, you’re truly heavent sent!

I’m sure there are more write-ups about the first Bloggers’ Kapihan. Thank you once more to all those who supported this event and much more thanks to my fellow BK crew for everything! Mabuhay kayong lahat!

LIFE Reborn

jhay — Sat, 25 Aug 2007 05:10:54 +0000

One of the projects I’ve been so busy with this past few weeks, if not months is the redesign and re-development of the Lasallian Institute For the Environment’s (LIFE) website. My first encounter with LIFE was when I joined a tree-planting activity on Mts Palay-palay/Mataas na Gulod last year as part of their ambitious and noble One Million Trees Project.

What’s LIFE?

From the name itself, and its flaghsip project, LIFE is a newly created institution of the La Salle Philippines Provincialate that aims to fulfill the De La Salle Philippines’ role of being God’s stewards of creation.

The One Million Trees project is an initiative that aims to plant 1 Million trees by the year 2011, which is the De La Salle Philippines’ centennial anniversary in the country.

A tall order

Sir Wowie, a good friend of my college mentor, Sir Yuri knew that I was quite handy with the internet and websites and thought I could be of help in the re-design of their former website, which back then was a relic from the realms of Web 1.0, it was all html, no CSS and had *shudders* tables. It was nicely designed though so kudos to Dan who built the site and later on my would be partner in this new project.

So I was introduced to Dan and Tito Ben, LIFE’s founder and Executive Director who immediately put me in the project. They told me that they wanted the site to be dynamic, with regularly updated news, stories, other rich content like videos and audio clips. They also wanted the site to feature and highlight the projects and initiatives by LIFE in an interactive manner. They wanted readers to comment on their stories, news, announcements, etc. They wanted a shoutbox so that visitors could leave a message on the fly, they wanted a photo gallery, a downloads section, summarizing what they need and envisioned for the site, they simply needed a CMS or a content-management system.

There are dozens of CMS platforms out there, like Drupal, PHP-Nuke, Joomla and yes WordPress. I came clean and honest with them that my programming skills are nothing to be so proud of as I am not formally trained in web programming, let alone creating and managing databases and creating a custom CMS from scratch.

They kindly considered that fact but still held on to me for advice and eventually, actual work on the site.

The first thing I did before taking on the project was assesing their current host’s specs and capabilities. I forgot who their webhost was, but it was something I was not comfortable working with. It was a Plesk-powered, Windows-run webhost account that 1) I wasn’t so familiar with, 2) I do not personally prefer to work on.

This bias comes from my limited experience of dabbling with WordPress, PHP-Nuke, Drupal, Fantastico, CPanel and FTP clients this past 4 years or so of being a netizen and blogger. Aside from blogging, I took on a small hobby of fiddling with the online apps and whatchamacallits becoming a newbie webmaster only tru experienec, trial-and-error and experiments.

My recommendation to them was to switch from a Windows-based webhosting account to Linux-based one. It’s a lot cheaper and allows for a certain degree of flexibility and robustness. Gladly, they agreed and decided to put me in complete control of the project.

Yikes!

I took on the project as a big opportunity to learn new things, work with new people much more knowledgable than me and to help out LIFE, because hey, I’m now a Lasallian, with a touch of blue of course. *ehem*

Drupal or WordPress?

I initially decided on using Drupal and customizing or extending it to suit LIFE’s needs which weren’t that complex. So the past 4 months or so, I spent whatever spare time I had dabbling and learning the inner workings of Drupal. It wasn’t such a simple and easy task, I even made little to no progress alone. Aside from Drupal’s steep learning curve for newbies like me, blogging on WordPress ate all of my time and my learning curve. Since I’ve been using it since, I’ve become so acustomed and comfortable with WP, I believe I have the basic know-how in making it work to meet LIFE’s online needs.

So that custom Drupal-based prototype for LIFE was shelved and I downloaded a fresh kit of WordPress and started tweaking PHP files once more. I figured that with what LIFE has stated for their needs, a blog would be best for them at this time. A more promising assurance is the emergence of a movement that is now pushing WordPress as a full-pledged CMS and not just a blogging plaform. More on this in a later post.

LIFE 2.0 (beta)

So the result is the new LIFE site that could be seen today, which was soft-launched last August 20, 2007. It uses a tweaked Mandigo theme plus a staple of WP plugins that add more functionality to WordPress.

The custom header will be changed to a more elegant design by the month’s end. The photo gallery and downloads section will follow suit. It’s basically a work in progress but it’s ready to serve LIFE’s needs of making its presence felt in the world wide web and pushing for its mission of being God’s stewards of creation.

It even has username@life.net.ph mailbox system powered by Gmail for your domain, which is a component of Google Apps suite. I plan on installing ActiveCollab on its back end so that LIFE core members and staff could carry out their work, planning and other collaborative projects online.

Lastly, an online discussion board would be setup once the LIFE community gets active online. Lots more are instore for the future, things will come as LIFE itself grows into a solid and well-known Lasallian institution for the environment and human development.

Do check out the new LIFE site, subscribe to their RSS feed and if you feel like it, join in one of their projects in saving our environment and securing a better future for all of us.