Already suffering from a protracted El Niño season, large areas of Luzon and Visayas teetered on the brink of electric power failure as the Department of Energy (DOE) and the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines (NGCP) issued several Red and Yellow Alert notices last week. High peak...
“Road traffic injuries are a major yet often neglected public health issue. Deaths and injuries from road crashes are preventable, and all sectors have a role to play in promoting road safety.” This is a message that the World Health Organization (WHO) has delivered many times in the past...
Amid the news of El Nino’s damage to agriculture, preparations for La Niña, and a change in leadership in the Senate, many may have missed the signing of the Implementing Rules and Regulations (IRR) of the Tatak Pinoy (Proudly Filipino) Act or Republic Act No. 11981, on May 22, 2024. The signing...
Housing, jobs, and education are three of the basic needs that the government should address to build a stronger and more prosperous Philippines. In fact in December last year, the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) disclosed that over 25 million Filipinos struggle to meet their basic needs,...
The sudden change in the Senate leadership isn’t something new. It had happened in the past, the most controversial of which was the ouster of then Senate President Jovito Salonga in 1991. On Monday, May 20, 2024, Senator Juan Miguel Zubiri stepped down as Senate president, paving...
“Those who have less in life should have more in law” was the credo that serves as the enduring legacy of the late former President Ramon Magsaysay. According to the Social Weather Stations’ March 2024 survey on self-rated poverty, there is an estimated 12.9 million poor families in the...
At the first-ever National Higher Education Summit held last week, President Marcos declared that “the most important service that government must provide to its people is a good education.” Noting that in the recent Times Higher Education’s 2024 Asia University Rankings, no Philippine...
Today would be a good time to explore a museum to revisit the stories that formed the Filipino culture and identity. Even for avid museum visitors, there will always be something new about an artifact that will give another view to an old story. Today would also be a good day for story-telling. Sit...
Major changes have been brought about by the shift from analog to digital technology. Social media platforms are now dominant, serving as the most influential purveyors of information and new ideas. One of the beneficial outcomes of these changes is the emergence of influential women and youth...
The testimony of an Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) official before a Senate hearing was quite revealing. The regulatory body primarily relies on desk monitoring—wherein companies are required to submit a report on the conditions of their plants—rather than conducting physical...
La Niña, the opposite of El Niño, is a climatic phenomenon characterized by unusually cooler sea surface temperatures in the central and eastern equatorial Pacific. While El Niño brings drought and heat, La Niña tends to trigger above-normal rainfall, potentially leading to flooding,...
Last week, the Supreme Court (SC) demonstrated its will to ensure equal and inclusive justice, one of the four guiding principles in the Strategic Plan for Judicial Innovations (SPJI) 2022-2027 enunciated by the en banc led by Chief Justice Alexander Gesmundo. At the joint 2024 Asia and the...
