Former Senate President Manny Villar OF TREES AND FOREST We are entering a decisive moment in our fight against the COVID-19 pandemic. The 7-day moving average of new cases has plummeted to 5,732 from a high of 20,915 around the second week of September. Active cases are down to 66,887 from a high...
OF TREES AND FOREST Former Senate President Manny Villar Why do people run for public office? What motivates people to devote themselves to 60 or 90 days of grueling campaign, cruel and unfair attacks on one’s character, loss of financial resources, and, in some instances, put their lives on the...
OF TREES AND FOREST Former Senate President Manny Villar Getting a college education has always been a life goal, even a status symbol for Filipinos. Having a college diploma—that big, laminated piece of paper hanging in your living room—is considered by many as one of the indicators of...
OF TREES AND FOREST Former Senate President Manny Villar It’s a grim number. There were 22,366 new COVID-19 infections last August 29, 2021. That’s a record-high number for the country. The rate of those people who received positive results from the more than 71,000 tests was 27.5 percent....
OF TREES AND FOREST Former Senate President Manny Villar The government of Afghanistan, which the United States helped put up and supported for 20 years, has collapsed. The US has made the decision to withdraw from the country they invaded in 2001 as a response to the horrific 9/11 attacks on the...
Of Trees and Forest Former Senate President Manny Villar Government will soon decide whether to extend the current Enhanced Community Quarantine (ECQ) beyond August 20. There have been suggestions from some quarters to extend the strict lockdown to the end of the month. There was even some chatter...
OF TREES AND FOREST Former Senate President Manny Villar We have been in some form of quarantine since March 15, 2020. I cannot remember all the acronyms (GCQ, ECQ, MECQ) assigned to the different levels of restrictions because they have mutated so much just like the COVID-19 variants. And starting...
OF TREES AND FOREST Former Senate President Manny Villar We seem to be caught in an unending Groundhog Day-like cycle of surges and lockdowns. We would experience a surge in new daily COVID-19 cases — similar to the one that hit us around March and April this year when daily cases reached a high...
OF TREES AND FOREST Former Senate President Manny Villar It is true what Indian writer Anita Desai once wrote: “Wherever you go becomes a part of you somehow.” Going to other places are not temporary destinations where you merely stop and go. They stay with you — the beauty and the...
OF TREES AND FOREST Former Senate President Manny Villar A statement released by the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) and picked up by various news organizations has stirred the pot among Filipino netizens online. In the statement dated July 9, 2021, the DTI’s Bureau of Philippine Standards...
OF TREES AND FOREST Former Senate President Manny Villar In my column last June 16, 2021 entitled “Can elections be meaningful in a pandemic?”, I discussed the imperative for our election officials to learn from the lessons of countries who decided to push through with democratic elections...
OF TREES AND FOREST Former Senate President Manny Villar I express my condolences to the Aquino family and the entire Filipino nation on the demise of former President Benigno Simeon C. Aquino, III who died and was buried last week. As I said in the statement I issued to the press, I admired the...
