The Manila Times UST and ‘The Varsitarian’ quadricentennial reunion
tarian holds its ValikVarsi quad- ricentennial reunion, at the Plaza Mayor of the University of Santo Tomas (UST) in Manila. The homecoming is part of the 400th year of UST in 2011. The Varsitarian is the official student paper of UST, the Philip- pines’ and Asia’s oldest university. The Varsitarian is the country’s oldest Catholic newspaper. It be- gan publication in 1928. Among the Varsitarian alumni
O
who have confirmed their attend- ance, according to the Inquirer are: National Artists for Literature F. Sionil José and Bienvenido Lum- bera; Emma Navarro, widow of National Artist for the Visual Arts J. Elizalde Navarro, who was art edi- tor of the Varsitarian in the 1950s; veteran visual artist Danny Dalena; Philippine Long Distance Tel- ephone Co. senior VP Jun Florencio; former New York Times correspond- ent Alice Colet-Villadolid; Inquirer columnists Neal Cruz and Rina
N Saturday, December 11, starting at 6 p.m. the Varsi-
Jimenez-David; and former Sen. Francisco Tatad.
There will be a tribute to Varsi-
tarian alumni who have passed away—Ophelia Alcantara-Dima- lanta, Wilfrido Nolledo, José Burgos Jr. and Eric Giron. UST is the best school of journalism in the Philippines. I was managing editor of The
Varsitarian in my senior year and its news editor in my third year. As news editor, I started the weekly Varsitarian, a no mean feat in those days because we were printing the paper offset (which took more time), unlike the weekly papers of UP, FEU and UE, which used the faster letterpress. After graduating magna cum laude in journalism, I wanted to enroll at the UST Graduate School so I could again vie for the edi- torship, which was denied me twice—“because of my views,” ac- cording to a professor of mine who taught me economics. “My views could embarrass UST,” he ex- plained. Accordingly, instead of al-
TONY LOPEZ
lowing me to enroll again, UST de- clared me “an undesirable student.” So I decided to work full time and joined The Manila Chronicle as busi- ness reporter and the Voice of the Philippines as a radio news writer. I would report for work at VOP at 4 a.m. to write the 6 a.m. newscast and to the Chronicle at 2 p.m. to write my business stories. The editor picked by UST and her staff lampooned the Pope during his visit. The entire V staff was sacked. As for me, I got a pri- vate audience—and blessings— from the same Pope—for good work during his papal visit. UP is 100. Ateneo is 150. But UST is 400 years old. In terms of herit-
Pilipinas, Kay Ganda!
E have often gotten used to the bad news and stories in our country that has often cov- ered the front pages of our news- papers and the headlines of our TV News programs. Yet, in the past several weeks, there have been several good stories that are worth noting and celebrating. These good stories make us real- ize that there is so much to hope for in our country and more im- portantly, they show that the Fili- pino can compete with the best in the world.
W HARVEY KEH One of them is the announce-
ment by international business groups that our country is now at the top of the Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) industry overtaking India in this sector. The BPO industry is one of our economy’s growth drivers since it provides thousands of jobs to Filipinos and at the same time brings in billions of dollars in investments to our country. This sector if nurtured properly can be one of our country’s main weap- ons against poverty since it gives its employees an above average salary ranging from at least P 20,000.00 to up to P40,000.00 per month which is more than enough to provide the needs for a family of four to six members. Sadly, our education system
hasn’t been able to cope with the high demand for skilled BPO workers. That is why some BPO companies still find it hard to fill up their vacancies. Let us hope that our government particularly the Department of Education will
address the problems of access and quality of our public basic education system so that more Filipinos can become competent enough to be hired in this grow- ing BPO industry in our country. Another good news this week is in the field of sports. Our na- tional football team recently held their Singapore counterparts to a draw while bringing down the highly-favored Vietnamese team, 2-0. As we all know, our country is a known lightweight in the football world and in the past Southeast Asian Games, our foot- ball teams have been the peren- nial whipping boys of the tour- nament. Yet, in the current Asean Football Federation (AFF) Suzuki Cup being held in Vietnam, they surprised everyone by beating the defending champion Vietnamese team in front of their 40,000 hometown fans. Many sports analysts and ex-
perts have consistently said that Filipinos have the physical gifts to excel in football if only our ath- letes were given proper training and exposure abroad. Sadly, much of our funds still go to basketball which is a sport that requires height and heft, something that
we are lacking compared to peo- ple of other countries. Perhaps this huge achievement by our football team will awaken our government leaders and the private sector to- ward investing more in our na- tional football development pro- gram. Who knows? Perhaps all of us will still live to see the day that our country will be able to com- pete in the World Cup.
In the realm of politics and gov- ernance where public distrust is usually high, the recent Pulse Asia survey continues to show that al- most eight out of 10 Filipinos still trust President Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino 3rd despite some earlier missteps of his administration. The very high trust rating of Aquino goes to show that Filipi- nos are willing to be patient with him as he continues to promote good governance and sustainable reforms in our country.
One thing that is good about this present administration is that they have been very trans- parent to the public with regard to the things that they have been doing. Some critics have actu- ally said that Aquino may have become too candid about how he feels about certain issues but I feel that this total honesty in the public eye is what Filipinos appreciate more about him. In the last administration, it was rare for the President to actually face the media and answer ques- tions pertaining to different is- sues but in Aquino’s case, he has always made it a point to make time to let the Filipino people
Surge in US students of Arabic »news analysis
BY KARIN ZEITVOGEL AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
WASHINGTON: Arabic was the fastest- growing foreign language for US university study last year, with enrollments growing by more than 46 percent compared to 2006, a study released Wednesday showed. Besides English, Arabic leap- frogged Latin and Russian to land in eighth place on the most studied lan- guage list, which has been compiled 22 times since 1958 by the Modern Language Association (MLA). Other languages that showed double-digit percentage growth were Korean, which grew by just over 19 percent; Chinese, up by 18.2 percent; American sign lan- guage, up 16.4 percent, and Por-
On the ABS-CBN TV interview of Mr. Joma Sison
THIS is a reaction to the interview of Mr. Jose Ma. Sison by ABS- CBN’s Anthony Taberna. Mr. Sison has not changed through the years. In every interview, he makes it appear that the commu- nist ideology is the best answer to the country’s ills and that he alone can make it possible. To further the “revolution,” Mr. Sison goes all-out to sacrifice the people’s lives no matter what. We have seen all these in the attacks being conducted by his cohorts against innocent civilians, military and lawmen, local officials and all those who may stand in the way of his so-called revolution. He has blamed the military for rights abuses, for deaths of civil- ians in crossfire, for almost any-
tuguese, by around 11 percent. But Spanish remains far and
away the most popular language other than English that is studied at US universities, with nearly 865,000 enrollments—a rise of five percent over 2006. Next came French, with 216,000 enrollments and German with 96,000. French was up nearly five percent and German around two percent compared to 2006. The report shows that French enrollments reached an all-time high of 388,000 in 1968, the year the country was rocked by massive strikes, riots and civil unrest. By 1980, they had fallen back to 248,000.
Enrollments for Russian spiked from around 24,000 in 1980 to
nearly 45,000 in 1990, when the Soviet Union was on the brink of breaking up. Five years later, they were back down to around 25,000. The number enrolling in Arabic courses have grown from 5,500 in 1998—when al-Qaeda claimed the US Embassy bombings in Nai- robi and Dar-es-Salaam that killed hundreds—to 10,584 in 2002, the year before the US-led invasion of Iraq, and 35,000 this year. The study counts enrollments, not number of students, the MLA points out, stressing that a single student majoring in a language may be enrolled in one or more classes in that language.
Language class enrollments
were collected from 2,514 US col- leges and universities, representing
99 percent of higher education institutions offering languages in the United States, the report said. Students at US universities can study everything from native American languages—the most popular of which was Hawaiian with more than 2,000 enrollments in 2009—to Kurdish, which saw enrollments triple from six to 18 between 2006 and 2010. Afghan Pushtu saw an astound-
ing growth curve, from zero enroll- ments in 2006 to 95 in 2009. The popularity of Old Church
Slavic is waning—only 73 enroll- ments last year compared to 133 in 2006—while New Testament Greek rocketed from zero enroll- ments in 2006 to 95 last year, just like Afghan Pushtu.
Send comments to
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thing and everything. He claims to know all the events happening in our land and quickly reacts to issues not favorable to the NPA or to the communist movement which he represents. I think there is no basis for him to put the blame on the military. He is liv- ing a life of abundance and luxu- ry and operates the CPP/NPA by remote control. He doesn’t have firsthand knowledge of what is truly happening here.
He champions the poor in
words but he does not do any- thing to solve poverty and really help the people. He claims pov- erty can be solved after the revo-
lution meaning he wants more people to die for his revolution to succeed. What the country needs are active solutions to alle- viate poverty and not mere lip service coming from Mr. Sison. Joma won’t come home. He has already found a home in The Netherlands and enjoys a luxuri- ous lifestyle wearing signature clothes and eating in plush, high- end and gourmet restaurants. The condition he has set for himself to come home is highly impossi- ble. No way really.
And who is he to rate President
Aquino? He might have forgotten that President Aquino won in a
democratic election and enjoys the mandate of the people. So no argument there whatsoever. Mr. Sison has lost his luster (if there was any) and no longer has the support of the people whom he has duped over and over. His movement’s members no longer place their trust in him and this has resulted in factionalism in their organization.
The purges in the CPP/NPA has
also gravely affected the move- ment. Mr. Sison is a despot, a dic- tator, a______(libelous word taken out by the editor) who is leading the CPP/NPA to self-destruction. A word of advice for Mr. Sison— stop play-acting. The CPP/NPA deception is today’s truth and nothing else.
RICARDO B. FORTALEZA Scout Limbaga, Q.C.
fortalezaricardo@yahoo.com
know about what is happening in his government.
Let us just hope and pray that he will continue to use his politi- cal stock wisely and will not be swayed by people around him who have self-serving interests. Finally, the Alternative Indig- enous Development Foundation Inc. based in Bacolod City brought pride and honor again to our country. Its ingenious use of a hydraulic ram pump to bring water to more than 170 upland villages won this year’s BBC World Challenge. Access to clean water is very important since without it a com- munity becomes susceptible to diseases due to a lack of hygiene among its members. More impor- tantly, this innovative venture al- lows the villagers to save money and time since they no longer have to walk for several kilome- ters just to be able get their wa- ter. The time and money saved can now be used for other activi- ties such as the education of their children and setting up their own small livelihood programs. There are so many wonderful and inspiring stories in our coun- try that we need to celebrate and be proud of. Indeed, when one reads about these stories, one can easily say, Pilipinas, Kay Ganda!
Comments are welcome at
harveykeh@gmail.com. Visit my blog at: http://
harveykeh.wordpress.com.
Follow me at:
http://twitter.com/ harveykeh.
http://kayanatin.com
B
age thus, UST is the greatest univer- sity in the Philippines and in Asia. UST was founded in 1611, an- tedating by 25 years the found- ing of Harvard in 1636. Harvard, as you know, is the oldest insti- tution of higher learning in the United States. UST is also the larg- est Catholic university in the world, as a single campus. Unlike Harvard which was named after its benefactor, John Harvard, UST was named after a saint and an intellectual, Saint Thomas Aquinas, the foremost Dominican theologian.
Money started up Harvard. In- tellectual and moral pursuit started up UST. Remember the US financial
meltdown of 2008 and 2009 which triggered the worst reces- sion in 80 years? The major play- ers—those who were on the wrong side of history, to use a fa- mous Harvard alumnus’ words— were graduates of Harvard. Unlike Harvard, UST is both a royal university and a pontifical
university. In the name of the king of Spain and in the name of the Pope in Rome.
UST is the living proof that the Philippines was already a civilized country when the Americans came, supposedly to liberate the country from 356 years of Spanish rule. In 1896, the Americans had claimed they had to conquer the Philip- pines to civilize the natives. Indeed, 375 years earlier,
Ferdinand Magellan was making the same claim. He was conquer- ing Las Islas Filipinas in the name of God and in the name of the king of Spain. Yet, the men who went with Magellan to Southeast Asia were the dregs of Spanish and Portuguese society. “Maton” (goons) is the word used by my good friend, Chitang Nakpil. “They committed all kinds of crimes and were fleeing from the law and Magellan got them as his men,” Chitang said in the inter- view by Jojo Silvestre in PhilStar last Sunday.
UST has produced more na-
tional heroes than any university in the Philippines, and that in- cludes Ateneo and UP. Ateneo claims the national hero, Rizal, as one of its alumni. But Rizal first went to UST before go- ing to Ateneo. UP also likes to say it produced the best literary writ- ers. Those writers were first edu- cated at UST before they went to UP to study further and to teach. At least three presidents were educated at UST—Sergio Osmeña, Manuel L. Quezon, and Diosdado Macapagal. They were all Bar top- notchers. They are among our coun- try’s best and most beloved leaders. UP produced five presidents—
Jose P. Laurel, Manuel Roxas, Elpidio Quirino, Ferdinand Marcos and Gloria Macapagal Arroyo. Among them are the most vilified and hated of Philippine presidents. Those who want to attend the
ValikVarsi reunion may call Rose- AnDioquino 0915-8663289 or Aki Barrios 0906-5565054.
Bna.biznewsasia@
gmail.com China’s clouded lens
EIJING: The paradox of a ris- ing China—a country that
wants to play a bigger role in glo- bal affairs but suffers from a com- bination of lethargy and stage fright—was on display here at a conference with Chinese officials. “China needs to be less of an
observer and more of an actor” on major issues such as North Korea and currency adjustments, de- clared one senior Chinese official during the meeting. “When we’re on the stage, we shouldn’t turn our back on the audience, as if we’re part of the audience.” And yet, when it came to pro- posing solutions during a meeting last Friday with American and Eu- ropean visitors, the Chinese were cautious. Officials didn’t disagree that North Korea and the imbal- ances in the global economy were big problems. But their recom- mendations focused on discussion rather than action—to the point that harmonious talk seemed an end in itself. China’s prescription for North
Korea is “dialogue, dialogue, dia- logue,” said Jun Fu, the executive dean of the school of government at Beijing University, at a news con- ference after the meeting ended. That passivity frustrates State De- partment officials, who think Beijing is privately fed up with North Korean brinksmanship, ac- cording to a State Department ca- ble made public by WikiLeaks. The conference was an unusual effort to explore areas of common interest and, potentially, joint ac- tion. It was hosted by the Central Party School, a leadership train- ing center headed by Xi Jinping, who is slated to be China’s next president. The other sponsors were the Aspen Strategy Group (where I’m a member) and the Aspen Institute Italia. “This isn’t a situation where we’re talking past each other, but we don’t seem to have the ability to act to- gether” despite “a surprising degree of common interest,” said Nicholas Burns, a former undersecretary of state who is director of the Aspen Strategy Group. On North Korea, he noted, China has the most leverage but “seems reluctant to use it” and “isn’t meeting the test yet” as a se- curity partner.
The meeting was held on the campus of the party school in the suburbs of Beijing. The school’s bland courtyards contrast with the gaudy architecture of the new downtown Beijing, clustered with fancy hotels and luxury boutiques. The anxieties that accompany
China’s new wealth were appar- ent in a story that ran in the offi- cial China Daily on the morning of our meeting. It described the trend among the country’s new rich to hire private bodyguards. Sometimes, it seems, gaining wealth just makes people more nervous about losing it. Several Chinese officials who
DAVID IGNATIUS
attended the not-for-attribution meeting explained that China is wary about foreign policy in part because officials are focused in- stead on maintaining domestic economic growth and keeping a potentially restless public happy. “I’m not saying that China is
selfish,” said a senior official, who then conceded that Beijing does indeed think first about its inter- nal problems. In the case of North Korea, China fears that pressuring Pyongyang would send desperate refugees across the border. The conversation produced a few signs of movement. One professor at the party school began by dis- missing US pleas for adjustment of China’s currency. But after more discussion, the professor said that perhaps China could reduce its trade surplus by raising salary lev- els so workers could buy more im- ports from the US. He even pro- posed a “coordination mecha- nism” to foster balanced trade. What frustrates US officials is that China sometimes seems more comfortable accommodating a strong United States, as it did in past decades, than partnering with an America that’s less dominant. One American delegate chided the Chinese for treating the Obama administration’s early concessions as signs of weakness, and for mak- ing a hawkish new claim that the South China Sea was a “core in- terest” for China. Joseph Nye, a Harvard profes- sor with the US group, said Chi- nese officials here privately tried to ease US concerns by saying that there had been a “misperception” of China’s comments about the South China Sea. “We’re in the same boat” was a remark made here by Chinese and Americans alike. That sounds en- couraging. But the boat is drift- ing these days, if not sinking out- right, and the two need to start paddling in unison. I came away from the meeting with the same mixed picture I saw touring China a month ago—that for all the country’s prosperity and seeming confidence, its lead- ers are preoccupied with prob- lems of internal growth and po- litical stability. They see policy debates with the West through this clouded lens.—(c) 2010, The Washington Post Writers Group
opinion@manilatimes.net and
davidignatius@washpost.com
Global view
THURSDAY
December 9, 2010
A 5
opinion
HARVEY’S REPUBLIC
VIRTUAL REALITY
WASHINGTON POST WRITERS GROUP
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