The Manila Times China’s new lighthouse at the Spratlys no big deal?


ENATE President Juan Ponce Enrile and Sen. Loren Legarda, chairman of the Senate Commit- tee on Foreign Relations, are not at all alarmed over the reported building of a lighthouse in the disputed Spratlys by China. The Manila Times had printed


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a two-part series written by Vera Files showing that China built the lighthouse on Subi Reef, just 26 kilometers southwest of Pag- asa Island that is occupied by the Philippines. Vera Files quoted experts as say- ing that the lighthouse was in- tended to expand and fortify Chi- na’s claim to the Spratly Islands, which is also being claimed in whole or in part, by the Philip- pines, Taiwan, Brunei, Vietnam, Malaysia and Indonesia. Enrile and Legarda believe that the construction of the light- house was no big deal. They said that the Philippines has also built some structures in Pag-asa so it


could not prevent other countries from building structures in the part of the Spratlys that they are claiming to be their own. “They’re putting a lighthouse, I understand. They already have structures there. I don’t know of any agreement where you pro- hibit others from putting up structures. We have built ahead of them in Pag-asa. We put an air- strip in Pag-asa. I think what they meant in the agreement that you mentioned is that status quo from where you are. But they can- not prevent you from building structures on the islands that you have occupied,” Enrile told Sen- ate reporters.


He said it is an altogether dif- ferent matter if China built the structure on an island occupied by the Philippines. “Then, it is already an aggres-


sive act,” he said. Oh yes, JPE also reacted on the alleged statement from the US


for Media were made in China. One time, irrepressible Estong


EFREN L. DANAO


Embassy in Manila that after 30 years, the Philippines will have to choose between China and US as ally. He said that the Philippines might make the choice before 30 years, and that choice is China. “In the next decade, China will attain a very influential position in world politics. It’s a distinct possibility. It’s better for us to ally ourselves with our neighbors in Asia,” he explained. While we are talking about China, let me put in this observa- tion: A big majority of the appli- ances raffled off by the senators in their separate Christmas parties


Rattling the tiger


ONDON: It was the 6th cen- tury BC Chinese sage Confu- cius who had said, “an oppressive government is to be feared more than a tiger.” Several centuries later, what is now the world’s most populous country—roughly one-fifth of the seven billion in- habitants of the planet—and a widely-acknowledged awakened economic dragon, is throwing its vast weight and exerting enor- mous political and diplomatic in- fluence all over the world. In the center of China’s latest GIGANTIC tantrum or “major bul- lying,” as some British newswires put it, is the Nobel Peace Prize for 2010. This year’s laureate is Liu Xiaobo, Chinese writer and lead- ing Tiananmen Square activist, who is now serving an 11-year jail sentence for his outspoken views on human rights and democracy. The Oslo-based Nobel Prize Committee chose the dissident Mr. Li for his “long and non-violent struggle for fundamental human rights in China.” The choice has angered China, which has called the award an affront and direct attack on its government and way of life. For the formal awards cer-


L NERIC ACOSTA


emony on December 10, Human Rights Day, the Chinese govern- ment has doggedly applied pres- sure on various embassies in Oslo to boycott the event. Out of the 65 governments invited, 19 have toed the Chinese line, the largest number of countries openly shun- ning what is the world’s most pres- tigious tribute to the heroism and valor of individuals who stand up to state power, entrenched tyranny or grave injustice.


For the most part, many of the countries forming this so-called “anti-Nobel” phalanx do not themselves hold sterling records on the human rights front. And most of these states are now largely dependent on the commer- cial and trade relations with China. Russia and Venezuela, for instance, are billion-dollar major trading partners of and colossal oil-suppliers to resource-hungry China, and are headed by Vladimir Putin and Hugo Chavez, redoubtable leaders known for their strong-arm use of state power and repressive measures in the face of dissent and opposition. But flexing newly-buffed muscle in the global arena has ostensibly not been enough. China has in fact gone as far as creating a curiously- timed alternative peace prize, the Confucius Prize for Peace. The awardee, hastily-named, is former Taiwan Vice President Lien Chan, a stalwart of the Kuomintang Party and widely seen as an interlocu- tor between China and Taiwan, which the former considers a ren- egade province.


All told, the Nobel Peace Prize, emanating from the small Nordic nation of Norway, has rattled a global tiger. The actions of China has unnerved an entire diplomatic


realm, eliciting international me- dia attention on what would oth- erwise have been simply an an- nual paean to exemplars of peace and moral courage. China is said to have “required” Chinese na- tionals in Norway to demonstrate against the December 10 Nobel Prize event, just as human rights organizations like 1977 Nobel Peace winner Amnesty Interna- tional had congregated in Oslo to denounce the continued repres- sion of Mr. Liu and the heavy- handed measures to keep repre- sentatives of other states from at- tending the ceremony. This high-level uproar is remi- niscent of the kind of reaction Adolf Hitler displayed in 1936 when the Nobel Peace Prize was given to German pacifist Carl von Ossietsky, who was convicted of treason for disclosing details of German rearmament. Hitler was incensed and prevented von Ossietsky from accepting the prize; the fact that Liu and his wife, who is also detained, are prevented from doing so marks the first time since 1936 that the Nobel medal and diploma will not be handed out. At the height of the Cold War, Russia (or what was the USSR) opposed the choice of human rights activist and physicist Andrei Sakharov and trade unionist Lech Walesa of Poland, as did the military junta of Burma when Aung San Suu Kyi won the prize in 1991. But all three were represented by family in the awards ceremonies: Sakharov and Walesa by their wives, Suu Kyi by her son. The heightened row over Mr.


Liu’s award, the first Nobel ever given to a Chinese citizen, high- lights, in truth, a defining dynamic of modern politics. The Times of London refers to it in a variation of academic Samuel Huntington’s “clash of civilizations” frame: the challenge posed to liberal democ- racies by China’s authoritarian model of commercial nationalism. The boycott of the Nobel ceremony by several countries on China’s be- hest is, as The Times put it, “emblem- atic of a dominant issue of 21th cen- tury international relations.” China of late has roared into the status of being the second larg- est economy in the world after the US, surpassing Japan’s lead in Asia. Chinese investments have made inroads into some of the most repressive states in Asia and Africa that hold some of the rich- est reserves of minerals, oil and abundant natural resources. Even developed economies, including the US, rely on Chinese savings flowing into bond markets, a re- sult of huge stocks of domestic savings and a massive export drive. The upside to the ruckus over


Nobel Peace Prize, however, shows that economic liberalism and wealth creation will necessarily engender greater demands for po- litical reform. The tiger is rattled, indeed, by a pesky prize-giving committee from a small country, but the world is increasingly wak- ing up to the bravery of dissidents in all corners of the globe who insist, by their incarceration or sacrifice, on the universal validity of democracy and political rights.


opinion@manilatimes.net


The relative importance of main clauses and subordinate clauses


wark, New Jersey, asking this very intriguing question about the relative importance of main clauses and subordinate clauses in complex sentences: “I am a physician who teaches ESL to students on the weekends. Many of the high school students have had questions about a les- son I taught on subordinate clauses. They were confused about the idea that the main idea goes to the main clause and the least important goes to the sub- ordinate clause. They showed me many examples of writing in magazines, textbooks and jour- nals where writers had put the obvious main idea in the subor- dinate clause. Is this English grammar rule still applicable? Am I teaching a rule that is not ap- plied in common usage? I would greatly appreciate your help.” Here’s my answer to that question: I’m afraid it’s not correct to say that in complex sentences, the main idea invariably goes to the main clause and the less important ones to the subordinate clause. Your ESL students who questioned that rule


L ■ LETTER FROM A4


Buying new PAF planes from Italy


peace and development efforts of the government. They aug- ment the air transport require- ments necessary in the delivery of basic services to people in remote communities. In times of calami- ties, the PAF’s quick response to


AST week, I received e-mail from a medical doctor in Ne-


JOSE A. CARILLO


are right. There is, in fact, no such rule. This looks to me simply a mis- interpretation of the basic rule that in a complex sentence, the main clause is the independent clause that can stand by itself, and the sub- ordinate clause is the dependent clause that can’t stand by itself. This, of course, isn’t the same as saying that the most important idea should go to the main clause or will be found in it; it’s perfectly possible for the most important idea to be the subordinate clause itself or, at least, to be part of it. Indeed, the position of the idea in a complex sentence isn’t a correct yardstick of its impor- tance in relation to the other ideas in that sentence.


This point becomes clear when


we closely examine a complex sentence like this one: “Because her husband abandoned her, the


save lives is unquantified. It’s quite disheartening how-


ever, that with said acquisition comes the criticism that the funds for the procurement of said air- craft should have been used in- stead for the improvement of in- fantrymen and military units. Criticism of this nature has put


the government in a “damn if you do, damn if you don’t situation.”


stewardess decided to leave the family home.” That sentence, of course, can also be constructed this way: “The stewardess decided to leave the family home because her husband abandoned her.” Now, which is the more impor- tant idea—the one found in the subordinate clause “because her husband abandoned her” or the one found in the main clause “the stewardess decided to leave the family home”? We really can’t say; we can’t validly make a value judgment on their relative impor- tance. All we can say is that the main clause “the stewardess de- cided to leave the family home” can stand by itself and that the subordinate clause “because her husband abandoned her” can’t. This is a grammatical and struc- tural distinction that doesn’t es- tablish the comparative impor- tance of the ideas involved. The point gets even clearer in the case of complex sentences with a relative modifying clause, like this one: “What we didn’t re- alize when we bought the prop- erty was that it was prone to heavy flooding.” This sentence, of course, can also be constructed


These critics should bear in mind that the PAF has already lost a sub- stantial number of its pilots to the civil aviation industry thus the more urgent is the need for a re- placement; which can only be at- tained by training people with the corresponding trainer aircraft. Moreover, there were also urgent calls from some sectors to buy new aircraft and modernize the PAF


this way: “That it was prone to heavy flooding was what we didn’t realize when we bought the property.” Either way, the idea in the main clause is “[the prop- erty] was prone to heavy flood- ing,” and the idea in the subor- dinate clause is “we didn’t real- ize [this] when we bought the property.” But there’s absolutely no way of figuring out which of the two clauses is more important or less important; knock off either one and the sentence collapses into a contextless heap.


I think this demonstrates the fallacy of the idea that in com- plex sentences, the main idea should go to the main clause and the less important ones to the subordinate clause. On the con- trary, the most important idea can be found anywhere in that sen- tence; indeed, in the case of com- plex sentences with a relative sub- ordinate clause, that most impor- tant idea could be the whole sen- tence itself.


Visit Jose Carillo’s English Forum at http://josecarilloforum.com.


j8carillo@yahoo.com


soonest so us to prevent the string of unfortunate accidents attrib- uted to aircraft defects. In any case, these new planes will serve its purpose. The cost will not matter as long as engine trouble leading to unwanted ac- cidents will now be avoidable.


MSGT BEN B. CALIZO (RET) Gapan, Nueva Ecija


T took us by surprise! Last month, DILG Sec. Jesse Robre- do issued a memorandum to South Cotabato Gov. Arthur Pingoy and the presiding officer and members of the Sangguniang Panlalawigan of South Cotabato directing them “to review/revisit” Provincial Ordinance 04 S. 2010 which imposes an absolute pro- hibition on open pit mining and “to make the necessary amend- ments and revisions” and finally enjoining the “immediate sus- pension of the implementation of the Ordinance pending its re- view.” The South Cotabato Envi- ronment Code, passed by the Sanggunian and signed last July 29, 2010 by then Gov. Daisy Fuentes, has a section that pro- hibits open-pit mining in the province. The Sanggunian has discussed the provincial environ- ment code for more than five years until it was signed this year. Open pit mining is the term used to differentiate this form of mining from extractive methods that require tunneling into the earth. Open-pit mines are used when deposits of commercially useful minerals or rock are found near the surface. That is, where the overburden or the surface ma- terial covering the valuable de- posit is relatively thin or the ma- terial of interest is structurally unsuitable for tunneling. For minerals that occur deep below the surface—where the overbur- den is thick or the mineral occurs as veins in hard rock— under- ground mining methods extract the valued material.


I


ANABELLE E. PLANTILLA


a forest reserve of 14,000ha of which 3,000ha are reported to still be primary forest. Many of the threatened and restricted-range species of the Mindanao and East- ern Visayas Endemic Bird Area have been recorded on Mt. Matutum, making it a very important eco- system for unique biodiversity. Our national bird, the Philippine Eagle has been recorded in this IBA and is still important for the conservation of this globally en- dangered species. According to newspaper re-


Open-pit mines are typically enlarged until either the mineral resource is exhausted, or an in- creasing ratio of overburden to ore makes further mining uneco- nomic. (Wikipedia). The Tampakan Copper-Gold Project in South Cotabato wants to get its hands on the Tampakan deposit which represents the larg- est undeveloped copper-gold de- posit in the Southeast Asia-West- ern Pacific Region which contains 13.5 million tons of copper metal and 15.8 million ounces of gold. Above this huge mineral de- posit can be found two important biodiversity areas (IBA): the Mt. Matutum Protected Landscape and Mt. Busa-Kiamba. Tampakan is nearer Mt. Matu- tum, which is a steep mountain north of General Santos City. Ac- cording to Haribon-BirdLife (2001), a forest cover survey reported that the forest stands are found at 1,290 to 2,270m and are therefore all montane in type. Mt. Matutum has


ports, South Cotabato will imple- ment the ordinances in the code until repealed by the provincial council. Alyansa Tigil Mina (ATM), an alliance of mining-af- fected communities and their support groups of NGOs/POs, lauded this move by the South Cotabato governor. ATM Na- tional Coordinator Jaybee Garganera finds it unfortunate that DILG Sec. Robredo and his power to issue a memorandum are being used to allow the prac- tice of a very destructive means of mining such as open-pit min- ing on the grounds that it is not in accordance with the Philippine Mining Act. Herein is the ques- tion: How do we reconcile this with the power of the local gov- ernment to protect its province and assert it autonomy? The Le- gal Rights and Natural Re- sources Center finds it very alarming that Robredo, who is supposed to champion LGU au- tonomy, would be suppressing the provincial governor of South Cotabato in its position to protect its environment from the grave ad- verse impacts of large-scale mining. Is it now unconstitutional under the Aquino government for a local government to fulfill its function of putting its con- stituents interests first over profit? It is ironic that our sup- posedly reformist and pro-peo- ple national government is now prioritizing foreign profit over its people’s food and water se- curity, their health and their capability to withstand disas- ters and climate change.


orgsus@haribon.org.ph Global view


Reyes of Banat, the emcee in one of the Christmas parties, checked if the television set to be raffled was made in China. “Thank goodness, it was not made in China. It was made in Guangzhou,” Estong quipped.


fHurrah for our ootball team


I’ll digress from congressional affairs to hail our football team that is making waves at the Asean Football Federation’s Suzuki Cup in Vietnam. It held three-time champion Singapore to a score- less draw before scoring a major upset over defending champion Vietnam, 2-0. Last Wednesday evening, I


watched our team play against Myanmar, courtesy of live cover- age by ABS-CBN. (I am sure that thousands more viewed the game over Studio 23 of ABS-CBN.)


Myanmar had players named K.K. Ko and T.T. Win. For a moment, I feared our players might lose their focus or composure in play- ing against opponents with names like K.K. Ko and T.T. Win. Thank heavens, they were not like me who almost died laughing whenever those names appeared on the screen.


As it happened, they kept their cool and came out with a fight- ing draw. With this, our team is now in the semifinals of the Suzuki Cup.


Congratulations to our Philip- pine football team. Our players do us proud. This will not be di- minished even if our team does not win the crown.


Sen. Edgardo J. Angara has been harping on the need to stop our mindless obsession with bas- ketball. He said that the Philip- pines can never regain its pre- eminence in this game of giants. Even with the use of naturalized


players, I must add. SEJA said that the Philippines should concen- trate instead on boxing, football and other sports where agility and strength, not just height and heft, are given a premium. He has been urging Philippine football leaders to take advantage of the offer of the Andalucia Foot- ball Association of Spain to help develop football in the Philip- pines. He said that the speed and endurance of Filipino youths are qualities that are ideal in football. He added that unlike in basket- ball, height does not matter much in football.


The Philippines is the only country in Southeast Asia with- out a strong football following. I hope that the impressive show- ing of our team at the Suzuki would perk up public interest in this sport where we used to be one of powers in Asia.


efrendanao2003@yahoo.com


Local autonomy and mining


SATURDAY


December 11, 2010


A 5


opinion


ENGLISH PLAIN & SIMPLE


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