Thousands of Iglesia Ni Cristo
Leyte farmers avails training program of the SM Foundation
TACLOBAN CITY- Farmers from the supertyphoon Yolanda ravaged towns of Tanauan and Barugo, both in Leyte, received training on farming of high value crops, fruits and vegetable farming initiated by the SM Foundation in partnership with Harbest Agribusiness Corporation (HAC).
The 12-weeks training, dubbed as Kabalikat sa Kabuhayan Farmers’ Training Program, was participated by close to 200 farmers coming from different barangays of the two towns, said Cristie Angeles, SM associate vice president for livelihood said.
Also present during the training was Toto Barcelona, president of the HAC, provincial agriculturist Rogelio Portula, town agriculturist Niceforo Liberato and Virginia Idano, assistant regional director of the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD).
Angeles said that the HAC is a program partner since the training program was conceptualized that provides the manpower and specialist who impart modern techniques’ in farming.
Angeles also said that their training program, started in 2007, is a dual technology training in high-value crops in vegetable and fruit farming intended to provide updated agricultural technology to farmers thereby empowering them, not only to earn more income but also to be self-sufficient in food.
The program includes provision for market linkages in cooperation with SM Food Group and Supermalls (SM-FGS), DSWD, Department of Agriculture, local government units and non-government organizations.
The funding for the training under the program was provided by SM Foundation in which they have also provide the seedlings used in the actual training at the demo- farm provided by the local government. Capacity building and entrepreneurial skills are also incorporated in the training.
Many of the farmers who finished the12-weeks-hands-on training program are to replicate what they have learned in their own farm lots. (RYAN GABRIELL ARCENAS)
At a cost of P6.7 million Repair of Palo municipal building finished, says Petilla
PALO, LEYTE – After more than four months after this town’s main government building sustained severe damages due to supertyphoon Yolanda, it is now fully rehabilitated.
This was announced by Mayor Remedios “Matin” Petilla who disclosed that the repair of the two-story municipal hall cost P6.7 million.
The funding for the repair of the building was from President Aquino, the mayor added.
The building, one of the landmarks of the town, had just undergone renovation but sustained damages after Yolanda hit the town on November 8, 2013.
The municipal hall’s roof sustained damages while its glass windows were shattered during the typhoon.
“But look at it now, it’s back to its old look before the typhoon. We really worked hard for the municipal building to recover from the devastation,” Mayor Petilla said in an interview.
The mayor, together with other officials of the town, was in the building during the onslaught of Yolanda with hundreds of evacuees staying at the second floor of the building.
Days after the typhoon, the building served as an evacuation center with its grounds built a makeshift hospital treating people who sustained wounds during the typhoon.
Freshly painted walls and ceilings and new glass windows have been noted inside and outside of the building.
Petilla added that they decided to install glass windows but fortified them to minimize damage during similar incidents.
“Reusable” structures and materials from the old building were re-installed to preserve the old look of the building. (AHLETTE C. REYES)
Chong slams critics as he denies receiving P570 million during last years of Arroyo regime
NAVAL, Biliran- Former Biliran Rep.Glenn Chong strongly denied reports that he was one of the solons that received largesse from the Arroyo administration while it was winding its term.
Chong, who is a lawyer by profession, said that the allegations against him smacked with intention to destroy his credibility.
Chong, who served as the congressman of the lone district of Biliran for a single term, was mentioned to have received P570 million during the last six months of the administration of former President and now Pampanga Rep. Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.
Aside from him, a report said, nine other former and incumbent solons received financial help from Arroyo purportedly to finance their pet projects amounting in all to P10.6 billion.
In the region, those who reportedly received funds aside from Chong were Leyte Rep. Ferdinand Martin Romualdez (P735 million) and former Rep. Trinidad “Ebbie” Apostol (P152.57 million)
In a text message, Chong says that he is “ready, willing and prepared to face any congressional investigation should there be one.”
Chong suspected that this imputation to his person could be intended to destroy his credibility, a result of his having been invited speaker in various venues and for “well-received” and believed lectures on PCOS (precinct count optical scan machines) fraud, being a victim himself.
He has for the past years gone to several areas in Luzon and Mindanao explaining before his well-attended audience the non-reliability of this machine.
He recalled that during his incumbency as a congressman, he requested a budget for various concreting projects in Biliran for roughly P570 million in December 2009 but the amount was never released.
Atty. Chong noticed that among the 10 solons mentioned, he was the only neophyte legislator. All the rest were veteran politicians and members of political dynasties. (ALVIN GZ.ARPON)
Our choice
I still feel like it all happened yesterday, that historic day when Typhoon Yolanda pummeled Tacloban to literally nothing.
This is my first time to talk about the experience. This is also the time when I feel I have to fully move on. None of my relatives perished and I believe that is reason enough to outgrow the trauma, but the universal fear that my hometown may not be able to bear the rigors of recovery haunts me everyday. The real typhoon, and the more powerful one, came in after Yolanda left.
I will never forget the days that followed after the typhoon. The set-up was like in a studio of a Hollywood film. It’s as if I had become a bit player in the “Walking dead” and “Warm bodies”. I felt the ambience of a zombie apocalypse along the streets. Dead bodies, tumbled cars, hungry people, uprooted trees and dark evenings impended the city for weeks. I never expected to participate in looting but I did. I was there in the mob of ransacking people and I never was conscious of anything. Until now, I still believe that it was not stealing but foraging. I would rant at anyone who would say that Taclobanons staged potent thievery. It is human instinct to cling to survival by all means especially after such a horrific event. The repercussions after Yolanda were worse and more life threatening. Year 2013 shall never be forgotten not only in Tacloban but also in the world.
Today, after 100 days of Yolanda, how far have we gone to rehabilitate Tacloban? We were all witnesses of the world’s tsunami-like help, yet we have not gone as close to at least nicely housing the survivors in the broken city. I laud NGOs who have done their part in monetary and moral uplift. But nothing will be moved if the government itself, the supposed mother aide, is not passionate to help recover Tacloban. I feel invalidated because I see no aggressive effort from the national government.
I can only look at my lamenting grandmother. I cannot even comfort her because I am afraid I might worsen her dismay. Neither Justin Beiber nor David Beckham was able to make her at ease. Perhaps, if everything falls back into place, she might get a grip of herself. I also feel her anger for the government. She has not mentioned anything but I know from my heart she is, as much as I am, depressed of what little steps we have taken to recuperate. I am glad she is no active member of any social media site. Because if she were, she would even be more disheartened.
People in facebook and twitter say that it will take years, probably 5-10 years before we see utter normalcy again. Why does it have to take this long? There is no standard time of recovery. If Sec. Petilla was able to at least light a few streets before Christmas, then anything else is possible. I believe that we will recover this long not because we ran out of options but because we declared it by choice.
It is our choice to recover within 5-10 years. It is the choice of the government to tiptoe toward full healing. I whine because I want to see my hometown get back up as fast as possible. But this may not be the case if only a few people believe we can do it quick. If we stop discouraging our neighbors, or ourselves then we are helping each other. We are helping a faster upturn for victims. And let us not promote ‘Tindog Tacloban’ anymore because I know we all have stood up already. The more appropriate tag line now should be ‘Gios Tacloban’ or ‘Gios Pilipinas’.
I do not want to feel like Yolanda came just yesterday. I want to feel like it happened months ago and that we are done with her.
Spirit of recollection in the world
THIS is a skill we have to cultivate and practise all the time. Remember St. Paul telling us: “If you have risen with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God. Mind the things that are above, not the things that are upon the earth.” (Col 3,1-2)
This is the essence of the spirit of recollection that is meant for all of us, since we are all supposed to live our life with God. Our life, like that of all other creatures, cannot be without its Creator, the provider of everything that we need. In fact, he is the ultimate and constant provision we need, more than anything else—food, money, air, etc.
In our case, since we are humans with intelligence and will, we need to be aware of this reality about ourselves and correspond to it knowingly and willingly. God is actually in us always, at the very core of our life, since he is the fundamental maintainer of our existence.
But more than keeping us in life, he is gives us everything else proper of a creature created in his image and likeness—knowledge, wisdom, power, etc. And since we cannot help but sin, he is also ever eager to give us his mercy, his ultimate gift before we can fully identify ourselves with him, our goal.
This spirit of recollection means we are constantly aware of his presence, vitally doing things with him and for him. It’s not supposed to keep us always passive, though a certain passivity and receptivity is involved. But it’s what supposed to give us impulse, energy and direction in our life.
This spirit of recollection can only be lived if we activate the gifts of faith, hope and charity that God constantly and abundantly gives us. People who are curious to know more things as well as lovers who always want to be with their beloved can offer us the template for developing this spirit of recollection.
We need to seek God, even if we have to deal with great difficulties. Christ himself told us clearly: “Ask, and it shall be given you. Seek, and you shall find. Knock, and it shall be opened to you.” (Mt 7,7)
We have to learn to discern the omnipresence of God—within us in our mind and heart as well as around us. We have to train our senses and our spiritual faculties of intelligence and will to go beyond the dimensions of the sensible and intelligible world. They have to capture the inputs of faith, hope and charity.
We should go beyond the physical, material and temporal, to enter into the world of the spiritual, eternal and supernatural. We should go beyond the merely practical and convenient, to be able to live the values of morality and piety of being children of God.
We should be able to be in constant intimate relation with God—talking to him, asking him for light, strength, etc.—by taking advantage of everything that happens in us and around us. Everything that we see, hear, feel, learn and know, everything that happens, whether good or bad, is always an occasion to be with God.
We have to disabuse ourselves from our tendency to think that dealing with God can only take place in some special moments of our life. All events and circumstances of our life—even our worst condition of committing a grave sin—can and should be a moment with God, praising him, thanking him, asking for pardon, asking for help.
If we have these truths well in place in our mind and heart, then we would be in the proper condition to develop this spirit of recollection. Of course, to prosper in this effort, we need to constantly mortify and purify our senses.
That means dealing some kind of death to our senses, and even to our intelligence, so that the life of faith, hope and charity can take root, grow and blossom in us.
It does not mean to do away with our senses and faculties, since that would be inhuman, but to mortify and purify them so as to be led and guided by faith, hope and charity.
This effort will take time, and we should learn to be patient. We should not forget that we are ranged against tremendous weaknesses, temptations, etc. But there’s always hope. We just have to persevere until this spirit of recollection becomes second nature to us, enabling us to be with God in the middle of the world.