After all is said and done, the embattled mayor Alice Guo must go. And more revelations would make one believe that Guo is an itch that won’t go away.
It’s time for her to step down and return to her farm and live her life as a private citizen. She has brought more questions than what she could clearly answer, and the public is tired of her misleading answers, carefully prepared and rehearsed with her by her lawyers.
All these, to conceal the truth behind her true identity. Hearing her and her same answers all over and over again can be exasperating, like trying to extract a sweet-smelling scent from a plastic flower. Once again, the obvious incompetence of some government agencies have shown that those with sinister plans can easily pass through the established processes of the bureaucracy.
This requires money, connections, and political clout. Alice Guo obviously has money – a rich girl pretending to be a poor farm girl. We were not born yesterday. But of course she denies all these and insists she is a “legitimate Filipino citizen” who grew up in her family’s farm but does not remember anything about it, making her ripe to be a legitimate Chinese spy.
This is simply because of a raid last year to a company she was linked to – the Hongsheng Gaming Technology Inc. and the raid again the following year for charges of human trafficking. In that raid, an illegal POGO operator catering to online gamblers in China surfaced, which also led to the rescue of some 700 plus workers.
There’s more. Two incorporators of Guo’s company Baofu land, the compound housing the POGO operations, had a Chinese national Zhang Ruijin. He was convicted for money laundering activities in Singapore with Lin Baoying who is also facing the same charges.
Now tell me, is this not cause for much concern involving a simple farm girl?
Motorcycle muffler menace
There’s this particular motorcycle rider who wakes me up at 4:30 each morning with his very loud muffler. I can almost be certain that he does this on purpose, him being the only one on the road yet from this early hour, what with the echo from the enclosure of tall buildings.
Excessive noise pollution is a violation, and the new LTO under Atty. Vigor Mendoza II must be serious in restraining these street infractions. And then the
whole metropolis is victimized by these noises, not to mention the recklessness of every rider on the road.
Which brings me to this question: what safety seminars or programs are given to these motorcycle riders before they are issued a driver’s license and their motorcycles duly registered by the LTO? Are there any? If there are, then they are ineffective.
It’s time for the LTO to inspect those muffler shops and confiscate those pesky "tambutsos." Also, the LTO should now amend Administrative Order No. AHS-2008-015 dated May 15, 2008 where it states under “Prohibited Actions” the following: “Using a cellular phone or other gadgets while operating the vehicle (motorcycle) is also prohibited.”
So tell me, aren’t all motorcyclists now users of mobile phones attached to their motorcycle’s handlebar?
A one ASEAN is truly Asian
No less than President Ferdinand "Bongbong" Marcos Jr. has given importance to our country’s harmonious inclusion with ASEAN and with other member-nations combined, especially so when the threat of an expansionist and mighty nation hangs over our heads.
Legend has it that the wide world of the South East Asian Region was born out of a potent union of the Earth’s Indian and Pacific Ocean plates. The region varies from the pastoral landscape of North West Vietnam to the lush forests of Myanmar, to the lower Himalayas emerged the mountain chain of continental South east Asia down to the South West Pacific and the beautiful islands that have appeared out to the South China Sea and on to Austronesia.
This great natural threshold between the Indian and Pacific Oceans contribute to the individuality of the South east Asian peoples, brimming with grandiose diversity, birthing many cultures, different in several aspects, yet similar in many fundamental traits.
Southeast Asia’s geography and topography contribute greatly to the history and life of its colorful civilizations, the great nations of Brunei Darussalam, Indonesia, Malaysia, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand, Vietnam, Singapore, and the Philippines.
Some periods of our mutual past may have failed at mutual understanding, but our world today has no excuses. Even today, many of us are still ignorant of each other despite the instruments of communication and the speed on the information highway (it used to be called infobahn).
Media may produce an awareness of other cultures, but it is an awareness at times replete with prejudice. What we really need now is a purity of soul. Our heritage binds us together. Our dreams appear from a common horizon.
Our lands remain sacred to our people and our region , despite intermittent alien intervention (sounds familiar?) we have given such names to our memories and we have drawn the image of our future with the common language we all speak: the language of cooperative unity.
We have transcended borders to form this new identity, and it is our intent to face both Asia and the West – and even China as a union of collective strengths with all the energy our individual nations may offer.
Under the vision of President Marcos Jr. is a renewed hope for the ASEAN region, with peace and diplomacy in every nation’s agenda, our limitations will be our source of greatness, and the avenues of cooperation and understanding be the tool for protocols at each day end bringing harmony, unity, and progress for all way beyond our sandy white shores.
Factoid: When the design for the UN flag was subject for approval by its member-nations, General Carlos P. Romulo (then head of the UN General Assembly and the UN Security Council), pointed out a grand objection. The Philippines had been scratched out from the map of the world on the proposed flag. The artist explained that the omission was unavoidable, saying it was no longer possible to include the Philippines on a world map bearing the size of a tablecloth. But the tiny man with a huge stature refused to listen to any and all excuses. Raising to his full height, the diminutive Tarlaqueño demanded: “I don’t care how you do it, just put my country on that flag!”