P-Noy's MC No. 1

Memorandum Circular No. 1 may have been issued in a hurry by the fact that the said MC has been amended thrice. It can be recalled that the first major blunder committed by then President Estrada was when he issued Executive Order No. 1. After signing E.O. 1 (which makes the term of office of all those coterminous with FVR's administration to end on June 30 1998 - without regard to the hold-overs and despite unwritten agreement for the hold-overs left behind - to properly turn over the projects and people down the line). Many appointees during the Estrada Administration were allegedly without extensive government experience. A year thereafter the cabinet was overhauled, little over two-year period, war broke out in Mindanao, allegations of corruption (jueteng) erupted, different factions from within the Presidency silently moves into different direction from within the circle of the Presidency, which resulted to political unrest. Barely a quarter after two years in Presidency - President Estrada was ousted in Office, escorted by his Chief of Staff out of Malacañang.

ADVOCACIES . . .

It was more than two years ago that we advocated for the intercession of the Divine for our country to unite towards a common goal in the POWER OF YOUR LOVE, where we prayed for a day to come for our country to move as one towards a common vision for a peaceful, well meaningful, economically stable and environmentally sound governance of our nation and its people, destroyed by the decaying moral fiber of our society and lack of sense of patriotism. In our post, WHAT AN IRONY, we expressed how we suffered so much because of the catastrophe brought about by Typhoon Ondoy and Peping, poor strategic planning and how we should move as one to help those who are in need in "The Sprit of Volunterism". Prior to that, we advocated on how a simple person, a driver at that, could make a difference in the lives of our fellowmen within and without the government. We also advocated for IT intervention of CS Examination to facilitate effective, efficient and speedy administration of CS Examination. In support of the Gender Advocacy movement: we advocated for Anti-Smoking Campaign where we talked about how smoking affects our economic growth and as early as May 2009 have been advocating for transparency in government transaction through IT intervention. In support of the advocacy against violence on women, we advocated to be vigilant on crimes against human trafficiking. We are thankful that our advocacy are being heard by policy makers.

Lately, days after our post on human trafficiking, the newly installed US Ambassador Harry K. Thomas, Jr., brought forth to our attention the problem on human trafficking in a column of Rina Jimenez-David at the Philippine Daily Inquirer. Experts, however, agrees that the key area that could solve the problem in our society is "POVERTY", which we are now advocating through "GOOD GOVERNANCE". We hope that the good US Ambassador recommends to their government to re-channel the P 11.4 billion non-humanitarian and non-trade assistance to address poverty issues thru good governance and allocates some to address issues concerning prosecution of offenses involving human trafficking and empowerment of witnesses, including corrupt prosecutors and magistrates - rather than warning us to lose the same merely because our country is at "Tier 2 Watch List" in the current edition of the US Department's "Trafficking in Person's Report" (as if interfering with our sovereignty) - with utmost due respect to the good Ambassador.