'Like the molave' in coastal greenbelts

Philippine Daily Inquirer/OPINION/by Ma. Ceres P. Doyo “Until our people, seeing, are become/ Like the molave, firm, resilient, staunch…/ Strong in its own fibre, yes, like the molave!” It is a pleasant surprise to read Rafael de Zulueta’s famous 1940 poem “Like the Molave” in a scientific handbook on the Philippines’ coastal greenbelt, even if the first line—“Not yet, Rizal, not yet”—is all I can remember now of the stanza we had to memorize...

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Ants, Robredo's mascots

Philippine Daily Inquirer/OPINION/by Ma. Ceres P. Doyo In 2000, when Jesse Robredo, then 42 and Naga City mayor for three terms, received the Ramon Magsaysay (RM) Award for Government Service, I was assigned to write a front-page story on him. In 2010, when he was appointed secretary of the Department of the Interior and Local Government, I dug up that story for a column piece. Not many can and will be DILG secretary, but there are thousands...

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Push, pass, FOI Act now!

Philippine Daily Inquirer/OPINION/by Ma. Ceres P. Doyo Yesterday, August. 15, was the National Day for Freedom of Information (FOI). I don’t know how the day came to be declared such, but the why should be obvious. Below is a pooled editorial which the Right to Know Right Now media coalition hopes would be widely circulated, published, broadcast and discussed in blogs, radio and television talk shows, newspapers, forums, schools, etc. Let us all...

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Mom, frat man-prof on willing hazing victims

Philippine Daily Inquirer/OPINION/by Ma. Ceres P. Doyo My column “Hazing victims, willing victims” (Inquirer, 8/2/12) drew many reactions from readers. As the title suggested, it was about putting the blame also on the willing victims and not just on those doing the hazing in order to prevent students from joining “brotherhoods” that inflict violence on candidates. Law student Marc Andre Marcos of San Beda Law School (run by Benedictine monks) died last week after initiation rites of the Lex Leonum Fraternitas, which is not recognized by the...

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Hazing victims, willing victims

Phiilppine Daily Inquirer/OPINION/by Ma. Ceres P. Doyo This is an unpopular, even tactless, thing to say while a family is grieving the loss of a beloved— that hazing victims are partly to blame for their own deaths. That they had it coming. It is not nice to blame the dead. But things need to be said. Another willing victim, a law student, is dead. Sue me for saying willing victim. WV, how un-cool. I have yet to hear bereaved families and friends of hazing victims say that their dear departed were willing victims, if not somewhat hesitant...

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