Mongaya: That diaper ad

THE top people of EQ diaper should have already withdrawn by now the television commercial that made fun of Ferdinand Magellan and Lapu-Lapu. They should not wait for the April 27 reenactment of this historic event that placed the Philippines in world history.

Let me express my thanks to Lapu-Lapu City Mayor Paz Radaza for calling public attention to this advertisement. We should not make fun of this serious piece of world history.

Echaves: Light at tunnel’s end

JUST when other offices were shutting down, this engineer-counselor couple defied trends and dared start their new office. So shared Pastor Jo Alfafara during the opening three years ago of Engr. Jacinto “Jun” and Dr. Russell Makiling’s clinic at Robinson’s Cybergate Mall across Chong Hua Hospital.

More than an office, their Educo-Psych Diagnostic and Counseling Clinic marked a new approach; it became the first mall-based counseling clinic in the entire Philippines.

Sun.Star Essay: Noise pollution, anyone?

WE can’t stop talking about global warming. But the attitude may be that it’s the usual chat. Celsius, Fahrenheit. Then we scan the usual newspaper page and flip quickly to the entertainment pages after we read the news on a heat stroke case in Baguio.

Mercado: Gray hair and bifocals

I’VE reached the point in my life when, if somebody tells me to wear socks, I don’t have to.” Scientist Albert Einstein’s comment is relevant to Cebu’s conference on “Ageing in Asia Pacific: Balancing the State and the Family.”

Convened this month, the Association of Asian Social Science Research Councils’ 20th biennial conference of considered “myths about the elderly” to new scientific tools, like “ALE.” ALE--what?

Cabaero: Keeping tourists safe

THEY were isolated cases, police said, but there could have been more that did not get reported by the victims.

Sexual assaults on female foreign tourists in Cebu numbered three for the first four months of the year. One incident happened in Badian town, another in Bantayan island and the third in Malapascua, all three places known as tourist magnets.

Lim: Empty churches

WE’VE read about the Europe of empty churches. Are we now entering into an era of a Philippines of empty churches? Not likely. Even a non-church going nominal Catholic like me does not believe that this phenomenon will happen in our country. But it’s not for the reasons you think.

While the faith of many may have wavered, the church-going activities will not. Most Filipinos (80% of which are Catholic), grow up with an infantile sense of religion. They will go to church not because they want to but because they are afraid of the consequences of not going.

Oledan: Wrong method

CORPORAL punishment remains a widely used method of disciplining a child. The general view is that it is effective in getting children immediately toe the line.

Over 60 percent of families have been found to still use corporal punishment to discipline children, resulting in the deterioration in the quality of parent-child relationship and in the capacity of the child to internalize socially acceptable behavior.

Tabada: Covering the basics

WHY aren’t there workshops for writing? asks J., a reader.

In a series of emails, J. said he had difficulty looking for a summer workshop that would refresh his teachers’ skills in English: grammar, vocabulary, composition.

Editorial: Marriages and cautionary tales

SIX years ago, an official who audited the number of marriages solemnized in Cebu City’s courts found so many that he described it as “a hub of swift marriages.” The words paint an amusing picture—one can almost see the couples sweating in their finery as they flit in and out of the courtrooms—but the real picture is grim.

Libre: Awesome Simon

RHYMIN’ Simon has got rhythm, bless him. He gave 12,000 fans a real good time in his sold out Auckland, New Zealand stop on April 8.

Wenceslao: Latest Joavan caper

IT WOULD be interesting to find out how outgoing Talisay City Mayor Socrates Fernandez and his patron Eduardo Gullas, outgoing first district congressman and a candidate for mayor in the May polls, would react to Joavan Fernandez’s latest caper. Brod Soc’s son was involved in a shooting incident at the South Road Properties side of Barangay San Roque, Talisay that wounded a poor watchman at 1 a.m. yesterday.

Nalzaro: Menace to society

HERE he goes again. Joavan, the beloved son of Talisay City Mayor Socrates “Brod Soc” Fernandez, is again in the “limelight,” following his involvement in another shooting incident. I am sure Joavan’s latest caper will be the banner of be in the front page of our local papers today.

Barrita: Lapu-Lapu’s diapers

LAPU-LAPU City Mayor Paz Radaza called for the pullout of a diapers ad in which Lapu-Lapu challenged Ferdinand Magellan to a battle after the Portuguese explorer offered him diapers of poor quality.

Radaza said the ad is a “grave insult” to the Oponganons and demanded a public apology from the product’s owners.

Carvajal: Fourth reject

THERE ought to be a law requiring debates on issues and programs of government to be the central if not the only election campaign activity. Unless we have this requirement our elections will remain as they have always been… a choice between personalities and not between programs of government.

Speak out: New condom design and the anti-RH advocates

ONLY very recently the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation announced that it was offering $100,000 to innovators who are able to redesign a condom based on the following proposition: that in order to succeed in its campaign for global health initiatives, both in terms of reducing the incidence of unplanned pregnancies and in prevention of infection with HIV or other sexually transmitted infections, the design should also be such that it will improve the user rate and user experience.

Editorial: Battle of Mactan spoof

LAPU-LAPU City Mayor Paz Radaza raised an interesting point about a diaper commercial that spoofs the Battle of Mactan. As mayor of the site of the 1521 clash between Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan and local chieftain Lapu-Lapu, she has all the right to complain about the diaper manufacturer’s treatment of that historic event.

Roperos: Honoring our hero

IT is a great service to our country when the mayor of Lapu-Lapu City acquired the courage to come out against the crass commercialization of an episode in our history.

Wenceslao: Bebot and PJ

THE House of Representatives is a lawmaking entity, so it would have made sense for candidates seeking House seats in the May elections to talk about legislative agenda.

But it seems like that has been lost in the passing in the current electoral campaign.

Seares: Diapers, not fish killed Magellan?

PLASTIC, poor-quality diapers offered by Magellan to Lapu-Lapu, not defense of Mactan Island, led to the battle that the "Magellan" song of Roman "Yoyoy" Villame (1932-2007) promoted more widely and efficiently than any history book did or will do.

When Lapu-Lapu's wife exposed the gift and compared it to the EQ diaper on their child, Lapu-Lapu fumed, saying the foreigner betrayed their friendship.

Yap: Miracles

TO PLAY the role of a watchdog, a journalist should not stop asking. The more important questions, it is said, are those that start with “why” and “how.”

Libre: Bigger fight

MAYOR Paz Radaza objects to ad linking Datu Lapu-Lapu to diapers.

For such disrespect to their hero, the citizens of Lapu-lapu should pursue a fight bigger than the Battle of Mactan against the manufacturer.

Editorial: Icon ‘shedding’ tears of blood

FROM 1989 to 1993, Filipino Catholics were transfixed on what was called the “Miracle of Agoo” in Agoo, La Union involving Judiel Nieva, who claimed to have seen apparitions of the Virgin Mary in various places and at certain times. The other “miraculous” events associated with the “miracle” were a Eucharistic host turning into actual flesh and blood, a “dancing” sun and an image of the Virgin Mary weeping blood (Wikipedia).

Roperos: Campaign updates

A MEETING has been set today as “part of the ongoing effort of Cebu print and broadcast media and the Police Regional Office to improve coverage of the May 2013 elections.” I think this meeting of top police officials with editors and senior reporters would ensure clean and peaceful elections in May.

So: Why Tingting Cojuangco doesn’t wear a watch

IF it had been me, I would have shrieked and jumped. Not Margarita “Tingting” Cojuangco—wife of Peping Cojuangco, mother of Mikee Jaworski, former governor of Tarlac, and senatorial aspirant.

Malilong: Jinggoy’s statement

DURING the proclamation rally of One Cebu in Toledo City last Monday, Sen. Jinggoy Estrada lambasted, to quote a Freeman report by AJ de la Torre, former chief justice Hilario Davide Jr., calling the latter a “political butterfly.”

Seares: Kris plan to study law and governance

KRIS AQUINO, controversial movie star and presidential sister, unwrapped her plan in a TV show. From being mostly showbiz, it soon spilled over to government and politics.

Espinoza: Comelec should show its teeth

MANDAUE City Mayor Jonas C. Cortes led the city’s workers last week in cleaning the walls of illegally posted campaign materials. His deed deserves emulation by other local officials.

The act of Mayor Cortes, though, should not be misunderstood as a publicity stunt. As the city’s chief executive, he has the obligation to execute the laws of the land and city ordinances.

Editorial: Hidden wealth

TO ALL but a few very wealthy individuals, offshore corporations and trusts in so-called tax havens are alien territory. So a recent report that about 500 Filipinos own such investments abroad should not concern the rest of us except that some of these personalities happen to be public officials seeking election in May 2013.

Roperos: Educating the poor

IT was only a short while ago when we wrote in this space about the depressing death because of poverty of a 16-year old freshman of the University of the Philippines (UP) in Diliman. Unable to fulfill the new school policy not to accept enrolment unless the student meets tuition fee requirements, she was emotionally weak to withstand the sad reality of her poverty. Yet UP is a school supposedly for the poor.

Wenceslao: Using 2010 polls to analyze 2013 elections

IT'S an interesting comparison: the candidacy of Hilario “Junjun” Davide III for governor in 2010 and his candidacy for the same post in the elections this May. I say interesting because the 2010 polls have been used by political analysts to size up Davide’s chances of winning against suspended governor Gwendolyn Garcia’s brother, Pablo John.