MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 2 December) – Months of speculating over the breakup between long-time reel and real lovers Kathryn Bernardo and Daniel Padilla finally ended when the couple came out to confirm the sad news. The sad news
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 20 November)—I am writing this to remind every husband that the wife’s birthday is as important to her as her favorite term of endearment (as in honey, sweetheart, love, etc.) that she loves to hear
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 13 November). “The cries of (orphaned) Israeli children and (orphaned) Palestinian children make no difference to me,” says Rep. Rashida Tlaib of Michigan (Democrat) as she delivered her moving privilege speech in the halls of
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 2 November)—Is the Sangguniang Kabataan (SK) an effective mechanism for participation of the youth in constructive politics and nation-building? The answer is not easy as it will entail a thorough review of the Sangguniang Kabataan
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 26 October)—Civilian lives are lost by the minute in Gaza in body counts unprecedented after World War II. Certainly, there are lives too that are wasted around the Israeli-Lebanese border, and deep into Israel, as
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 22 October) – China has told the U.S. many times to find a solution to the Israel-Palestine conflict. The U.S., finally, is trying to find a solution save that it is quite too late. After the
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 19 October)—The human carnage in Palestine now is unprecedented. The 1948 and 1967 Arab-Israeli wars would pale in comparison with this one. Every civilized nation agrees that Israel, or any country for that matter, deserves
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 19 August) – A budget proposal of the national government to be enacted by Congress into the General Appropriations Act (GAA) is called the national expenditure program (NEP). Secretary Amina Pangandaman of the Department of
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 04 August) – To be human is to balance between several extremes. Sometimes we tend to avoid these extremes, but at other times it is better that we pursue them to better understand life. The
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 25 July) – President Ferdinand R. Marcos, Jr.’s State of the Nation Address (SONA) on July 24, his second, lasted for one hour and eleven minutes, got 68 applauses, and one standing ovation which happened
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 19 July)—Anybody has the right to dream BIG. But not so many people are blessed with how to start right. “How do we start” is not really the big question. The more relevant concern is:
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 31 May)—There had been several attempts made to improve Philippine educational system. These attempts were almost always cut every time we have a new President. The fact alone that the education sector always gets the
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 22 May)—I’d like to talk a little about having a balanced personality but not really from the point of view of psychology or psychologists. This is my own practical way of looking at things, and
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 10 May) – The 2022 Bar Exam produced another batch of lawyers who are worthy additions to the perennially under-staffed practitioners in the legal profession. For many of us, Bar Exams come and go, new
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 29 April)—The province of Maguindanao never took so much share of the limelight until the so-called “Maguindanao Massacre” happened during the incumbency of Datu Andal Ampatuan Sr. as governor of the province. That fateful November
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 08 April). Do you ever imagine what four things you can do to change your life forever? More often, we imagine what would make us a better person in terms of what we think, say,
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 23 March) – I had a chance to join a group tour to Dubai on March 15-21, 2023. I love the experience because it was both educational and fun. Educational, because there are a lot
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 8 March)—Last week a group of young professionals in their late ’30s asked me: “What three things will you advise us, Sir?” I did give them three pieces of advice, because in the first place,
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 28 February) – A physician once told me, “He who can manage stress better lives longer.” It makes sense. I am no health authority and so I take every physician’s word hook, line and sinker.
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 12 February). “Love is not jealousy, ambition, fulfillment or becoming; Love is not plain desire or pleasure. When you love, everything will come right. Love has its own action. – J. Krishnamurti (1968). Valentine’s Day (February
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 28 January). Valentine’s Day (February 14) is quite near. It is a special day for lovers, young and old. “All is fair in love and war,” as the saying goes. The origin of this idiom
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 18 January) – On December 10, 2022 I spoke to Dr. Kadil M. Sinolinding Jr., one of the members of parliament (MP) of the Bangsamoro Transition Authority in the BARMM. I was particularly interested on
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 11 January) – As of this posting more than 500 senior officers of the Philippine National Police responded to the call of Secretary Benjamin Abalos of the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG)
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 29 December) – New Year’s Resolution. This is one tradition that never dies. While Christmas celebration is for a third of the world’s population (I am guessing), New Year’s day celebration is engaged by more
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 21 December) – Every Monday is market day in our hometown. On these days vendors, young and old, come to display their trade wares like “ukay-ukay” (used clothings, shoes, blankets, etc.), agricultural products, and fruits.
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 14 December) – Christmas time is just the best time to talk about Santa Claus. And though this bearded man may no longer be an important Christmas character in some parts of the world, he
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 6 December) – Before you may think that it was Santa Claus who made this reply, I had the permission of the writer to publish her generous comments. I sought her permission as this “reply”
MATALAM, North Cotabato (Mindanews / 01 December) – This Yuletide season Santa Claus is very much alive, and to think this way out from a Muslim’s perspective, is doubly amazing. I can’t speak for the Christians, though, and those who
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 15 Nov) – Almighty Allah created us in a way that we are related and connected to one another as we are born from the reproductive association between our male and female parents. This relation
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 2 November) – The Sandiganbayan Sixth Division acquitted of graft charges Charlita Andales Escaño, director of the Finance and Administrative Services Department of the Mindanao Development Authority (MinDA). In a 26-page decision dated October 26,
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 27 October) — The Intellectual Property Office of the Philippines (IPOP) has granted patent registration to an energy prototype for renewable energy conversion developed by Nash Maulana, a columnist of The Mindanao Cross in Cotabato
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 21 October) — I always tell my students in graduate school: “It’s not pleasant to see a grade of INC (incomplete) in your Transcript of Records (TOR). This may not matter much to those of
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 11 Oct) – Did you ever feel you are a misfit because you are so different from the rest of the gang? For years, I felt like a misfit too. When I was in the
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 5 Oct) – In my more than three decades of writing (reckoned from the time I was chosen Editor of the university school paper in 1981-1984), not once did it occur to me that I
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 28 Sep) – Pikit is one of 17 towns and one city that comprise the province of North Cotabato. To some, Pikit is equated to a troubled town which may be attributed to the fact
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 23 September) – Humanity, and its many dimensions, is probably the most interesting subject any print, broadcast and the social media can have. In the same token human development should be the ultimate goal of
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 14 Sep) – It’s good to dream of big and loftier things, or to wish you were like that someone you idolize because of his looks, status in life, and whatever good luck there is
MATALAM, North Cotabato – (MindaNews / 6 Sep) – I first heard this cliché “when you know better, you do better” on American television “The Oprah Winfrey Show.” It was hosted by the highly empowered woman, few of her kind,
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews /16 Aug) – Sen. Robin Padilla files a bill seeking to legalize same sex individuals to enter into civil union. This was docketed as Senate Bill No. 449. Sen. Padilla’s bill not only seeks to institutionalize
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 12 August) — First, a parking area should be available before buying a car. This was filed under House Bill No. 31. Now, former House Speaker and Masbate Rep. Lord Allan Jay Velaso filed another
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 5 August) — Former President and now Representative of the 2nd congressional district of Pampanga, Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, has filed anew the Anti-Turncoatism bill in the House of Representatives. The bill seeks to prohibit so-called political
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 26 July) – A lot have already been said and written about the plan to raise the salaries of teachers, but until now, this is more of lip-service and rhetoric than a reality. Just recently,
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 21 July) — It’s graduation time or many have already marched to the stage to receive their diplomas through face-to-face or virtual graduation ceremonies. While the general feeling is that the diploma is one’s ticket
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 11 July) – Yes. This was non-fiction, unaltered personal experience. But how I came to realize this was even more interesting. In 2019, pre-COVID time, I was strolling along in one of my favorite malls
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 28 June) – If there was anything most people would like to continue from the PRRD administration it was the Build, Build, Build Program. And it is a good thing that PBBM (President Bongbong Marcos
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 22 June) – Now, it seems, that we won over the pandemic (COVID-19), we might be thinking that we are now hassle-free. No. The impact of the more than two-year-old pandemic on the economy would
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 9 June) – For the one who first thought that there should be Father’s Day inasmuch as there is Mother’s Day, I give my gratitude to him/her. As a father, though, and as an advocate
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 8 June) — I thought she first articulated her desire to be the next Secretary of National Defense probably to make sure her plan to oblige young citizens of this country to undergo military service
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 25 May) – The Persian poet Rumi wrote, “Don’t grieve. Anything you lose comes around in another form.” We really hope so. As newly elected public officials prepare to assume their respective offices after noon
MATALAM, North Cotabato (MindaNews / 21 May) — The opposition, or Leni Robredo’s camp to be more specific, has been saying they lost in the 2022 elections due to “disinformation” / “misinformation” and the handiwork of the paid “trolls.” (The
