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For the past 20 years, The Filipino Express has provided the Filipino American community the best news, arts and entertainment coverage from around the United States and the Philippines.
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This website includes selected articles from this week's edition of the Filipino Express. Not all the stories published in the printed version appear on this site.
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NEW YORK CITY -- Tycoon Fernando Zobel de Ayala and Sen. Pia Cayetano were among the more than a dozen Filipinos who flew in from Manila to compete in the world’s largest marathon last Sunday involving more than 38,000 runners from 100 countries.
At least four other US-based Filipino Americans sponsored by Ayala Foundation’s Project GILAS ran in last Sunday’s New York City Marathon.
As if running Ayala Corp. is not tough enough, Zobel de Ayala finished the grueling race in 14,805th place with a time of four hours, eight minutes and 51 seconds (4:08:51), the Philippine Star reported.
Zobel de Ayala, 46, is president and chief operating officer of one of the largest diversified conglomerates in the Philippines.
Senator Cayetano placed 14,080th overall and 2,772nd among the female runners with a time of four hours, six minutes and 28 seconds (4:06:28). She joined the Venice marathon last October 22 where she clocked four hours 14 minutes.
The 26.2-mile marathon started at the Verazzano Bridge and ended at Central Park. It cut through the city’s five boroughs -– Staten Island, Brooklyn, Queens, the Bronx, and Manhattan -– and was watched by more than two million New Yorkers lining the streets to support the runners, making it “a race like no other,” organizers said.
Zobel de Ayala was cheered on by his wife Kit and two daughters as he crossed the finish line despite freezing eight-degree temperatures that weakened many runners, some of whom failed to complete the race. He ran at a pace of 9.29 minutes per mile.
He ranked 11,807th among the male finishers of the race. His teammates included siblings Amanda and Francesca Carpo, Jonjon Rufino and Ayala executive Nona Torres.
Scores of other Filipinos and Filipino-Americans living in New York also joined the race, including Marie Clare Katigbak-Sillick, daughter of Philippine Star bureau chief in Washington Jose Katigbak.
Sillick, 31, chief copywriter at Bobbi Brown Cosmetics and author of a book due out in February, turned in a time of 4:18.52 and came in 17,894th place. It was her first marathon.
But more important for Zobel de Ayala than being successful in his first New York marathon run — which earned him a nondescript medal given to all finishers – was raising funds for Habitat for Humanity and the GILAS computer education program.
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EAST BRUNSWICK, NJ -- The victory of Democratic Senator Robert Menedez has raised the hopes of Filipino American Democrats in the state, who said they believed that Menendez would champion the cause of the immigrants.
“Menendez’s parents are immigrants, he knows how immigrant feels,” said veterinarian Delfin Tumibay, a Filipino American who is a member of the Democratic Party in Belleville, NJ.
Tumibay also expressed the hope of about 10 million undocumented immigrants that the new de mocrat-controlled Congress would allow an overhaul of the immigration laws of the United States and provide a path toward legalization of immigrants.
President Bush, in a televised press conference Wednesday, was optimistic that he could work with bipartisan support for a comprehensive immigration bill pending in Congress.
Menendez, who became a senator when then-Senator Jon Corzine gave up the post to assume the governorship of New Jersey, survived a bruising campaign and attacks from Republican Tom Kean Jr. to win a full- term U.S. Senate seat.
“In this election, I have walked by faith and not by sight, and my faith has been renewed. Thank you, Lord,! “Menendez said at the victory party Tuesday night.
Menendez got 1,137. 696 or 53 percent of the votes as compared to 955.878.457 votes of Kean.
“In January, Bob Menendez was my choice for the U.S. Senate. Today, he is New Jersey’s choice,” Corzine said.
Menendez ‘s huge immigrant following were enthusiastic of the Democrats’ grabbing of the House majority.
“Menendez knows practically knows every immigrant issue, his victory is an advantage to Filipinos and Asian Americans,” Ludy Hughes, who was appointed by Gov. Jon Corzine as manager of Turnpike project. “We worked hard to campaign for him. Once again, the election shows that values are important to New Jersey. Menendez will be a great senator,” Hughes said.
At the victory party, Hispanic supporters chanted “Si, Se Puede, (Yes, we can) as Menendez urged them in Spanish to support him. He called his Hispanic supporters “brothers and sisters.”
Several other Filipinos said they believed Menendez will be a stronger voice of minorities in the Senate.
“He is down-to-earth and approachable. He will surely help the needy. He wants wages to be increased and supports seniors’ projects,” said sisters Lily Cantuba and Celi Cantuba-Reside who brandished red, white and blue posters of Menendez during election night.
“ I’m really sure he will speak for us all in the Senate. Menendez came from poor Cuban family. His mother is a seamstress. He understands our needs. It is important that we support him,” said Dr. Eden Dalanon , an advocate for the homeless in Jersey City who attended the victory party.
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LONDON -- A suspected al Qaeda operative who underwent training in the Philippines watched impassively in a British court on Monday, November 6, as prosecutors played shaky hand-held video of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) and other US financial targets he has admitted planning to bomb.
Briton Dhiren Barot, 34, pleaded guilty last month to conspiracy to murder in connection with planned attacks in the United States and Britain -- the latter including the use of a “dirty bomb” laced with radiological material.
At Monday’s sentencing, prosecutor Edmund Lawson played video footage he said was shot in April 2001 on a reconnaissance mission by Barot for the attacks in the United States.
Lawson said the bombings were planned in 2000 and 2001 and apparently shelved after the al Qaeda attacks on the United States on Sept. 11, 2001, in which nearly 3,000 people died.
But he said the plans were later revived and were being worked on in 2004 in the run-up to the suspects’ arrest.
“Barot, evidently a member or close associate of the al Qaeda terrorist organization, led the conspiracy to cause lethal explosions both here and in the United States of America,” Lawson told the court. “The plot was to carry out massive explosions here and in the United States.”
The 80 minutes of video were at the end of a tape of the Hollywood film “Die Hard with a Vengeance”, found after Barot and seven co-defendants were arrested in August 2004.
Barot’s co-defendants, who deny involvement, are due to go on trial next April. Under British media law, reporters are banned from reporting details that could prejudice their case.
Also found were encrypted files containing the plans for the US attacks, which police cracked with the help of a code word discovered during investigations in Pakistan.
The plans were in four computer files, compiled with meticulous detail. “They have the outward appearance, in a sense the feel, of being a formal business proposal,” Lawson said.
In the case of Citigroup’s New York headquarters, five attack options were considered ranging from vehicle bombs to the use of a hijacked petrol tanker or “flying object”, he said.
Lawson said prosecutors had not definitively established the targets in Britain but said investigators had found a computer file with notes on London hotels and three railway stations.
He described these as evidence of “nefarious investigation into the potential for terrorist activity”. Inside other computer files, police found research on radioactive materials and the use of radiation dispersal devices, or “dirty bombs”.
Lawson said a first “terrorist visit” to Pakistan and the disputed Kashmir region in 1995 documented by Barot described “intensive training in various aspects of terrorism, such as use of weapons and preparation of poisons and explosives”.
Later training included a two-week spell in 1999 in the Philippines. Barot then visited the United States between August 17 and Nov. 14, 2000 and from March 11 to April 8, 2001.
It was during the latter trip that the video of the NYSE and other buildings was shot.
Lawson said prosecutors believed Barot visited Pakistan in April 2004 to show al Qaeda backers his plans to blow up several gas-filled limousines in underground car parks in Britain. Barot has admitted the so-called “Gas Limos Project”. (MNS)
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LOS ANGELES -- Charlie “Atong” Ang, a friend of former President Joseph Estrada, is reportedly at the Los Angeles International Airport on Thursday, November 9, to board a flight back to the Philippines after a five-year stay in the US to face plunder charges filed against him at the Sandiganbayan.
Ang, according to a television report, was escorted by US Marshals and was turned over to National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) agents led by Reynaldo Esmeralda at the Los Angeles airport.
Ang and his escorts are due to board a Manila-bound Philippine Airlines flight past 8 p.m. in Los Angeles and are expected to arrive in Manila at 5 a.m. on Friday. From the airport, he will be brought to his detention place that will be determined by the anti-graft court.
Justice Secretary Raul Gonzales confirmed that Ang, the former Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corporation (PAGCOR) consultant , will be arriving in the Philippines early Friday morning after being extradited from the United States.
Ang is escorted by Esmeralda, deputy director of the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) Regional Operations Service, and Claro de Castro Jr., the bureau’s Interpol chief, and will be taken straight to the NBI jail on arrival.
He is a co-accused in the plunder case for which Estrada is being tried by the Sandiganbayan.
Ang is accused of funneling P130 million in alleged tobacco tax kickbacks and illegal gambling payoffs to Estrada, who is also being tried for plunder, a capital offense, before the Sandiganbayan.
Gonzalez and NBI Director Nestor Mantaring will meet Ang at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA).
The justice chief had Ang fetched after the US State Department informed the Philippine government on October 6 to return him to the country no later than November 11.
“Attorney Esmeralda told me that all is set for Ang’s return,” Gonzalez told reporters.
NBI spokesperson and Criminal Intelligence Division chief Ricardo Diaz said Ang will not receive any special privileges while in detention.
“We will not give him what he wants but we will give him what he needs -- security and a roof over his head,” said Diaz.
But Diaz did not discount the possibility that the Department of Justice would eventually place Ang in separate quarters.
Ang, a gambling buddy of Estrada, fled the country on January 20, 2001 following Estrada’s ouster. He was arrested at the Paris Hotel Casino in Las Vegas on the basis of a Philippine government request for his extradition.
After a year in US custody in a North Las Vegas jail, he was freed on $300,000 bail and placed under house arrest. He was made to wear an electronic monitoring device while US marshals guarded his home.
Last September, a US District Court judge ruled Ang extraditable to the Philippines.
Diaz said there will be heavy security at the NAIA for Ang’s arrival because of Ang’s claim that his life is in danger.
According to the standard procedure in such cases, Ang will be handcuffed upon arrival and escorted to the NBI jail, where he will be temporarily detained pending the issuance of a commitment order by the Sandiganbayan.
“We expect the commitment order within a week given the sensitivity of the case,” Diaz said.
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