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Founded in 1986
Founding Publisher/Editor:
Lito A. Gajilan
Columnists:
Atty. Michael J. Gurfinkel
Joseph G. Lariosa
Gani P. Tolentino
Ted L. Reyes
Atty. Reuben S. Seguritan
Photographers:
Butch Gata
Sheryl Garcia
The opinions expressed by columnists are their own and do not reflect the opinion of the paper nor that of the publisher
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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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To tell us what you think about Filipino Express Online or to comment on the stories published here, E-mail us at Filexpress@aol.com
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ACT 1: Hard ICE
IN recent months, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement have shown their adherence to their call of duty: Enforce immigration laws. Agents have raided more factories employing illegal help recently that in any other time in the last 20 years. They have barged through homes and arrested illegal aliens who turned to hiding after receiving removal proceeding orders from the agency.
This year alone, more immigrant families were separated than united. It has been though for undocumented immigrants. They have come face-to-face with the strong arm of immigration law. And the ICE has proven finally that they are indeed the team for the job. Job well done. Now is the time for the agency’s second act.
ACT 2: The Humane ICE
Last week, the agency announced its new program called “Scheduled Departure”– a scheme that would allow hiding undocumented aliens facing deportation to surrender and avoid the hassles of arrest and detention. These illegals, upon surrender, would then be given ample time to put their lives in order and leave on their own terms–no ifs, buts, or hidden charges, just a smooth and peaceful way to leave the country.
They will even be give a pat on the back and cool immigration points if ever they decide to return to the country legally.
The ICE is shedding off their tough skin with this new program. They are showing the public that they are not as hard and cold as everyone thinks, but warm and compassionate as well.We are buying it. We are convinced. Now, what’s the catch?
ACT 3: Reform
Act one is done, act two is ongoing, and act three is never far behind. For all we know, the entire play will culminate in the greatest climax of all – immigration reform. It is election year, and most right-wing Americans are convinced that the ICE have done their job in enforcing the law through the millions of people they deported recently. Likewise, left-wing Americans are swaying to the rhythm of the humane ICE as stressed in act two.
It will not be surprising to see a sweeping initiative to fix the immigration system anytime soon. Act two is a test to see if undocumented immigrants will indeed come out if given the right deal. In addition, it will also test how the public would react to the government being flexible and compassionate towards lawbreakers.
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BILLS TO EASE VISA BACKLOGS APPROVED BY IMMIGRATION SUBCOMMITTEE
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Editor’s Note: REUBEN S. SEGURITAN has been practicing law for over 30 years. For further information, you may call him at 212 695 5281 or log on to his website at www.seguritan.com
Two House Bills (H.R. 5924 and H.R. 5882) that were introduced to ease the retrogression of immigrant visa numbers were approved by the Subcommittee on Immigration last August 1.
H.R. 5924, sponsored by Representative Robert Wexler on April 29, 2008, would provide additional visas for nurses and physical therapists. H.R. 5882 sponsored on April 23, 2008 by Rep. Zoe Lofgren seeks to recapture unused employment-based and family-based visa numbers.
These bills are now with the full House Judiciary Committee for review.
Although these bills are considered “stop gap measures”, they provide a gleam of hope to hundreds of thousands who are currently waiting and/or intending to apply for immigrant visas.
More Visas for RNs and PTs
If passed, H.R. 5924 will provide an additional 20,000 visas for Registered Nurses and Physical Therapists every year for three years or until September 30, 2011. Their immediate family members will be allowed to immigrate without being subject to the quota limitation.
Under this bill, the USCIS will be required to fast-track its review and act on the immigrant visa petition (I-140) within 30 days from filing. The I-140 petition is the first step in the green card process.
A fee of $1,500 for each nurse who uses the visa will be charged to the employer except when the employer was affected by the Katrina disaster or is located in a Health Professional Shortage Area.
The fees collected will be used to fund a grant program designed to help nursing schools all over the U.S. attract and/or retain students and faculty members.
This bill has wide support. In a letter written to the sponsors last May 16, the American Hospital Association (AHA) and the American Society for Healthcare Human Resource Administration (ASHHRA) stressed the urgent need for nurses because “the nation’s severe nursing shortage, now in its ninth year, challenges the hospitals’ ability to operate at full capacity to care for communities.”
AHA has 5,000 member hospitals and other health care organizations while ASHHRA represents 3,200 health care human resource managers. Both organizations offered their resources to help enact the legislation.
Recapture of Unused Visas
If passed, H.R. 5882 will recapture employment-based and family-sponsored immigrant visas lost due to government processing delays and prevent loss of these visas in the future. It will add to the fiscal year’s 140,000 employment-based quota and 480,000 family-sponsored visas, the previous year’s unused visas and the number of unused visas from the fiscal years 2002 to 2007.
Under existing laws, green cards already authorized by Congress but remained unused were lost because there is no system which will preserve these unused green cards.
Under H.R. 5882, these unused green cards will be restored and again be available for use by U.S. employers to retain their foreign workers/employees and also allow families of U.S. citizens and permanent residents a faster reunion with their relatives.
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“OFFER DEEDS, NOT WORDS” – OBAMA
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It was a missed opportunity for John McCain.
Even if he already ceded the UNITY 08 quadrennial convention being held at the backyard of Sen. Barack Obama long before it even started to Mr. Obama, Senator McCain should have given himself a sporting chance to trot his wares before 7,000 journalists of color that descended in Chicago, Illinois last week. There was nothing wrong with Mr. McCain crashing the party. After all, he was one of its two most valuable invited guests.
Mr. McCain could have made the case before the journalists from the four big minority organizations in the country that he is a better alternative to Mr. Obama. Mr. McCain’s lame excuse for non-appearance that there was a scheduling conflict does not really wash because both Messrs. McCain and Obama were supposed to attend the five-day event on Thursday (July 24th). But both of them were not available then. And they were given another day to reschedule. The UNITY 08 got confirmation from the Obama camp that he can make it the day after the conference on Saturday, July 26, prompting organizers to extend the conference for another day, Sunday, July 27th, which should have been a “free-day” for the out-town conference attendees or their departure day. While UNITY 08 organizers heard nothing from McCain camp.
A TOKEN PARTICIPANTS
As a result, only an estimated 2,000 journalists were on hand to watch, listen and interact with Mr. Obama Sunday (July 27th) as the rest of the participants were heading to the airport.
But then again, appearing before 2,000 journalists of color was an asset that speaks volumes of how low Mr. McCain regards the minority journalists. Mr. McCain did not give journalists a chance to put the campaign claims of Mr. Obama on the crucible by his no-show that nothing but promoted Obama’s strengths.
When an early black panel moderator Joe Davidson, Washington Post political editor, insinuated that the mainstream media were giving Mr. Obama a “kids gloves” treatment, another black panelist Les Payne, Pulitzer Prize-winner and columnist of New York Newsday, suggested that journalists should not clap their hands if Mr. Obama is introduced.
Mr. Payne told journalists that they should hold their applause despite mainstream media’s attitude of celebrating the Bush administration’s “(discredited) weapons of mass destruction” during the last eight years. But when Mr. Obama was introduced into the stage, the convention delegates brought down the house by giving Mr. Obama a standing ovation. Moderators Suzanne Malveaux, CNN anchor, and Romesh Ratnesar, world editor, TIME magazine, were able to solicit answers from Mr. Obama that “the only way to solve Iraq War is thru political accommodation” and “I was being “cr iticized for my (Middle East and European) trip although when Sen. McCain traveled to Mexico, Canada,” and other countries right after he (McCain) won the Republican presidential nomination, Mr. McCain was not criticized.”
WILL U.S. APOLOGIZE?
In one of the conscience-tugging questions of the day from the audience, Mr. Brian Bull, assistant news director of Wisconsin Public Radio, representing the Native American Journalists Association (NAJA), prefaced his question this way: “Senator Obama, the Australian and the Canadian Prime Ministers expressed apologies for the atrocities they committed to their indigenous tribes. Is the US government ready to apologize to the atrocities committed to the Native American Indians during the last 500 years?”
Mr. Obama answered slowly: “I personally would want to see our tragic history of our treatment of Native Americans acknowledged. There is no doubt that our treatment of Native Americans as well as other persons of color in this country that we had some very sad and difficult thing to come up with. What the official apology will look like how and/or shape is something I will have to consult with Native American tribes and counsels and to talk about it with them because obviously in some occasions, there are a whole host of issues and problems that they are concerned about and need prioritizing.
“One of the things that I said to tribal leaders I would do is to set up an annual meeting with them and make sure that the20whole range of issues are addressed.
“But I always want to believe that when it comes to issues on reparations for Native Americans as well as African Americans, the most important thing for US government to do is not just to offer words but offer deeds.
“And when you look at situation on tribal lands, the fact that by every social economic indicators, Native Americans are doing worse than any population on health, education, on substance abuse, housing situation or unemployment is skyrocketing and I have more concerns about delivering a better life and creating a better relationship with Native American people than anything else and that is what I want to engage with tribal leaders.”
“When it comes to reparation, will you take a step further in apologizing for slavery?” followed up Ms. Malveaux.
To this follow-up question, Mr. Obama, said, “The best reparation we could provide is to provide good schools to inner cities and jobs to the unemployed and strategies that invest people in lifting people out of legacy of slavery in general. But will allow us to build broad coalition that will get these things done. That I think is the best strategy.
UNIVERSAL EDUCATION, HEALTH CARE
“The effect of dealing with some legacy of discrimination will cost millions of dollars and we are not going to have that kind of resources unless all Americans feel that they are invested in making this thing happen. And so I am more interested in talking abo ut how every child has to learn, every person has health care, every person has a job, every senior citizen retires with dignity and respect. If we have proportionate universal health care that will just disproportionately affect every people of color because they are disproportionately uninsured and if we have an agenda that says every child in America should go to college regardless of income that will disproportionately affect people of color because our children oftentimes cannot afford to go to college.”
This point of view of Mr. Obama should be a preview on how Senate Bill 1315 that includes the grant of Filipino World War II veterans will fare under the Obama presidency in case, the U.S. House of Representatives gives the bill a pass this year.
I hope if the Filipino veterans bill will get a token grant of benefits from the U.S. government after they were denied the enjoyment of G.I. bill for education and other benefits, an apology, like the U.S. government’s apology to Japanese Americans interred in various internment camps across the United States during World War II, should also be inserted in the Senate Bill 1315. (lariosa_jos@sbcglobal.net)
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“U5MR” draws a blank from most people, including many in this Western Samar city.
Include Doring. This scrawny tricycle driver pedals me to the internet café to meet an Inquirer deadline. He charges three measly bucks for one way. Ex-commisioner Benjamin Abalos’ line --“May 200 ka diyan sec” -- is light years away for Doring.
“U5MR” is scientists’ shorthand. This indicator pegs probability of a kid dying, between birth and fifth birthday, expressed per 1,000 births. It’s the most sensitive gauge of child health and well-being, UN’s “State of the World’s Children 2008” says.
But that rings no bell for Doring.. “Rain or shine, sick or well, I drive this tricycle to support my family.” He prays his five kids will live. A neighbor’s three-year old baby girl died from gastro-enteritis. Poor sanitation and under nutrition in Calbayog take a heavy toll on children.
Doring’s prayer is a mute expression of something he never heard of either: “Millennium Development Goals” The Philippines and 188 countries, signed in 2000, a pledge to meet eight “MDGs”.
Number 4 target: To whittle down, by two-thirds, deaths of children both at birth and those under five, come 2015. By then, Doring, who is 42 but looks 52, would only be 49.
We may yet beat the 2015 deadline. Under five deaths here were a gross 80 in 1990, National Statistical Coordination Board recalls. This dropped to 31 in 2006. Infant mortality rates have been cut from 57 to 23. But immunization has lagged badly.
Overall averages, however, can paper over gaps between the “haves”, like Batangas, and “have nots,” like Western Samar. Skewed life expectancies reflect this fissure.
People in Western Samar live, on average, 61 years. That’s better than Twai-Tawi’s 51. But this is a gut- wrenching 11 years shorter than life spans of Cebuanos and Pampangenos.—and a Singaporean’s 78.
Western Samar is No. 5. of 10 provinces with truncated life expectancies.. The others were: Antique, Kalinga, Apayao, Eastern Samar, Basilan, Lanao del Sur, Sulu, Maguindanao and Tawi-Tawi.
“Differences in homes, clothing or even menus, are galling enough,” the late National Scientist Dioscoro Umali noted.. “But denial of life itself, and premature graves, are an obscene injustice. It vests the cries for justice.., with the pent up force of deep anger. We will reap the whirlwind if we persist in sowing the wind this way”
Western Samar is rich in natural resources. Part of the largest old growth forests are here. It has land, water, biodiversity, etc. But vicious politics has crimped development and stoked insurgency..
It also.embedded poverty. The result is lack of clean water, shoddy health care, etc.The poorest 10 percent, like tricycle driver Doring, consume four centavos out of every available peso here. The richest burn up 33 centavos.
Western Samar has boosted high school graduate ratios. But Bohol’s primary and enrolment rate of 89 percent oustrips Western Samar’s 80. It cut poverty incidence from 55 to 46 percent -- similar to Negros Oriental levels. But more needs to be done.
“Chances of children surviving beyond their fifth birthday differs significantly.”, the latest Asia-Pacific MDG study reports. The odds hinge on “which part of a country they are born and to what type of household.”
“Children least likely to survive are those in the poorest households,” says this joint study by Asian Development Bank and UN. “The poorest 20 of households typically account for considerably more than 20 percent of a country’s child deaths…U5MR is “typically far higher in rural than urban areas, often by over 50 percent. And these rural-ruban gaps have persisted…
Translate that into the Philippine setting. Children in poorer cities, like Calbayog, are twice as likely to be underweight as those in metro areas like Makati. The provincial yardsticks also hold: 12 out of every hundred kids in Western Samar, are underweight compared to Palawan’s five.
To get more bang for the buck, spend for basic human needs of poorest, the 1972 Stockholm Conference urged. Thus, delegates crafted an innovative “20-20 Pact” The Philippine response to the “20:20 Initiative’s” humane vision is the “20 Per Cent Development Fund”, stitched into the Local Government Code
Section 287 of the Code commits governments to earmark 20 centavos out of every tax peso for needs of the most marginalized : nutrition, health care, medicine, potable water and sanitation, education. Livelihood projects were to be supported.
But politicians have crassly manipulated this vital safety net into a mini-pork barrel. Lapu -Lapu City’s Association of Barangay Councils, for example, fittered away P2.25 million, mostly in allowances for members.. Aloguinsan town splurged P540,000 for “a live concert and a dance-break”. Dapitan disbursed half a million pesos for it’s “executive band.”
Significantly, small ( $50 ) livelihood loans for poor women, won for the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize for Muhammad Yunus \ and Grameen Bank.. “Micro-credit is a means…. whereby large population groups find ways to break out ofpoverty,” the Nobel citation said.
That’s exactly how the Center for Agriculture and Rural Development helped half-a-million poor Filipinas and families Thus, it got the 2008 Magsaysay Award for Public Service.
“Prioritize the use of ( the 20 per cent ) development fund for improvement in delivery of basic social and health services”, President Arroyo urged the League of Provinces. This would lower “U5MR” even if Doring can’t define it.
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