Are the excesses of the colonial-minded Doña Victorinas & the hypocrisies of Padre Damaso still plaguing our Philippine society in this 21st century? Are the power elite of our society the true saviors of the country or have they become as morally corrupt or intellectually bankrupt as many of the Spanish colonizers of the past?

The image below of Noli Me Tangera opera performers in USA sourced from www.abs-cbnnews.com




Let me share my latest "Philippine Star" newspaper column today in the Lifestyle section's Sunday Life, it's on the September 2014 staging of the Noli Me Tangere opera in Resorts World Manila in the Philippines.

This opera is based on the controversial and "subversive" 19th century "Noli Me Tangere" novel by the national hero Dr. Jose Rizal.

People say Rizal was inspired by other Western literary works and that the main protagonist Crisostomo Ibarra was actually himself, the Europe-educated idealist?

The New York City staging of the Noli opera received a mixed review from the "New York Times" last year, will it fare better qualitatively in the Philippines this year and will it be popular with the local audience?

Read my Philippine Star column below and share to others, or tell me your feedback? Best wishes!

Click the link before to read:

http://www.philstar.com/sunday-life/2014/03/09/1298579/are-excesses-dona-victorinas-and-hypocrisies-padre-damaso-still


Image below of the Noli Me Tangere opera in New York City sourced from www.broadway.com

Missing jet, stolen passports & the need to prevent terrorism

On the tragedy of the missing Malaysian Airlines Flight 370: Let us stop & strictly check the shocking cases of so many stolen passports, possibly used for terrorism or other transnational crimes.

Image below sourced from www.cbc.ca



Image of grieving relatives of missing Malaysian Airlines jet below sourced from www.cnbc.com



I just read in the news now from News 5 Aksyon channel of the Philippines and the CNN news channel that CNN law enforcement analyst and former FBI assistant Tom Fuentes said: "Interpol's database has 39 million records of stolen travel documents at the present time... One billion passengers a year board international flights where there's no inquiry made of that database. So it leaves an opening".

Image below of Austria passport sourced from www.tampapassports.com:




Here are my questions:

How come international airlines like Malaysian Airlines didn't stop or investigate the two stolen passports' names before selling them flight tickets, the guy from Italy and the guy from Austria? Isn't there an Internet database for Interpol and foreign governments to share or have a common list of ALL stolen passports' names?

How did the Immigration officials of Malaysia allow the two guys from passing through their airport using stolen passports? I'm impressed by the modern and high-tech airports of Malaysia, especially Kuala Lumpur, don't the Immigration authorities there have a computer and Internet-linked database on stolen passports, wanted criminals, wanted terrorists, etc.?

On the issue of stolen passports, it is disturbing to read that those two passports by citizens of Austria and Italy were stolen in Thailand, that tourist paradise just our neighbor. Can we request or appeal to the government of Thailand to reinforce and boost their police and law enforcement agencies, even if they have to get help from Interpol or even foreign governments like USA, China, Israel, South Korea, Germany, etc.?

Last, but not the least, how many of the world's 39 million stolen passports at present belong to citizens of the Philippines or are Filipino passports? Can the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) please tell the public or investigate this? I've read and heard reports that stealing or even illegally selling Philippine passports to others used to be not a small problem here in the Philippines.

Whether big or small problem the dilemns of stolen or illegally sold Philippine passports, what can the government of the Philippines do to boost the security features of our Philippine passports?

What can we also ultimately do to improve the security measures---did they already buy CCTV units---for all our airports here in the Philippines as part of our contribution to stop global terrorism and transnational crimes?

Let us pray still for the safety of the passengers of the missing Malaysian Airlines flight.


Image of Italy passport below sourced from lucente.org





Image below of a Philippines passport sourced from gulfnews.com