The Manila Times Opinion

15/09/2025

THE violent death of Charlie Kirk is a tragedy I condemn unequivocally. Violence, even against polarizing figures, has no place in a society that claims to value human dignity. Taking a life is both a crime and a moral transgression. Yet while we mourn his death, we must not let grief obscure the contradictions that defined his public career. For even as Kirk proclaimed his Christian faith, he trafficked in a politics steeped in racism, misogyny and anti-Semitism, betraying the Gospel of peace he claimed to defend. This tension between condemning violence against Kirk while refusing to canonize his politics is where reflection is needed, especially for evangelicals in the Philippines who admired him as a model of faith.

THE violent death of Charlie Kirk is a tragedy I condemn unequivocally. Violence, even against polarizing figures, has no place in a society that claims to value human dignity. Taking a life is both a crime and a moral transgression. Yet while we mourn his death, we must not let grief obscure the co...

15/09/2025

Making healthy food accessible to all

15/09/2025

ENOUGH! TIME TO PROTEST

15/09/2025

Fifth of a series

15/09/2025

RECENTLY, the Commission on Higher Education, through Commissioner Ethel Valenzuela, urged colleges and universities in the Philippines to fully adopt artificial intelligence (AI), digital innovation and inclusive education practices to stay competitive and relevant. According to the good commissioner, “We’re still preparing students for yesterday’s jobs,” as she called on higher education institutions to speed up their digital transformation, integrate AI tools into teaching, and rethink outdated models.

RECENTLY, the Commission on Higher Education, through Commissioner Ethel Valenzuela, urged colleges and universities in the Philippines to fully adopt artificial intelligence (AI), digital innovation and inclusive education practices to stay competitive and relevant. According to the good commission...

15/09/2025

TODAY, almost a quarter of the 40 million Canada population are immigrants.

15/09/2025

THERE is a perceptible, gradual and simmering political storm. The hitherto silent majority of Filipinos — whose dissenting voices more than four decades ago birthed the people power revolution that culminated in EDSA 1 that booted out the late president Ferdinand Marcos Sr. into an ignominious exile in the United States, and which precipitated EDSA 2 that ousted Joseph Ejercito Estrada from the presidency and jailed thereafter two decades after — appears to have awakened from a deep slumber of sheer disinterest and complacency.

THERE is a perceptible, gradual and simmering political storm. The hitherto silent majority of Filipinos — whose dissenting voices more than four decades ago birthed the people power revolution that culminated in EDSA 1 that booted out the late president Ferdinand Marcos Sr. into an ignominious ex...

15/09/2025

THE torrent of developments related to the flood control corruption scandal nearly drowned out the news that Royina Garma will testify for the prosecution against former president Rodrigo Duterte in the crimes against humanity case the latter is facing before the International Criminal Court (ICC). Ten months after she entered the US, where she found detention and not the asylum that she’d sought, the retired police colonel returned to the Philippines. Here she is facing murder and frustrated murder charges in connection with the 2020 ambush of lawyer Wesley Barayuga, but no warrant has been issued. Upon arriving in Manila, Garma departed for Malaysia to meet with officials from the ICC. This meeting had been arranged by former senator Antonio Trillanes IV and concerned Garma’s testimony against the man to whom she owed her meteoric rise to position and power in the years 2017 to 2022.

THE torrent of developments related to the flood control corruption scandal nearly drowned out the news that Royina Garma will testify for the prosecution against former president Rodrigo Duterte in the crimes against humanity case the latter is facing before the International Criminal Court (ICC).....

15/09/2025

MAYOR Vico Sotto of Pasig City has warned about the “many outright lies” and attempts to muddle the issues surrounding the flood control scandal, specifically in the testimonies of Pacifico “Curlee” Discaya and his wife Cezarah “Sarah.”

15/09/2025

As evidenced by complicity in the Gaza genocide, the US-Israel military symbiosis in the Middle East is increasingly shunned by the international community. What the region needs is aggressive economic development.

15/09/2025

SEN. Imee Romualdez Marcos, the president’s elder sister and chair of the Senate foreign relations committee, has come out with guns blazing against an alleged “plot” to remove Vice President Sara Duterte through the Ombudsman and prevent her from running for president in 2028. The alleged plot, she says, requires naming Justice Secretary Jesus Crispin Remulla, a trusted Marcos lieutenant, as Ombudsman, and then using the office to charge her with various crimes.

SEN. Imee Romualdez Marcos, the president’s elder sister and chair of the Senate foreign relations committee, has come out with guns blazing against an alleged “plot” to remove Vice President Sara Duterte through the Ombudsman and prevent her from running for president in 2028. The alleged plo...

15/09/2025

(This statement is being published in lieu of the Monday column of Fr. Ranhilio Aquino.)