Noam Chomsky ... Still Furious at 76

Sunday Herald - 20 March 2005
By: Alan Taylor

ON my way to meet Noam Chomsky in Boston, I pick up a copy of The American Prospect, whose cover features snarling caricatures of US Vice-President Dick Cheney, and of Chomsky: the man dubbed by Bono "the Elvis of academia". Cheney is presented as the proverbial bull in an international china shop, Chomsky is portrayed by this "magazine of liberal intelligence" as the epitome of high- minded dove-ish, misguided idealism. Chomsky, of course, is well used to such attacks. For every cloying article by a disciple, there is a rocket from the enemy camp revelling in his perceived failings and undermining his reputation, denigrating his scholarship as a linguist and joyfully repeating statements which, when taken out of context, seem tinged with fanaticism.

To his credit, Chomsky puts them all on his website, whether it's TheNew Yorker describing him as "the devil's accountant" and "one of the greatest minds of the 20th century", or The Nation, which lampooned him as "a very familiar kind of academic hack" whose career has been"the product of a combination of self-promotion, abuse of detractors, and the fudging of his findings". He stands accused of asserting that every US President since Franklin D Roosevelt should have been impeached as war criminals; of supporting the murderous Pol Pot regimein Cambodia; and of comparing Israel to the Third Reich.

Leaving behind red-brick Harvard, where the winter snow is at last beginningto melt, one enters a vast industrial estate. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where Chomsky has been professor of modern languages and linguistics since 1976, is home to more than 10,000 students, each ofwhom pays around $50,000 a year for the privilege of studying at America's self-styled "ideas factory".

Chomsky, who at 76 is technically retired, inhabits a suite of office so verflowing with foreign translations of his books and dusty academic journals. A photograph of the British philosopher Bertrand Russell hangs above a door, as a picture of the Pope might decorate a priest's study. The professor, his gatekeeper says, has gone for a walk, but he should return soon, if he can find his way back. Apparently, he is exploring a hitherto uncharted underground route on the campus.

I am shown into his office, which looks as if it has been burgled. Papers are piled high and strewn on every available surface. On a desk are photographs of his grandchildren. Chomsky, who has been married to the same woman for more than half a century, has three children, two daughters - one of whom works for Oxfam, the other is a teacher - and a son, who is a software engineer. When finally he does appear, I am informed that my allotted hour has shrunk magically to 45 minutes. Interviewers, it's intimated, are lining up like planes on a runway waiting for take-off. "Don't take it personally," I'm told.

I remind Chomsky of his 1990 visit to Scotland, when he spoke on "self-determination and power" at the Pearce Institute in Govan, Glasgow. "You've got to remind me what this is about," says Chomsky. This does not seem a promising start. I remind him that he is coming to Edinburgh to deliver a Gifford Lecture. "I know that," he says, rather testily. "But who are you?"

Chomsky is quietly impatient, his voice subdued and crackly. He has retained his wavy hair, which flops over his ears, and he dresses likea style-unconscious academic - black trainers, white socks, denims, charity-shop jumper. To some interviewers he comes across as bitter and despairing but others, including me, find a seam of laconic humour beneath the serious, restrained manner. When he starts to talk he often forgets to stop and in the course of our foreshortened hour he proves as difficult to interrupt as the Queen's Christmas message. Wind him up and away he goes.

But with Chomsky it's hard to know where to begin. Having spent more than 50 years at the MIT, he is the author of dozens of books and countless articles. A decade ago, Nature mentioned him in the same breath as Darwin and Descartes. Among his modern peers are Einstein, Picasso and Freud. Apparently, only Shakespeare and the Bible have been cited in scholarly publications more often than Chomsky has been.His influence is equally formidable, including generations of media students and the likes of John Pilger, Harold Pinter, Naomi Klein and James Kelman.

"If Chomsky has a specialist subject," wrote Kelman, "then some would argue it is not linguistics, nor the philosophy of language, rather it is US global policy, with particular reference to the dissemination of all related knowledge."

Not all of Chomsky's devotees would agree with Kelman. Some, such as author and columnist Paul Johnson, wish he'd stuck with linguistics and kept his nose out of politics. Through his study of language and, in particular, syntax, Chomsky is credited with transforming the way foreign languages are taught through his theory of a "universal grammar", and of "revolutionizing our view of the mind". Several ofhis books, including Syntactic Structures and Theory Of Syntax, published in 1957 and 1965 respectively, are invariably referred to as essential documents, though they're hardly accessible to the layman.

Meanwhile Manufacturing Consent, which he co-wrote with Edward Herman in 1988, is on every rookie journalist's reading list. Chomsky is the sceptic's sceptic, believing that the true nature of the US's role in the world is distorted and hidden from the American people by the corporate-owned media elite and federal government representatives who protect business interests in order to get re-elected or keep their jobs in the administration. Though he reluctantly supported Democrat John Kerry's failed pitch for the presidency last November, Chomsky is neither a Republican nor a Democrat. From his perspective, there's not a lot to choose between them; they're both "business parties".

We begin by talking about the piece in The American Prospect. "It's the journal of what they modestly call 'the decent left'," he says, oozing contempt. "It's kind of moderate social democrat and they see themselves as embattled. You know, caught between two powerful forces which are crushing them. One is Dick Cheney, representing the WhiteHouse, the Pentagon, one of the most powerful forces in history, and the other one - an equal and opposite force - is me. Do you think any intellectual or academic in history has ever received such praise? I mean, it's way beyond the Nobel Prize. I already got someone to put it on the website. It tells you something about their attitudes. They're pathetic, frightened, cowardly little people."

Interesting, I note, that though his face is on the magazine's cover, his name is nowhere to be seen in the piece. "Oh, no, no, no," Chomsky says, grinning at my naivety, "you can't mention it. You can't mention anything. You can't read anything. All you can do is report gossip. So you heard some gossip saying that I was in favour of Pol Pot or I support Osama Bin Laden. That I'm in favour of [Slobodan] Milosevic. And then you heard it at a dinner party so it must be true. My previous interviewer is doing a documentary mainly on Palestine. She just got a PhD at New York University. She was telling me that if she ever so much as mentioned my name her faculty members practically collapsed in terror. The idea that you could look at anything of mine was so frightening it couldn't happen. Which is standard. You can't think because that's too dangerous. Or you can't look at public opinion. You should see public opinion. It's amazing."

In what way? Just before last November's presidential election, he says, two of America's most prestigious public attitude monitoring institutions - the Program on International Policy Attitudes and the Chicago Council on Foreign Relations - published studies which showed that both political parties, the media and what he calls "the decent left" are far to the right of the American public on most major issues. "I'm right in the mainstream," says Chomsky. "And, of course, it wasn't reported."

"The major facts were just suppressed," he says. "Actually, these two reports were reported in two local papers in the country and a couple of op eds. That's it. In the entire country. The most important information possible right before an election."

What the reports showed, he explains, was that the American public are strongly opposed to the use of force, except in terms of the UN Charter, and in the face of imminent attack. "The public wants the UN, not the US, to take the lead in an international crisis," says Chomsky. "That includes reconstruction, security and so on in Iraq. A majority of the public is actually in favour of giving up the veto at the UN so the US would go along with the majority. An overwhelming majority supports the Kyoto Protocol. In fact, so enthusiastically that Bush voters assumed that he was in favour of it, because it was so obviously the right thing to do.

"The same huge majority is in favour of joining the International Criminal Court. A large majority of the population takes it to be a moral issue for the government to provide health care for everybody. It goes on and on like this. The public is far to the left of anything in the establishment."

Come the elections, he says, the public suffered from mass delusion. They didn't understand what the candidates stood for. What they were voting for was imagery. "Elections are run by the public relations industry; the same guys who sell toothpaste." Issues don't register on the radar. "You don't talk about what the candidates stand for, what you have is John Kerry goose-hunting and riding his motorcycle and George Bush pretending to be a simple kind of guy, who chops wood and takes care of his cattle.

"And plays golf?

"No, no. You don't push that too much, that's elitist. He is supposedto be an ordinary guy. Take a look at him! His sleeves are rolled up; he's just getting ready to go back to the ranch. You don't present him as what he is: a spoiled frat boy from Yale who only got somewhere because of his parents."

Chomsky, one suspects, could continue in this vein ad nauseam. Even now, at an age when most people would rather be in a gated Florida compound than constantly locking horns with the establishment, he persists in banging his head against closed doors. In the US, he is either a pariah or a prophet, "a kind of modern-day soothsayer", according to his biographer Robert Barsky.

"Unlike many leftists of his generation," says Barsky, "Chomsky never flirted with movements or organisations that were later revealed to be totalitarian, oppressive, exclusionary, anti-revolutionary, and elitist. He has very little to regret. His work, in fact, contains some of the most accurate analyses of this century."

Nobody can deny Chomsky's commitment to the cause of truth. His father was a renowned Hebrew scholar who emigrated from the Ukraine to theUnited States in 1913 to avoid being drafted into the army. His motherwas also a Hebrew scholar and wrote children's books. Chomsky was born in Philadelphia in 1928, and his precocity was nurtured at an experimental elementary school. By 10, he was reading the proofs of his father's edition of a 13th-century Hebrew grammar, and writing about the rise of fascism in Spain for his school newspaper. As a teenager he would often take a train from Philadelphia to New York to visit his uncle, who had a newspaper stand and a changeable political viewpoint. "First he was a follower of Trotsky," Chomsky says, "then he was an anti-Trotskyite. He also taught himself so much Freud he wound up as a lay psychoanalyst with a penthouse apartment."

At the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, Chomsky met his mentor, Zellig Harris, a politically active professor of linguistics. It was Harris who dissuaded him from abandoning his studies and going to Israel where the new state was in formation. In 1956, at an MIT symposium on information theory, Chomsky presented a paper which overturned conventional linguistic wisdom. "Other linguists had said language had all the formal precision of mathematics," said George Miller, a psychologist who was in the audience, "but Chomsky was the first linguist to make good the claim."

Throughout his life, Chomsky has maintained his twin interests in politics and linguistics but it is the former which has consumed his energies in recent years and given him such a public profile. When he speaks, he says, crowds turn up in their thousands. In Sweden, the venue changed from a small hall to a football stadium. He turns down many more requests than he accepts. Rarely does he agree to appear on American television, because - as I can testify - he will not compromise by talking in sound bites. Proper discourse requires time to allow arguments to develop.

"You can only be on television if you have concision," he says. "That means you can say something between two commercials. That's a terrific technique of propaganda. On the rare occasions when I' m asked to be on television, I usually refuse for this reason. If you're gonna be asked a question, say, about terrorism and you're given three sentences between commercials, you've got two choices. You can repeat conventional ideology - you say, yeah, Iran supports terrorism. Or you can sound like you're from Neptune. You can say, yeah, the US is one of the leading terrorist states. The people have a right to ask what you mean. And so if it was a sane news channel - A-Jazeera, say - you could talk about it and explain what you mean. You're not allowed to do that in the United States."

On occasion, one suspects, Chomsky doth protest too much. Like fellow American "dissidents", such as Michael Moore and Gore Vidal, he may complain about the manipulative power of the media and government but he can hardly complain that he has been rendered voiceless. Indeed, these days the internet is a potent weapon in his armoury. He can't be both the most cited living person and marginalised.

There is little doubt, however, that his relentless monitoring of theAmerican media and his fundamental distrust of the denizens of Washington DC make him a formidable and eloquent adversary and, consequently, persona non grata in certain quarters. In general, he believes that the US should stay out of other countries' affairs. Bush's White House, he says, only believes in democracy when it serves American interests. The same guys who backed Saddam Hussein's brutal suppression of the Shi'ites are the ones who ordered the invasion ofIraq.

He is in full flow, bashing Paul Wolfowitz, the architect of the war in Iraq and US nominee for the presidency of the World Bank, rubbishing Tony Blair - "I suppose Hitler believed what he was saying too" - and recalling how, in 1985, Ronald Reagan declared a national emergency because he thought Nicaragua was about to march into Texas, when his assistant pokes her head round his door and says my 45-minute hour is up. On the way out, Chomsky draws my attention to a ghoulish painting hidden behind a filing cabinet.

"It's a terrific Rorschach test," he says menacingly. "When I ask people from North America what it is, nobody knows. When I ask people from South America, everybody knows. If you ask people from Europe, maybe 10% know. What it is, is Archbishop Romero on the 25th anniversary of his assassination [in El Salvador], six Latin American intellectuals - Jesuits - who were also murdered, all by elite forces armed and trained by the United States who also killed another 70,000people. Nobody knows a thing about it.

"Suppose it had been in Czechoslovakia. Suppose the Russians had murdered an archbishop and killed [Vaclav] Havel and half-a-dozen of his associates. Would we know about it? Yeah. We probably would have nuked them. But when we do it, it doesn't exist. It reminds me of the world."

Noam Chomsky will give the Gifford Lecture - Illegal but Legitimate: A Dubious Doctrine for the Times - at the McEwan Hall, Edinburgh, at5.15 pm on Tuesday, March 22, 2005

INSTEAD OF VAT HIKE GO AFTER EVADERS, IMPROVE COLLECTION

MEDIA RELEASE
IBON Foundation, Inc.
3/F SCC Bldg 4427 Interior Old Sta Mesa, Manila, Philippines
Tel. +632 713-2729, +632 713-2737 E-mail: media@ibon.org
References: Rosario Bella Guzman (Executive Director)
Antonio Tujan (Research Director)
March 16, 2005

Instead of hoping for the approval of the value-added tax (VAT) bill before Senate takes its recess, government can work on other pro-people revenue measures like improving tax collection and going after tax evaders.

Research group IBON Foundation advises the Arroyo administration not to be too fixated on the VAT bill approval because there are other ways for government to raise revenues. One is to plug leakages in tax collection, as government data reveals that the average VAT leakage for the period of 1998 to 2002 was P41.6 billion. This is 30% of the country’s potential tax due.

Government data also shows that there is a high level of tax evasion among corporate taxpayers, which amounted to an annual average of P54 billion, or a tax evasion rate of 38% of potential tax due. Going after tax evaders, and thus improving direct taxation is a more reasonable measure than pushing for indirect taxation schemes like VAT.

VAT itself is inherently inequitable due to its indirect nature. It imposes a uniform tax rate on all taxpayers regardless of their incomes or ability to pay. This goes against the basic principle of taxation that it must be equitable. Worse, the income from these taxes does not go back to taxpayers in the form of social services, but to debt payment.

The Arroyo administration has vowed to match the public’s sacrifice of paying higher taxes with a commitment to cut government excess spending, fight graft and corruption and prosecute tax cheats. But these are policies that government should be pursuing rather than implementing new tax measures. It is unjust for government to offer its commitment to these policies in exchange for the public’s support for a VAT increase.

Given the increasing difficulty of making ends meet as prices continue to rise and wages remain stagnant, any additional tax burden would only serve to drive the majority of the people further into poverty and debt. Thus aside from improving tax collection and going after tax evaders, government should explore other pro-people measures like reforming its debt management, addressing graft and corruption and reimposing tariffs to specially-sensitive products. (end)

State Terrorism

From: SOUNDING BOARD
By: JOAQUIN G. BERNAS, SJ

We should not forget that states can perpetrate more horrifying terror. Remember Samar, Dresden, Hiroshima.

Our real task in the coming period is to devise a pattern of relationships which will permit us to maintain this position ofdisparity [US military-economic supremacy]. . . To do so, we will have to dispense with all sentimentality and daydreaming. . . . We should cease to talk about vague and. . . unreal objectives such as human rights, the raising of the living standards, and democratization.

Theday is not far off when we are going to have to deal in straight power concepts. The less we are then hampered by idealistic slogans, the better." -- George Kennan, Director of Policy Planning, US StateDepartment, 1948.

Terrorism is a favorite topic especially after 9/11 when more than 3,000 innocent lives perished in a flash in New York. It was terrorism perpetrated by nonstate agents. We should not forget that states can perpetrate more horrifying terror. The other night I watched the The Fog of War, an award-winning documentary where former US secretary of defense Robert McNamara was the main actor. It was a reminder of the horrors of World War II.

Early in the documentary McNamara narrated how in 1962 the UnitedStates was within a hair-breadth away from nuclear war where one ofthe options was the complete annihilation of Cuba. Fortunately, diplomacy prevented it. But we need to recall horrors that had happened before.

Remember Dresden. In February 1945, within less than 14 hours Dresden, a defenseless German city, was scorched by military bombers killing about a third of its inhabitants, possibly half-a-million innocent lives.

Remember Tokyo and other Japanese cities. Thousands of people perished under rain of firebombs dropped by US bombers. This was even beforeNagasaki and Hiroshima. When Hiroshima and Nagasaki's time came150,000 died instantly and thousands more by the slow, horrible death from radiation.

The US won the war. Japan surrendered. Germany, too, was defeated.

Military leaders of Germany and Japan were tried for war crimes. ButRobert McNamara himself observed that, if the United States had lost the war, American leaders would have been tried for war crimes!

It was happening even before World War II. In 1899 Filipinos fought American soldiers equipped with superior firepower. The death toll among Filipinos was enormous, and some provinces had horror stories to tell. Samar, for instance, had a General Smith.

A historian reports the testimony of a Marine Major: "The major said that General Smith instructed [a soldier] to kill and burn, and said that the more he killed and burned the better pleased he would be; that it was no time to take prisoners, and that he was to make Samar a howling wilderness.

"Major Waller asked General Smith to define the age limit for killing, and he replied 'Everything over ten."

Mark Twain commented: "We have pacified some thousands of the islanders and buried them; destroyed their fields; burned their villages, and turned their widows and orphans out-of-doors; furnished heartbreak by exile to some dozens of disagreeable patriots; subjugated the remaining 10 millions by benevolent assimilation, which is the pious new name of the musket; we have acquired property in the 300 concubines and other slaves of our business partner, the Sultan of Sulu, and hoisted our protecting flag over that swag. " And so, by these Providences of God -- and the phrase is the government's, not mine -- we are a World Power."

Is terrorism just brutal, unthinking violence? "No. Experts agree thatthere is almost always a strategy behind terrorist actions. Whether it takes the form of bombings, shootings, hijackings, or assassinations, terrorism is neither random, spontaneous, nor blind; it is a deliberate use of violence against civilians for political or religious ends." And states can be the more dangerous terrorists. ###

The Filipino Women’s Century-Old Struggle for National Liberation

The struggle of Filipino women for national liberation turns a century this month. For more than a century, from the revolutionary contributions of the woman General Gabriela Silang against colonialism to the very first suffragist organization founded in 1905, the women’s liberation movement in the Philippines has made considerable development in terms of advancing the cause of women against feudal and colonial oppression and exploitation.

by: AVA DANLOG
Bulatlat/Vol. V, No. 5/March 6-12, 2005

For this year, militant women’s groups, led by Gabriela, the largest multi-sectoral alliance of women’s organizations in the country, launch a campaign against President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo and her anti-national, anti-people and anti-women policies.

Historical significance

International Women’s Day falls on March 8 because of its historical significance in women activism. It was in March 8, 1957 when women workers of garment factories in New York marched to protest against low wages, 12-hour daily work schedule and the oppressive working conditions. This was prompted by the death of women and children when a garment factory caught fire because they were locked inside at night. The demonstration was violently dispersed.

It was in March 8, 1908 that marked the extensive protest of women against capitalist exploitation. On this day, 30,000 women workers marched to call for more humane working conditions and legislation against child labor and the right to suffrage of women.

March 8 was then proclaimed as International Women’s Day in 1977, when the United Nations General Assembly passed a resolution mandating the observance of International Women’s Day by its member nations. But as early as 1910, international labor groups have paid tribute to women’s heroic struggles by celebrating March 8 as International Women’s Day, several decades before the UN would do so.

In the Philippines, the first feminist organization, Asociacion Feminista Filipina, was established in 1905. Although it focused largely on social issues, such as maternal and child care, prostitution and gambling, and consisted mainly of women from the upper and middle classes, its birth signaled the awakening of the Filipino women’s feminist consciousness and later paved the way for the establishment of militant and political women’s groups.

The first observance of International Women’s Day in the country was in 1971 when Makibaka (Makabayang Kilusan ng Bagong Kababaihan or Patriotic Movement of Modern Women) and Katipunan (Katipunan ng Bagong Kababaihan or Association of Modern Women) mobilized women in protest of poverty.

When martial law was declared, mass demonstrations were prohibited and Makibaka went underground, becoming one of the first organizations to be a member of the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP). It was only in 1984 when militant March 8 commemorations once again commenced, spearheaded by Gabriela.

Advances in the women’s movement

According to Gabriela Women’s Party Rep. Liza Maza, herself a former Gabriela secretary general, the fact that women are being organized and the militancy of women is being sustained, are manifestations of the movement’s development, especially since the patriarchal value system is deeply rooted in the Filipino culture.

She added, “There is now legislation on defining violence against women as a crime. So in that sense, the women’s movement, I think that is not just an achievement on legislation, but largely the achievement of the women’s movement that have lobbied and advocated for enshrining the rights of women in the law.”

According to Joms Salvador, national chairperson of GABRIELA Youth, the movement has reached a lot in terms of popularizing the cause. More women’s organizations are established. Internationally, the Philippine experience in organizing women is looked upon. Salvador adds that the diversity of women organizing in the country is a measure of how stable and strong the women’s movement is.

Women’s situation

Still, feudal and foreign oppression and exploitation of women continue. Majority of women, who are rural-based, do not enjoy the right to own land. In a study conducted by Amihan (National Federation of Peasant Women), the disparity can run as high as 10 centavos for a woman agricultural worker for every peso that a man earns.

The same trend applies to female workers who are victims of contractualization and poor working conditions, usually employed in the manufacturing and service sectors. Because of retrenchments and lax labor laws in these sectors, more and more women are forced to emigrate. This, aside from the added burden to women for their traditional roles as homemakers.

In a study conducted by Gabriela, seven out of 10 Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs) are female, 44 percent of whom are employed in the service sector while 33 percent is in the entertainment sector. The miserable situation of female OFWs is heightened by racial discrimination and racism.

However, the exploitation of women OFWs roots not just from the racial discrimination in foreign countries or the gender-based oppression, but also from the factors that force them to leave the country: widespread poverty and the government’s labor export policy.

The emigration of females is encouraged by the labor export policy of the Arroyo administration that contributes to the massive global sex trade and modern-day slavery of Filipino women and children, according to Ninotchka Rosca of the Purple Rose Campaign.

Under the Arroyo administration, Filipinos are exported as sex commodity to nearly 200 countries and is a major exporter of women as virtual sex slaves around the world. Almost 600,000 Filipino women are trafficked worldwide under the euphemisms “Guest Relations Officer,” “entertainer” and “cultural dancer.”

Alarmingly, incidences of violence against women and children have risen, particularly rape and sexual abuse. Ten years ago, statistics show that six women and children are raped daily. Last year the figure doubled as 12 women and children become victims of sexual abuse daily. Domestic violence remains widespread with 18 women and children becoming victims of battering daily. This number would surely rise with the current economic crisis. Studies reveal that majority of urban-based domestic violence center on money. In a separate study, more incidences of domestic violence happen during the months of December and May wherein money is needed for the holiday season and the incoming school year.

Economic crisis as the most urgent issue

Of all the issues faced by women, the most pressing would be the economic crisis. According to Maza, the crisis has specific impact on women because they are looked upon as secondary providers. Their contribution in production is valued less than that of men’s.

They don’t receive social services like health and education. And because of their traditional roles, they are burdened with stretching every peso to make both ends meet.

“As one becomes so economically disempowered, the more you become victims of violence. Especially now that poverty is so acute, more violence is present, even in the homes,” she adds.

The passage of the additional 2 percent Value Added Tax (VAT) would then certainly make it harder for women. Gabriela listed seven basic commodities whose prices will surely rise: rice, milk, liquefied petroleum gas (LPG), sugar, coffee, soap and cooking oil. All these are commodities that concern mothers and housewives.

For these reasons, the theme of this year’s International Women’s Day call on militancy to oppose the anti-national, anti-people and anti-women policies of the Arroyo administration.

Struggle for national liberation, too

According to Maza, it is important to account the long years of women’s struggles and triumphs in order for society to look into the future and see what else needs to be done. It is a testament to how the women’s movement developed in the Philippines as against the feminist construct with the sole perspective of individual rights.

“I think it is high time to look at it as an overall achievement of women, to look into this undeveloped perspective that the Filipino women have really contributed a lot in our struggle for freedom and democracy and the struggle for the women’s empowerment and the recognition of women’s rights and welfare,” she adds.

The annual observation of International Women’s Day is an effective venue for the re-education of society in understanding our history to discern the historical roots of gender oppression in the country and the role of women in history, Maza also said. The main enemy of women and of the oppressed and exploited peoples is US imperialism which preserves fascism and national, religious and racial chauvinism in the country through the family, religion, state and the media. All these aim to perpetuate the degradation of women and further divide the working class and the people at large, she added.

© 2004 Bulatlat ■ Alipato Publications

Filipino Women Find No Comfort from a Woman President

Edith Gallardo sells kakanin (rice cakes) for a living. Sometimes, she would also sell pancit and boiled peanuts to earn more money. She earns an average of P100–P150 a day. For Gallardo and other impoverished Filipino women, having a woman president is no solace. She believes that President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo has done nothing to lift Filipino women from poverty and exploitation.

BY RONALYN V. OLEA
Bulatlat/Vol. V, No. 5/ March 6-12, 2005

Women from different sectors of Philippine society presented their woes during a forum called Ulat Lila (Purple Report) organized by the Center for Women’s Resources (CWR), March 4.

As wives and mothers, women are always the first to bear the brunt of economic devastation. Based on the 2003 Family Income and Expenditure Survey (FIES), three out of five Filipino families live a hand-to-mouth existence.

Inflation rate was pegged at 7.4 percent at the end of 2004, the highest in six years. Meanwhile, the real value of the peso stands at P0.53 due to increases in prices of commodities and services.

In 2004, the price of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) increased 12 times, with a total increase of P144.65 per 11-kg cylinder. The price of LPG increased by P80 from January 2004 to February 2005.

Water rates have also risen. Maynilad jacked up its rate by 36 percent and Manila Water by 21 percent. Electricity rates also went up. A family consuming 120 kwh to 200 kwh of electricity a month pays 34 percent higher. Those who consume 1000 kwh a month pay 28 percent more.

Gertrude Libang, executive director of the Center for Women’s Resources (CWR), said that the impending Value-Added Tax (VAT) increase would burden the consumers even more. “Since the consumer is at the end of the chain with no one to pass the VAT to, she/he ends up taking up the VAT.”

An example cited by Libang is a can of sardines. With VAT at 10 percent, a can of sardines costs P9.87. At 12 percent, the price goes up to P10.60 per can.

Women workers

Unemployment rate among women was 11.7 percent as of October 2004. Only two out of five workers are women. Women’s labor force participation rate is only 50 percent as against men’s 83 percent. Half of the women work force are therefore part of the reserved labor force.

Nanette Miranda, spokesperson of the Koalisyon Laban sa Kontraktwalisasyon (Coalition Against Contractualization) criticized the Macapagal-Arroyo government for not doing anything about the widespread contractualization of labor which, she said, affects most women workers.

Twenty-five percent of the workers in the industrial and service sectors are non-regular workers. According to the labor department, there are 651,000 non-regular workers in 2003. Forty-seven percent or 307,000 are contractuals who work in construction projects, real estate, renting and business activities. Twenty-four percent or 159,000 are casual workers in hotels and restaurants. Probationary workers account for 18 percent or 120,000 of non-regular workers. There are 67,000 apprentices/learners and seasonal workers.

Miranda revealed that women working in factories work more than eight hours a day to meet the company’s quota. She also cited the pregnancy test as an additional requirement for work.

“Mas tumitindi ang kalagayan ng mga manggagawang kababaihan sa ilalim ng babaeng presidente,” (The situation of the women workers and the workers in general has worsened under a woman president) Miranda said.

Peasant women

According to the National Statistics Office (NSO), there were 11.8 million agricultural workers and farmers as of October 2004. The average wage of women in agricultural sector, based on Bureau of Agricultural Statistics’ report, is P127.98. This amount is 15 percent less than the wage of their male counterparts.

Zen Soriano, spokesperson of the Amihan (National Federation of Peasant Women), complained they hardly feel the country’s supposed “economic growth.” “Binibili sa murang halaga ang aming ani kahit napakataas ng aming gastos. Hindi kami ang nakakapagpresyo kundi ang mga traders.” (Our products are bought at low prices. It is not us who determine the price of our products but the traders.)

Soriano also said that ordinary farmers like her do not benefit from the Gloria rice. The said hybrid rice, Soriano said, needs inputs they cannot afford to buy. “Wala namang subsidyong ibinibigay sa amin kaya walang saysay ang Gloria rice.” (We do not get any subsidy from the government. Gloria rice is senseless for the poor farmers.)

The peasant leader also said the government has failed to implement a genuine agrarian reform program. The Department of Agrarian Reform, now called Department of Land Reform (DLR), claimed 3.37 million hectares of land were distributed in 30 years. However, data from the department do not include re-claimed emancipation patents and certificate of land ownership awards (CLOA). Based on government data, 75 percent of the beneficiaries are men.

Soriano also hit Macapagal-Arroyo’s plan of allotting one to two million hectares of land for agri-business.

“Gusto nila ayusin ang Konsitusyon para paaygan ang 100% foreign ownership.” (They want to change the Constitution to allow 100 percent foreign ownership of land.)

Soriano related that some mothers leave their families to work as domestic helpers in the cities in order to augment the limited income. “Ang mga nanay hahanap ng paraan para mabuhay ang pamilya. Iiwan ang mga anak sa kamag-anak, kapitbahay. Minsan, naaabuso ang aming mga anak na babae.” (Mothers will find ways to support the family. They will leave their children to relatives, neighbors. In some cases, our daughters are subjected to abuse.)

The lifting of restrictions on rice importation, Soriano said, is tantamount of depriving them of their livelihood. “Pinapatay ni GMA ang kabuhayan natin.” (GMA is killing our livelihood sources.)

Migrant women

Connie Bragas-Regalado, chairperson of the Migrante International, said that 65 percent of overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) are women, mostly in the service sector. Every day, 3,000 Filipinos leave the country to work abroad.

Fifteen percent of the Filipino families are dependent on OFW remittances. The World Bank estimates OFWs remit USD 8 billion annually.

Regalado herself worked as a domestic helper in Hong Kong for 13 years. She said the Hong Kong government has persistently pushed for their wage cut. “We work for 12-16 hours a day,” she said, usually receiving a monthly salary of P18,000. Of this, they send home P15,000.

Regalado also revealed that after 9/11, there has been an intensified crackdown on illegal immigrants in many countries. Many Filipinos have been detained. This, she said, have resulted in massive deportation. However, the Philippine government has only promised to provide free passports and could not provide job opportunities for the returning OFWs.

Urban poor

Edith Gallardo of the Samahan ng Maralitang Kababaihang Nagkakaisa (Samakana or Organization of United Urban Poor Women)-Tatalon Chapter also shares Regalado’s sentiments. Gallardo sells kakanin (rice cakes) for a living. Sometimes, she would also sell pancit and boiled peanuts. She earns P100–P150 a day.

Gallardo said they usually have sardinas and noodles for meal. Like any other family living in an urban poor community, they are constantly threatened of demolition.

Based on the estimates by the National Housing Authority, there are 1.41 million informal settlers in the country. Fifty-two percent of this can be found in the National Capital Region.

The budget of the government for housing is a measly P2.74 billion in 2004, accounting for only 0.30 percent of the national budget. The Macapagal-Arroyo government promised to build 1.2 million houses for the poor. In her three-year term, the government only accomplished 73.6 percent of its target or 882,823 units. The figure is only 25 percent of the total house units needed by the urban poor.

Gallardo also related the death of her sick mother. “Dinala ko siya sa public hospital, hiningan ako ng P1,000 pandeposito. Saan ko po kukunin iyon? Namatay siya na hindi nagagamot.” (I took her to a public hospital. I was asked to deposit P1,000. Where would I get that? My mother died without receiving any treatment.)

Gallardo vowed, “Pag nakita ko si Gloria, hindi ko siya patatawarin, siya ang pumatay sa aking nanay.” (When I see Gloria [Macapagal-Arroyo], I will not forgive her. She was the one who killed my mother.)

Violence against women

The violence against women continues. In 2004, there were 2,005 cases of sexual abuse reported to the Philippine National Police (PNP). Documented cases of rape reached 1,228. Meanwhile, cases of sex trafficking and white slavery increased four times from 2003 to 2004.

Figures from the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) on the other hand are higher. Based on its records, there were 11,526 cases of violence against women and children in 2004. Ninety percent of the cases filed before the DSWD were cases of sexual abuse against girls. Of the 3,346 rape cases, 31 percent were cases of incest.

Facing the Challenges

Gertrude Libang, executive director of the Center for Women’s Resources (CWR), said, “The challenge for women now is how to course the tide in their favor. Each issue indicates a formidable task of reckoning and action, and clearly, there are a lot of things to be done. Women should recognize that they play a decisive role in the transformation of the Philippine society.”

She ends, “The feudal view has portrayed women as the hand that rocks the cradle. But in this era and in this trying moment in our country, women is also the same hand that wields half of the power of the people. President Macapagal-Arroyo should realize this.”

© 2004 Bulatlat ■ Alipato Publications

Uncovering the Forbidden Truth

Review of The Forbidden Book by Abe Ignacio, Enrique de la Cruz, Jorge Emmanuel, and Helen Toribio (T’boli Publishing and Distributor, U.S.)172 pages
Philippine selling price: P1,400.00

The relevance of The Forbidden Book lies not only in the wealth of historical information and insights that it provides. It comes at a time when the U.S. is engaged in another imperialist war, this time in Iraq. Leafing through the book, one finds himself or herself confronted by similarities between the Philippine-American War and the Iraq War.

BY ALEXANDER MARTIN REMOLLINO
Bulatlat
Vol. V, No. 3, February 20-26, 2005

In his famous article, “The Miseducation of the Filipino,” the late historian and social critic Renato Constantino wrote about the Philippine-American War of 1899-1914 being hidden from the textbooks that we in the Philippines are made to read in school.

The American forces sent to the Philippines in the late 19th century were here to liberate the country from the Spanish colonizers, these books say, and the Filipinos are depicted as having willingly accepted American rule which had the purpose of teaching Filipinos the art of self-government. Buried in the official histories is the fact that the U.S. waged a 15-year war against Filipino freedom fighters who had just won their freedom from Spain with negligible “help” from American troops – as confirmed by British lawyer Richard Brinsley Sheridan who was working in the Philippines when the war broke out.

Recent papers show that nearly 1.5 million Filipinos died in the war against U.S. colonial occupation.
The miseducation about the Philippine-American War, however, started much earlier in the United States. This miseducation of the American people about the Philippine-American War is the subject of The Forbidden Book by Filipino-American scholars Abe Ignacio, Enrique de la Cruz, Jorge Emmanuel, and the late Helen Toribio – launched in the Philippines at the Popular Bookstore Feb. 5, a day after the war’s 106th anniversary.
The book takes its title from a 1900 cartoon showing then U.S. President William McKinley preventing Uncle Sam from reading “The Forbidden Book” on “the true history of the war in the Philippines.”

On Feb. 4, 1899, the U.S. engaged the Philippines in a war on the pretext that Filipino soldiers had fired at American troops at the San Juan Bridge. It was actually the other way around: an American soldier named Willie Grayson had fired shots at four Filipinos crossing the bridge.

“Halto!”

The late historian Teodoro Agoncillo, in his classic History of the Filipino People, recounted the incident, quoting Grayson himself thus: “I yelled ‘Halt!’...the man moved. I challenged with another ‘Halt!’ Then he immediately shouted ‘Halto!’ to me. Well I thought the best thing to do was to shoot him.”

The Forbidden Book collects political cartoons in the period of the Philippine-American War which appeared in various American newspapers and magazines. Of these there are 88 colored cartoons and 133 black-and-white cartoons.

In their selection of the cartoons, the authors present both sides of the Philippine-American War: the “pros” and the “antis.” It is clear from the way they explain the book, however, where they stand on the issue.

The authors speak of an “economic transformation” in the U.S. characterizing the period between the end of the U.S. Civil War in 1865 and the beginning of the Philippine-American War in 1899.

“One important consequence of the economic transformation was the need for overseas markets to sell American manufactured goods,” the authors write. “Concerned that the domestic market area was not enough to absorb the products of industry and agriculture, powerful interests lobbied to keep overseas markets open to U.S. business.”

They didn’t make that up. They merely explain the words uttered in 1897 by leading capitalist expansion advocate Sen. Albert Beveridge: “American factories are making more than the American people can use; American soil is producing more than they can consume. Fate has written our policy for us; the trade of the world must and shall be ours.”

By highlighting that point, the authors set the tone for the reading of the book, thereby giving the reader pointers on how to make sense of those cartoons that justify the occupation of the Philippines based on McKinley’s “Manifest Destiny” slogan, based on the claim of “(Taking) up the White Man’s burden--/...(Among) new-caught, sullen peoples,/Half-devil and half-child,” to paraphrase British pro-imperialist poet Rudyard Kipling.

Negroes as savages

The cartoons were illustrated at a time when the Negroes were looked upon by the white Americans as savages, if not beasts, and there are many cartoons included in the book which depict the Filipinos as African tribal babies. One of the cartoons even compares the killing of Filipinos to “killing niggers.”
However, there are cartoons which unveil the lies behind the “Manifest Destiny” slogan, portraying the war as one that is in the interest of the U.S. capitalist establishment but not of the American people and certainly not of the Filipino people.

The relevance of The Forbidden Book lies not only in the wealth of historical information and insights that it provides.

It comes at a time when the U.S. is engaged in another imperialist war, this time in Iraq, which is being justified along the same messianic claims – a war supposedly intending to dismantle tyranny in Iraq, only to replace Saddam Hussein’s tyranny with the tyranny of a clique of leaders ready to accommodate U.S. economic interests in Iraq’s rich resources. Leafing through the book, one finds himself or herself confronted by similarities between the Philippine-American War and the Iraq War.

It is very good that being based in the U.S. did not take the Filipino out of the book’s authors. In coming out with this book, the authors secure for themselves a place in history with other Filipino expatriate intellectuals who continued or have continued to be Filipino – and fight for the Filipino – even “in the belly of the beast,” like Carlos Bulosan and Dr. E. San Juan, Jr.

Author De la Cruz, a former University of the Philippines professor, is now with the California State University’s Asian American Studies. A former professor himself, Emmanuel is with Asia for Asian Studies in California while Toribio taught at San Francisco State University’s Asian American Studies. The book is available in the Philippines at Popular Bookstore along Tomas Morato Street (near the corner of Timog Avenue), Quezon City; or contact Ms. Joy Soriano at (63-2)4557738. Bulatlat

© 2004 Bulatlat ■ Alipato Publications

P8,000 Daily for a PMA Cadet; a Paltry P43 for the State Scholar

Unlike all other state universities and colleges (SCUs), the Philippine Military Academy (PMA) remains the learning institution most favored by government. While the budget of the SCUs has been slashed anew several-fold this year, that of the PMA has been increased.

By Ronalyn Olea
Bulatlat
Vol. V, No. 3, February 20-26, 2005

Compared to all other state universities and colleges (SCUs), the Philippine Military Academy (PMA) remains the learning institution most favored by government. Along with the Department of Education (DepEd), the SCUs have their new budgets slashed several-fold.

The PMA, as expected, has no budget cut; its allocation has in fact been increased – from P557.92 million last year to P568.17 million this year.

In the proposed budget, the PMA cadet is subsidized with P12 million for a four-year course or roughly P8,219 a day; his counterpart at the state Polytechnic University of the Philippines (PUP) has a measly P43 a day or only 0.52 percent of the PMA cadet’s daily subsidy.

The PMA produces the country’s military elite but its professional hierarchy in the armed forces has been wracked by graft scandals, mutinous tendencies and human rights violations. This has not deterred the current presidency – and its predecessors – from showering both the military and national police with fat salary increases and other high budget allocations, however.

Speaking at a rally of about 1,000 students in Mendiola, Manila on Feb. 14, Rizza Ramirez, national president of the National Union of Students of the Philippines (NUSP), asked: “Is this government more interested in producing corrupt military officials than professionals and teachers much needed by the country? While this government spends huge amounts of money in launching its war in Mindanao, the Filipino students suffer from dilapidated facilities, tuition and miscellaneous fee hikes and low quality of education.”

The Valentine’s Day rally, joined by students from SCUs and public high schools, called President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo a “heartless mother.” The state scholars and other rallyers lambasted the Macapagal-Arroyo government for cutting education expenditures mercilessly in favor of debt servicing and military expenditures.

In the proposed national budget for this year, 33.6 percent goes to interest payments amounting to P301.69 billion, Ramirez said. The combined allocation for debt servicing, including the payment for the principal debt, accounts for more than 70 percent of the national budget. The country has now incurred a $60 billion foreign debt.

Moreover, P1.2 billion will be allotted for intelligence funds this year. The Office of the President will get P650 million. The intelligence fund earmarked for the Philippine National Police (PNP) is P270 million; Department of National Defense (DND), P111.5 million; and National Intelligence Coordinating Agency (NICA), P31.24 million.

The budget of the DND this year amounts to P43.6 billion. The Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) will get P46.04 billion.

Anti-VAT, too

Ramirez, a college senior from the University of the Philippines (UP), also opposed the imposition of a hike on the Value-Added Tax (VAT) saying taxes do not translate to social services such as education, health and housing.

“Isn’t it appalling for Ms. Macapagal-Arroyo to tax anew the poor majority so as not to default on debt payments? The Filipino youth and the people in general do not get their fair share in the nation’s wealth. The national budget for this year reveals so much about her real priorities,” the NUSP president said.

Overall, education spending remains a pittance compared to debt servicing and military expenditures. For the first time, the Department of Education (DepEd) will suffer a budget slash of P4.6 billion from last year’s allocation. The reduction is expected to even aggravate the public education crisis in terms of shortages in classrooms, desks, textbooks and teachers.

SCUs will have to do with P950 million less than the previous allocation. The UP budget will bear the biggest slash amounting to P355.64 million. Because of the reduced subsidies, SCUs are even more compelled to increase tuition and other fees.

In UP, tuition increases have been imposed even under the Socialized Tuition and Financial Assistance Program (STFAP). While in 1989, tuition was pegged at P17 per unit today it stands at P300 per unit. In 2001, tuition in the UP graduate school increased from P300 per unit to P500-P700 per unit. In the state university’s five units, laboratory fees have also been jacked up. From the previous P0.00 to P50, these fees were increased to P500 to P600.

Processing fees

Meanwhile, in PUP processing fees were hiked by 67 to 100 percent. The PUP administration also plans to increase tuition from P12 per unit to P88 per unit. The Philippine Normal University (PNU) also increased its tuition by 400 percent in 2003.

Regional state universities also suffer tuition and other fee increases. In Central Luzon State University (CLSU), for example, tuition and miscellaneous fees were hiked by 298 percent. At the Aklan Polytechnic Institute, tuition will increase by 400 percent in the next four years. The Ramon Magsaysay Technological University (RMTU) in Zambales raised its tuition from P80 to P150 per unit last year. A P200 development fee is also collected from the students.

The Mindanao State University in General Santos City will raise its tuition from P50 to P150 per unit. The University of Eastern Philippines (UEP) in Samar will also implement a tuition hike, from P40 per unit to P150 per unit.

The budgets cuts have reportedly driven thousands of state scholars from registering at the SCUs anymore because of higher tuition. They either join the increasing army of college dropouts or, particularly those whose families can afford it, enroll for two-year technical or vocational courses in quest of a job abroad.

Meanwhile, about 10,000 students from the Mapua Institute of Technology (MIT) in Manila walked out of their classes on Feb. 14. Wearing black, the students opposed the proposal to change the name of the university to Malayan Institute. MIT, a top engineering school, is owned by the Yuchengco Group of Companies. The Yuchengcos own the Malayan Insurance and Rizal Commercial Banking Corporation, among others. The school is listed among the top 1,000 corporations in 2003 with P28.7-million profit. Bulatlat

© 2004 Bulatlat ■ Alipato Publications