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President-elect Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos, Jr., accompanied by his family, receives his Certificate of Proclamation at the Batasang Pambansa on Wednesday, May 25, 2022.
Marcos, Duterte
proclaimed winners in
PH’s fastest vote count
BY FILANE MIKEE CERVANTES
Philippine News Agency
MANILA – The Congress on Wednes-
day proclaimed former senator Fer-
dinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. as the
country’s new president and Davao City
Mayor Sara Duterte as vice president
following the fastest canvassing in the
country’s election history.
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MAY 27, 2022 www.canadianinquirer.net VOL. 8 NO. 491
PROCLAIMED
PHILIPPINE NEWS AGENCY
10
Roe vs. Wade highlights the
important role of high courts in
democratic societies
The House and Senate, acting as the
National Board of Canvassers (NBOC),
approved the joint canvassing commit- 18
tee report and adopted the accompany-
ing resolution of both chambers on the `
proclamation of the duly elected win- Whataboutism: what it is
ners in the May 9 presidential and vice and why it’s such a popular
presidential elections. tactic in arguments
The joint congressional canvassing com- The rise and rise of Harry Styles: how
did the former boyband member
PAGE 20
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2 Philippine News
No objection to Congress’ canvassing
of votes: Robredo camp
BY FILANE MIKEE
CERVANTES
Philippine News Agency
MANILA – The camp of the
presidential candidate Vice
President Leni Robredo on
Tuesday said they will not ob-
ject to the inclusion of all the
certificates of canvass (COCs)
in the tallying of votes for presi-
dent in the last May 9 elections.
In a manifestation during
the Congress’ canvassing of the
votes for the presidential and
vice presidential races, Robre-
do’s election counsel Atty. Ro-
mulo Macalintal reiterated the
vice president’s previous pro-
nouncement to “accept the de-
cision of the majority”.
“In her public statement, VP
Leni Robredo asked her sup-
porters that we need to accept
the decision of the majority. Sin-
abi niya, bagaman may hindi pa
nabibilang, bagaman may mga
tanong ukol sa eleksyon na ito
Marcos receives envoys from
US, Japan, SoKor, India
Philippine News Agency
MANILA – The camp of the
prMANILA – Presumptive
President Ferdinand “Bong-
bong” Marcos Jr. on Monday
received United States Chargé
d’Affaires, and the Ambassadors
from Japan, South Korea, and
India during separate meetings
at BBM headquarters in Man-
daluyong City.
First to visit Marcos was Ka-
zuhiko Koshikawa, Japanese
Ambassador to the Philippines,
at around 9 a.m. followed by
Ambassador Kim Inchul of
South Korea who paid a courte-
sy call at 10 a.m.
At around 11 a.m., Indian Am-
bassador Shambhu S. Kumaran
also paid a visit followed by US
Chargé d’Affaires Heather Varia-
va who arrived at about 12 noon.
During their private meet-
ings, the envoys vowed to
strengthen the ties in trade and
na kailangang matugunan, pali-
naw na ng palinaw ang tinig ng
taumbayan (She said that while
there are still votes not tallied,
or questions regarding the elec-
tion left unanswered, the voice
of the people is getting clearer
and clearer),” Macalintal said.
He told Congress which con-
vened as the National Board of
Canvassers that the Robredo
(VP LENI ROBREDO/FACEBOOK)
diplomacy, as well as their com-
mon interests in democracy,
self-determination, and eco-
nomic recovery.
“We were able to discuss
many of the things that how are
we going to handle the next few
years in terms of the relation-
ship of our countries,” Marcos
told reporters in a press confer-
ence after the series of meetings.
The envoys from the four
countries also assured Marcos
of their willingness to provide
necessary assistance to hasten
the country’s recovery from the
ill effects of the pandemic.
“Ang lagi ko lang pinapaalala
sa kanila sinasabi ko palagay ko
sa pandemyang ito ang recovery
ng lahat natin ay hindi kakayan-
in ng kahit na isang bansa, kahit
na gaano kayaman kailangan (I
just told them that I think the
recovery from this pandemic
cannot be done by one country
alone), the partnership will be
the one that will bring us to keep
camp would also waive their ap-
pearance during the proceedings.
“And with that continuing
manifestation your honors may
we be allowed to respectfully
waive our appearance before this
joint committee to further expe-
dite its proceedings,” he added.
Atty. Vic Rodriguez, the
spokesperson of presumptive
president Ferdinand “Bong-
the global economy at least as
stable as possible,” Marcos said.
“We’ve been having excellent
progress for the past few years,
and we look forward to con-
tinuing the progress that in the
relevance under the new admin-
istration,” the Indian Ambassa-
dor, for his part, told reporters
after he met with Marcos.
Other representatives were
not able to meet the media after
they met with Marcos as they
have to leave soon due to prior
engagements.
Marcos also assured the en-
voys from the four countries
that the Philippines has always
held them in high regard as
friends, allies, and partners.
Marcos won via landslide
after garnering more than 31
million votes during the May 9
national polls.
Earlier, several world leaders
including those from the US,
China, Russia, Japan, Australia,
South Korea and the European
www.canadianinquirer.net
bong” Marcos Jr., thanked Ro-
bredo for her patriotism in recog-
nizing the integrity of the result
of the presidential elections.
“We join in the manifesta-
tion of my distinguished col-
league and one of the election
law practitioners, Atty. Romulo
“Romymac” Macalintal. Like-
wise, we would like to recognize
and thank the patriotism exhib-
ited by Vice President Leni Ro-
bredo for expressly recognizing
the integrity and the result of
the recently-concluded general
elections,” Rodriguez said.
Based on unofficial tally by
the Commission on Elections,
Marcos won via landslide after
garnering more than 31 million
votes while Robredo garnered
14.81 million votes in the pres-
idential race.
Positive development
Malacañang on Tuesday wel-
comed the decision of the camp
of Robredo to expedite the can-
vassing of votes.
“The decision of the camp
Grateful to Ambassador Koshikawa Kazuhiko for the fruitful discussion on how
the Philippines and Japan can work together to further improve our transporta-
tion and infrastructure. (BONGBONG MARCOS/FACEBOOK)
Union have congratulated Mar-
cos on his win.
“As you know, nakakatanggap
na ako ng mga (I have already re-
ceived) congratulatory messag-
es from heads of states nakausap
ko na sila, ang unang nakatawag
sa amin ay si (I’ve talked to them,
the first was) US President Joe
Biden, and Chinese President
Xi,” Marcos noted.
“Also, Japanese Prime Min-
ister Kishida, I even spoke with
the outgoing Prime Minister of
Australia, PM Morrison who
had just gone through an elec-
MAY 27, 2022 FRIDAY
of Vice President Ma. Leonor
‘Leni’ Robredo to expedite the
canvassing of votes for Presi-
dent is a positive development,”
acting presidential spokesper-
son and Communications Sec-
retary Martin Andanar said in a
press statement.
He reiterated his call to all
political candidates to respect
the outcome of the elections.
“As we earlier articulated, let
us respect the outcome of the
election and give chance to the
winning candidates to fulfill their
campaign platform,” he added.
In a May 12 public address,
Duterte said he is convinced
that there was no cheating or
other voting irregularities in
the recent polls.
He, however, urged the
Commission on Elections
(Comelec) to investigate cheat-
ing allegations including the
2,000 vote-counting machines
(VCMs) that malfunctioned.
(with reports from Azer N. Par-
rocha/PNA)■
tion. So, marami na talagang
nangyayari (many are happen-
ing now), we’re already being
recognized,” he added.
“This new administration is
being recognized mukha namang
wala ng problema sa (there seems
to be no problem with) recog-
nition. Maybe the comfortable
margin that we enjoy during the
election has a part to play with
that,” Marcos stressed.
Previously, various world lead-
ers have also commended the
peaceful and orderly conduct of
elections in the country. ■
FRIDAY MAY 27, 2022
Spare civilians, PRRD to ‘friend’ Putin
BY AZER PARROCHA
Philippine News Agency
MANILA – Amid concerns
over the Russia-Ukraine war’s
mounting death toll, President
Rodrigo R. Duterte on Monday
night urged his “friend” Rus-
sian President Vladimir Putin
to take precautions to spare ci-
vilians from attacks.
In a prerecorded Talk to the
People, Duterte requested the
Russian Embassy in the Phil-
ippines to relay his message to
Putin, saying that it is the Rus-
sian leader’s obligation to en-
sure the safety of the innocent.
‘Yung embassy ng Russia,
kung nakikinig (The embassy
of Russia, if you’re listening), I
am not picking a quarrel with
anybody. I said Putin is a friend
of mine. But…it is your moral
obligation to see to it na (that)
the civilians, the innocent ones,
children, the elderly, mga babae
(the women)… Vulnerable
masyado sila at walang — hindi
sila marunong magtago, nandi-
Final report includes cops PH gov’t’s
killed in drug war: CHR ‘balancing act’ over
BY MA. TERESA
MONTEMAYOR
Philippine News Agency
pandemic saved
economy, lives
MANILA – The final report on
the investigated killings linked
to the anti-illegal drug campaign
of the Duterte administration
includes accounts of police offi-
cers who died during operations,
the Commission on Human
Rights (CHR) said Monday.
“The comprehensive report
took into account law enforcers
or police killed (pages 6 to 8) as
well as killings by unidentified
individuals outside of the con-
text of police operations (pages
24 to 26),” CHR Executive Di-
rector Jacqueline de Guia said
in a statement.
This, she noted, is contrary to
claims that there was no men-
tion of law enforcers who lost
their lives and of killings out-
side of police operations.
“The findings of the final re-
port extend its scope from the
previous analysis, which covers
yan lang sa bahay nila (They are
too vulnerable and don’t know
how to hide, they just stay in
their homes),” he said.
Putin, he said, could at the
very least give civilians a “warn-
ing” to vacate their homes and
transfer to “safer grounds.”
Duterte described how Pu-
tin’s military is handling the
war as a “ruckus” and appealed
to him to “control” his soldiers.
“The way they are handling
the war everyday, pati ‘yung
mga civilian, binobomba…Putin
kaibigan ko man siya (even the
civilians are being bombed…Pu-
tin is my friend). You are in con-
trol of everything. Anyway, you
really started the ruckus there.
Higpitan mo ang mga sunda-
lo mo. Nagwawala eh (Control
your soldiers. They’re running
amuck),” he added.
He said the problem of in-
flated oil prices will not be
solved until the Russia-Ukraine
war ends.
“You have to solve the war
between Ukraine and Russia
before we can talk of even re-
only incidents investigated in
Region 3, Region 4-A, and the
National Capital Region,” she
said. “The scope of the April
2022 release is nationwide and
covers 882 dockets involving a
total of 872 incidents with 1,139
victims, almost double in terms
of the scope in the initial report.”
The final report aims to
strengthen the initial CHR
findings:
*That there is a consistent
narrative by law enforcers al-
leging victims initiated aggres-
sion or resisted arrest;
*That there is use of exces-
sive and disproportionate force;
*That targeted victims were
mostly civilians killed in uninhab-
ited locations sustaining gunshot
wounds in the heads and/or torso;
*That there is non-coopera-
tion by the police; and
*That there is a lack of effec-
tive, prompt, and transparent
accountability mechanism to ad-
dress the drug-related killings.
De Guia said the report has
been formally communicat-
turning to normalcy. Sa pagka
ngayon it’s a bleak picture be-
cause mukhang ayaw pa ni Pu-
tin hintuan ‘yung giyera (For
now, it’s a bleak picture because
it looks like Putin does not want
to stop his war),” he said.
Meanwhile, Duterte clarified
he is not condemning Putin but
merely “sharing his sentiment.”
“I am not condemning Presi-
dent Putin. I am just sharing my
sentiment which is also the sen-
timent of every human being na
nandito sa kuwartong ito (in
this room). It’s not the way how
to fight a war,” he added.
Despite comparisons made
between him and Putin, he said
he was different because he
pitied the innocent for being
dragged into the war.
“Maraming nagsasabi na
pareho daw kami ni Putin nag-
papatay. Alam mo gusto ko lang
malaman ninyong Pilipino na
pumapatay talaga ako. Sinabi
ko ‘yan sa inyo noon pa. Pero
ang pinapatay ko kriminal.
Hindi ako pumapatay ng bata o
matanda. Magkaiba ang mundo
ed to the Presidential Human
Rights Committee and the De-
partment of Justice.
The report was completed by the
EJK (Extrajudicial Killing) Task
Force led by former Commissioner
Gwendolyn Pimentel-Gana.
It is considered a “more
comprehensive and expansive
version of the initial report” re-
leased last November 2021.
“We are heartened by the re-
marks of Acting Presidential
Spokesperson Secretary Martin
Andanar, which acknowledged the
CHR’s independence and invited us
to coordinate with concerned gov-
ernment agencies,” de Guia said.
“We are hopeful that this sig-
nals greater cooperation and
the enhanced response of the
government in bringing full
justice to all alleged EJK cases
linked to the anti-drug cam-
paign,” she added.
The CHR hopes for the interna-
tional community to see that local
mechanisms are working through
the government’s investigations
of human rights violations. ■
www.canadianinquirer.net
Philippine News
President Rodrigo Roa Duterte and Russian President Vladimir Putin pose for posterity
prior to the start of the 16th Annual Meeting of the Valdai Discussion Club at the Poly-
ana 1389 Hotel in Sochi on October 3, 2019. (RICHARD MADELO/PRESIDENTIAL PHOTO)
namin ni — ‘yung nangyayari
ngayon sa Russia pati sa Amer-
ika (A lot of people are saying
that Putin and I are the same
because we kill people. I want
Filipinos to know that I really
kill. I said this before. But I kill
criminals. I do not kill children
and elderly. What is happening
in Russia and America is dif-
ferent from what is happening
here),” he said.
BY AZER PARROCHA
Philippine News Agency
MANILA – Malacañang on
Tuesday shrugged off a report of
alleged misinformation by Presi-
dent Rodrigo Roa Duterte during
the onset of the coronavirus dis-
ease 2019 (Covid-19) pandemic,
saying it is a new strain of coro-
navirus at that time that had not
been identified in human before.
A report published by non-gov-
ernment organization Innovation
for Change said Duterte has been
perceived as “a major source of
disinformation during the pan-
demic” when he consistently
shared inaccurate information
on Covid-19 on top of confusing
pronouncements on his plans to
respond to the health crisis.
3
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine,
launched on February 24, has
left thousands killed and in-
jured, and forced over 14 mil-
lion people to flee abroad.
Data from the United Nations
Human Rights Monitoring Mis-
sion recorded around 7,061 civil-
ian casualties, with 3,381 killed
and 3,680 injured across the
country since the beginning of
Russia’s armed attack. ■
“No one in the world [knew]
about Covid-19 during the on-
set of the pandemic,” Andanar
said in a Palace press briefing.
Despite Duterte’s pro-
nouncements, Andanar said
the government’s Covid-19 re-
sponse has been a success.
“What is important is our
success in balancing the health
of the nation and the economy
on the other hand. In the end,
what is important are our mile-
stones,” he added.
Andanar cited how the Phil-
ippines surpassed its 70 per-
cent vaccination target of the
eligible population before the
end of Duterte’s term.
Data from the Department of
Health (DOH) showed that 69
❱❱ PAGE 4 PH gov’t’s ‘balancing
4 Philippine News
Duterte expects
next admin
would explore
nuke energy
Bataan Nuclear powerplant building (JIRU27/WIKIMEDIA COMMONS, CC BY-SA 3.0)
BY AZER PARROCHA
Philippine News Agency
MANILA – President Rodri-
go R. Duterte is hopeful that
the next administration would
explore nuclear energy as an
alternative energy source in the
Philippines.
In a prerecorded Talk to the
People aired Monday night,
Duterte said the next admin-
istration must study nuclear
power because the Philippines,
which depends on imported
crude oil, is vulnerable to the
effects of the ongoing Rus-
sia-Ukraine conflict.
“I hope that the next admin-
istration would at least explore
now the possibility of itong nu-
clear...Tutal ang nagumpisa nito
noon si Marcos. Nagpagawa siya
ng nuclear plant. (nuclear ener-
gy…After all, this started during
the time of Marcos. He estab-
lished a nuclear plant),” he said.
Duterte was referring to the
controversial Bataan Nuclear
Power Plant (BNPP) in Morong,
Bataan, a project of former
President Ferdinand Marcos Sr.
which was never used because
of safety and corruption issues.
“You know oil is not infinite,
may katapusan ‘yan (It has an
end). Someday it will dry up,
it will be good for any govern-
ment to prepare the possibility
of making the transition from
oil, yung (to) fossil fuel, to nu-
clear,” he added.
He, however, acknowledged
that reviving the BNPP could
also spell trouble such as the
1986 explosion and fire at the
Chernobyl nuclear power plant
in Ukraine that released large
amounts of radioactive materi-
al into the atmosphere.
“Kaya lang medyo delikado
‘to (But it is quite dangerous).
You know kagaya ng sa ( just like
the) Chernobyl ng (of ) Ukraine
nagkaroon ng (there was a) leak
and so there was this radiation.
Mabuti na lang (Thankfully)
all nations contributed to the
control or fixing the Chernobyl
including Russia, which is now
attacking Ukraine,” he said.
In February, Duterte signed
Executive Order No. 164, which
would establish a nuclear ener-
gy program for the Philippines.
The EO, which outlined the
national government’s position
on a nuclear energy program,
takes into account economic,
political, social, and environ-
mental objectives.
It also mandates the Depart-
ment of Energy (DOE) to develop
and implement the Nuclear En-
ergy Program as part of the Phil-
ippine Energy Plan, and coordi-
nate with and assist the Nuclear
Energy Program-Inter-Agency
Committee (NEP-IAC) in per-
forming its functions.
Earlier, presumptive Pres-
ident Ferdinand “Bongbong”
Marcos Jr., son and namesake
of Marcos Sr., said he was look-
ing into reviving the moth-
balled nuclear power plant.
He said the BNPP was ordered
shut “not because of any scien-
tific reason” but “for politics.” ■
Adopt guidelines on
seniors discount for
online buys, gov’t urged
BY FILANE MIKEE
CERVANTES
Philippine News Agency
MANILA – The House of
Representatives has adopted
a resolution urging relevant
government agencies to imple-
ment the guidelines on the ap-
plication of discounts granted
to seniors and persons with dis-
abilities (PWDs) for all online
transactions.
During Monday’s plenary
session, the chamber adopted
House Resolution 2488 urging
the Department of Trade and
Industry, the Department of So-
cial Welfare and Development,
the Department of Information
and Communications Technol-
ogy, the National Commission
of Senior Citizens, the National
Council on Disability Affairs,
and other relevant government
agencies to effectively imple-
ment the guidelines on the ap-
plicability of senior citizens and
PWD discounts and privileges
to all online transactions.
Quezon City Rep. Alfred Var-
gas said the Expanded Senior
citizens Act and the Magna
Carta for Persons with Disabil-
ities, which grant the privilege
of 20-percent discounts on es-
sential goods and are exempted
from paying the added tax, do
not make any distinction on the
applicability between offline
and online transactions and
must thus be interpreted to be
available for online purchases.
He said senior citizens and
PWDs, who remain to be among
the most vulnerable sectors
PH gov’t’s ‘balancing...
❰❰ 3 million Filipinos are
now fully vaccinated
against Covid-19 while
nearly 14 million have received
their booster shots.
With the reopening of more
productive economic activities
in full swing, he said the coun-
try’s economy grew by 8.3 per-
cent in the first quarter of 2022.
Andanar earlier said a strong
economy is Duterte’s best legacy.
www.canadianinquirer.net
of society in terms of public
health and accessibility of basic
services, were forced largely to
be indoors and reliant on pur-
chasing goods online due to the
coronavirus pandemic.
He noted that due to the lack
of clear guidelines from imple-
menting agencies regarding
the special discounts on online
transactions, several Filipino
senior citizens and PWDs were
unable to avail of the privileg-
es “that they rightfully deserve
under the law.”
“Given the importance of on-
line transactions in the everyday
life and subsistence of Filipinos
especially belonging in the se-
nior citizens and persons with
disabilities sector, it is impera-
tive that the government estab-
lish and properly implement the
necessary guidelines for special
discounts on online transac-
tions to uphold the rights and
welfare of the elderly and PWDs
with the privileges they are enti-
tled to under the law,” he said.
In a radio interview, DTI
Secretary Ramon Lopez urged
e-commerce platforms to pre-
A male amputee heading to the Shrine Hills in Matina, Davao City on April 15,
2022 (ROBINSON NIÑAL JR./PNA)
“Iyan po ang good news at
ito po ang mas mahalaga na
tingnan natin (That is the good
news and this is the important
feat we have to look at),” he said.
Results of an OCTA Research
survey conducted from March 5
to 10, 2022 found that 83 percent
of respondents approve of the
government’s Covid-19 response.
Forty-two percent said they
“truly approve,” while 40 percent
MAY 27, 2022 FRIDAY
pare their systems in accepting
price discounts for senior citi-
zens and PWDs.
Lopez said that those enter-
prises operating online stores
should reprogram their system
to include the 20-percent senior
citizen and PWD discounts.
Senior citizens and PWDs
are also exempted from val-
ue-added tax (VAT) payment of
8 percent for online purchases,
phone calls, and mobile apps.
“We will require the online
stores to have these features,”
Lopez said.
The DTI has yet to announce
when it will start requiring on-
line shops to include senior
citizens and PWD discounts on
their platforms.
Earlier, the Bureau of Internal
Revenue said most online pur-
chases do not apply the discounts
for senior citizens and PWDs.
At the onset of the pandem-
ic, consumer advocacy group
Laban Konsyumer, Inc. has
been pushing for senior citizen
and PWD discounts on online
transactions amid the increase
in activities on e-commerce. ■
said they “somewhat approve.”
Two percent said they “tru-
ly disapprove” of the govern-
ment’s Covid-19 response, while
4 percent said they “somewhat
disapprove” and 11 percent can-
not say whether they approve
or disapprove.
Andanar expressed gratitude
to Filipinos for supporting the
government’s efforts to address
the ongoing health crisis. ■
FRIDAY MAY 27, 2022 5

www.canadianinquirer.net
 6 Philippine News
No repat requests yet;
most OFWs in Sri Lanka
still working
BY JOYCE ANN L.
ROCAMORA
Philippine News Agency
MANILA – The Department
of Foreign Affairs (DFA) said
most of the Filipinos in Sri Lanka
continue to work despite the eco-
nomic crisis that hit the country.
Nevertheless, the agency
continues to monitor the situa-
tion on the ground and remains
ready to repatriate them upon
request.
“All parties are monitoring if
any Filipino worker in Sri Lanka
will request repatriation. So far,
both the Philippine Embassy in
Dhaka and the Honorary Con-
sulate in Colombo have not re-
ceived any such request,” it said
in a statement dated May 24.
“For now, most of the OFWs
(overseas Filipino workers) are
still able to continue their em-
ployment despite the ongoing
Marcos, Duterte...
❰❰ 1 mittee, confirmed that
Marcos had won the
presidency by a land-
slide 31,629,783 votes, or more
than 16 million votes ahead of sec-
ond placer presidential candidate
Leni Robredo.
Duterte, on the other hand,
also overwhelmingly won the
vice presidential race in the
Congress’ official count with
32,208,417 votes, or a huge mar-
gin of 22 million over her closest
rival, Senator Francis Pangilinan.
Senate President Vicente
Sotto III and Speaker Lord Al-
lan Velasco proclaimed Mar-
cos and Duterte as duly elected
President and Vice President.
The declaration comes after
a two-day official vote tally by
the country’s National Board of
Canvassers.
House Majority Leader Mar-
tin Romualdez highlighted that
the voter turnout during the May
9 polls was at a record-breaking
83.11 percent with more than 55
million voters.
“Indeed, our democracy
is alive and vibrant! The ev-
er-growing political interest
shown by our electorate is sym-
crisis. Should circumstances
necessitate the return to the
Philippines of OFWs, this will
be coordinated by all concerned
agencies, led by the DFA and
DOLE (Department of Labor
and Employment),” it added.
Based on the latest DFA data,
there are at least 581 Filipinos
in Sri Lanka.
The United Nations said the
compounded impact of the
Anti-government protest in Sri Lanka on April 13, 2022 in front of the Presiden-
tial Secretariat (ANTANO - OWN WORK/WIKIMEDIA COMMONS, CC BY-SA 4.0)
bolic of the people’s clamor for
change, prosperity, and prog-
ress,” Romualdez said.
He noted that the Joint Com-
mittee canvassed a total of 171
certificates of canvass (CoCs),
132 of which were electronical-
ly transmitted to the Consoli-
dated and Canvassing System
(CCS) by the Board of Can-
vassers of provinces, cities, and
overseas absentee voting coun-
tries, while 39 were physically
delivered to the Senate from
the Special Board of Canvassers
for overseas absentee voting,
local absentee voting, and de-
tainee voting.
He urged Filipinos to put polit-
ical divisiveness behind them and
to support the newly proclaimed
top leaders of the country.
“With the country reeling
from the impact of a global pan-
demic and other major calami-
ties and disasters, it was evident
that the nation was divided as to
what direction to take in order
to move forward. But the ma-
jority has spoken. It is high time
that we listen to their voice and
uphold the outcome of our dem-
ocratic process,” he said.
coronavirus pandemic, foreign
exchange scarcity, rising infla-
tion, and prolonged power cuts
have crippled the country’s
economy and aggravated an
“already dire situation” over ac-
cess to food and health.
These plunged the South
Asian nation into unrest, with
violent protests erupting on the
streets calling for political and
economic reforms. ■
“Let us heal the wounds of
political division, brace our-
selves for the challenges ahead,
and move forward as a strong
and united Philippines. Let us
be prepared to work harder
for the nation and give our full
support to the new leadership.
At the end of the day, we are all
Filipinos and we want nothing
than to see our beloved nation
chart its own course and ulti-
mately triumph,” he added.
The Marcos-Duterte UniTe-
am tandem won on a platform
of unity, which will be the “step-
ping-stone” of the country’s
recovery from the coronavirus
pandemic.
Earlier, several world leaders
including those from the US,
China, Russia, Japan, Australia,
South Korea and the European
Union have congratulated Mar-
cos on his win.
Following Congress’ procla-
mation of Marcos as the pres-
ident-elect, the transition pe-
riod will begin leading to the
inauguration on June 30.
Duterte, meanwhile, earlier
announced that her inaugura-
tion is set for June 19. ■
www.canadianinquirer.net
Lawyer, vlogger
Trixie Cruz-Angeles
named Marcos’
press secretary
BY AZER PARROCHA
Philippine News Agency
MANILA – Lawyer, radio
commentator, and vlogger Rose
Beatrix ‘Trixie’ Cruz-Angeles
has been named press secretary
of presumptive President Fer-
dinand “Bongbong” Marcos, Jr.
Marcos’ chief-of-staff and
incoming Executive Secre-
tary Atty. Vic Rodriguez said
Cruz-Angeles accepted the offer
to be press secretary and head of
the Presidential Communica-
tions Operations Office (PCOO).
“I am grateful for the oppor-
tunity I am given to take part in
the administration of President
Bongbong Marcos as his Press
Secretary. It is with humility
that I accept the nomination
and assume the responsibili-
ty of running the affairs of the
PCOO,” Cruz-Angeles was quot-
ed as saying in the press release.
Rodriguez said Cruz-Angeles
will “oversee the operations of
the PCOO, which includes the
conduct of regular press brief-
ings to media practitioners cov-
ering Malacañang activities.”’
Marcos earlier announced
that he will not appoint a spokes-
person, which in effect limits
Cruz-Angeles’ function to talking
head during press briefings.
Cruz-Angeles previously
served as a social media strategist
at the PCOO from July 2017 to
2018 during the administration
of President Rodrigo Duterte.
As a lawyer, she is known for rep-
Rose Beatrix ‘Trixie’ Cruz-Angeles (JOSEPH VIDAL/SENATE OF THE PHILIPPINES)
MAY 27, 2022 FRIDAY
resenting military officers charged
with rebellion and mutiny.
Cruz-Angeles was also a for-
mer commissioner for Cultural
Heritage of the National Com-
mission for Culture and the Arts
and former spokesperson of the
Integrated Bar of the Philippines.
She currently hosts the
Karambola program over DWIZ.
She also maintains a vlog
“Luminous by Trixie Cruz-An-
geles & Ahmed Paglinawan”
which has over 400,000 follow-
ers on Facebook.
Cruz-Angeles used to be the
publisher of Politiko, an online
publication on and about politi-
cians and government officials
in the country, and a columnist
for Inquirer.net.
She was a lecturer at the Ate-
neo de Manila University and
the Institute for Cultural and
Arts Management.
She finished her law degree at
the University of the Philippines
(UP) in 1997 and is taking an In-
ternational Relations degree at
the University of Minnesota in
the US as well as a master’s de-
gree in Archaeology, also in UP.
In a press statement, outgo-
ing PCOO secretary and act-
ing presidential spokesperson
Martin Andanar welcomed
Cruz-Angeles’ nomination.
“Attorney Angeles is no
stranger to PCOO having served
the office during the early years
of the Duterte Administration.
We wish Attorney Angeles all
the best in her latest assign-
ment,” Andanar said. ■
FRIDAY MAY 27, 2022
PRRD signs laws creating
museums in Cavite,
Kalinga, MisOr
BY AZER PARROCHA
Philippine News Agency
MANILA – President Rodrigo
R. Duterte has signed three laws
establishing three cultural cen-
ters and museums in Cavite, Ka-
linga, and Misamis Oriental to
“promote culture and the arts.”
He signed Republic Act 11770,
RA 11771, and RA 11772 establish-
ing the Kalinga Cultural Center
and Museum in the province of
Kalinga, the Cagayan de Oro City
(CDO) Cultural Center and Mu-
seum in CDO, Misamis Oriental,
and the Biliran Cultural Center
and Museum in the province of
Biliran, respectively, on May 24.
Under the laws, the cultural
centers and museums will serve
as the institutional medium for
the protection, preservation,
presentation, and promotion
of the cultural, artistic, archae-
ological, social, historical, reli-
gious, and philosophical heri-
tage of the Kalinga, Cagayan de
Oro (CDO), and Biliran Island,
and its people in view of the
richness of their legacies and
their relevance to their contem-
porary and future aspirations.
The Kalinga Cultural Center
and Museum will be a collabo-
ration between their respective
provincial and city governments,
and the National Commission
for Culture and the Arts (NCCA)
with its concerned affiliated cul-
tural agencies among others.
The provincial government of
DILG-led vax drives administer close
to 2M doses: Año
BY CHRISTOPHER LLOYD
CALIWAN
Philippine News Agency
MANILA – Department of
the Interior and Local Gov-
ernment (DILG) Secretary
Eduardo Año on Monday said
1,934,807 doses of Covid-19
vaccine were administered to
unvaccinated or those with in-
Kalinga, the City Government of
CDO, and the provincial govern-
ment of Biliran must provide the
land necessary for the construc-
tion or establishment, or both,
of the main venue and ancillary
offices and facilities of the three
cultural centers and museums.
The amount necessary for
the implementation of the laws
will be charged against the cur-
rent year’s budget of the NCCA
(Proper).
Thereafter, such amount as
may be necessary for its con-
tinued implementation will be
included in the annual General
Appropriations Act.
The NCCA is the overall pol-
icy-making body, coordinating,
and grants-giving agency for the
preservation, development, and
promotion of Philippine arts
and culture.
It is also an executing agency
for the policies it formulates and is
tasked with administering the Na-
tional Endowment Fund for Cul-
ture and the Arts fund exclusively
Pres. Rodrigo Duterte (VALERIE ESCALERA/ PRESIDENTIAL PHOTO)
complete doses during their
house-to-house vaccination
campaign.
During President Rodrigo
R. Duterte’s Talk to the People
Monday night, Año reported
that 811 cities and municipal-
ities conducted the house-to-
house vaccination with 784,548
given primary dose, 792,498
vaccinated with the second
dose, 350,237 administered
for the implementation of culture
and arts programs and projects.
LTO district office
Meanwhile, Duterte also
signed a law establishing a dis-
trict office of the Land Trans-
portation Office (LTO) in the
City of General Trias, Cavite.
Republic Act 11769, also signed
on May 24, directs the Secretary
of Transportation to immediate-
ly include in the department’s
programs the operationalization
of the LTO district office in the
City of General Trias.
Under the law, the funding for
the LTO district office in General
Trias must be included in the an-
nual General Appropriations Act.
RA 11769 must take effect 15
days after its publication in the
Official Gazette or in a newspa-
per of general circulation.
The act originated in the
House of Representatives and
was passed by the House and
the Senate of the Philippines on
May 25, 2021 and January 31,
2022, respectively. ■
with the first booster shot and
7,524 getting the second boost-
er dose as of May 22.
The top three regions were
Region 13 (Caraga) with 477,657
vaccinated individuals; Region
3 (Central Luzon) -- 421,138
doses; and Region 11 (Davao Re-
gion) -- 246,249 doses.
Earlier, Año directed all lo-
cal government units (LGUs) to
scour their areas and convince
www.canadianinquirer.net
Philippine News
10% of poll
workers’ honoraria
remain unclaimed:
Comelec
BY FERDINAND PATINIO
Philippine News Agency
MANILA – The Commis-
sion on Elections (Comelec) on
Tuesday said only 90 percent of
the electoral board (EB) mem-
bers have so far received their
honoraria from the poll body.
“We only have about 90 per-
cent (claimed) in the payment
of the honoraria of Electoral
Boards,” said Comelec Deputy
Executive Director for Opera-
tions (DEDO) Teopisto Elnas in
a press briefing.
He urged the remaining EB
members who have yet to claim
their honoraria to proceed to
the Offices of the Election Offi-
cer (OEOs).
“The funds are there with our
Election Officers. If you have
the time, please claim your
honoraria,” Elnas said.
Under the law, the Comelec
have 15 days to settle all obli-
gations including payment of
honorarium.
Meanwhile, Elnas said the
PHP2,000 additional pay ap-
proved by the Comelec en banc
is not included in the payment
the poll body has so far released
to the teachers.
“As for the additional honorar-
ia, we are still looking at the de-
tails, like how many are entitled
and from which areas will we give
the unvaccinated and those eligi-
ble to get Covid-19 booster shots.
Año issued the directive as
the Omicron BA.4 subvariant
has now entered the country
putting the public’s health at
grave danger.
He added the Omicron BA.4
subvariant poses a threat to
public health as it can evade im-
mune protection from vaccina-
tion and prior infection.
7
additional honoraria,” he added.
A total of 647,812 teaching
and non-teaching personnel
from the Department of Edu-
cation (DepEd) served as poll
workers last May 9.
Under Comelec Resolution
No. 10727, the EB chairper-
sons will receive PHP7,000;
EB members with PHP6,000;
DepEd Supervisor Official with
PHP5,000; and Support Staff
with PHP3,000.
In other development, a total of
30 electoral protests have already
been filed before the Comelec.
“The Electoral Contest and
Adjudication Department had
informed me that, as of May 23,
they have received 30 election
protest cases,” acting Comelec
spokesman John Rex Lau-
diangco said.
The electoral protests are all
involving local elective posts,
he said.
“All of these have been dock-
eted and are being reviewed al-
ready. Of course, it will proceed
in accordance with our rules
and procedures,” he added.
A total of 690 aspirants for
congressman, 259 for gover-
nor, 219 for vice governor, 1,891
for provincial board members,
4,316 for mayor, 3,824 for vice
mayor, and 34,911 for council-
ors participated in the May 9
national and local elections. ■
Año said LGUs must maximize
its resources in convincing the
unvaccinated and booster-eligi-
ble population to get vaccinated
“as a precautionary measure ver-
sus a more transmissible Omi-
cron variant and possible com-
munity transmission.”
“We direct all LGUs to be pro-
active in its vaccination efforts
❱❱ PAGE 9 DILG-led vax drives
8 Philippine News MAY 27, 2022 FRIDAY

FOI promotes open,

participatory gov’t: CHR
BY LADE JEAN KABAGANI Bureau Communications Office among President (Rodrigo) Duterte in 2016 was
Philippine News Agency others – have already prepared their not only a clear recognition of this fun-
Correspondent/Hosts transition report for the incoming of- damental freedom but also a promotion
Bea Kirstein T. Manalaysay
Joanna Belle Deala ficials for endorsement. One initiative of an open and participatory govern-
Kathleen Mae Guerrero MANILA – The Commission on Hu- they wish the next administration will ment,” she added.
Arianne Grace Lacanilao man Rights (CHR) on Tuesday said the continue is the Freedom of Information The Commission, she said, joins the
Violeta Arevelo
Babes Newland Freedom of Information (FOI) has con- program which acts as a transparency PCOO in the endorsement of this policy
Matte Laurel tributed to the “promotion of an open mechanism of the Executive branch,” de to the next Administration.
Graphic Design
and participatory government.” Guia said in a statement. De Guia said the freedom of informa-
Shanice Garcia CHR executive director, lawyer Jac- Citing the Section 7 Article III 3 of the tion, as a demonstration of modern de-
Ginno Alcantara queline Ann de Guia, welcomed the rec- Philippine constitution, de Guia noted mocracy, “is imperative in the fulfillment
Arlnie Colleene Talain Singca
ommendation of the Presidential Com- the “right to information” allows the cit- of consonant rights” such as the freedom
Account Manager munications Operations Office (PCOO) izens to access “official records and to of speech, expression, and the press.
Kristopher Yong to the incoming administration to retain documents and papers pertaining to of- “CHR reminds our leaders that public
Director/Producer
the FOI policy. ficial acts, transactions, or decisions, as trust is the cornerstone of our democra-
Boom Dayupay “In an interview, acting Deputy Pres- well as to government research data used cy,” De Guia said, as she urged the next
idential Spokesperson Undersecretary as a basis for policy development” on all administration to continue crafting
Photographers/Videographers
Ginno Alcantara
Kris Ablan said that the Presidential subjects and issues of public concern.” measures that will push transparency
Communications Group – which con- Despite the existing constitution- and good governance.
Operations and Admin sists of agencies such as the Philippine al guarantee, de Guia emphasized that She added: “A push for this directly cor-
Victoria Yong Information Agency, Philippine News there is a lack of enabling legislation to responds to countering corruption and
Amelia Insigne
Agency, Radio Philippines Network, exercise this right. advocating for public accountability.” ■
Management People’s Television Network, and the “So the pronouncement made by
Alan Yong

For photo submissions, please email

editor@canadianinquirer.net Duterte tells drug smugglers: ‘I’ll
forever remain your enemy’
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Member
BY AZER PARROCHA He also dismissed criticism from hu- Netherlands suspended its investigation
Philippine News Agency man rights groups as “posturing.” into the alleged crimes against humani-
“Itong (These) human rights, they ty attributed to Duterte’s drug war to as-
are — all they have to do — all that they sess “the scope and effect of the deferral
MANILA – As his six-year term ends can do really is posturing, hanggang di- request” of the Philippine government.
on June 30, President Rodrigo R. Duter- yan lang ‘yan sila (that is all they can do). The ICC’s investigation covers the
te warned drug smugglers that he would They cannot help the country,” he said. conduct of the drug war under Duter-
always consider them his enemies. Duterte said law enforcement agents te’s watch, as well as alleged killings in
This, after Department of the Interior should be able to kill drug dealers merci- Davao City between 2011 and 2016 when
and Local Government (DILG) Secretary lessly, especially if it endangered their lives. the President was still the mayor.
Eduardo Año reported to him that “shabu” “They should be able to kill the drug Duterte has repeatedly insisted that
(crystal meth) and marijuana amounting lords without mercy. Hayaan mo ‘yang the ICC has no jurisdiction to probe the
to at least PHP295.9 million were confis- human rights na ‘yan. Hindi makatulong drug war because Philippine judicial
cated by law enforcers from May 11 to 22. sa bayan natin ‘yan (Ignore the human processes are working.
“Galit talaga ako. ‘Pag ginawa mo ‘yan rights groups. They cannot help the na- The Philippines formally ended its
sa bayan ko, para na ring tinatapos mo tion),” he added. ties with the ICC on March 17, 2019, or
ang buhay namin. So gusto kong dapat In November 2021, the Internation- exactly a year after the scrapping of the
malaman ‘yan ng mga durugista (I am al Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague, Rome Statute. ■
really mad. If you destroy my country,
it is as if you ended our lives. So I want
drug lords to know), I will forever re-
main your enemy. Iyan ang tandaan nin-
yo (Remember that),” he said in a prere-
corded Talk to the People.
He reiterated his promise to continue his
anti-narcotics campaign even as a civilian.
“We can continue this fight even if I am
already a civilian. Mahirap itong shabu na
‘to, sabi ko sisirain ang bayan nito (This
shabu is a difficult case, it will destroy this
nation). They will make the Philippine
society dysfunctional,” he added.
Duterte said he would rather see drug
lords and drug peddlers “dead than alive.” Pres. Rodrigo Duterte (ALBERTO ALCAIN/ PRESIDENTIAL PHOTO)

www.canadianinquirer.net
FRIDAY MAY 27, 2022 9

Antiquated thinking about old age hinders
Canada’s economic and social development
BY THOMAS KLASSEN, York
University, Canada
The Conversation
Governments in Canada de-
fine working age as being be-
tween 15 and 65, but this misrep-
resents the lives of Canadians.
The 2016 census found that
one-in-five Canadians aged 65
and older — nearly 1.1 million
people — are still working and
that one-third do so full-time.
Many in the private sector
and those who are self-em-
ployed work well past age 65,
which explains why the aver-
age retirement age in Canada is
now 64.4, an increase of three
years in two decades.
False assumptions about
turning 65
Although mandatory retire-
ment at age 65 was eliminated
more than a decade ago, laws
and public policy, including
Statistics Canada definitions,
continue to assume that every-
one retires at 65.
In many provinces, workers’
compensation laws only pay in-
jured workers for their loss of
earnings until they turn 65, or
for two years if they were old-
er than 63 when injured at the
workplace.
The obligations of employers
to rehire workers following an
injury only apply until someone
turns 65.
Employers aren’t required
to provide medical and dental
benefits, or life and disability
insurance, to workers 65 and
over. There may be no differ-
ence whatsoever among the
skills, abilities and job duties of
Canada News
an employee aged 64 and one
aged 65, but one receives bene-
fits while the other does not.
There is nothing magical
about turning 65. A reformula-
tion of both working age and re-
tirement is sorely warranted to
strengthen Canada’s economic
and social development. Other
countries have already done so.
Recent development
Setting age 65 as the entry to
old age is a relatively recent de-
velopment.
Germany, the first nation to
adopt an old-age social insurance
program in 1889, set the eligibili-
ty age at 70. Newfoundland’s old
age pension, established in 1911,
set 75 as the minimum age to re-
ceive benefits. Canada’s Old Age
Pension Act, which was in effect
from 1927 to 1952, set the pen-
sionable age at 70.
In the mid-1960s, when the
Canada Pension Plan was intro-
duced, 65 was established as the
age to receive a full pension and
to receive Old Age Security pay-
ments. Canadian workers’ 65th
birthday became the universal
marker of their exit from the
labour market and official entry
into old age.
Demographers and other ex-
perts say we should revisit the
definition of “old age” and “re-
tirement age,” because using 65
is increasingly inappropriate as
people live longer and healthier
lives than ever.
As well, compared to sev-
eral decades ago, Canadians
are spending more years in
post-secondary education, re-
sulting in a later start to full-
time work.
Work itself has also changed,
with a fewer and fewer occupa-
tions requiring intense physical
labour.
Reconsidering what’s
meant by old
There are ways to update the
definition of old age that would
have clear social and economic
benefits.
One is to have several mark-
ers for “old,” such as “young old
age” for those aged 65-74; “mid-
dle old age” for those 75-84 and
“advanced old age” for those 85
and above.
This recognizes the diversi-
ty among people 65 and older,
permitting politicians and oth-
er stakeholders to design more
sensitive and age-appropriate
policies for each of these three
distinct demographic groups.
For instance, working past
age 65 has been shown to have
health benefits for some groups
and therefore should not be dis-
couraged for the “young old.” longer period of time. The latest crease the number of people
A second option is to adjust Canadian census finds there are classified as old and would
the age that marks the official more than 9,000 centenarians in more accurately reflect the to-
entry into old age — currently Canada, mostly women, each of tal number of people in Cana-
65 — to account for increasing whom has been defined as old for da’s working age population. A
longevity. A century ago, Ca- nearly a third of their lives. modern definition would also
nadians reaching age 65 could Geared towards men mitigate stereotypes of old-
expect to live for another 13 Using the same definition of er workers and ageism while
years. At present, men reaching old for both women and men prodding governments to re-
65 will live 18 more years, while is a reflection that, histori- form outdated laws and provide
women will live 22 more years. cally, retirement and pension a boost to an economy often
With longer life expectancy, it ages were set for men and not facing worker shortages.
only makes sense to have the age women because fewer women Increasing the age at which
marker for old age set higher. worked outside the home. Canadians are considered old is
This option has been proposed Because women live longer surely a political easy sell. After
in the United Kingdom and is on average than men, they must all, who could be opposed to be-
often accompanied by the proc- work longer to have similar re- ing regarded as younger? ■
lamation: “70 is the new 65.” tirement savings, but that’s not
Lastly, old age could be made possible if they retire at the same This article is republished
more gender-sensitive. Women age as their male counterparts. from The Conversation under a
live longer on average than men, A revised conception of old Creative Commons license.
and so are classified as older for a age would significantly de-

DILG-led vax drives...

❰❰ 7 and seek these people
who are eligible for
inoculation. The De-
partment of Health’s (DOH) de-
tection of BA.4 signals the need
for a more aggressive action to
ensure that the people are vac-
cinated and protected against
this highly contagious variant
of Covid-19,” he said.
With regards to the recorded
community health protocol of-
fenses, Año said 40,335 individ-
uals violated the wearing face
mask requirement from May
11 to 22, 26.76 percent high-
er compared to the previous
month.
The DILG also recorded 2,180
violators of the physical distanc-
ing regulation while one violat-
www.canadianinquirer.net
ed the mass gathering limit.
Under the government’s drug
war campaign, Año said an-
ti-narcotics authorities arrest-
ed 1,796 drug personalities with
no reported fatalities in 1,556
operations.
The authorities also confis-
cated 96.26 kilograms of shabu
and 40.92 kg of marijuana with
a total amount of PHP295.96
million from May 11 to 22. (with
reports from Priam F. Nepomu-
ceno/PNA)■
10
Roe vs. Wade highlights the important role
of high courts in democratic societies
BY DANIELLE MCNABB,
Queen’s University, Ontario
The Conversation
On May 2, shockwaves were
sent across the United States
when news broke of a leaked doc-
ument saying the U.S. Supreme
Court would overturn the land-
mark abortion case Roe vs. Wade.
The leaked draft opinion in-
dicated that the court would re-
verse the constitutional federal
protection of abortion rights,
and allow individual states to se-
verely restrict (and even outright
ban) the medical procedure.
In response, Americans and
people around the globe have
taken to the streets in protest.
They’re also sharing stories to
raise awareness about the impact
a Roe vs. Wade reversal will have.
While the leaked opinion is
still technically in draft form —
meaning it could change — this
event speaks to the important
role played by high courts in
democratic societies.
The decisions made by high
courts often have consequen-
tial implications. When courts
“of last resort” make rulings on
issues such as abortion, this is
not simply a matter of abstract
importance. Obviously, wheth-
Bill 96: An attack on justice
and fundamental rights
BY ROBERT LECKEY
Policy Options
With Bill 96, the Quebec gov-
ernment is signalling that the
defence of French is incompati-
ble with fundamental rights.
The summer recess and Que-
bec’s general election are com-
ing up fast and the Legault gov-
ernment is in a hurry to adopt
its Bill 96, An Act respecting
French, the official and com-
mon language of Québec. This
reform, aiming to protect and
promote French, has many
pieces and it’s plain that public
debate has overlooked some of
them. The bill’s impact on public
services for new arrivals and on
Canada News
er or not an individual can legal-
ly and safely obtain an abortion
can have a significant impact on
the trajectory of their life.
As someone who researches the
Supreme Court of Canada, I see
the potential reversal of Roe vs.
Wade as a stark reminder of why
we need to pay attention to our
own high court and its inner work-
ings. Part of this includes a closer
look at the organizations and peo-
ple who intervene in cases.
The Supreme Court of
Canada
Since the introduction of the
Canadian Charter of Rights
and Freedoms 40 years ago, the
Supreme Court of Canada has
The Supreme Court of Canada has played a big role in defining the scope of
rights for Canadians.
the English-language CÉGEPs
has been discussed. In contrast,
I shall focus on the worrisome
effects of Bill 96 on the adminis-
tration of justice and our funda-
mental rights and freedoms.
Judicial bilingualism un-
der threat
First, the bilingual operation
of the province’s court system
is threatened. Section 133 of the
Constitution Act, 1867 allows
using English and French in
Quebec courts. Moreover, sec-
tion 530 of the Criminal Code
guarantees each accused person
the right to be tried by a judge
who speaks the accused’s chosen
official language. While in Que-
bec this guarantee benefits an-
glophones, in the rest of Canada
played a big role in defining the
scope of our rights.
Canada had a similar case to
Roe vs. Wade in 1988 called R.
vs. Morgentaler. In a split-deci-
sion, the Supreme Court ruled
that the criminal prohibition
of abortion violated Canadians’
right to “life, liberty and securi-
ty of person.”
It also gave the green light to
same-sex marriage. In the past
decade it has made landmark
decisions on politically conten-
tious matters such as medical
assistance in dying, safe-injec-
tion sites and sex work.
The role of interveners
In light of the high stakes of
it benefits francophones.
The upshot is that it’s neces-
sary to have numerous bilingual
judges, with the linguistic
needs varying from one
judicial district to another.
At present, the chief justice
of the Court of Quebec as-
sesses the linguistic needs
of each district, deciding
where judicial candidates
must be bilingual to re-
spect the constitutional
requirements. Preced-
ing governments, both
Péquiste and Liberal, ac-
cepted this arrangement.
But Bill 96 as recently
amended will upend this pro-
cess. Under the amendments,
knowledge of a language oth-
www.canadianinquirer.net
these decisions, the court permits
dozens of outside actors to make
arguments in its cases; a practice
known as “intervention.”
Essentially, any interested
party, whether governments,
corporations, interest groups or
people, can apply for intervener
status in any given case. If ac-
cepted by the court, interveners
are permitted to make brief argu-
ments on the legal issues at hand.
Historically, the court has rare-
ly rejected applications to inter-
vene, accepting more than 90 per
cent of the requests it receives.
In an early abortion case
heard by the Supreme Court
in 1976, the court permitted
women’s organizations, phy-
sician associations, as well as
anti-abortion groups, to partic-
ipate as interveners.
The idea behind intervention
is that rulings on issues like abor-
tion, are going to have wide-rang-
ing societal impacts that go well
beyond the direct litigants in a
case. This makes it in the court’s
best interest to consider a diver-
sity of perspectives.
Additionally, there is dem-
ocratic value in ensuring that
Canadians who are most likely
to be affected by the aftermath
of a court decision are given the
chance to speak directly to the
er than the official language of
Quebec, French, cannot nor-
mally be relevant in the selec-
the bilingual
operation of
the province’s
court system is
threatened.
tion process for judicial candi-
dates. It can be relevant only if
the justice minister so decides
after consulting the minister
MAY 27, 2022 FRIDAY
court. Intervention creates an
opportunity for this to occur.
The decline of equity-seek-
ing interveners
While intervention might
sound like good idea (at least in
theory), it is not inherently de-
mocratizing.
In my preliminary analysis of
all Charter cases heard by the
Supreme Court in the past de-
cade, I found there to be a no-
ticeable decline in interventions
made by equity-seeking groups.
That is, organizations that ad-
vocate for social justice and fight
for the full participation and
equality of marginalized people.
In particular, women’s groups,
which were once among the
most frequent and successful in-
terveners during the 1980s and
‘90s, have been far less involved
in Supreme Court of Canada
cases during the past decade.
The Women’s Legal Edu-
cation and Action Fund, an
organization originally creat-
ed to advance women’s rights
through litigation, was at one
point the most frequent inter-
vener, behind only a handful of
governments. Despite this, it
only intervened in four Char-
ter cases at the Supreme Court
❱❱ PAGE 20 Roe vs. Wade
of the French language – who
is currently the same person –
and after all reasonable means
have been taken to avoid
requiring bilingualism
on candidates’ part. The
assessment of the chief
justice – who knows the
needs on the ground bet-
ter than anyone else – is
excluded. This change
will predictably reduce
the courts’ capacity to re-
spect individuals’ consti-
tutional rights.
Might this reduction
in the powers of the chief
justice in this regard infringe
the constitutional principle
❱❱ PAGE 16 Bill 96: An attack
FRIDAY MAY 27, 2022
Indigenous-led conservation aims to
rekindle caribou abundance and traditions
BY CLAYTON LAMB,
University of British Columbia
The Conversation
It’s been many years since
community members from
West Moberly First Nations
last ate caribou meat from their
traditional territory. South-
ern Mountain Caribou haven’t
been hunted by this communi-
ty in central British Columbia
since it voluntarily decided to
stop hunting them in the 1970s.
Caribou abundance is now a
fraction of what it used to be.
These endangered caribou have
been rapidly dwindling across
their range. In 2013, the Klinse-
Za caribou found in the central
Rocky Mountains of British Co-
lumbia had declined to 38 ani-
mals, and only 16 were counted
from a helicopter during a prov-
ince-led census.
This bleak news came after
a neighbouring caribou herd,
the Burnt Pine, was extirpated
— made extinct in a particular
region — the year before.
The forced cessation of cari-
bou hunting due to the declin-
ing populations posed a key
challenge for First Nations and
Canada — signatories of Trea-
ty 8. The treaty assured First
Nations that “they would be as
free to hunt and fish after the
treaty as they would be if they
never entered into it” — clear-
ly a promise not kept. With an
infringed treaty and an endan-
gered species on the brink, time
and patience were running out.
With caribou that were once
described by West Moberly El-
ders as being as abundant as
“bugs on the landscape” now
rapidly disappearing, there
were only two options: do
nothing and watch extirpation
happen within a decade, or do
something to change the fate of
these caribou.
An Indigenous-led effort to
increase caribou abundance
and cultural practices such
as hunting is reshaping ideas
about the best approach for car-
ibou recovery and is successful-
ly increasing the caribou popu-
lation in B.C. every year. When
I joined this project in 2020,
there were 87 caribou. This
number has now crossed 114
and is growing daily. In fact, we
expect the birth of 20-30 calves
this spring.
Extirpation was not an op-
tion
Caribou landscapes in Al-
berta and B.C. have changed a
lot over the last century, alter-
ing predator-prey dynamics.
Climate change and resource
extraction have made some
habitats more appealing for
deer, moose and elk and intro-
duced features such as roads or
pipelines, allowing predators
to move faster and farther. The
caribou suffer unsustainable
levels of predation due to more
abundant and efficient preda-
tors including wolves, cougar,
bears and wolverines.
West Moberly First Nations
and Saulteau First Nations have
been actively stewarding these
landscapes for millennia. After
colonization, they witnessed
dramatic conversion of these
lands, including the decline of
caribou and many other im-
pacts to ecosystems.
The First Nations were de-
termined to avert the loss of
caribou. After discussions with
wildlife scientist Scott McNay
of Wildlife Infometrics and oth-
ers a decade ago, the two First
Nations began an ambitious ef-
fort to recover caribou in their
homelands.
The goal was to one day re-
kindle a culturally meaningful
caribou hunt, which would be
attained by increasing caribou
abundance. The effort was col-
laborative from the outset, with
the two First Nations working
together with independent sci-
entists, government and indus-
try partners and conservation
organizations to identify op-
portunities and initiate efforts.
The Klinse-Za recovery fo-
cused on emergency measures
to reduce predation and a long
term goal of recovering habitats
to restore predator-prey dy-
namics from recent history.
Short-term measures to
avoid extirpation
These First Nations began
reducing caribou predation in
2013 by lowering the number
of wolves in caribou habitat.
While harvesting wolves is not
something that is taken light-
ly, it was needed at this time
to avert the loss of caribou.
Trappers and hunters from the
communities worked together
to harvest wolves whose pelts
Once described by West Moberly Elders as being as abundant as “bugs on
the landscape,” caribou populations are now rapidly disappearing. (GIGUERE/
WILDLIFE INFOMETRICS, AUTHOR PROVIDED)
www.canadianinquirer.net
Canada News
were often sold or used to make
goods for the community. Brit-
ish Columbia began reducing
wolves as well in 2015.
In 2014, a maternal pen was
added to further this conserva-
tion effort. Maternal pens are
simple fenced enclosures in
caribou habitats where adult
female caribou are brought to
birth and raise their calves safe-
ly. The goal of maternal pens is
to protect calves during their
first few vulnerable weeks of
life when many are easily killed
by predators.
Wolf reductions and maternal
penning allowed the Klinse-Za
caribou to triple in less than a
decade. This unprecedented in-
crease — to 114 animals in 2022
from 38 animals in 2013 — sig-
nals the success of the actions
enacted by West Moberly First
Nations, Saulteau First Nations
and Wildlife Infometrics.
Longer term visions
With the threat of extirpation
reduced, West Moberly First
Nations, Saulteau First Nations
11
and the governments of British
Columbia and Canada came to-
gether to plan long-term goals
including habitat protection
and restoration.
In February 2020, a landmark
partnership agreement was
signed between the four parties
that secured 7,900 square kilo-
metres for caribou. The agree-
ment covers the Klinse-Za car-
ibou as well and five adjacent
subpopulations, and will pro-
vide the endangered caribou
with essential habitat security.
This was one of the only
examples where emergency
responses such as wolf reduc-
tions and maternal pens have
been followed up with expan-
sive habitat protections in such
short order.
Unfortunately, the norm is
currently a lack of habitat pro-
tection while caribou habitat
continues to get worse. Howev-
er, this Indigenous-led conser-
vation effort in central British
Columbia is poised to change
that by working together with
different groups to restore the
habitats needed to sustain the
vulnerable caribou.
Weaving knowledge and
working together
As I worked with West
Moberly First Nations, Sault-
eau First Nations, Wildlife In-
fometrics and university part-
ners, I found that Indigenous
stewardship and the collabora-
tion of all these different groups
was the key to this successful
recovery.
Indigenous leaders exercised
their treaty rights for rapid and
effective recovery measures,
while helping people rethink
what endangered species con-
servation means. The many
groups helped weave west-
❱❱ PAGE 15 Indigenous-led conservation
12
Putin’s key mistake? Not understanding
Ukraine’s blossoming national identity -
even in the Russian-friendly southeast
BY LOWELL BARRINGTON,
Marquette University
The Conversation
Russian President Vladi-
mir Putin’s decision to invade
Ukraine in February 2022 has,
thus far, produced the opposite
of what he expected.
Rather than deepening polit-
ical fissures in the West, Putin’s
invasion has united the leaders
and populations of the majority
of countries across Europe and
encouraged further NATO ex-
pansion.
Putin also seems to have be-
lieved it would be relatively
easy to capture Ukraine’s capi-
tal and topple its government.
Instead, the Russian military
lost the battle for Kyiv and
experienced the humiliating
sinking of its flagship Black Sea
cruiser, leaving Putin to oversee
subdued Victory Day celebra-
tions on May 9, 2022.
These defeats, together with
the deaths of thousands of Rus-
sian soldiers, have forced Pu-
tin’s generals in Ukraine to shift
course and focus their attacks
on the east and southeast of the
country - areas that are more
linguistically and ethnically
Russian. The early results of the
campaign to gain control in east-
ern Ukraine were disappointing
for Putin. Once again, the resent-
ment of Ukrainian civilians and
effectiveness of the Ukrainian
military stood in sharp contrast
to his expected outcome.
Most leaders’ decisions are
based on a mix of rational calcu-
lations and preexisting mind-
sets. Putin is no exception.
One of his key convictions is
that Russians and Ukrainians are
the same people, an idea he has
talked and written about for years.
It is an important part of why
he proclaimed Russian soldiers
would be welcomed in Ukraine.
World News
Understanding Putin’s poor
judgment requires a look at his
failure to grasp shifts in how
Ukrainian citizens have identi-
fied themselves since the Soviet
Union collapsed in 1991.
Drifting from Russia
For much of the period since
the breakup of the Soviet Union,
Ukraine saw notable regional
differences in levels of support
for pro-Russian presidential
candidates vs. pro-Western
ones. This pattern reflected the
reality that many residents of
the far eastern and far southern
parts of the country saw them-
selves as closely aligned, cultur-
ally and politically, with Russia.
Those in the far west of Ukraine,
meanwhile, tended to identify
with Europe more than Russia.
The visible divides in presi-
dential election voting masked
an important set of changes, in
which Ukraine was becoming
increasingly more Ukrainian -
linguistically, ethnically and na-
tionally. Going as far back as the
late 1990s and early 2000s, social
science researchers like myself
have emphasized how Ukraine’s
population, as a whole, was con-
necting less and less with Rus-
sia. At the same time, a discrete
Ukrainian national identity was
beginning to emerge.
This process sped up in
Russian President Vladimir Putin (UNITED NATIONS PHOTO/FLICKR, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)
2013 and 2014, when the Rus-
sian-friendly President of
Ukraine, Viktor Yanukovych,
chose to sign an agreement
with the Russian-led Eurasian
Economic Union rather than
with the European Union. Ya-
nukovych’s decision sparked
massive protests, known as
the Maidan Revolu-
tion, which forced
Yanukovych to flee
the country. Putin’s
subsequent actions
to seize Crimea and
aid separatist activ-
ities in the Donbas
region of eastern
Ukraine accelerat-
ed the weakening of
the country’s attach-
ment to Russia and
the yearning among
Ukrainians to look
westward to Europe.
Volodymyr Kulyk,
one of the most im-
portant scholars on
Ukrainian identi-
ty and public attitudes about
Russia, argued in 2016 that the
blurry line dividing those who
identified with the West from
those who supported close ties
to Russia “shifted eastward” af-
ter 2014.
Political scientist Elise Gi-
uliano, a specialist on the poli-
www.canadianinquirer.net
tics of ethnic identity, provided
evidence in a 2018 article that
the majority of ethnic Russians
in the Donbas did not support
the actions of the pro-Russian
separatists seeking to secede
from Ukraine.
A national identity deepens
Growing support after 2014
Most leaders’ decisions
are based on a mix of
rational calculations and
preexisting mindsets.
across Ukraine for an overarch-
ing, civic national identity - based
on Ukrainian citizenship rather
than ethnic identity - was the
most crucial change. It offered a
means to unite ethnic Ukrainians
and ethnic Russians in Ukraine.
My latest research exam-
ines the strength of a citizen-
ship-based, civic national iden-
tity in Ukraine and how it relates
to ethnic identity and language.
Quantitative and qualitative
survey data offers evidence of how
weak Ukrainians’ attachment to
Russia and how strong their at-
tachment to Ukrainian citizenship
had already become before 2022,
even among ethnic Russians and
Russian-speaking Ukrainians.
Most respondents viewed a
civic national identity based
on citizenship as an important
part of their self-identity. More
participants in the survey saw
this kind of national identity as
MAY 27, 2022 FRIDAY
an important or very import-
ant part of who they are than
those who felt that way about
the region they live in, the lan-
guage they speak or their eth-
nic identity. Comments from
respondents about the impor-
tance of being a Ukrainian cit-
izen included statements like
“Because I love my
country”; “I do not
betray my country”;
and “I am proud of
Ukraine, and I am a
patriot.”
The results also
underscore that it
is not contradictory
for people to per-
ceive this kind of
national identity as
an important part of
their identity while
also feeling the same
way about their eth-
nic identity, spoken
language or region.
In Ukraine at least,
ethnic identity and
a multiethnic, civic national
identity are not the incompat-
ible rivals they’re sometimes
thought to be.
And so I wasn’t surprised to
read about Oleksandr Vilkul’s
staunch defense of Ukrainian
sovereignty. A powerful politi-
cian in southeastern Ukraine,
Vilkul had long espoused sup-
port for the rights of Russian
speakers and closer ties with
Russia. In early May 2022, The
New York Times reported that
the Russians approached Vilkul
with an offer to align with the
invading Russian forces.
Vilkul’s response?
“Get lost.”
Looking westward
Putin’s aggressive actions
in the years leading up to the
2022 invasion had convinced
Russian-speakers like Vilkul in
❱❱ PAGE 14 Putin’s key mistake
FRIDAY MAY 27, 2022
Plastic pollution: European farmland could
be largest global reservoir of microplastics
BY JAMES LOFTY,
Cardiff University, PABLO
OURO, University of
Manchester, VALENTINE
MUHAWENIMANA, Cardiff
University
The Conversation
Plastic particles smaller than
5mm (known as microplastics)
are well-documented pollutants
in ocean and freshwater habi-
tats. The discovery of microplas-
tics in the most remote rivers of
the Himalayas and the deepest
trenches of the Pacific Ocean
has sparked widespread con-
cern. But how much microplas-
tic lies closer to home – buried
in the soil where food is grown?
Our latest study estimated
that between 31,000 and 42,000
tonnes of microplastics (or 86
trillion – 710 trillion micro-
plastic particles) are spread on
European farmland soils each
year, mirroring the concentra-
tion of microplastics in ocean
surface waters.
The cause is microplas-
tic-laden fertilisers derived
from sewage sludge diverted
from wastewater treatment
plants. These are commonly
spread on farmland as a re-
newable source of fertiliser
throughout European coun-
tries, in part due to EU direc-
tives that aim to promote a cir-
‘Covid-19 is not over anywhere until it’s over
everywhere’: WHO
BY RAMON MONSALVE, JR.
Philippine News Agency
GENEVA – The head of the
World Health Organization
(WHO) told global health minis-
ters on Sunday that although re-
ported Covid-19 cases and deaths
have declined significantly, it is
not time to lower the guard.
Tedros Adhanom Gebreye-
sus delivered his message
during the kick-off of the annu-
al World Health Assembly – the
decision-making body of WHO
composed of representatives of
194 countries.
cular waste economy.
As well as creating a massive
reservoir of environmental
microplastics, this practice is
effectively undoing the bene-
fit of removing these particles
from wastewater. Spreading
microplastics onto farmland
will eventually return them to
natural watercourses, as rain
washes water on the surface of
soil into rivers, or it eventually
infiltrates groundwater.
Wastewater treatment plants
remove solid contaminants
(such as plastics and other large
particles) from raw sewage and
drain water using a series of
settling tanks. This produces
an effluent of clean water that
can be released to the environ-
ment. The floating material
and settled particles from these
tanks are combined to form the
sludge used as fertiliser.
We found that up to 650 mil-
lion microplastic particles be-
tween 1mm and 5mm in size
entered a wastewater treat-
ment plant in south Wales, UK,
every day. All of these particles
were separated from the in-
coming sewage and diverted
into the sludge rather than be-
ing released with the clean ef-
fluent. This demonstrates how
effective default wastewater
treatment can be for removing
microplastics.
At this facility, each gram of
Noting that it was the first
time since 2019 that the Assem-
bly could take place in-person, he
asked ministers where the world
stood two years into the most se-
vere health crisis in a century.
“So, is Covid-19 over? No, it’s
most certainly not over. I know
that’s not the message you want
to hear, and it’s definitely not the
message I want to deliver,” he said.
He added that although in
many countries all restrictions
have been lifted and life looks
much like it did before the pan-
demic, reported cases are in-
creasing in almost 70 countries
in all regions.
sewage sludge contained up to
24 microplastic particles, which
was roughly 1% of its weight. In
Europe, an estimated 8 million
to 10 million tonnes of sewage
sludge is generated each year,
with around 40% sent to farm-
land. The spreading of sewage
sludge on agricultural soil is
widely practised across Europe,
owing to the nitrogen and phos-
phorus it offers crops.
UK farms also use sewage
sludge as fertiliser. In our study,
the UK had the highest amount
of microplastic pollution within
its soils across all European na-
tions (followed by Spain, Por-
tugal and Germany). Between
500 and 1,000 microplastic par-
ticles are applied to each square
metre of agricultural land in the
UK every year.
“And this in a world in which
testing rates have plummeted,”
he added.
Tedros warned that reported
deaths are also rising in Africa,
the continent with the lowest
vaccination coverage.
“This virus has surprised
us at every turn – a storm that
has torn through communities
again and again, and we still
can’t predict its path, or its in-
tensity,” he said.
While agreeing that there is
progress with 60 percent of the
world’s population already vac-
cinated, Tedros reminded that
almost one billion people in
www.canadianinquirer.net
World News
A poisoned circular waste
economy
At present, there are no ade-
quate solutions to the release of
microplastics into the environ-
ment from wastewater treat-
ment plants.
Microplastics removed from
wastewater are effectively
transported to the land, where
they reside until being returned
to waterways. According to a
study conducted in Ontario,
Canada, 99% of microplastics
in agricultural soil were trans-
ported away from where the
sludge was initially applied.
Until then, they have the po-
tential to harm life in the soil.
As well as being easily con-
sumed and absorbed by ani-
mals and plants, microplastics
pose a serious threat to the soil
lower-income countries remain
unvaccinated.
“It’s not over anywhere until
it’s over everywhere. Only 57
countries have vaccinated 70
percent of their population –
almost all of them high-income
countries,” he noted.
Tedros also warned that in-
creasing transmission means
more deaths and more risk of
a new variant emerging, and
the current decline of testing
and sequencing means “we are
blinding ourselves to the evolu-
tion of the virus”.
He pointed out as well that in
some countries there is still in-
13
ecosystem because they leach
toxic chemicals and transport
hazardous pathogens. Exper-
iments have shown that the
presence of microplastics can
stunt earthworm growth and
cause them to lose weight.
Microplastics can also
change the acidity, water hold-
ing capacity and porosity of soil.
This affects plant growth and
performance by altering the
way roots bury into the soil and
take up nutrients.
There is currently no Eu-
ropean legislation to limit the
amount of microplastics em-
bedded in sewage sludge used
as fertiliser. Germany has set
upper limits for impurities like
glass and plastic, allowing up to
0.1% of wet fertiliser weight to
constitute plastics larger than
2mm in size. According to the
results from the wastewater
treatment plant in south Wales,
applying sewage sludge would
be prohibited if similar legisla-
tion were in place in the UK.
For the time being, land-
owners are likely to continue
recycling sewage sludge as sus-
tainable fertiliser, despite the
risk of contaminating soils and
eventually rivers and the ocean
with microplastics. ■
This article is republished
from The Conversation under a
Creative Commons license.
sufficient political commitment
to roll out vaccines, and there
are still gaps in operational and
financial capacity.
“And in all, we see vaccine hes-
itancy driven by misinformation
and disinformation”, he added.
Tedros said WHO’s primary fo-
cus now is to support countries to
turn vaccines into vaccinations as
fast as possible, but they are still
seeing supply-side problems for
tests and therapeutics with insuf-
ficient funds and access.
“The pandemic will not mag-
ically disappear. But we can end
❱❱ PAGE 16 ‘Covid-19 is not
 14
We’re about to have Australia’s most
diverse parliament yet – but there’s
still a long way to go
BY TIM
SOUTPHOMMASANE,
University of Sydney
The Conversation
The message from Saturday’s
election result was clear: Aus-
tralians want a political reset.
And not just about issues such
as government integrity and
climate change.
While much attention has
been directed at the teal wave of
independents, another change
is taking place to the composi-
tion of parliament.
This Australian parliament is
shaping to be the most diverse
yet in its ethnic and cultur-
al background. Capital Hill is
about to see a substantial injec-
tion of colour.
A fitting result
Newly elected members Sally
Sitou, Michelle Ananda-Rajah,
Sam Lim, Zaneta Mascarenhas,
Cassandra Fernando and Dai Le
will bolster the non-European
representation of the House of
Representatives.
The Indigenous ranks of par-
liament are also set to swell,
with the additions of Marion
Scrymgour and Gordon Reid in
the House, and Jacinta Price in
the Senate.
In many ways, it is a fitting
result to an election that had
its share of controversies about
representation.
Labor caused consternation
when it parachuted former
Senator (and ex-NSW Pre-
mier) Kristina Keneally into
its then safe southwest Sydney
electorate of Fowler, cruelling
the prospects of local Vietnam-
ese-Australian lawyer Tu Le.
A second captain’s pick from
Putin’s key mistake...
❰❰ 12 eastern and southern
Ukraine to think of
themselves, first and
foremost, as Ukrainians.
The horrific attacks Putin has
unleashed this spring will only
accelerate this process, I believe.
The time and firepower need-
ed to gain control of Mariupol,
World News
Anthony Albanese, millionaire
former political adviser Andrew
Charlton, ran in the western
Sydney seat of Parramatta, to the
chagrin of local aspirants from
multicultural backgrounds.
Such picks left many asking,
with good reason: if worthy
candidates from non-Euro-
pean backgrounds can’t get
preselected in multicultural
electorates like Fowler and Par-
ramatta, how can we get more
diversity into parliament?
It’s a question that lingers,
notwithstanding what this elec-
tion has delivered.
Still a long way to go
If it feels like a surge of diver-
sity will flow through the par-
liament, it’s only because there
was so little to begin with.
While those from a non-Euro-
pean background make up an esti-
mated 21% of the Australian pop-
ulation, they made up just a tiny
fraction of the 46th parliament.
The 47th parliament could
feature up to 13 parliamentarians
with a non-European, non-In-
digenous background, along with
nine or ten (depending on final
results) parliamentarians of In-
digenous background.
That may sound like a strong
result – it’s certainly an im-
provement, and better than
how many other major institu-
tions in Australian society per-
form – but we should put it in
perspective.
It would still mean just a
tiny fraction of the parliament
(no more than 10%) having a
non-European or Indigenous
background – far less than what
you’d see if the parliament ac-
tually reflected our society ac-
curately. Australia lags signifi-
cantly behind the US, UK and
a heavily Russian-speaking city
in eastern Ukraine, is symbolic
of Russia’s short-term struggles
and long-term problems.
Even if the Russian military
were to gain and keep control of
Ukraine’s east and southeast, it
will come only after a long and
terrible period of fighting and
Canada and New Zealand.
It’s not all about numbers, of
course. We can’t judge the cali-
bre of our parliament solely on
whether it’s proportionately
representative.
Yet when sections of society
can’t see themselves within our
public institutions, it is a problem.
The very legitimacy, and quality,
of those institutions can suffer.
A new phase?
For a long time, calls for great-
er multicultural diversity in pol-
itics have been typically greeted
with indifference. It wasn’t an
urgent problem. Gender diversi-
ty was a higher priority. Political
parties didn’t feel the pressure
from those supposedly excluded
from the system.
That now has changed. La-
bor has been brutally punished
for its Fowler move. A swing of
more than 16% saw the seat fall
to independent (and former
Liberal) Dai Le.
Clearly, being from a non-Eu-
Parliament House, Canberra Australia (THENNICKE - OWN WORK/WIKIMEDIA COM-
MONS, CC BY-SA 4.0)
bombing. More homes, schools
and hospitals in Ukraine’s most
ethnically and linguistically
Russian areas will be destroyed,
and many more of the very peo-
ple Putin claimed he sought to
protect will lose their lives.
To the extent Ukrainians
and Russians in Ukraine see
www.canadianinquirer.net
ropean background isn’t the
electoral handicap political
parties have sometimes feared.
Something generational is at
play. Australia may once have
comfortably accepted that new-
er arrivals were expected to
play the role of the grateful sup-
plicant in their “host society”.
But the children and grand-
children of yesterday’s migrants
don’t see themselves as guests in
their own country. They aren’t
happy refugees or cheerful mi-
grants who are content to know
their place. They’re taking their
lead less from the Anh Dos of the
world and more from the AOCs
(Democrat politician Alexandria
Ocasio-Cortez) of US politics.
Demands about access and
equity for non-English speak-
ing background people have
been replaced with calls for the
equal treatment of “people of
colour” and for attention to “in-
tersectionality”.
We could be seeing a new
themselves as one people, they
increasingly do so as part of a
multiethnic Ukrainian nation-
al identity anchored by shared
citizenship and a shared love of
the country Putin’s forces con-
tinue to assault.
In the long term, the ongoing
attacks will further reinforce
MAY 27, 2022 FRIDAY
phase in the evolution of Aus-
tralia’s multicultural project.
While a triumph in many re-
spects, Australian multicultur-
alism has to date fallen short
on several counts. A celebration
of cultural diversity has never
been accompanied by a sharing
of Anglo-Celtic institutional
power. Or, for that matter, by
a full reckoning with racial in-
equality and injustice.
That’s why it will be interesting
to observe this new parliament.
The very presence of this new eth-
nic and cultural diversity will, in
subtle and not so subtle ways, be
felt in Canberra and beyond.
Critical mass matters. It is
hard, for example, to imagine a
more diverse parliament trying
to wind back racial hatred laws
(as parliament has done on more
than one occasion with respect to
the Racial Discrimination Act).
Or to imagine a diverse par-
liament indulging other period-
ic bouts of race politics (think
of the scaremongering over Af-
rican gangs in Melbourne or the
McCarthyist targeting of Chi-
nese-Australians).
All such excesses become
much harder when the people
debating such matters have
skin in the game.
So don’t mistake the wave of
multicultural politicians for be-
ing a mere symbolic adornment
in Canberra – like the politi-
cal equivalent of having exotic
foods and festivals.
It may feel like a subplot for
now, but this could end up be-
ing just be as significant as the
teal revolution. ■
This article is republished
from The Conversation under a
Creative Commons license.
Ukraine’s civic national identi-
ty and solidify what Putin fears
most from Ukraine: a broad
desire to look westward, rather
than eastward, for its future. ■
This article is republished
from The Conversation under a
Creative Commons license.
FRIDAY MAY 27, 2022
Ideology matters in unravelling
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine
BY RICHARD MEISSNER,
University of South Africa
The Conversation
In explaining the war on
Ukraine, ideology matters as
much as interests. This means
that we need to factor ideology
into our analysis if we want to
gain a deeper understanding of
interstate violent conflict. If we
focus purely on the material in-
terests of an aggressive state we
land up with a lopsided picture
of war. We view it simply as a
continuation of politics – diplo-
macy has failed therefore the
use of force is the only option.
But understanding and fore-
casting foreign policy behaviour
requires understanding ideology
and interests – equally. Ideolo-
gy is important for a number of
reasons. It highlights political
actors’ consideration of what is
right or wrong and how they see
themselves. It also tells us who
they associate with as well as
their interpretation of the world.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine
was a rude awakening to the lib-
eral world, raising the fear that
liberalism’s ideological hegemo-
ny may have ended. This, after
30 years since the “The End of
History?” as, advanced by polit-
ical scientist Francis Fukuyama.
Are we seeing an antithesis,
the beginning of history, along
opposing ideological fault lines?
Weeks before the Russian
invasion, liberal democracies
such as the EU, Ukraine, the US,
stood in opposition to Russia,
Belarus, and the breakaway re-
gions of Donetsk and Luhansk.
What is not clear is the ideology
of the side opposing the liber-
al democratic grouping, other
than to say that they are illiber-
al or autocratic.
Opposing ideologies were
also evident in the United Na-
Indigenous-led conservation...
❰❰ 11 ern and Indigenous
knowledge and skills
to produce a robust
program for conserving cari-
bou.
Realizing habitat resto-
ration at the scale of a caribou
sub-population, which spans
thousands of square kilometres,
tions Security Council. Kenya
expressed grave concern over
Russia’s recognition of Donetsk
and Luhansk as independent
states and argued for the pur-
suit of peace through diplomat-
ic channels. This placed it in the
liberal democracy camp.
But South Africa togeth-
er with Angola, Namibia, and
Mozambique abstained from a
UN General Assembly vote op-
posing Russia’s invasion. This
was interpreted as a tacit en-
dorsement of Russia’s actions.
Ideologically, Russia supported
liberation movements such as
South Africa’s African Nation-
al Congress, Angola’s MPLA,
Namibia’s Swapo, and Mozam-
bique’s Frelimo.
The pursuit of liberal peace
stood opposed to the tacit sup-
port of despotism.
My research on conflict and
cooperation over water resourc-
es and as a lecturer in interna-
tional politics teaching foreign
policy analysis shows that ideol-
ogies and interests are import-
ant in understanding and fore-
casting foreign policy behaviour.
Ideas contained in ideology
inform foreign policy practice.
Behaviour that could – for bet-
ter or worse – influence individ-
ual lives.
Why ideology matters
Ideologies are about our
identities, moralities, how we
perceive cause and bring about
change, and the interpreta-
tion of events and procedures.
Through ideologies, political
actors consider what is right or
wrong, how they see themselves
and with whom they associate.
This goes along with their in-
terpretation of the world.
Ideology resides within our
cognitive and political lived ex-
periences.
Ideology’s interpretation el-
ement comes to the fore when
can take more than 25 years. It
involves removing roads and
other linear features such as
seismic lines and reducing or
eliminating industrial activity
in some areas. Once the resto-
ration of these linear features is
done, the trees throughout the
landscape need to grow.
one considers that ideologies
often claim that they have an
opposite ideology to denounce,
overpower and defeat. These
opposite ideologies often take
a dehumanised form of an alien
power. In Ukraine’s case, it is
perceived Nazism. The reme-
dy is the denazification of the
Ukrainian state and leadership.
Russian President Vladimir
Putin and his government have
been referring to this phenome-
non in Ukraine before and during
Russia’s invasion of Crimea in
2014. This interpretation of
Ukraine by Russia and its leaders
is ideological propaganda.
Russia’s idea that Russians
and Ukrainians are ethnically
identical explains the rejec-
tion of Ukraine’s independent
millennium-long history. Seen
from Moscow, it is morally
wrong to separate them into
two sovereign states with a de-
fined border in-between given
that the identity of Russians
and Ukrainians are similar.
Cause and effect play out in
the ideological equation when
the Russian leadership sees
fit to react in such a way as to
bring the Russians and Ukrai-
nians together into one state
since the powers in the Kremlin
disbelieve that a separation be-
tween the two peoples is not the
preference of the Ukrainians.
Ukraine’s leadership and cit-
izens resistance to the invasion
indicates a general aversion to
conquest and despotism. It also
shows an ideological stance
leaning heavily towards liberal
democracy. This manifests par-
ticularly in the Ukrainian gov-
ernment’s calls to join the EU and
NATO. It’s also been clear from
the virtual addresses by Presi-
dent Volodymyr Zelensky to the
US Congress, the Parliaments of
Canada, EU, Japan and a host of
other liberal democracies.
The next step of the collab-
orative caribou recovery fo-
cuses on healing the landscape
through these measures so it
can support caribou without in-
terim measures such as wolf re-
ductions or maternal penning.
Because of the strong partner-
ships nurtured to date and the
www.canadianinquirer.net
World News
Interests, power and security
Considering interests, power,
security, and wealth in the inva-
sion have seen its fair share of
explanations. Putin’s view of the
North Atlantic Treaty Organi-
sation’s (NATO) encroachment
ever closer to Russia’s border
over the past 30 years is often
proclaimed as the main expla-
nation for his decision to invade.
Fearing an alliance that had been
in the past the natural foe of the
Soviet Union does not sit well
with Russia and its leader. With-
in this interpretation, we see
power and security manifesting
at the state and individual levels.
The geopolitical proximity of
the Nato makes it difficult for
Russia to keep its neighbours in
its near abroad under its Soviet
Union-style sphere of influence.
The projection of Russia’s power
is interlinked with its security
concerns. Both are on the same
side of the foreign policy coin.
With the prospect of Ukraine
becoming a NATO member,
Russia and its leader find it dif-
ficult to intervene and support
unpopular regimes among NA-
TO’s members. Belarus is a case
in point.
Regarding the wealth aspect,
Ukraine has for long been the
habitat protections secured,
the caribou habitats in central
British Columbia are poised
to be leading examples of what
restored landscapes for caribou
look like.
The project is a testament
to what’s possible when peo-
ple come together to achieve a
15
breadbasket of Europe and
many developing countries.
Ukraine is also home to some
of Europe’s largest nuclear and
hydroelectric power plants.
Before the invasion, there
were plans to restructure the
Ukrainian energy system and
integrate it into a common
energy area. Germany and
the US are leading players. In
July 2021, they declared that
Ukraine’s connection to the Eu-
ropean energy market is high
on Germany’s and the EU’s po-
litical agendas.
Natural gas is, therefore, not
the only explanation for Rus-
sia’s powerful grip over Europe.
Ideological cusp or funeral
dirge?
Is the world standing again
at the beginning of history af-
ter the Second World War when
two emerging ideologies stood
opposite each other? On this,
and to paraphrase Vladimir Le-
nin’s famous quote:
In the end, one or the other will
triumph – a funeral dirge will be
sung over the Russian Federa-
tion or liberal democracy. ■
This article is republished
from The Conversation under a
Creative Commons license.
common goal by proving that
grassroots initiatives can do the
impossible. ■
This article is republished
from The Conversation under a
Creative Commons license.
 16 MAY 27, 2022 FRIDAY

Bill 96: An attack... ‘Covid-19 is not...

❰❰ 10 of judicial indepen-
dence? The question
arises because this
principle includes a dimension
of institutional independence,
which protects the judiciary
from political interference.
As for the administration
of justice, the new law will
require French translations
of pleadings drafted in En-
glish. Furthermore, numerous
judgments drafted in English
will not be rendered until the
French translation of them is
ready. The cost increase, ad-
ministrative heaviness and
longer lead times are obvious.
And Quebec already struggles
to satisfactorily provide access
to justice in English, as a result
of inadequate governmental in-
vestment in legal translation.
When the defence of French
attacks fundamental rights
In addition, Bill 96 activates
the notwithstanding clauses of
the Canadian Charter of Rights
and Freedoms and the Charter
of Human Rights and Freedoms,
better known as the Quebec
Charter. The government has
reprised its sweeping, pre-emp-
tive use of the notwithstanding
clauses from its Law 21, An Act
respecting the laicity of the State,
a usage characterized by Justice
Blanchard in the Hak judgment
as “careless and indiscriminate.”
The government thus signals
that the defense of the French lan-
guage isn’t a social aim that is com-
patible with fundamental rights.
On the contrary, the promo-
tion of French is antagonistic
to them. As for the safeguarding
of fundamental rights by our
independent courts, it’s an im-
pediment to the pursuit of ma-
joritarian will.
For example, thanks to the
notwithstanding clauses, any
investigation by the govern-
ment regarding businesses’
respect of their language obli-
gations can take place notwith-
standing the right of everyone,
entrenched in the two charters,
to be free from unreasonable ❰❰ 13 it. We have the knowl- for peace, peace for health’’,
search and seizure. edge. We have the the first in-person Health As-
The need to protect and pro- tools. Science has giv- sembly since the start of the
mote French in Quebec – as en us the upper hand,” he said, Covid-19 pandemic.
valuable as it is – isn’t temporary. calling on countries to work At the meeting, country dele-
Nor is the remedy that Bill 96 is together to reach 70 percent of gates make decisions on health
setting up. This intended perma- vaccination coverage. goals and strategies that will
nence of the new regime makes The 70th World Health As- guide public health work and the
its opposition to our fundamen- sembly is being held in Gene- work of the WHO Secretariat to
tal rights all the more worrisome. va, Switzerland, from May 22- move the world towards better
In a free, inclusive, tolerant, 28, under the theme “Health health and well-being for all. ■
and plural Quebec society, must
the promotion of the priceless
heritage of the French language
be opposed to fundamental
rights and freedoms? For de-
cades, the Quebec Charter – the
creation of the National As-
sembly, and the embodiment of
fundamental guarantees of in-
ternational law – was cherished
as the hallmark of a free and
liberal Quebec society. Has our
government forgotten? ■
This article first appeared
on Policy Options and is repub-
lished here under a Creative
Commons license.

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www.canadianinquirer.net
FRIDAY MAY 27, 2022
Entertainment
The Heard v. Depp trial is not just a media
spectacle – it is an opportunity to discuss
the nuances of intimate partner violence
BY KELLIE LYNCH, The
University of Texas at San
Antonio
The Conversation
Strip away the celebrity in-
trigue and media frenzy, and
the high-profile court battle be-
tween actors Johnny Depp and
Amber Heard involves issues
painfully familiar to many wom-
en and men across America.
The civil defamation case,
which is due to conclude on
May 27, 2022, centered around
discussion of intimate partner
violence. IPV is experienced by
an estimated 6.6 million wom-
en and 5.8 million men each
year in the U.S.
A court will decide the mer-
its of a libel lawsuit Depp filed
against Heard after she wrote
an op-ed in The Washington
Post describing her experience
as a “public figure representing
domestic violence.”
As a scholar and someone
who cares about expanding
public understanding of the
complex dynamics of IPV, I
have mixed views over the
high-profile nature of the Depp
v. Heard trial.
The spotlight affords the op-
portunity to openly discuss the
nuances of IPV that are often
overlooked and perhaps may
empower some victims to feel
less alone. However, many have
consumed the trial as a form
of entertainment, exposing a
tendency of online observers
to armchair-label the parties
involved either as the “real” vic-
tim or perpetrator of abuse.
Bidirectional violence vs.
mutual abuse
Away from the Depp v. Heard
trial, IPV is experienced and
perpetrated by both women
and men across the world. Re-
search suggests that around 1 in
4 women and 1 in 10 men in the
U.S. have experienced IPV with
some form of negative impact,
be that fear, concern for their
safety or injury.
Further, the occurrence
and consequences of IPV have
been exacerbated during the
COVID-19 pandemic as a result of
isolation and financial insecurity.
While some IPV will be uni-
directional, meaning only one
partner inflicts violence on the
other, the jury of the Depp v.
Heard trial heard evidence that
each had been violent toward the
other during their relationship.
The type of behavior alleged
is what experts describe as bidi-
rectional violence, and it is quite
common in certain cases of IPV.
Indeed, a 2012 review of pub-
lished studies measuring bidi-
rectional versus unidirectional
violence in relationships found
that, on average, nearly 3 in 5
occurrences of IPV were bidi-
rectional in nature.
Bidirectional violence is typ-
ically defined as instances in
which a person reports both
perpetrating and being the vic-
tim of violence.
Notably, it does not imply
that the frequency, severity,
motivation and consequenc-
es of the violence are the same
between partners. Further, the
term bidirectional violence
is not synonymous with the
notion of “mutual abuse” – a
controversial term that arose
during testimony in the Depp-
Heard trial.
The term “abuse” implies a
power imbalance between part-
ners. It would entail one partner
utilizing the power differentia-
tion to control, threaten and in-
timidate the other partner.
As such, the idea of “mutu-
al abuse” does not make sense
in the context of how many
experts conceptualize IPV in
heterosexual relationships, as
there is unlikely to be a mutu-
al power imbalance. While IPV
may, and often does, involve
abusive behavior, it is problem-
atic to label a relationship as
mutually abusive even if both
partners are both violent to-
ward each other, as one partner
may be violent in response to
the other partner’s abuse.
IPV is not a singular phe-
nomenon
Allegations of violence and
substance use on both sides
during the Depp-Heard trial
painted a troubling picture of
what occurred in their relation-
ship. An audio recording used
in the trial depicted Depp’s ap-
parent concern that he couldn’t
take any more “physical abuse
on each other” after Heard ad-
mitted to hitting him. Heard,
meanwhile, testified that she
hit Depp “reactively” while
Depp hit her “proactively.”
This brings up another im-
portant point. To accurately
measure and understand the
nuances of IPV, one must con-
sider the context under which
the violence occurs.
For example, are both par-
Johnny Depp (HARALD KRICHEL - OWN WORK/WIKIMEDIA COMMONS, CC BY-SA 3.0)
www.canadianinquirer.net
ties instigating the violence, or
is one party acting in self-de-
fense? Is the violence part of a
repeated pattern of other abu-
sive behavior?
Experts describe multiple
types of IPV that involve differ-
ent characteristics and patterns
regarding how often women and
men perpetrate such violence.
For example, “coercive con-
trolling violence” – which is
also referred to as “intimate
terrorism” – is a type of IPV
more commonly perpetrated by
men than women, wherein one
partner – the primary abuser
– perpetrates coercive control
over the other – the victim.
The goal of coercive control
is to strip a victim of autonomy.
It can involve both physical and
nonphysical abuse tactics cen-
tered around fear, intimidation
and degradation. For example,
an abuser may restrict a vic-
tim’s access to credit and debit
cards to exert financial control.
Or they may limit a victim’s
access to the outside world
through monitoring or taking
their phone.
17
However, coercive control is
not present in all types of IPV.
“Situational couple violence” is
another form of IPV, character-
ized as conflict that escalates into
physical violence. The violence
can range from what is classified
as minor, for example slapping,
to severe, such as choking.
This type of IPV is perpetrat-
ed by women and men at simi-
lar rates, research shows.
Much of the research sur-
rounding IPV is limited to
heterosexual couples. There
is evidence that both coercive
control and situational couple
violence are found in same-
sex IPV. But it is unclear from
current research how issues of
power, control and situation-
al violence as they play out in
same-sex relationships con-
form to and diverge from heter-
onormative relationships.
Helping victims, providing
resources
Regardless of what anyone
thinks of the merits of Depp’s
or Heard’s allegations, people
should be aware of the powerful
impact IPV has on those who
experience it.
Every day victims are si-
lenced, dehumanized and, in
the most extreme cases, mur-
dered by their abusers. Over
half of all female homicides in
the U.S. involves an intimate
partner – compared with about
5% of male homicides – and an
abuser’s controlling behavior
toward the victim is among the
strongest risk factors for inti-
mate partner femicide.
Meanwhile, IPV remains a
significant problem for men,
yet many men are left without
the same resources as women
and face unique stigma when
seeking help. ■
This article is republished
from The Conversation under a
Creative Commons license.
18
The rise and rise of Harry Styles:
how did the former boyband member
become the biggest name in pop?
BY LIZ GIUFFRE, University
of Technology Sydney
The Conversation
You’ve probably heard the
name Harry Styles. He is the
current “real big thing” in pop-
ular music.
But how did a former boy
band star become such a huge
musician and award-winning
artist in his own right – and
does he deserve all the breath-
less praise?
The hype began in 2010 as a
member of mega group One Di-
rection. Paul McCartney gave
them his blessing as they clearly
tapped into The Beatles legacy.
On a break since 2016, One Di-
rection is still breaking records
Harry Styles (VAGUEONTHEHOW/FLICKR, CC BY 2.0)
iWantTFC’s “Run to Me” iWantTFC’s “Run to
Me” Me” tackles love in the midst of viral scandal
ABS-CBN
When 2022 started, the Phil-
ippine population was reach-
ing 112 million. Over 92 million
were social media users. That’s
slightly more than 82 percent
of the total population. And
according to the Digital 2022
report of social media manage-
ment firm Hootsuite and Cre-
ative Agency We Are Social, the
Philippines ranked second in
Entertainment
online. Their 2015 music video
Drag Me Down recently passed
one billion views on YouTube –
seven years after its release.
Since going solo, Styles has
wowed audiences as a fashion
icon and performer, releasing
his third solo album, Harry’s
House, this week.
Styles’ latest single, As It Was,
is already a world record holder
for daily streams across multiple
platforms, debuting in its first
week with 43.8 million plays.
As a solo artist, he has won a
swag of international awards,
including Grammys, Brits and
ARIAs.
His 2019 album, Fine Line,
debuted at number one on the
Billboard charts and is the most
recent album to make it to Roll-
the world in terms of time spent
on the internet and social media.
This is the reality-based
milieu where leading global
Filipino streaming platform
iWantTFC’s newest series,
“Run To Me”, takes place. It
is also the context where two
strangers living opposite lives,
with only being passionate
streamers as their shared ex-
perience, will find their way to
each other in the most unex-
pected manner.
ing Stone’s 500 Greatest Al-
bums of All Time.
While Styles has groups of
young female fans who have fol-
lowed him since One Direction,
his current fan base is much
broader, brought together by
the community and mood built
through his music.
Substance as well as style
Styles’, um, style has been lik-
ened to iconic musician David
Bowie in terms of gender and
genre fluidity. NPR describes
him as “dressed in the finery of
rock’s legacies”. GQ called him
“one of the best dressed men in
the world” with “elegance and
bold choices”.
In 1970, Bowie appeared on
the cover of his album The Man
Who Sold the World in a “man
dress”. In 2020, Styles wore a
tailor-made lace Gucci gown on
the cover of Vogue.
The nature of his public
profile means there has been
intense scrutiny about his per-
sonal life. Styles has been re-
peatedly asked about his sexual
orientation. His response has
been to call these questions
“outdated”.
In responding in this way he
provides strong leadership for the
young mainstream. He is essen-
tially saying no one should need
to justify or explain who they love.
Popular music becomes real-
ly powerful when artistic state-
ments lead to action. Styles
Jewel (Alexa Ilacad) is on
top of her game online. She has
reached superstar status for
capturing the niche of singing
flawlessly while doing make-up
tutorials. But while enjoying the
success of her virtual life, she is
down in the dumps with her real
family life. Born in wealth, her
busy mother Emerald (Mickey
Ferriols) has no time for Jewel,
focusing instead on the fami-
ly business. To make matters
worse, Emerald showers atten-
www.canadianinquirer.net
does this most overtly in the
song Treat People With Kind-
ness, which he performs draped
in pride flags. This is a clear act
that tells LGBTQA+ fans they
are welcome.
Of course, Styles is privileged
in terms of money, race and
gender – and this means he can
make art and take risks with
less to lose than others.
As Billy Porter reminds us,
queer people of colour have
been challenging expectations
about representation for de-
cades, often as a matter of ne-
cessity rather than mere choice.
The personal and commu-
nal in action
In addition to fine songwrit-
ing, which he does with some
regular collaborators, Styles
also draws from a diverse pool
of influences.
Iconic artist Stevie Nicks re-
ferred to him as “the son I nev-
er had”. In return, Styles said
Nicks’ songs “made you ache,
feel on top of the world, make
you want to dance, and usually
all three at the same time”.
At Coachella in April 2022,
he invited Shania Twain to per-
form with him. Introducing
her, he said: “in the car with
my mother as a child, this lady
taught me to sing”.
The next week he invited
Lizzo on stage, and together
they performed I Will Survive,
a tribute to their shared love of
tion on Jewel’s younger brother,
Diamond (Sean Tristan), mak-
ing it clear that the child prefer-
ence is intentional.
Meanwhile, Wilson is also a
music streamer but struggles
for views. He is deep in various
side hustles to pay for the hos-
pital bills of his mother (Nikki
Valdez) who is battling leuke-
mia. But while it’s hard to get
fan love online for Wilson, he
and his mother share such a
rich, unconditional love.
MAY 27, 2022 FRIDAY
1970s music.
Collaboration with other art-
ists – particularly artists from
different perspectives – shows
Styles is open to exploring dif-
ferent territory.
Popular music doesn’t have
one “sound” over time – it
changes with fashion, technolo-
gy and culture. Staying relevant
means being able to embrace
different ways of doing things.
Harry’s House
His new album, Harry’s
House, shows another evolu-
tion in Styles’ musical career.
It builds on his pop music
background and travels around
between 70s style folk story-
telling and various eras of great
dance music. Lyrically, it moves
from cryptic – “I bring the pop,
you bring the cinema” – to ex-
plicit – “if you’re getting your-
self wet for me, I guess you’re all
mine”, mostly drawing praise
from music critics.
Popular music matters be-
cause it brings people togeth-
er. Harry Styles, and popular
music like his, does this on a
mass scale. Whether the Style
(sorry) is your taste or not, his
value is not only demonstrated
in the millions of sales, but in
the power of the connections he
builds between his fans. ■
This article is republished
from The Conversation under a
Creative Commons license.
Without warning, the lives of
Jewel and Wilson take a surpris-
ing turn when they cross paths
as Wilson tries to rescue Jewel
from what he thought was an
actual kidnapping. When Wil-
son finds out that Jewel staged
her own kidnapping to draw her
mother’s attention, Jewel con-
vinces Wilson to play along as
her fake kidnapper.
If the audience thinks this
❱❱ PAGE 20 iWantTFC’s “Run to
FRIDAY MAY 27, 2022
Is intermittent fasting the diet for you?
Here’s what the science says
BY MCKALE
MONTGOMERY, Oklahoma
State University
The Conversation
What if I told you all you need
to do to lose weight is read a cal-
endar and tell time? These are
the basics for successfully follow-
ing an intermittent fasting diet.
Can it be that simple, though?
Does it work? And what is the
scientific basis for fasting? As a
registered dietitian and expert
in human nutrition and metab-
olism, I am frequently asked
such questions.
Simply stated, intermittent
fasting is defined by alternat-
ing set periods of fasting with
periods in which eating is per-
mitted. One method is alter-
nate-day fasting. On “fast days,”
followers of this form of fasting
are restricted to consuming no
more than 500 calories per day;
on “feast days,” which occur ev-
ery other day, they can eat freely,
with no restrictions on the types
or quantities of foods eaten.
Other methods include the
increasingly popular 5:2 meth-
od. This form of fasting involves
five days of feasting and two
days of fasting per week.
Another variation relies on
time-restricted eating. That
means followers should fast
for a specified number of hours
– typically 16 to 20 per day –
while freely consuming foods
within a designated four- to
eight-hour period.
But what about eating breakfast
and then small meals throughout
the day to keep the body’s metab-
olism running? After all, that’s the
conventional wisdom that many
of us grew up with.
To answer these questions, it
helps to understand the basics
of human metabolism.
Human metabolism 101
The human body requires a
continual supply of energy to
sustain life, and the foods we
eat provide us with this energy.
But because eating is often fol-
Lifestyle
lowed by periods of time with-
out eating, an intricate set of
biological pathways is in place
to meet the body’s energy de-
mands between meals.
Most of the pathways func-
tion at some level all the time,
but they fluctuate following a
meal in a predictable pattern
called the fed-fast cycle. The
time frames of the cycle can
vary, depending on the food
types eaten, the size of the meal
and the person’s activity level.
So what happens, metabolically
speaking, after we eat? Consum-
ing carbohydrates and fats leads
to a rise in blood glucose and also
lipid levels, which include choles-
terol and triglycerides.
This triggers the release of
insulin from the pancreas. The
insulin helps tissues through-
out the body take up the glucose
and lipids, which supplies the
tissues with energy.
Once energy needs are met,
leftover glucose is stored in the
liver and skeletal muscle in a
condensed form called glycogen.
When glycogen stores are full,
excess glucose converts to fatty
acids and is stored in fat tissue.
About three to 18 hours after
a meal – again, depending upon
a person’s activity level and size
the of the meal – the amount of
circulating blood glucose and
lipids returns to baseline lev-
els. So tissues then must rely on
fuel sources already in the body,
which are the glycogen and fat.
A hormone called glucagon, se-
creted by the pancreas, helps
facilitate the breakdown of gly-
cogen and fat to provide energy
for the body between meals.
Glucagon also initiates a pro-
cess known as gluconeogenesis,
which is the synthesis of glu-
cose from nondietary sources.
This helps maintain the right
level of blood glucose levels.
When the body reaches a true
fasting state – about 18 hours
to two days without additional
food intake – the body’s stores
of glycogen are depleted, and
tissues like the heart and skel-
etal muscle start to rely heavily
on fats for energy. That means
an increase in the breakdown of
the stored fats.
“Aha!” you might say. “So in-
termittent fasting is the key to
ultimate fat burning?” Well,
it’s not that simple. Let’s go
through what happens next.
The starvation state
Though many tissues adapt
to using fats for energy, the
brain and red blood cells need a
continual supply of glucose. But
when glucose is not available
because of fasting, the body
starts to break down its own
proteins and converts them to
glucose instead. However, be-
cause proteins are also critical
for supporting essential bodily
functions, this is not a sustain-
able process.
When the body enters the
starvation state, the body goes
into self-preservation mode,
and a metabolic shift occurs in
an effort to spare body protein.
The body continues to synthe-
size glucose for those cells and
tissue that absolutely need it,
but the breakdown of stored fats
increases as well to provide ener-
gy for tissues such as the skeletal
muscle, heart, liver and kidneys.
This also promotes ketogen-
esis, or the formation of ketone
bodies – molecules produced
in the liver as an energy source
when glucose is not available. In
the starvation state, ketone bod-
ies are important energy sources,
because the body is not capable
of solely utilizing fat for energy.
This is why it is inaccurate when
some proponents of intermittent
fasting claim that fasting is a way
of burning “just fat” - it’s not bio-
logically possible.
What happens when you
break the fast? The cycle starts
over. Blood glucose and lipids
return to basal levels, and ener-
gy levels in the body are seam-
lessly maintained by transi-
tioning between the metabolic
pathways described earlier. The
neat thing is, we don’t even have
to think about it. The body is
well-equipped to adapt between
periods of feasting and fasting.
Possible downsides
If an “all-or-nothing” dietary
approach to weight loss sounds
appealing to you, chances are
it just might work. Indeed, in-
termittent fasting diets have
produced clinically significant
amounts of weight loss. Inter-
mittent fasting may also reduce
disease risk by lowering blood
pressure and blood lipid levels.
On the flip side, numerous
studies have shown that the
weight reduction from intermit-
tent fasting diets is no greater
19
than the weight loss on a stan-
dard calorie-restricted diet.
In fact, the weight loss
caused by intermittent fasting
is due not to spending time in
some sort of magic metabolic
window, but rather to reduced
overall calorie consumption.
On feast days, dieters do not
typically fully compensate for
lack of food on fasted days. This
is what results in mild to mod-
erate weight loss. Approximate-
ly 75% of the weight is fat mass;
the rest is lean mass. That’s
about the same ratio as a stan-
dard low-calorie diet.
Should you still want to go
forward with intermittent fast-
ing, keep a few things to keep in
mind. First, there are no studies
on the long-term safety and ef-
ficacy of following this type of
diet. Second, studies show that
intermittent fasters don’t get
enough of certain nutrients.
Exercise is something else to
consider. It helps preserve lean
muscle mass and may also con-
tribute to increased weight loss
and long-term weight mainte-
nance. This is important, be-
cause nearly a quarter of the
weight lost on any diet is mus-
cle tissue, and the efficacy of
intermittent fasting for weight
loss has been demonstrated for
only short durations.
Also, once you stop following
an intermittent-fasting diet,
you will very likely gain the
weight back. This is a critical
consideration, because many
people find the diet difficult
to follow long-term. Imagine
the challenge of planning six
months’ worth of feasting and
fasting around family dinners,
holidays and parties. Then
imagine doing it for a lifetime.
Ultimately, the best approach
is to follow an eating plan that
meets current dietary recom-
mendations and fits into your
lifestyle. ■
This article is republished
from The Conversation under a
Creative Commons license.
 20
Whataboutism: what it is and why it’s
such a popular tactic in arguments
BY BENJAMIN CURTIS,
Nottingham Trent University
The Conversation
Whataboutism is an argu-
mentative tactic where a person
or group responds to an accusa-
tion or difficult question by de-
flection. Instead of addressing
the point made, they counter it
with “but what about X?”.
As bickering couples and par-
ents of siblings will know, this
happens in daily life all too of-
ten. “You lied about where you
were last night!” a person feel-
ing wronged will say. To which,
instead of owning up, the part-
ner replies: “Well, what about
you? You lie to me all the time!”
Similarly, in response to being
told off for the state of her room,
one child’s whataboutist reply
will be to say: “But what about my
brother’s room? His is worse.”
It happens on social media,
in politics and in societal and
international conflict too. To
wit, UK prime minister Boris
Johnson, in February 2022.
In response to Keir Starmer’s
accusation of wrongdoing in
relation to the partygate affair,
Johnson sought to deflect at-
tention by (falsely) accusing
Starmer of failing to prosecute
Jimmy Savile during his time as
director of public prosecutions.
Media commentators have
rightly pointed out that Johnson
was simply adopting what one
journalist called Donald Trump’s
iWantTFC’s “Run to...
❰❰ 18 is far-fetched, they’d
be surprised by how
many real news head-
lines in the last three years re-
vealed that there are teens who
are faking their kidnapping to
attract their parents’ attention.
For instance, on May 18, 2019,
there were news reports on a
13-year-old Chinese boy who
had himself bound and gagged
in an abandoned truck in Sich-
uan province. Police found out
that he faked his kidnapping
because he wanted to see his
parents who were working in
another part of the country.
When troubles in real lives
impact their online lives which
complicate further their real
Lifestyle
“favourite dodge”. When criti-
cised, Trump would routinely
deflect attention by claiming that
someone else was worse.
The rise of social media and
increasing political polarisa-
tion may well have made wha-
taboutism more visible. But it
is certainly not a new tactic. It
was, in fact, taught by the soph-
ists, a group of lecturers, writ-
ers and teachers in Greece, over
2,500 years ago.
In some limited circum-
stances it may be a legitimate
tactic, for example, when it is
relevant to highlight that the
person making the accusation
has a bias. For the most part,
however, even if the person
making the accusation is a hyp-
ocrite or has double standards,
this does not mean that their
accusation is false.
Origins of whataboutism
The exact term was first used
in print by a reader named Li-
onel Bloch in 1978 in a letter
to the Guardian. “Sir,” writes
Bloch, “your leader [article],
East, West and the plight of the
warring rest (May 18), is the
finest piece of ‘whataboutism’
I have read in many years.” He
goes on to decry the use of this
tactic as a “Soviet import” used
by “progressive minds” to de-
fend communism.
But Bloch’s usage derives
from earlier uses of similar
terms. In a letter to the Irish
Times published on January
30 1974, reader Sean O’Conaill
lives, what future awaits Jewel
and Wilson? This is the excit-
ing premise of “Run to Me”.
Directed by Dwein R. Balta-
zar, “Run to Me” is produced
by ABS-CBN Entertainment,
Dreamscape Entertainment,
iWantTFC, and Kumu. The se-
ries also stars Malou Crisologo,
CJ Navato, Karl Gabriel, Ivan
Carapiet, Margaux Montana,
Henz Villaraiz, Matty Juniosa,
and Haira Palaguitto.
“Run to Me” will be available for
streaming outside the Philippines
starting on May 20 on KUMU and
starting on May 21 -- with a new
episode dropping every Saturday
-- on iWantTFC for subscribers
on the Premium Plan. ■
complains about the use of
the tactic by IRA defenders,
to whom he refers to as “the
Whatabouts”. Three days later,
the Irish journalist John Healy
published a column in the same
paper, on the same topic, dub-
bing the tactic “Whataboutery”.
Formally speaking, wha-
taboutism is a fallacy most
closely related to the ad homi-
nem fallacy, wherein a person
responds to an accusation by
attacking the person making it.
It is a fallacy because even if
the counter-accusation is true,
it doesn’t defend whoever is be-
ing accused (the lying partner,
the messy child, Donald Trump)
in the first place. At best, it
shows that both parties behaved
shamefully. And, of course, two
Whataboutism is often deployed when an argument is seen as a battle to be
won and not a debate.
Roe vs. Wade...
❰❰ 10 published between
April 2013 and De-
cember 2021.
At a time when women’s re-
productive rights are being con-
stitutionally threatened south
of the border, and where there
remain difficulties in accessing
abortion in parts of Canada, the
decline of interventions by wom-
en’s organizations is troubling.
Also discouraging is that in
four recent decisions, the Su-
preme Court of Canada denied
the intervention requests of
several organizations, includ-
ing equity-seeking groups,
in cases that are set to have
wide-ranging public policy and
human rights ramifications.
www.canadianinquirer.net
wrongs do not make a right.
In philosophy, an argument
is a reasoned debate aimed at
truth. But in many other con-
texts, people often do not view
arguments in this way. They
view them, rather, as battles to
be won. Their goal is to get their
opponent to concede as much
as possible without their con-
ceding anything themselves.
Viewed in this way, wha-
taboutism is an effective strat-
egy. It works on the principle
that offence is the best form of
defence. By launching a count-
er-attack, you place your oppo-
nent on the back foot.
Why whataboutism is so
popular
Psychologists suggest that
this view of arguments is preva-
The first decision considers
the constitutionality of existing
laws that prevent some refu-
gees from seeking protection,
while the second examines
the power of courts to enforce
parenting orders, particularly
in the context of internation-
al custody disputes. The third
looks at how legal rights en-
shrined in the Charter apply
outside of Canada and the last
details who is responsible for
worker health and safety in city
construction projects. The top-
ics cover a lot of ground, each
holding important legal and so-
cial implications.
We need to pay attention to
these trends moving forward.
MAY 27, 2022 FRIDAY
lent in political debate because
it is driven by partisan bias.
When confronted by an oppo-
nent with a different political
viewpoint, you are more like-
ly to view what they say as an
attack to be countered, rather
than a point to be debated.
More pernicious is when wha-
taboutism is put to work as a mis-
information tool. Since the cold
war era Russian propagandists
have responded to criticism of
Russian policies by immediately
pointing out that western coun-
tries have similar policies.
The same ploy is routinely
seen in other conflict situa-
tions. Chinese propagandists
have used it to deflect criticism
of how China’s Uyghur popula-
tion is treated. Junta propagan-
dists in Myanmar have used it
similarly when criticised for the
regime’s treatment of Rohingya
muslims. The list goes on.
The sophists were the propa-
gandists of ancient times. They
prided themselves on being able
to convince an audience – using
any means available, including
whataboutism – of any conclu-
sion, irrespective of its truth.
Plato was an ardent critic of
the sophists. He vehemently
made the point that arguments
should be aimed at truth. His
most famous work in this respect
is the Gorgias dialogue, which
sees Socrates and Callicles de-
bate the good and evil of man.
❱❱ PAGE 21 Whataboutism: what it
Interveners set the stage for
what perspectives the Supreme
Court will ultimately consid-
er when making decisions that
shape Canadians’ lives.
The potential reversal of Roe.
vs. Wade should serve as a stark
warning of the power the high
courts hold to transform soci-
etal conditions. Although the
Supreme Court has historically
made many decisions that have
expanded and promoted the
rights of Canadians, it is equally
capable of narrowing and limiting
the scope of our rights as well. ■
This article is republished
from The Conversation under a
Creative Commons license.
FRIDAY MAY 27, 2022
Why football needs a gender revolution
BY STACEY POPE, Durham
University
The Conversation
This July the UEFA women’s
Euros kick off, and women’s
football will be watched by mil-
lions of people. But will this vis-
ibility help boost gender equal-
ity in the game or give rise to a
further backlash of anti-women
attitudes and misogyny?
The #MeToo movement has
raised public awareness of issues
such as misogyny, sexual harass-
ment and gender discrimination.
These issues are increasingly
central to public debate about fu-
ture policy change in many areas.
However, football – the world’s
most popular sport – remains a
bastion of male domination.
But some momentum has been
building towards greater gender
equality in football. In 2019 a re-
cord 1.12 billion people watched
the FIFA women’s World Cup.
Our research has shown evidence
in the UK of a “new age” of media
coverage of women’s sport.
Women in football are be-
coming increasingly visible not
only as players and fans, but
also as pundits, match officials,
journalists and club workers.
But this does not mean sexism
and misogyny, which have been
core characteristics of the so-
called beautiful game for many
years, have disappeared.
Earlier this month a row
erupted in Scotland when sev-
eral women journalists walked
out of the Scottish football writ-
ers awards in Glasgow following
what was reported to be a series
of sexist, misogynist and racist
“jokes” by a male after-dinner
speaker. Sports broadcaster Eil-
idh Barbour tweeted afterwards:
“Never felt so unwelcome in
the industry I work in than sit-
ting at the Scottish Football
Whataboutism: what it...
❰❰ 20 Fittingly, it contains
the earliest example
of whataboutism that
I have been able to find and the
Sports
Writers Awards. A huge remind-
er there is still so much to do in
making our game an equal place
#callitout #equalgame” — Eil-
idh Barbour (@EilidhBarbour)
We need a gender revolution
if we want to reach equality and
justice on the pitch and beyond.
Sexism, misogyny and abuse
There have been several dis-
turbing incidents of misogyny
and abuse in football this year.
In late January, Spanish
premier league club Rayo Val-
lecano announced its deci-
sion to hire disgraced coach
Carlos Santiso to take charge
of its women’s team, despite
a recording emerging of him
encouraging his staff to find a
girl to gang-rape to help team
bonding. Despite fans being ap-
palled, Santiso remains in post.
This is patriarchy at its worst.
Our recent research found that
men continue to dominate the
highest-ranking roles in men’s
club football. Where women are
included in leadership roles, they
are typically channelled towards
peripheral roles. This way wom-
en are removed from major foot-
balling decisions and male domi-
nance in the sport is maintained.
This is how clubs protect
men’s interests, and why club
presidents rarely feel obliged to
take action in cases such as San-
tiso’s. And this is why, even in
the rare cases where a player or
official faces consequences for
misogynistic behaviour, he of-
ten finds lucrative employment
once the scandal dies down, and
remains active in the industry.
Far too many clubs are will-
ing to ignore these issues. The
consensus is often that if a play-
er, manager or director is mak-
ing money, winning games and
bringing in trophies, the rest
is irrelevant. This is arguably
the case for Scottish club Raith
Rovers’ signing of David Good-
best response to it:
Socrates: You’re breaking
your original promise, Callicles.
If what you say contradicts what
willie earlier this year.
The player was found by a civil
court to have raped a woman in
2017, yet Raith still decided to hire
him. After many fans voiced out-
rage, and the women’s team cap-
tain resigned, the manager still
tried to defend the move by insist-
ing that Goodwillie has “a proven
track record as a goalscorer”.
Eventually, after sponsors
started pulling out and first
minister Nicola Sturgeon con-
demned the decision, Raith
Rovers made a U-turn and an-
nounced that it would not, after
all, sign Goodwillie. He is now
playing for another Scottish club.
Northern Ireland women’s
team manager Kenny Shiels re-
cently made headlines by nega-
tively comparing women play-
ers’ emotional resilience to that
of men. Speaking after North-
ern Ireland lost 5-0 to England,
Shiels claimed that in women’s
football, teams concede goals in
quick succession because women
and girls are “more emotional”.
Shiels’ comments drew much
criticism, and while he apol-
ogised, it is hard to undo the
damage of senior figure in the
you really think, your value as
my partner in searching for the
truth will be at an end.
Callicles: You don’t always say
www.canadianinquirer.net
sport perpetuating stereotypical
assumptions about women. For-
mer England and Arsenal player
Ian Wright then took to Twitter
to demonstrate how things get
emotional for men too.
In one of our recent studies,
a survey of 1,950 male football
fans found that openly misog-
ynistic attitudes still dominate
football fandom in the UK.
We identified three groups
of football fans: those with
progressive attitudes who ex-
pressed support for more gen-
der equality and wider coverage
of women’s sports; fans with
misogynistic attitudes who saw
women’s sports as inferior, and
its coverage as “positive dis-
crimination” or “PC nonsense”;
and finally, fans who manoeu-
vred between progressive and
misogynistic attitudes, publicly
expressing support for gender
equality, but in private revealing
more misogynistic attitudes.
In this study, we found that
while progressive attitudes
were strongly represented
among football fans, the most
dominant group, by far, was the
one that openly demonstrated
what you think either, Socrates.
Socrates: Well, if that’s true, it
only makes me just as bad as you
…■
21
misogyny.
Time for revolution
Football does not operate in
a vacuum. If misogyny is rife in
wider society, this transfers to
the football arena. The recent
“leg-crossing remarks” about
Labour deputy leader Angela
Rayner show that this blatant
sexism is in evidence at the
highest levels of the nation.
Yet important battles are being
won. Society is making it clear it
will not turn a blind eye to mi-
sogyny any longer. Recent exam-
ples of misogyny in football draw
a grim picture, but the media
reported these incidents wide-
ly and critically, and the public
voiced its objections loudly.
Yet, wherever there are ad-
vances in gender equality, there
is also a backlash. And this is of-
ten more severe in environments
traditionally dominated by men
– like football and politics.
Simply increasing the visibil-
ity of women is not enough to
end sexism and misogyny in the
sport. What we need to reach
equality and justice on the
pitch and beyond is a gender
revolution. We need everyone
involved, from players to man-
agers, fans to sponsors, to take
a clear and uncompromising
stance against misogyny and
help create a welcoming envi-
ronment for women.
Equality, diversity and inclu-
sion must be firmly embedded
within clubs and governing bod-
ies, and this is not currently the
case. News this week that the
US men’s and women’s teams
will share their World Cup prize
money is welcome. Changing
this mindset will take time, but
it’s possible if we refuse to ex-
cuse anti-women attitudes.■
This article is republished
from The Conversation under a
Creative Commons license.
This article is republished
from The Conversation under a
Creative Commons license.
22
Indonesia dethrones Gilas Pilipinas in SEA Games
Philippine News Agency
HANOI – Tokyo Olympics
bronze winner Eumir Marcial
mauled his unheralded Timor
Leste opponent to lead a fi-
nal-day, four-gold medal haul
that somehow lost luster af-
ter Gilas Pilipinas failed in its
mission on Sunday in the 31st
Southeast Asian Games here.
Showing superior skills, Mar-
cial made quick work of Delio
Anzageci Mouzinho, forcing a
referee-stopped contest (RSC)
victory in the first round of the
middleweight finals, following
through on big victories scored
earlier by Ian Clark Bautista
and Rogen Ladon at the Bac
Ninh Stadium.
But the story of the day, the
saddest in Team Philippines’
participation here, was the
stunning 81-85 defeat suffered
by Gilas Pilipinas to a gritty In-
donesian squad backstopped
by former NBA player Marques
Bolden and coached by former
Gilas mentor Raiko Toroman.
The defeat came after the
Gilas Pilipinas women’s team
absorbed a similarly surpris-
ing 93-96 setback at the hands
of the upstart Malaysian squad
at the Thanh Tri Gymnasium
Palace proud of Team PH
performance in SEA Games
BY AZER PARROCHA
Philippine News Agency
MANILA – Malacañang has
congratulated Team Philip-
pines for its fourth-place fin-
ish in the 31st Southeast Asian
Games (SEAG) in Hanoi, Viet-
nam held on May 12 to 23.
“Mabuhay ang galing ng
atletang Pinoy sa Hanoi. Na-
kapag-uwi po ang ating mga
pambansang atleta ng 52 gold
medals, 70 silver medals at 107
bronze medals sa pagtatapos
ng Southeast Asian Games sa
Vietnam. Pang-apat po ang Pil-
ipinas sa labing-isang kalahok
na bansa (Long live our Filipino
athletes in Hanoi. Our nation-
al athletes took home 52 gold
medals, 70 silver medals and
107 bronze medals at the end
Sports
earlier, although the loss was
somehow softened by the fact
the distaff team still won the
gold medal via the winner-over-
the-other rule.
The Gilas women’s cause was
helped along by Vietnam, which
beat Malaysia 69-65 late Satur-
day night, the Malaysians’ sec-
ond defeat in five games.
With a 4-1 card, the Gilas
women bagged the gold. Indo-
nesia can match that record
with a win over Singapore later
Sunday but Gilas will still pre-
vail, having beaten the Indons
93-77 Monday last week.
With a 5-1 mark, the men’s
squad coached by Chot Reyes,
who took over when Tab Bald-
win gave up the post last Jan-
uary, became only the third
Philippine team in SEA Games
history to fail in its golden quest
after similar silver medal fin-
ishes by the country in the 1979
and 1989 games, both in Malay-
sia, against 18 title conquests.
This immediately prompted
calls on social media for Reyes
to resign, with his detractors
pointing out that the biennial
competition is the lowest form
of competition in Asia.
The last time Reyes coached
Gilas was in the 2014 Asian
Games in Incheon, South Ko-
of the Southeast Asian Games
in Vietnam. The Philippines is
fourth out of the eleven partici-
pating countries),” acting presi-
dential spokesperson and Com-
munications Secretary Martin
Andanar said in a Palace press
briefing on Wednesday.
“Maraming-maraming
salamat po sa karangalang ibin-
igay ninyo sa Pilipinas (Thank
you very much for the honor
you have given to the Philip-
pines),” he added.
The Philippine Sports Com-
mission (PSC) initially project-
ed a third-place finish.
However, PSC William
“Butch” Ramirez said there was
nothing to be ashamed of the
Philippine contingent’s showing
despite it being a far cry from its
149-gold haul when it hosted the
biennial meet in 2019.
rea, with the team winning just
three of seven games to finish
seventh overall.
“Our players played their
best,” Reyes said after emerging
from the dugout. “Indonesia
came up with a very good game
plan. They shot well from the
three-point line. In the end, we
just couldn’t match it.
“Obviously that’s on me. I
take full accountability and re-
sponsibility for the result. Like
I said, they tried their best and
that’s sports. That’s life. Some-
times, things don’t work out the
way we played,” he added.
Lost in the horror and agony
of that loss were the victories
posted by Ladon, who edged
Thao Tran Van of Vietnam 3-2
in the men’s 52kg division, and
Bautista, who humbled Naing
Latt of Myanmar 5-0 in the
men’s 57kg class.
The other Pinoy boxer in the
finals, Tokyo Olympian Irish
Magno, lost to Vietnamese
Nguyen Thi Tam in the wom-
en’s flyweight championship
and bagged the silver, the same
fate suffered by the esports team
in its League of Legends finals
showdown against Vietnam 0-3.
The Philippine contingent,
backed by the Philippine Sports
Commission and the Philippine
“Our performance in bring-
ing home 52 gold, 70 silver,
and 104 bronze medals in plac-
ing fourth overall in the medal
standings was a good finish de-
spite the various challenges our
national athletes had to face
amid the Covid-19 pandemic
before competing in Vietnam,”
Ramirez said.
According to Ramirez,
funding training programs to
develop elite athletes for in-
ternational competition was
expensive.
“You need money for coach-
es, both local and foreign, air-
fare, transportation, and hotel
for international exposure to
season them, plus the logistical
support like proper nutrition,
sports psychology, and med-
icine for athletes discovered
abroad or locally,” he added.
www.canadianinquirer.net
Olympic Committee, finished
the 12-day biennial games with
51 gold medals on top of 67 silver
and 92 bronze medals for fourth
overall, a big comedown from its
overpowering performance three
years ago when it bagged the
country’s second overall crown
with a harvest of 149-117-121.
Host Vietnam, still battling
Thailand for the football crown,
the most cherished gold here at
press time, continued to put the
finishing touches to its domi-
nant run to the overall crown
with a 193-115-109 haul, fol-
lowed by Thailand (84-96-126)
and Indonesia (63-83-74).
Singapore, which seized
fourth from the Philippines
last Friday, remained stuck at
47 golds with 45 silver and 67
bronze medals for fifth.
Of the 11 participating coun-
tries here, only Timor Leste
failed to win a gold.
Bolden, who played for the
Cleveland Cavaliers, served
as the lynchpin for the Indon
squad that finished with a 6-0
card, with Abraham Grahita
also lending support.
With his teammates watch-
ing from the sidelines, Marcial,
26, who has already won two
pro fights, went to work as soon
as the bell sounded, delivering
Opening ceremony of the 31st Southeast Asian Games in Hanoi, Vietnam (PSC
(PHILIPPINE SPORTS COMMISSION)/FACEBOOK)
He said the Philippine Sports
Institute needs adequate gov-
ernment funds to pursue its
goals of updating the country’s
know-how in sports medicine
and technology, including the
improved sports rehabilitation
facilities, in keeping abreast
with the rest of the world.
MAY 27, 2022 FRIDAY
solid punches to his foe.
“I shouted to him to extend
the fight, but it didn’t reach the
last two-minute mark, I guess.
The referee just stopped the
fight,” women’s featherweight
bronze medalist Nesthy Petecio
said after cheering Marcial.
The Philippines ended the
boxing competition with three
gold medals, one silver and five
bronze medals, a far cry from
the seven golds, three silver
medals and two bronze medals
won by the country in the 2019
SEA Games.
Gymnastics emerged as the
goldmine for Pinoys in these
games, with world vault champion
Carlos Yulo leading a 7-4-1 harvest.
“I congratulate Malaysia. They
still had that heart to play the
game. Even though they were
down, we really had a hard time.
They were making shots,” said
Gilas Women coach Pat Aquino.
The Gilas women had an av-
erage winning margin of 23
points in their past four games
in winning their second straight
SEA Games title.
“I still tip my hat off for the
girls. They played their hearts
out. It’s just not as sweet as we
want it to be. But we are still gold
medalist. I’m so proud of them
having that feat,” said Aquino. ■
Vietnam, the overall cham-
pion, tallied 446 medals high-
lighted by 205 gold, 125 silver,
and 116 bronze medals.
Thailand came in second
with 92 gold, 103 silver, and 136
bronze while Indonesia placed
third with 69 gold, 91 silver, and
81 bronze.■
FRIDAY MAY 27, 2022
Inflation: the supermarket business
model is too fragile to shield customers
from rising food prices
BY LISA JACK, University of
Portsmouth
The Conversation
Food prices, like almost ev-
erything else, are rising fast.
There have recently been warn-
ings of “apocalyptic” costs, and
a declaration that the “era of
cheap food” is over.
Such announcements have
been linked to creaking econo-
mies trying to recover from the
pandemic and the effects of war
in Ukraine, one of the world’s
largest exporters of food.
But to fully understand why
food prices cannot be kept down,
and what could be done to help
struggling households, we need
to look at how our supermar-
kets actually make money. My
research shows that the current
system has been balanced on a
knife edge for some time.
The fact is that most of the
income from selling food with
very low margins at very high
volumes is swallowed up in over-
heads such as payroll and the
costs of running stores and dis-
tribution centres. This has three
effects on supermarket econom-
ics worth considering the next
At 3.9%, Australia’s unemployment rate
now officially begins with ‘3’. What’s next?
BY JOHN HAWKINS,
University of Canberra
The Conversation
Early in the election cam-
paign, on April 14, we learned
that Australia’s unemployment
rate had slipped below 4% in
March, to 3.95% – the lowest
rate in 48 years.
But the Coalition was denied
Business
time you stock up on groceries.
Firstly, supermarkets only
make a decent profit if people
buy convenience food, treats
and non-food items (everything
from toilet paper to fuel and
clothing). Seven out of the top
ten items that bring in the most
money for supermarkets fall
into the categories of alcohol,
snacks and confectionery.
One influential book on the
subject argues supermarkets
need to ensure – through shop
design and promotion – that
customers buy at least some
higher margi items (regardless
of their intention when they
enter the store).
Supermarkets also need to
be competitive by offering great
deals on cheap, bulk, long-life
foods such as cereals and pasta,
to provide customers with sav-
ings which they may then spend
on the non-food items and
higher margin treats. If there
is generally less money in peo-
ple’s pockets, due to inflation
and a cost-of-living crisis, they
will be generally less inclined
to buy these discretionary (and
more profitable) items, making
the supermarket less profitable.
From this perspective, the
the bragging rights that would
flow from an unemployment rate
beginning with “3” because of a
Bureau of Statistics convention
of quoting the rate to only one
decimal place, which meant the
rate was presented as “4.0%”, the
same as the month before (when
it was actually 4.04%).
Thursday’s figure, for the
month of April, has broken the
barrier. Officially 3.9% (and ac-
recent controversial announce-
ment that multibuy deals are now
not being banned in the UK is in
fact good news for the retailers.
Food for thought
Secondly, food is cheap in su-
permarkets because they use
their bargaining power to get
large volume discounts. When
Tesco was founded in the early
1960s, consumers benefited be-
cause it challenged the previous
situation which had favoured
the large manufacturers and
processors in setting prices.
This lowers prices for shop-
pers, but severely impacts earn-
ings for the supermarket. And
once prices cannot be pushed
down any further – with cow’s
milk, the price paid to produc-
ers is mostly at or below the
cost of production – charging
suppliers to market and pro-
mote their products is one of
the few tools available for a su-
permarket to make money.
Information about this kind
of “commercial income” can be
found in the notes at the back
of retailers’ annual financial
reports. I have analysed these,
and found that without com-
mercial income, in 2021 very
few supermarkets would have
tually 3.85%), it is clearly below
4% for the second consecutive
month (because the March
figure has been revised down-
wards to also round to 3.9%).
It means the unemployment
rate has decisively broken out
of the band of 5-6% it has been
in or near for the past two de-
cades and slipped below 4%.
It has fallen to where it was a
half-century ago when (in the days
www.canadianinquirer.net
made any profit at all.
But there is a limit to bargain-
ing and fee earnings. And when
the prices of raw ingredient, fuel,
financing and packaging are all
rising, supermarkets will have
to give way. It is likely they will
have to raise prices for custom-
ers in order to maintain stocks
and keep their 365-day 24-hour
model going. Many food produc-
ers have already been pushed as
low as they can go.
Supermarket sweep
Thirdly, around 80% of the
cost of the food we buy is sim-
ply the overheads of providing
shops, factories, transport, dis-
the survey was quarterly) it jumped
from 3.7% to 5.4% between Novem-
ber 1974 and February 1975.
Of course, 3.9% is an average.
Over the country, the unem-
ployment rate ranges from lows
of 2.9% in Western Australia
and 3.1% in the Australian Cap-
ital Territory, to highs of 4.5% in
Queensland and South Australia.
For women, the rate is an almost
half-century low of 3.7%, less than
23
tribution centres and produc-
tion. If fuel goes up, so does the
cost of the infrastructure – and
then the cost of groceries.
A related issue is that cheap
food is a real benefit for those
who have storage, particularly
fridge freezers. Shoppers over-
stocking at home benefits the
supermarkets, but we know
that around one third of all UK
food is wasted. So we end pay-
ing more, but end up throwing
the food away.
To achieve a fair, sustainable,
healthy and affordable food sys-
❱❱ PAGE 30 Inflation: the supermarket
the 14-year low of 4.0% for men.
Australia isn’t alone. The un-
employment rate is below 4%
in the United States, the Unit-
ed Kingdom and New Zealand;
and below 3% in Japan, Germa-
ny and Korea.
Further declines are expected.
The Reserve Bank is forecasting
unemployment of 3.6% by 2023,
❱❱ PAGE 24 At 3.9%, Australia’s
 24
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At 3.9%, Australia’s...
❰❰ 23 a few points less than
the Treasury, which is
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But the Bank is modest about
its forecasting ability. It only
claims to be 90% confident that
by mid-2024 the rate will be
somewhere between 2% and 5%.
At a press conference to re-
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Labor treasury spokesman Jim
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He said he would work with the
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were reflected in those forecasts.
The improvement is real
Sometimes the unemploy-
ment rate can be misleading. It
can fall because people have left
their jobs and are too despon-
dent to search for new ones,
meaning they are classified as
“not in the labour force” rather
than unemployed.
And it can fall even though
people are less fully employed,
working fewer hours than they
did (in accordance with an in-
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hour per week is all that’s need-
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of 63.8%, well above the 62.4% be-
fore the COVID crisis and the hun-
dreds of billions of dollars spent in
response from March 2020.
The number of hours worked
rose in April to a record 1,833
million hours.
Underemployment – the pro-
portion of people working fewer
hours than they would like – fell
to a fresh 14-year low of 6.1%.
Wages missing out
Australia’s steadily falling
unemployment rates have to
date had little effect on wages
growth. The figures released on
Wednesday showed wages grew
2.4% in the year to March, up
only marginally on the 2.3% in
the year to December.
The Reserve Bank says its busi-
www.canadianinquirer.net
BY CALLIE FREITAG,
University of Washington,
Heather D. Hill, University of
Washington
In the United States, children
are more likely to experience
poverty than people over 18.
In 2020, about 1 in 6 kids,
16% of all children, were living
in families with incomes below
the official poverty line – an in-
come threshold the government
set that year at about US$26,500
for a family of four. Only 10% of
Americans ages 18 to 64 and 9%
of those 65 and up were experi-
encing poverty, according to the
most recent data available.
ticks down when the economy
grows and up during downturns.
It stood at 17% in 1967 – just
about the same as in 2020. In
many recent years the rate hov-
ered even higher – around 20%.
Another way to measure
poverty
Researchers calculate the of-
ficial poverty rate by adding up
a household’s income and com-
paring it with a threshold of
what is needed to survive.
The government has calcu-
lated this rate the same way
since the 1960s.
ness liaison programme is giving
it a more positive picture, with
firms telling it they are having to
pay to attract and retain staff.
The Bank is forecasting annual
wages growth of 3% by December
and 3.5% by December 2023, but
it concedes its wage growth fore-
casts have been overoptimistic in
the past, producing higher num-
bers than eventuated in most of
the past ten years.
The Bank remains hopeful.
Previous dips in unemploy-
ment, in 2008 and 2010, boost-
ed wages growth.
A recent study by two of its
economists finds that in the loca-
tions where unemployment fell
below 4% in the decade before
COVID, wages grew the most.
MAY 27, 2022 FRIDAY
One of its shortcomings is
that it excludes several sources
of income, including tax credits
and the Supplemental Nutri-
tion Assistance Program, which
are intended to reduce poverty.
In 2011, the government began
to calculate an alternative met-
ric: the supplemental poverty
measure. It includes SNAP and
tax credits. It also uses thresh-
olds based on the cost of living in
different areas of the country. For
a family of four, this threshold
currently ranges from $24,000
to $35,000, depending on where
a family lives and whether they
own or rent housing.
According to this alternative
measure, 10% of children were
living in poverty in 2020, the
lowest rate ever recorded.
Depending on which mea-
sure you use, either 7 million or
11.7 million U.S. children lived
in poverty in 2020.
By both metrics, poverty is
higher for children of color. The
official poverty rate for Black
children stood at 26%, and 23%
for Hispanic children, while for
white, non-Hispanic children it
was 10%.
Before and after 2020
Both child poverty rates
had been declining before the
❱❱ PAGE 30 1 in 6 US
Higher rates in store
The most immediate impact
of Thursday’s very welcome
news on unemployment will be
confirmation within Reserve
Bank HQ that the economy can
withstand further increases in
interest rates.
The next increase is likely a
fortnight after the next govern-
ment takes office, following the
Bank’s June board meeting on
Tuesday June 7.
Only if it gets clear evidence
that wages aren’t climbing as it
expects is it likely to consider
changing course. ■
This article is republished
from The Conversation under a
Creative Commons license.
FRIDAY MAY 27, 2022
What is the metaverse, and
what can we do there?
BY ADRIAN MA, Toronto
Metropolitan University
The Conversation
You’ve likely heard recently
how the metaverse will usher in
a new era of digital connectivity,
virtual reality (VR) experiences
and e-commerce. Tech compa-
nies are betting big on it: Mic-
rosoft’s massive US$68.7 billion
acquisition of game developing
giant Activision Blizzard re-
flected the company’s desire to
bolster its position in the inter-
active entertainment space.
Prior to this, Facebook’s par-
ent company rebranded itself
as Meta — a key pillar of founder
Mark Zuckerberg’s grand am-
bitions to reimagine the social
media platform as “a
metaverse company,
building the future of
social connection.”
But other non-
tech corporations are
clamouring to get in
on the ground floor as
well, from Nike filing
new trademarks to
sell virtual Air Jor-
dans and Walmart
preparing to offer
virtual merchandise
in online stores us-
ing its own cryptocurrency and
non-fungible tokens (NFTs).
As a journalism professor
who has been researching the
future of immersive media, I
agree the metaverse opens up
transformative opportunities.
But I also see inherent chal-
lenges in its road to mainstream
adoption. So what exactly is the
metaverse and why is it being
hyped up as a game-changing
innovation?
Entering the metaverse
The metaverse is “an inte-
grated network of 3D virtual
worlds.” These worlds are ac-
cessed through a virtual real-
ity headset — users navigate
the metaverse using their eye
movements, feedback control-
lers or voice commands. The
headset immerses the user,
Technology
stimulating what is known as
presence, which is created by
generating the physical sensa-
tion of actually being there.
To see the metaverse in ac-
tion, we can look at popular
massively multiplayer virtual
reality games such as Rec Room
or Horizon Worlds, where par-
ticipants use avatars to interact
with each other and manipulate
their environment.
But the wider applications be-
yond gaming are staggering. Mu-
sicians and entertainment labels
are experimenting with hosting
concerts in the metaverse. The
sports industry is following suit,
with top franchises like Man-
chester City building virtual sta-
diums so fans can watch games
and, presumably, purchase vir-
a metaverse company,
building the future of
social connection.
tual merchandise.
Perhaps the farthest reaching
opportunities for the metaverse
will be in online learning and
government services.
This is the popular concep-
tion of the metaverse: a VR-
based world independent of our
physical one where people can
socialize and engage in a seem-
ingly unlimited variety of vir-
tual experiences, all supported
with its own digital economy.
More than virtual reality
But there are challenges to
overcome before the metaverse
can achieve widespread, global
adoption. And one key chal-
lenge is the “virtual” part of this
universe.
While VR is considered a key
ingredient of the metaverse rec-
ipe, entrance to the metaverse
is not (and should not) be limit-
ed to having a VR headset. In a
sense, anyone with a computer
or smartphone can tap into a
metaverse experience, such as
the digital world of Second Life.
Offering broad accessibility is
key to making the metaverse
work based on VR’s continued
uphill battle to gain traction
with consumers.
The VR market has seen re-
markable innovations in a short
period of time. A few years ago,
people interested in home VR
had to choose between expen-
sive computer-based systems
that tethered the user or low-
cost but extremely limited
smartphone-based headsets.
Now we’ve seen the arrival
of affordable, ultra high-quali-
ty, portable wireless
headsets like Meta’s
Quest line, which has
quickly become the
market leader in home
VR. The graphics are
sensational, the con-
tent library is more ro-
bust than ever, and the
device costs less than
most video game con-
soles. So why are so
few people using VR?
On one hand, global
sales of VR headsets
have been growing, with 2021
being a banner year for headset
manufacturers, who had their
best sales since 2016’s flurry of
big-brand VR device releases.
But they still only sold around
11 million devices worldwide.
Getting people to even use
their devices can be a chal-
lenge, as it’s estimated only 28
per cent of people who own VR
headsets use them on a daily
basis. As numerous tech critics
have pointed out, the VR main-
stream revolution that has been
promised for years has largely
failed to come to fruition.
Virtual movement, physi-
cal discomfort
There are a myriad factors,
from missed marketing op-
portunities to manufacturing
obstacles, as to why VR hasn’t
www.canadianinquirer.net
Virtual reality headsets are increasing in popularity, but there are challenges to
their widespread adoption.
caught on in a bigger way. But
it’s possible that using VR is in-
herently unappealing for a sig-
nificant number of people, par-
ticularly for frequent use.
Despite impressive advance-
ments in screen technology,
VR developers are still trying to
address the “cybersickness” — a
feeling of nausea akin to motion
sickness — their devices elicit in
many users.
Studies have found that neck
physical discomfort may pres-
ent another barrier, which may
remain an issue as long as VR
requires the use of large head-
sets. There’s also research to
suggest that women experience
much higher levels of discom-
fort because the fit of the head-
set is optimized for men.
And beyond the physical
challenges of using VR is the
isolating nature of it: “Once you
put on the headset, you’re sep-
arated from the world around
you,” writes Ramona Pringle,
a digital technology professor
and researcher.
Certainly, some are drawn
to VR to experience height-
ened escapism or to interact
with others virtually. But this
disconnection to the physical
world, and the uneasy feeling of
separation from people, may be
a significant hurdle in getting
people to voluntarily wear a
headset for hours at a time.
25
Mediated, magical worlds
everywhere
Augmented reality (AR) expe-
riences may hold the key for the
metaverse to reach its true po-
tential. With AR, users use their
smartphone (or other device)
to digitally enhance what they
perceive in the physical world in
real-time, allowing them to tap
into a virtual world while still
feeling present in this one.
A metaverse centred on aug-
mented reality wouldn’t be a
completely new digital world —
it would intersect with our real
world. It’s this version of the
metaverse that could actually
have the ability to change the
way we live, argues computer
scientist and tech writer Louis
Rosenberg:
“I believe the vision portrayed
by many Metaverse companies
of a world filled with cartoonish
avatars is misleading. Yes, vir-
tual worlds for socializing will
become quite popular, but it will
not be the means through which
immersive media transforms so-
ciety. The true Metaverse — the
one that becomes the central
platform of our lives — will be
an augmented world. If we do it
right, it will be magical, and it
will be everywhere.” ■
This article is republished
from The Conversation under a
Creative Commons license.
26
Five digital games to help DOST-8 boosts
your child’s development food innovation
BY FIONA SCOTT, University
of Sheffield
The Conversation
center to diversify
MSME products
Recent research has linked
playing video games in child-
hood with an increase in intelli-
gence. While parents and carers
may be pleasantly surprised by
these findings, they are less un-
expected for many researchers
of children’s digital play.
Studies have previously shown
that playing digital games is asso-
ciated with a wide range of ben-
efits for children, even in those
who are very young. Certain
types of digital game play can en-
hance learning and help develop
digital skills. Digital games can
also improve “executive func-
tion”, such as working memory
and impulse control, in both pre-
schoolers and adolescents.
But some broader benefits of
digital play, though no less im-
portant, are far less commonly
celebrated as reasons to play
digital games. Digital play sup-
ports meaningful connections
between children and their peers
and families. There is also in-
creasing evidence that children
and their families find comfort
and joy in digital game play, par-
ticularly during difficult times.
Parents, grandparents and
other adults can help children
to develop skills and support
their social and emotional de-
velopment by spending time
playing with them or talking to
them about the digital games
they love. Digital games whose
design encourages parental par-
ticipation have also been shown
to particularly support young
children’s play and creativity.
Various design features of
digital games have been shown
to support different types of
play and different positive out-
comes for children. With this
in mind, here are five digital
games to unashamedly enjoy
playing with your children.
1. Just Dance series (Ubisoft)
Good for: physical movement;
shared fun
Ages: 10+ (or younger in Kids
Mode)
Available across multiple plat-
forms, Just Dance is a game in
which players learn and perform
dance move and routines by fol-
lowing demonstrations on screen.
Technology
Games like Just Dance have
been applauded for encourag-
ing children to move, but they
can also be a source of shared
joy for children, their friends
and family. Exercise games have
also been shown to enhance ex-
ecutive functions associated
with attention in children.
2. Little Red Coding Club
(Twinkl)
Good for: computational
thinking skills; exploratory
play; critical thinking
Ages: 4-8
In Little Red Coding Club,
which children can play on Ap-
ple and Android devices, chil-
dren guide characters from the
well-known fairytale, Little Red
Riding Hood, through an im-
mersive 3D forest to the safety
of grandma’s house, by gradual-
ly learning, and then using, ba-
sic coding skills and knowledge.
I recently conducted a study
that found that Little Red Cod-
ing Club’s use of augmented re-
ality technology enabled young
children to quickly understand
how to define and debug simple
algorithms.
3. Animal Crossing: New
Horizons (Nintendo)
Good for: Relaxation; social play
Ages: 3+
There is increasing recogni-
tion that digital games can sup-
port social development. In the
pandemic-era favourite, Ani-
mal Crossing: New Horizons,
children can gradually shape
their own fantastical island
paradise, complete with a fully
customisable avatar and host of
eccentric neighbours.
Nintendo’s safety features
make it easy for children to so-
cialise safely online through
visits to other children’s is-
lands. Children’s passion for
digital games also encourages
social interaction through on
and offline fan communities.
4. Minecraft (Mojang Stu-
dios)/LEGO Worlds (Warner
Bros.)
Good for: Creativity;
open-ended play; social play
Ages: 7+
Building games like Mine-
craft and LEGO Worlds have
an open-ended format, where
there are multiple ways to
play and few or no fixed goals.
This open-ended play has been
linked to creativity.
5. Dora and Friends (Nick-
elodeon)
Good for: Representation;
multimodal story creation
Ages: 5+
In Dora and Friends, play-
ers can design characters,
choose music, images and back-
grounds, then add recordings of
their own voices, before com-
bining multiple scenes to tell a
story. This combination of ele-
ments is known as multimodal
story creation, which supports
the development of children’s
literacy skills.
The character options in Dora
and Friends allows children to
play as characters that look like
them. Digital play has the pow-
er to support children to devel-
op their identities, so having
characters that are like them is
important. While the children’s
media industry undoubtedly
has more work to do, games that
simply allow children to create,
or play as, characters that look
like them are a starting point.
❱❱ PAGE 30 Five digital games
www.canadianinquirer.net
(EASTERN VISAYAS STATE UNIVERSITY)
BY SARWELL MENIANO
Philippine News Agency
TACLOBAN CITY – The De-
partment of Science and Tech-
nology-Region 8 (DOST-8) is
strengthening the seven-year-
old Eastern Visayas Food Inno-
vation Center (EVFIC) to cope
with changing and stringent
market demand.
The DOST regional office
here and the Eastern Visayas
State University (EVSU) signed
a new memorandum of agree-
ment to come up with more in-
novative and diverse local food
products for micro small and
medium enterprises (MSMEs).
DOST-Eastern Visayas assis-
tant regional director for tech-
nical operations Marilyn Rad-
am said in a phone interview on
Monday the new deal between
their agency and one of the re-
gion’s leading schools will cover
three years.
“The EVFIC needs to be
strengthened in terms of its ca-
pability for product development
and technology transfer initia-
tives. The agreement also seeks
to provide the technical support
services of the region’s processed
food industry,” Radam told the
Philippine News Agency.
Aside from training and techni-
cal consultancies to capacitate the
EVFIC, the DOST is also provid-
ing nearly PHP500,000 fund sup-
MAY 27, 2022 FRIDAY
port for its operations this year.
Earlier, the DOST also pro-
vided a PHP5 million grant for
the research project to develop
a shelf-stable “lechon paksiw”
(roasted pig stewed in vinegar)
in collaboration with local pro-
ducers in the city.
The EVFIC works to repro-
cess the leftover lechon into
shelf-stable products such
as “lechon paksiw de Leyte,”
which can provide the potential
for expansion of their existing
market and also seen to serve as
emergency food in times of ca-
lamities in the region.
“The EVFIC started oper-
ating in 2015 with five Filipi-
no-designed and fabricated
food processing equipment. In
2017 until the present, DOST
has been providing funding as-
sistance for its operation which
now amounts to nearly PHP6
million,” Radam added.
The center is housed inside
the EVSU main campus here.
The facility is being manned
and maintained by the school.
Since its opening in 2015,
EVFIC has developed 1,340
product concepts, 258 food prod-
uct prototypes, and is now in the
process of updating 165 packages
of technologies for the commer-
cialization of interested MSMEs.
It has served a total of 954
MSMEs in terms of technolo-
❱❱ PAGE 30 DOST-8 boosts
FRIDAY MAY 27, 2022
How many bots are on Twitter?
The question is difficult to answer
and misses the point
BY KAI-CHENG YANG,
Indiana University, FILIPPO
MENCZER, Indiana
University
The Conversation
Twitter reports that fewer
than 5% of accounts are fakes or
spammers, commonly referred
to as “bots.” Since his offer to
buy Twitter was accepted, Elon
Musk has repeatedly questioned
these estimates, even dismissing
Chief Executive Officer Parag
Agrawal’s public response.
Later, Musk put the deal on
hold and demanded more proof.
So why are people arguing
about the percentage of bot ac-
counts on Twitter?
As the creators of Botometer,
a widely used bot detection tool,
our group at the Indiana Uni-
versity Observatory on Social
Media has been studying inau-
thentic accounts and manipu-
lation on social media for over a
decade. We brought the concept
of the “social bot” to the fore-
ground and first estimated their
prevalence on Twitter in 2017.
Based on our knowledge and
experience, we believe that esti-
mating the percentage of bots on
Twitter has become a very diffi-
cult task, and debating the ac-
curacy of the estimate might be
missing the point. Here is why.
What, exactly, is a bot?
To measure the prevalence
PH’s 1st ‘science for change’ facility
to rise in Bicol
BY SAMUEL TOLEDO,
CONNIE CALIPAY
Philiipine News Agency
LEGAZPI CITY – The
first-ever “science for change”
facility in the country will
soon rise in this city, with its
PHP115-million budget includ-
ed in the 2022 General Appro-
priations Act (GAA).
Albay Second District Rep.
Joey Salceda, in an interview on
of problematic accounts on
Twitter, a clear definition of the
targets is necessary. Common
terms such as “fake accounts,”
“spam accounts” and “bots” are
used interchangeably, but they
have different meanings. Fake
or false accounts are those that
impersonate people. Accounts
that mass-produce unsolic-
ited promotional content are
defined as spammers. Bots, on
the other hand, are accounts
controlled in part by software;
they may post content or car-
ry out simple interactions, like
retweeting, automatically.
These types of accounts often
overlap. For instance, you can
create a bot that impersonates
a human to post spam automat-
ically. Such an account is simul-
taneously a bot, a spammer and a
fake. But not every fake account
Friday, said the “Bicol Science
For Chance” (S4C) facility will
be a regional research and devel-
opment (R&D) center that will
support science, technology and
innovation (STI) ecosystems and
foresight thinking in the region.
Salceda said to date, there is
no existing regional center that
is dedicated to STI for the use of
Bicolanos.
“Talent retention and knowl-
edge exchange remain a chal-
lenge in Bicol Region,” he said,
is a bot or a spammer, and vice
versa. Coming up with an esti-
mate without a clear definition
only yields misleading results.
Defining and distinguishing ac-
count types can also inform prop-
er interventions. Fake and spam
accounts degrade the online en-
vironment and violate platform
policy. Malicious bots are used to
spread misinformation, inflate
popularity, exacerbate conflict
through negative and inflamma-
tory content, manipulate opin-
ions, influence elections, conduct
financial fraud and disrupt com-
munication. However, some bots
can be harmless or even useful, for
example by helping disseminate
news, delivering disaster alerts
and conducting research.
Simply banning all bots is not
in the best interest of social me-
dia users.
adding that this motivated him to
push the putting up of the facility.
He said the S4C will serve as
a catalyst in the harmonization
of the Department of Science
and Technology’s (DOST) R&D
agenda to the Bicol region-
al development plan, and the
adoption of locally generated
technologies, inventions, and
innovations.
“We need to increase research
innovation and productivity,
adopt technologies, develop the
www.canadianinquirer.net
Technology
For simplicity, researchers
use the term “inauthentic ac-
counts” to refer to the collec-
tion of fake accounts, spam-
mers and malicious bots. This is
also the definition Twitter ap-
pears to be using. However, it is
unclear what Musk has in mind.
Hard to count
Even when a consensus is
reached on a definition, there
are still technical challenges to
estimating prevalence.
External researchers do not
have access to the same data as
Twitter, such as IP addresses
and phone numbers. This hin-
ders the public’s ability to iden-
tify inauthentic accounts. But
even Twitter acknowledges that
the actual number of inauthen-
tic accounts could be higher
than it has estimated, because
detection is challenging.
Inauthentic accounts evolve
and develop new tactics to
evade detection. For example,
some fake accounts use AI-gen-
erated faces as their profiles.
These faces can be indistin-
guishable from real ones, even
to humans. Identifying such ac-
counts is hard and requires new
technologies.
Another difficulty is posed by
coordinated accounts that ap-
pear to be normal individually
but act so similarly to each oth-
er that they are almost certainly
controlled by a single entity. Yet
they are like needles in the hay-
culture of STI, and strength-
en partnership and innovation
linkages,” Salceda said.
Salceda, who is a known
economist, stressed the need
to continually promote local
health research projects, and
provide more opportunities to
scientists/researchers.
The lawmaker lamented that
at present, the STI ecosystem
and regional research, develop-
ment and innovation are frag-
mented, resulting in overlap-
27
stack of hundreds of millions of
daily tweets.
Finally, inauthentic accounts
can evade detection by tech-
niques like swapping handles or
automatically posting and de-
leting large volumes of content.
The distinction between in-
authentic and genuine accounts
gets more and more blurry. Ac-
counts can be hacked, bought
or rented, and some users “do-
nate” their credentials to or-
ganizations who post on their
behalf. As a result, so-called
“cyborg” accounts are con-
trolled by both algorithms and
humans. Similarly, spammers
sometimes post legitimate con-
tent to obscure their activity.
We have observed a broad
spectrum of behaviors mixing
the characteristics of bots and
people. Estimating the preva-
lence of inauthentic accounts
requires applying a simplistic
binary classification: authen-
tic or inauthentic account. No
matter where the line is drawn,
mistakes are inevitable.
Missing the big picture
The focus of the recent de-
bate on estimating the number
of Twitter bots oversimplifies
the issue and misses the point
of quantifying the harm of on-
line abuse and manipulation by
inauthentic accounts.
Through BotAmp, a new tool
❱❱ PAGE 29 How many bots
ping R&D coverage.
“The absence of showroom to
exhibit all R&D/STI initiatives
in Bicol will be responded by
this science for change facility,”
Salceda said.
Once fully functional, the
center/facility is anticipated
to benefit medium, small, and
micro-enterprises (MSMEs),
researchers, higher educational
institutions, students, and oth-
er public and private stakehold-
ers, he added. ■
28 MAY 27, 2022 FRIDAY

Travel
Private sector SoKor to resume tourist
gains confidence visa issuance in June
to reopen business
BY JOYCE ANN L. lifted its ban on tourism. Soon visa application and entry pro-
ROCAMORA more and more Filipinos will vis- tocols soon.
Philippine News Agency it Korea,” the embassy said. According to Seoul-based
It added that the “resumption Yonhap News Agency, short-
BY CHRISTINE CUDIS also assured that the former will boost people-to-people ex- term visas have only been is-
Philippine News Agency employees will be given priority MANILA – South Korea will changes between Korea and the sued for the purpose of diplo-
in the hiring process. resume the processing of applica- Philippines via tourism.” macy, government affairs, or
Its owner, Francis Ledesma, tions for the issuance of all types The embassy said it will an- humanitarian reasons over the
DAVAO CITY – The City Tour- president of Halifax Davao Ho- of visas, including the C-3-9 for nounce further details about past two years. ■
ism Operations Office (CTOO) tel Inc., said they will start soon tourists starting June 1, 2022.
here on Monday said the eco- with rehabilitation, refurbish- The Korean Embassy in Ma-
nomic outlook is well on its way ing, and recruitment of man- nila, in an advisory dated May
to recovery as the city’s first five- agement staff, and other hotel 19, said multiple entry visa is-
star Marco Polo hotel has prom- personnel who will undergo sued before April 5, 2020 and
ised to reopen this year. training. has not yet expired may also be
“It is very welcome news. “We want to give back to used “without re-application”.
Marco Polo is an icon in Davao Davao City the prestige of what In addition, submission of
City’s tourism was once the consent for isolation will “no
industry. To iconic hotel that longer be required” by June 1.
have it reopen Dabawenyos “More and more Koreans have
signifies that are proud of. been visiting the Philippines
the manage- While we want since the Philippine government
ment is confi- to open soon,
dent with the Marco Polo’s we are cautious

CebuPac resumes int’l

economic out- we do not sacri-
look of the city reopening fice the quality
and its ability to also signals that our clients

ops via Cebu in July

bounce back af- expect from us,”
ter the pandem- Davao’s he added.
ic,” CTOO chief commitment Me a nw h i l e ,
Generose Tec- Department
son told Phil- for tourism of Tourism in BY MA. CRISTINA tional destination CEB is restart- 129 will leave the Incheon Inter-
ippine News recovery. Davao Region’s ARAYATA ing in its Cebu hub. national Airport at 12:25 p.m. and
Agency (PNA). (DOT-11) di- Philippine News Agency Restarting this flight will arrive in Cebu at 10:50 p.m.
One indicator rector Tanya help passengers from the Vi- To date, CEB spokesperson
of the revival of Rabat-Tan said sayas and Mindanao to travel Carmina Romero said CEB
the city’s eco- the reopening MANILA – Low-cost carrier again without needing to pass operates between Manila and
nomic vigor is of the Marco Cebu Pacific (CEB) announced by Manila, CEB Chief Commer- Incheon once every Tuesday,
the notable in- Polo Davao will Thursday afternoon the resump- cial Officer Xander Lao said. Thursday, Saturday and Sunday.
crease in appli- create a ripple tion of its international opera- He said the carrier is looking Romero said CEB will operate
cations to renew their business effect in the business sector. tions via Cebu beginning July 3. forward to expanding its interna- daily flights between Manila and
permits, she added. “Marco Polo’s reopening also In an advisory, the carrier said tional network in the next months. Incheon beginning June 1. This
In February 2022, the Davao signals Davao’s commitment the plan is to operate twice week- Flight 5J 128 is expected to leave is because currently, South Ko-
City Business Bureau pro- for tourism recovery. We are ly between Cebu and Incheon, the Mactan International Airport rea only accommodates essen-
cessed 38,832 business renew- delighted that the re-opening South Korea every Thursday and at 12:25 p.m., and arrive in Incheon tial travelers, while the process-
als, noting the 162 new business will also mean job opportuni- Sunday. This is the first interna- at 6:10 p.m. The return flight 5J ing of visas will start on June 1.
registrations in January. ties for our tourism workers, “We know that many are ex-
At the onset of the pandemic, especially those who were dis- cited to fly and visit South Ko-
Marco Polo Davao ceased oper- placed because of the pandem- rea, ‘the land of BTS, K-beauty,
ations affecting more than 200 ic,” she said. and samgyupsal’. We look for-
hotel workers. The DOT-11 has been holding ward to flying more Juans as
The Apo View Hotel also training sessions for industry South Korea opens up to leisure
temporarily closed in 2021 but players including indigenous travelers very soon,” she said.
announced its resumption of communities to prepare for its Fully vaccinated travelers
operations early 2022. full recovery. need to bring their vaccination
According to the Mindanao “Even in a crisis we continue card, filled-out foreigner reg-
Journal report on Sunday, the to find opportunities on how istration card, and a negative
management of the Marco Polo we can rethink and reshape a coronavirus disease 2019 test
Hotel Davao confirmed that the more resilient tourism for the Cebu Pacific’s A321 at Terminal 3 (THEHONCHOMINDSET - OWN WORK/WIKIMEDIA result taken within 48 hours
reopening is underway. It was future,” Tan said. ■ COMMONS, CC BY-SA 4.0) before the flight schedule. ■
www.canadianinquirer.net
FRIDAY MAY 27, 2022
Plant-based milk products: what you need
to know before making the switch
BY MIRIAM CLEGG,
University of Reading
The Conversation
Over the last decade, the num-
ber of people drinking cow’s
milk has dropped – with people
swapping dairy for plant-based
alternatives, such as oat and al-
mond milk. With new types of
plant-based milks seemingly
emerging every week, this trend
is unlikely to stop any time soon.
There are a number of rea-
sons why people are making the
switch from dairy to plant-based
alternatives. For one, many peo-
ple aren’t able to consume dairy.
Not only are around 5% of UK
adults lactose intolerant, dairy
is also the most common aller-
gen in early childhood.
Another major reason that
people are switching to plant-
based dairy alternatives is be-
cause of animal welfare and en-
vironmental concerns. Studies
show that dairy milk produces
more environmental emissions
and requires more land and
water usage than plant-based
dairy alternatives.
But despite being marketed as
alternatives to dairy, plant-based
products may not be exactly the
same as dairy. So if you’re think-
ing of making the switch, here are
a few things to be aware of.
Pay attention to nutrients
Cow’s milk is a rich source of
many important nutrients, such
as protein, calcium, iodine and vi-
tamin B12. But many plant-based
dairy alternatives don’t natural-
ly contain the same amount of
How many bots...
❰❰ 27 from the Botometer
family that anyone
with a Twitter account
can use, we have found that the
presence of automated activi-
ty is not evenly distributed. For
instance, the discussion about
cryptocurrencies tends to show
more bot activity than the dis-
Food
these nutrients and micronutri-
ents as dairy milk – if any at all.
On average, most plant-
based alternatives contain al-
most no protein – while one
glass of cow’s milk containing
around eight grams of protein.
Soya milk is the exception, con-
taining a similar amount of pro-
tein per glass as dairy.
Protein is essential for
healthy growth and develop-
ment. While everyone needs
protein, some groups may need
more than others. For example,
older adults need it to maintain
muscle strength with ageing and
children require it for growth.
On average, most UK adults
get around 15% of their protein
intake from dairy products. But
if plant-based dairy alternatives
are used as like-for-like replace-
ments, this number could be
less than 1.8%. So if you do make
the switch to plant-based dairy
products, soya milk may be your
best bet for getting protein. If
you use other types of plant-
based milk alternatives, it will
be important to include other
high-protein foods in your diet,
such as tofu or eggs, to make
sure you’re getting enough.
Most plant-based dairy al-
ternatives also don’t naturally
contain the same vitamins and
minerals that dairy does. As
such, many need to have these
added during the manufacturing
process, which is called “fortifi-
cation”. It’s worth noting, how-
ever, that any plant-based dairy
alternatives labelled “organic”
will not contain any fortified
vitamins and minerals as this
cussion about cats. Therefore,
whether the overall prevalence
is 5% or 20% makes little differ-
ence to individual users; their
experiences with these accounts
depend on whom they follow
and the topics they care about.
Recent evidence suggests
that inauthentic accounts
would go against regulations.
Calcium is a very important
micronutrient found in milk.
It’s needed for good bone health,
particularly in children and ad-
olescents. But my own research
has shown that only 57% of milk
alternatives, 63% of yogurt al-
ternatives and 28% of cheese al-
ternatives are fortified with cal-
cium. So to ensure you’re getting
enough in your diet, check the
label and look for products that
have been fortified with calcium.
Or, focus on eating foods that
contain calcium – such as forti-
fied breads and cereals or tinned
sardines or salmon.
Iodine is another important
nutrient, especially for pregnant
women and young children as
it’s important for brain develop-
ment. It also helps make thyroid
hormones, which are important
for both growth and metabolism.
Despite milk and dairy products
being the main source of dietary
iodine, only a small handful of
plant-based dairy products are
Plant-based milk alternatives may not contain the same nutrients as cow’s milk.
might not be the only culprits
responsible for the spread of
misinformation, hate speech,
polarization and radicaliza-
tion. These issues typically in-
volve many human users. For
instance, our analysis shows
that misinformation about
COVID-19 was disseminated
www.canadianinquirer.net
fortified with iodine. Again, it’s
important to read the product’s
label to see if it’s been fortified
with iodine or not. Otherwise, fo-
cus on eating foods that contain
iodine, such as fish, shellfish or
seaweed – or if this is not possible
by taking a supplement.
Also look out for vitamin B12
in any plant-based dairy alterna-
tives you may buy. This vitamin is
essential for the brain, nerves and
blood cells. While some plant-
based dairy alternatives contain
vitamin B12, most don’t, so you’ll
need to focus on getting vitamin
B12 from other food sources.
Meat typically contains the high-
est levels of vitamin B12, but if
you follow a vegetarian or vegan
diet you may need to consume
yeast extract, fortified breakfast
cereals or supplements to make
sure you’re getting enough.
Other considerations
Plant-based dairy alterna-
tives aren’t cheap – costing
almost three times the price
of cow’s milk and other dairy
overtly on both Twitter and
Facebook by verified, high-pro-
file accounts.
Even if it were possible to
precisely estimate the preva-
lence of inauthentic accounts,
this would do little to solve
these problems. A meaningful
first step would be to acknowl-
29
products (such as yoghurt).
For a family of two adults and
one child, the cost of consum-
ing dairy products is around
£310.89 a year – while plant-
based alternatives may cost
closer to £856.70 a year. Pur-
chasing own-brand products
which are fortified may be a
cheaper way to avoid dairy
while sticking to a budget.
But of course, there are many
reasons why a person may need
to switch to plant-based dairy al-
ternatives – whether that’s due to
allergies or environmental con-
cerns. If you’re worried about you
or your child getting enough vita-
mins and minerals in your diet
after making the switch to plant-
based alternatives, it’s worth con-
sulting with a registered dietitian
or doctor. Plant-based milks are
generally not recommended for
children under two years. After
that, fortified soya milk is like-
ly the best alternative as it will
contain important vitamins and
minerals, as well as high amounts
of protein.
If you prefer other plant-based
milk alternatives, look for one
that’s fortified. Avoid rice drinks
if you have children under the
age of five as they may contain
high levels of arsenic. But thanks
to increasing interest in plant-
based diets, there’s now a wealth
of choice when it comes to plant-
based dairy alternatives – just
make sure you read the label be-
fore buying one. ■
This article is republished
from The Conversation under a
Creative Commons license.
edge the complex nature of
these issues. This will help so-
cial media platforms and poli-
cymakers develop meaningful
responses. ■
This article is republished
from The Conversation under a
Creative Commons license.
 30
Introducing Biebs Brew! The much-
anticipated next collab between
Justin Bieber and Tim Hortons
TIM HORTONS
• Biebs Brew launches at
Tims restaurants across Can-
ada and the United States on
June 6. And because Tims
guests couldn’t get enough of
them the first time around,
Timbiebs are also returning
to Tims restaurants in Canada
and the U.S. for a limited time.
• Tims restaurants in Canada
will also have a limited-edition,
stainless steel Biebs Brew tum-
bler – co-created with Justin
Bieber – available for guests to
purchase starting on June 6.
The wait is almost over – start-
ing June 6, Tim Hortons guests
across Canada and the United
States can try Justin Bieber’s
next Tims-inspired creation!
The first part of the Tims x
Justin Bieber collab was focused
on Justin putting his own spin on
his favourite treats at Tim Hor-
1 in 6 US...
❰❰ 24 COVID-19 pandemic.
The official rate
dipped to 14% in 2019
from 21% five years earlier. It
shot back up to 16% in 2020,
when the pandemic compound-
ed economic hardships for
many families.
The supplemental measure
of child poverty tells a more
complete story.
Steps the government took
during the pandemic, including
its series of economic impact
payments, the child tax credit
expansion and a boost in SNAP
benefits, led the supplemen-
tal child poverty rate to keep
declining even during the eco-
Food
tons: bite-sized Timbits donuts.
This time, Justin and Tims de-
veloped a new twist on what the
iconic brand is best known for:
brewing Canada’s favourite coffee.
In product brainstorms with
the Tims team for the second
collab, Justin shared that he
prefers his coffee on ice, which
led to working on a new flavour
of Tim Hortons Cold Brew,
which is made with 100 per cent
ethically sourced premium Ar-
abica beans and is slowly cold
steeped for 16 hours to enhance
the bold and smooth flavour.
Also inspired by a slight sweet
tooth and his love for hints of
delicious vanilla flavouring in
his coffee, Justin and our bever-
age innovation team developed
a creamy French Vanilla flavour
to go with our Cold Brew. Biebs
Brew is the perfect blend of
those two beloved Tims flavours.
“We couldn’t stop at Tim-
biebs, we needed a Biebs Brew
nomic crisis.
The government will release
its child poverty data for 2022
in September 2023. But some
researchers at Columbia Uni-
versity have monthly data sug-
gesting that child poverty rose
steeply after the expiration of
the pandemic-era programs.
They estimate that 3.7 million
more children were living in
poverty in January 2022 than
in December 2021 because of
the expiration of the child tax
credit expansion. ■
This article is republished
from The Conversation under a
Creative Commons license.
too. And we are bringing both
to Tims next month,” said Jus-
tin. “Doing a Tim Hortons col-
lab had always been a dream of
mine. I grew up on Tim Hortons
and it’s always been something
close to my heart.”
All three Timbiebs flavours
– Chocolate White Fudge, Sour
Cream Chocolate Chip, and
Birthday Cake Waffle flavours –
will return to Tims restaurants
in Canada and the United States
along with Biebs Brew on June 6.
In Canada, Tims restaurants
will also have a co-branded
limited-edition Biebs Brew
tumbler available for guests
to purchase. These co-created
tumblers are made with stain-
less steel, come with a reus-
able straw, and can be used for
both hot and cold beverages.
They also go on sale on June 6
while supplies last. Select Tims
restaurants will also be bring-
ing back limited quantities
Five digital games...
❰❰ 26 For slightly older
children (7+), the Ste-
ven Universe: Save the
Light games from Grumpyface
Studios incorporate LGBTQ
themes. Meanwhile, Brikym
Game Studio’s Kingdom of Kuru
was developed by two Black
game designers with a mission
Inflation: the supermarket...
❰❰ 23 tem we need to tack-
le the overheads and
waste to keep costs
down. With this aim, some su-
permarkets are investing in ar-
tificial intelligence systems to
track and manage food waste
more effectively, which in turn
should bring better inventory
management and forecasting.
That would contribute to less
wasted products throughout
the entire system.
Shorter supply chains would
cut down transportation costs
as does reducing the range of
products on offer (which is ef-
fective but not always popular
with consumers). Away from
www.canadianinquirer.net
Justin Bieber (TIM HORTONS)
of Timbiebs merchandise for
guests, including the beanie,
fanny pack, and tote bag that
were developed in collabora-
tion with Justin.
“Timbiebs was a huge suc-
cess – truly beyond all of our
expectations – and what made
it so great was the authenticity
of the partnership,” said Hope
Bagozzi, Chief Marketing Offi-
cer for Tim Hortons.
to improve representation.
While the design features
of the five games listed above
support a range of benefits for
children, digital games are used
differently, and hold different
meanings, in different families.
A digital game doesn’t neces-
sarily have to be beautifully de-
the supermarket shelves, there
is research which suggests that
the best way to make sure the
poorest can afford food is to in-
crease incomes through living
wages, universal credit or a uni-
versal basic income.
But supermarkets could still
play a major role. The current
system, which relies on some
consumers buying large quan-
tities of food, some of which is
unhealthy and some of which
will be thrown away, is a model
in desperate need of change. ■
This article is republished
from The Conversation under a
Creative Commons license.
MAY 27, 2022 FRIDAY
“Even before the Timbiebs
collaboration, Justin had of-
ten shared with fans how he’d
grown up with Tim Hortons and
was obsessed with the brand.
His commitment to working
with us to develop a natural
and authentic twist on the Tims
experience is what made Tim-
biebs a hit and we know guests
are going to love Biebs Brew and
his take on Tims Cold Brew.” ■
signed or obviously educational
to support joyful and meaning-
ful play experiences for chil-
dren and their families. ■
This article is republished
from The Conversation under a
Creative Commons license.
DOST-8 boosts...
❰❰ 26 gy training, technical
consultancies, and
product development.
EVFIC is a facility that gives
opportunities for local resi-
dents to develop their ideas
and concepts in the field of food
processing into innovative and
marketable products.
The center offers a range of ser-
vices that include extensive train-
ing on food development process
and technical consultancy, as well
as packaging and labeling design.
Among the equipment
housed at EVFIC are a vacuum
fryer, freeze dryer, water retort,
and packaging machine, among
others. ■
 MAY 27,
JULY 2022
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