A day after Christmas, on 26 December 2020, President Rodrigo Duterte revealed in his weekly briefing that some soldiers have been vaccinated against COVID-19. That revelation, including his mention of Sinopharm, a Chinese state-owned corporation that controls over a thousand subsidiaries and 6 publicly-listed companies (including China Traditional Chinese Medicine and Beijing Tiantan Biological Products), […]
Category: Reflections
Reflections are commentaries on the current issues and events of the day. They are analyzed from the vantage point of history, management, and socio-political science.
Like anything else that is published at IngmingAberia.com, they are by no means the last word to any issue. Instead, they are meant to provoke further discussion and hopefully facilitate consensus.
Reflections are like a smorgasbord of ideas. They can be many things to many people. They can be either affirmation of best practices, a critique of a perceived dysfunction, an invitation for discussions of an issue to continue, or a turn-key proposals for change.
The poor to the rescue, again?
(Published by The Manila Times on 6 May 2020) THE presidential adviser on entrepreneurship, Jose Maria “Joey” Concepcion 3rd, whipped up a social media fuss a few days ago. On April 29, 2020, in an online discussion dubbed “We Rise as One,” organized by the Shareholders’ Association of the Philippines, where he was one of […]
The Balik-Probinsya Remix
(Published by The Manila Times on 29 April 2020) THE coronavirus pandemic has exposed the many faces of poverty, especially in urban areas. It also exposes what seems to be the limited knowledge the government has of poverty. Because of this deficiency, the solutions it proposes to address the problem are also suspect. News reports, […]
Duque’s Tenacity
(Published by The Manila Times on 22 April 2020) HEALTH Secretary Francisco Duque 3rd is to gecko as Vulcaseal is to glue. He clings to his post with the tenacity of a skin disease (to borrow the words of Jose Rizal in Noli Me Tangere). That is the impression he projects if one is to […]
Still Evolving, Science Gropes for Answers
(Also published by The Manila Times on 11 April 2020) A NEW study suggests that the coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19)-causing virus can travel distances way beyond government’s spread-prevention physical distancing protocol of 1 meter. It shakes the grounding on which strategies to control the pandemic stands. An Agence France-Presse (AFP) report says, “the researchers, led […]
The Diamond Princess syndrome
At most 78, and not the actual number of cases of 712 (12 deaths) of the passengers of Diamond Princess could have been infected if the ship was evacuated earlier.
Droplet or airborne?
The message and frame by which COVID 19 communicated is crucial: on it depends how people behave and take precautions to avoid being infected.
More culture, less law
(Also published by The Manila Times on 18 March 2020.) MY neighborhood in an inner barangay (village) of Imus, Cavite has had progress in somehow easing the flow of vehicular traffic (consisting mostly of motorcycles, tricycles and private cars) by applying more self-discipline and relying less on traffic enforcers. I must hasten to mention that […]
As the world bleeds, extra powers threaten to further divide us
(Also published by The Manila Times on 25 March 2020) PEOPLE in many countries, especially in Europe, are sick of and dying from the coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19). Declared by the World Health Organization (WHO) as a global pandemic, the virus has infected at least one individual in 188 countries and territories. A cruise ship […]
Policy Delphi and People’s Congress — the theoretical boxwork
(Also published by The Manila Times on 4 March 2020) DEVELOPED by Project RAND (of Rand Corp.) in the 1950s, the Delphi Method is a management tool originally designed “to forecast the impact of technology on warfare. The method entails a group of experts who anonymously reply to questionnaires and subsequently receive feedback in the […]
Let’s Recolor Our World
A 40-MINUTE or so wait for a bus ride from Imus, Cavite that would take me to Lawton, Manila often gets me to digress to something many commuters go through while they feel public transportation has abandoned them — to consider paying more for alternative modes of transport (e.g., Grab, taxi, Angkas, car pooling, etc.). […]