Thus said Comelec Assistant Regional Director Felicisimo Embalsado as the statement of contributions and election expenditures (SOCEs) submitted by candidates appeared to be lower than what were expected from them.

Embalsado, however, stressed that while at the level of the local offices of the Comelec their function was only to receive the document, it is their central office that has the authority to check if the amount declared by the candidates were indeed true.

“Our duty here is only ministerial and we cannot question it. We just accept the document as submitted by them. We just transmit this to our central office for them to scrutinize the Soces of the candidates,” Embalsado said.

According to him, all the Soces submitted by the candidates, both the winners and losers, at the local level would be forwarded before the week ends at the campaign service unit of the Legal Department of the their central office.

The said office is headed by Director Esmeralda Lada.

He said that the amount of expenses declared by the candidates at their Soce would be based on the guidelines of the Comelec.

Under our elections law, a candidate running under a political party is only to spend P3 per voter and if running as an independent, is only to spend P5 per voter.

The amount would be computed based on the number of registered voters of a locality.

Those who would be found to have violated this rule would be penalized of not less than one year imprisonment without probation and perpetual disqualification to hold public office.
A Comelec official, who does not want to be named, said that the expenses declared by the candidates were not truthful.

“What they have declared were not the real amount that they actually spent during the elections,” the poll official said.

All candidates who run during the May 13 elections are mandated to submit their election expenses. The submission of the Soce ended last June 13.

Here in Leyte, all the five congressmen who won declared their elections expenses less than P1 million.

The highest poll spender was Rep. Ferdinand Martin Romualdez of the province first district. He claimed to have spent P727,000.

Rep. Lucy Torres Gomez,meantime, declared the lowest election expenses among the five solons of the province at P212,473.

JOEY A. GABIETA
Staffwriter

N. Samar’s Capitol Building.

Lutao disclosed that today’s celebration starts with an anniversary mass at 10:00 a.m. at the Ibabao Hall, New Capitol Building. After the mass, a simple program will follow at the same venue.
Board Member Jose “Jojo” Layon will give a welcome remarks after the mass singing of the Philippine National Anthem. An intermission number will follow.

This year 48th founding anniversary celebration, with theme; “Moving Forward,” will be highlighted by the anniversary message of Gov. Paul Daza. After the governor’s message, the Capitol singers with Lito Camposano and company will render some songs to end the half day activities. A a lunch will be served.

Last year, the province’s anniversary was held with a weeklong celebration. From the first day to the culmination day, lots of activities was held such as trade fair, job fair, concerts, variety shows, sports, Miss Northern Samar pageant which serves as the highlight of the occasions, and many others. It was participated in by different local and national agencies, different LGUs, and the private sector, NGOs, POs and others.

Some said that the reason of an almost no celebration of the founding anniversary of the province was because of the change in political atmosphere of the province with Daza defeated on his reelection bid as governor.

Northern Samar is bounded on the north by the San Bernardino Strait San, on the east by the Pacific Ocean, on the west by the Samar Sea, on the southwest by Western Samar and on the southeast by Eastern Samar. Its total land area is 3,692.93 km. The province began its journey as was a province after Congressman Eladio T. Balite of Northern Samar and Felipe J. Abrigo of Eastern Samar authored Republic Act 4221, which was approved by Congress in 1963. The law, ratified in a plebiscite on June 19, 1965, divided Samar into three provinces, namely, Northern Samar, Eastern Samar and Western Samar. The first provincial officials of Northern Samar were elected on November 14, 1967 and on January 1, 1968, they officially assumed office.

Catarman is the capital town of the province where most political and economic activities take place. It is the seat of administration and the center of trade and commerce as well as industry.

The province is divided into three (3) major geographical areas, namely: Balicuatro area, Central area, and Pacific area including Catubig Valley – the province’s rice granary. It comprises 24 towns or municipalities with 569 registered barangays. The province is divided into two legislative districts, the first district covers 14 towns namely; Allen, Biri, Bobon, Capul, Catarman, Lavizares, Lope de Vega, Mondragon, Rosario, San Antonio, San Isidro, San Jose, San Vicente and Victoria with the latest registered voters of 192,778. The second district covers 10 towns namely; Catubig, Gamay, Lapinig, Lao-ang, Las navas, Mapanas, Palapag, Pambujan, San Roque, and Silivino Lobos. (Tito Tepace)

Killed were Sergeant Renato Cabarse, assistant commander of Philippine Army’s 78th Infantry Brigade operational control detachment based in Burauen, Leyte, and Cafgu member Alexander Estrella with the assailant identified as 55-year old Cesar Manidlagan who also died during the incident, Police Inspector Federico Sanchez, police chief of Burauen town, said.

Another Cafgu member, Abner Tolibas, was hit and wounded at his right shoulder due to the incident.

“The whole incident happened only for less than three minutes,” Sanchez, in a phone interview, said.

Manidlagan was shot and killed by another Cafgu member, Genes Cabidog.

The incident took place around 4:45 pm Monday inside a Cafgu detachment located in Barangay Anonang.

Estrella died on the spot while Cabarse died while he was being treated at the Burauen District Hospital. Tolibas was brought to a hospital in Tacloban for medical treatment and was said to be in stable condition.

All the victims were on duty and stationed at their respective posts at the time of the incident, Sanchez said.

“We are still conducting our investigation though we can declare the case as solved as the suspect is already dead. What we are doing right now is to establish the motive of the suspect,” the town police chief said.

But based on their initial investigation, Manidlagan attended a birthday celebration of a relative and was under the influence of liquor when he entered their detachment, 10.6 kms. away from town center.

He was said to have immediately proceeded to his barracks and get his service firearm, a Garand rifle, and shot his victims.

First to be hit was Estrella who died on the spot, followed by Cabarse and Tolibas, who was inside a foxhole.

Estrella and Cabarse, who was then the acting chief of the Cafgu unit, were stationed in post number 1.

Sensing that he would be the next victim of Manidlagan, Cabidog shot and eventually killed the suspect. Cabidog was stationed at post number 2.

The victims and the suspect belong to the 78th Infantry Battalion based in Brgy. Abuyogon, six kms away from the crime scene.

Captain Dranreb Canto, spokesperson of the 802nd Infantry Brigade based in Ormoc City, declined to comment on the incident saying they would conduct their own investigation.

“But this is an unfortunate incident,” Canto, reached on his mobile phone, said.

Felipe Gerona, a Cafgu member, recounted in a mobile phone interview that Manidlangan got drunk from attending a birthday party in the village. He went to his barracks and grabbed a tip bolo and attempted to hack Cabarse but Estrella, who was on duty, pacified him.

“After Manidlangan was pacified, he went back to his barracks and grabbed a M1 Garand rifle and shoot Estrella. Cabarse who was approaching the camp was also shot to death by the suspect,” Gerona narrated. (JOEY A. GABIETA & SARWELL Q. MENIANO)

Called the Weather Index Insurance – Credit Asenso, this product will help rural banks, nongovernment organizations (NGOs) and micro-insurance financial institutions (MFIs) to cope with the effects of typhoons (windspeed) or floods (rainfall) on the low income sector.

According to BAC President Joel T. Almagro, over the past several years, the Philippines has been visited by very strong typhoons and floods that have ravaged large tracts of lands all over the country. These extreme weather conditions caused high loan defaults especially among the low income sector, which Credit Asenso hopes to address.

“Micro-financing institutions catering to the low-income sector are the most at risk at experiencing bad loans. As much as 70% of these defaults are due to the occurence of natural calamities,” he said.

Mr. Almagro explained that Credit Asenso offers lending institutions security for their operation or loan portfolio especially since the country is visited by typhoons at least 20 times per year. Some of these fall within the trigger events defined by the product.

Credit Asenso uses a state-of-the-art satellite technology that determines event triggers for rainfall and windspeed. This technology ensures that claims are determined on a real time basis or can be viewed online thus there is no need for lengthy and time consuming claims investigations and loss adjustments.

Based on their location in the Philippines, trigger indices for windspeed and rainfall have been developed for each municipality, which makes it an innovative product in the Philippine’s micro-financing sector.

Weather Index Insurance – Credit Asenso is a product developed by BAC, a member of the Malayan Group of Insurance companies, the largest and number 1 non-life insurance group in the country, and international partners DHI, a leading forecast and real-time modeling of extreme weather events institution as well as Munich RE, one of the world’s largest and leading risk carriers. (PR)

In the first ever Media Night of the Pintados-Kasadyaan Festival dubbed as “Rayhak Media Pagdayaw Kan Senior Santo Niño”, media practitioners of this city braved the rain with their antics in hosting and entertaining.

The event was a success even with a short notice given by the management and organizers of the Pintados-Kasadyaan Festival, according to Philippine Information Agency Regional Director Erlinda Olive Tiu.

“We are thankful to them for giving us a chance to showcase and share the talents that we have,” she said.

“But I hope next time, the invitation should be given earlier so we could have a longer preparation and carefully study all sequences so we could have a better presentation than what we had in this first Media Night,” she added.

Presidential Communication Group Operation Office Undersecretary and PIA Director General Jose Mari Oquiñena, who was the guest of the Media Night, in his speech reminded the importance of media to people’s daily life.

The news that media provides is very important as it provides information and guide the people on what is happening in their community and in the country, according to Oquiñena.

“What you show and present on television, radio and newspaper is really important to us and always think of the children who are watching the news if they will be affected,” Oquiñena said.

Performers during the Media Night were from Leyte Samar Daily Express, Radyo Diwa, 8 Magazine, MOR DJs, IBC-6 staff, PIA and AGIO members.

Celebrity performer during the Media Night activity was “Budoy” of Junior Kilat, a Waray who made name in the music industry in Cebu. Aksyon Radyo-DYVL and Love Radio of the Manila Broadcasting Corporation sponsored his presence at the Media Night.

More than 220 media practitioners from radio (FM and AM stations), television, print, government media, information officers and online media practitioners attended the first ever Media Night. (Roel T. Amazona)

Major General Gerardo Layug, commanding officer of the 8th ID, who inducted the newly elected press corps officers, said in his short speech that media has a very important role in molding people through public information. Every information that the media releases to the public, especially regarding the government programs for the rebels when they return to the folds of the law, is very vital- and this is one of the reason why members of the New People’s Army are continuously going down to surrender.

Rommel Rutor, Leyte Samar Daily Express correspondent for Samar, who was reelected as 8ID Press Corps president, made mentioned that about 5 years ago the same press corps was organized, but for some reason it became inactive. With this reorganization, the press corps is expected to be active as partners of the community and the Philippine Army in public information.

The newly elected 8ID Press Corps are the following;
President : Rommel Rutor; Vice President for Samar: Gene Navelon of the DyOG Radyong ng Bayan, Calbayog City; Vice President for Northern Samar: Ahmir Ortego of Power FM Catarman, N. Samar; Vice President for Leyte: Fred Padernos of Leyte Samar Daily Express and DyBR Tacloban; Vice President for So. Leyte : Josie Sercenia; Secretaries: Rachel Arnaiz of Philippine Daily Inquirer and Melanie Pasia of Bombo Radyo Tacloban; Treasurer: Archie Globio of DyBR Tacloban; Business Managers: Jean Dalmacion and Elmer Siervo. (FRED PADERNOS & RESTY CAYUBIT)

DoE director for Renewable Energy Management Bureau Mario Marasigan said in a statement the certificate was given to Philippine Solar Farm-Leyte, Inc., the company that intends to build the solar project.

Marasigan added the DoE eyes FIT-related power projects to start operations by 2015.

The project in Ormoc City costs about P2.9 billion and will be located in a 44-hectare area at the upland village of Dolores in said city.

Korean investors expect to source the funds for the project from the Korea Development Bank Daewoo Security Co. and constructions are expected to commence this July or August.

According to Marasigan, the FIT incentive will be given to renewable energy (RE) proponents that will finish their power plants ahead of the rest or based on a “first come, first serve basis.”

He added the government has a 50MW quota for solar energy plants, 200MW for wind, 250MW for biomass and 250 for mini-hydro.

Granting of FIT is stipulated under the Renewable Energy Act of 2008 to encourage proponents to put up more RE projects in the country.

Under the law, RE providers will be given a definite amount of time to charge fees directly to consumers.

Marasigan said another project application us being processed and declaration of commerciality will be issued soon.

The provincial government of Leyte has earlier issued resolutions endorsing the project.

Separate resolutions were also passed by the city government of Ormoc and Barangay Dolores supporting the project.

The Philippine Solar Farm-Leyte, Inc. has already secured environmental compliance certificate from the Environmental Management Bureau (EMB) regional office last April 9. (REYAN L. ARINTO)

The conference, held at Maqueda Bay Hotel aimed to raise responsiveness on the nature and management of disaster, in order to promote the culture of preparedness among government officials and the public.

Also present were representatives from national government agencies, non-government organizations, media practitioners, disaster risk reduction and management officials, and the local chief executives in the region.

DILG Regional Director 8 Pedro Noval said that local government units (LGUs) must formulate the LCCAP because aside from being mandated to lead in disaster preparedness, LGUs play a critical role in ensuring that communities can manage known risks associated with climate change and must respond to foreseen and unforeseen risks.

Meanwhile, Local Government Academy (LGA) Executive Director Marivel Sacendoncillo said the program is a challenge to LGUs.

She added that Samar was chosen as possible site for the pilot run because of the pool of advocates in the island.

According to the agency, adaptation to global warming is a response to climate change that seeks to reduce the vulnerability of biological systems to climate change effects.

Even if emissions are stabilized relatively soon, climate change and its effects will last many years, and adaptation will be necessary.

“Adaptation is usually more effective, and less expensive than reactive adaptation,” the LGA director said.

LCCAP is piloting in three regions in Bicol, Visayas and Mindanao this year.(PIA 8- Samar Avha Hilario)

“Only the best, finest and fittest must enter the police service as we do not want our recruits to be inept who will just be ineffective and inefficient in the future,” said PRO8 chief PCSUPT. Elmer Ragadio Soria.

“We will ensure a high level of competence among our recruits. Applicants who bribed their way into the police force would eventually become corrupt themselves, we will not let this happen in PRO8,” he added.

Soria said he ordered the PRO8 Police Officer I (POI) Regional Screening Committee to strictly abide by the PNP Circular 2005-008 on the Rationalization and Qualification Standards for Initial Appointment in the PNP Uniformed Service which provides a system of measuring the qualifications of individual applicants.

The “Doctrine of Transparency” shall also be observed in all stages of the recruitment process to preclude anomalies, illegal acts, biases and favoritism, Soria added.

He further informed that the new recruits are intended to beef-up the manpower and strengthen the operational capabilities of different city or municipal police stations in the region after their mandatory two-year assignment in the Regional Public Safety Battalion 8.

The PRO8 currently has 6,191 uniformed police personnel in active duty status complemented by 134 non-uniformed personnel.

Although higher office has yet to pronounce the recruitment quota for PRO8, the Regional Personnel Human Resource Development Division (RPHRDD) had started to accept application folder for CY 2013 POI Regular and Attrition Recruitment Program until June 28.

Recruitment for the rank of POI in the PNP is open to all qualified Filipino men and women, with good moral character, not less than 21 nor more than 30 years old and holder of any formal baccalaureate degree from a recognized learning institution.

Interested applicants must have appropriate eligibilities for PO1 which are National Police Commission (NAPOLCOM) PNP Entrance; Licensed Criminologist under RA 6506; Professional Regulatory Commission (PRC) bar or board passers under RA 1080; Honor Graduates under PD 907 or the Civil Service Commission (CSC) Career Service Professional Examination.

Also, applicants must not have been dishonorably discharged from military employment or dismissed for cause from any civilian position in the government.

Applicants must have no pending criminal cases in court, including at the Office of the Ombudsman, or administrative cases if already a government employee; and must have not been convicted by final judgment on an offense or crime involving moral turpitude.

Male applicants must be at least 1.62 meter in height and 1.57 meter for females and must weigh not more or less than 5 kilograms from the standard weight corresponding to the applicant’s height, age and sex.

Applicants who meet the requirements must prepare an application folder containing 6 duly-authenticated copies by the issuing office/agency of the following documents in white tabbing:
City/Municipal Mayor’s Endorsement; City/Municipal Adhoc Resolution, Certification and Worksheet; Duly accomplished Personal Data Sheet (CSC Form 212 Revised 2005); NSO Birth Certificate (for married applicants, submit marriage contract); Eligibility report of rating; Two (2) pieces 2×2 Black and White picture with nametag, one (1) half bust size and one whole body picture with white background; Transcript of Records and Diploma; Certificate of Good Moral Character issued by the college/university where the applicant graduated; Local clearances (barangay, municipal/city police, police provincial office, mayor’s, MTC, RTC, provincial prosecutor’s and NBI) and Medical Certificate from City/Municipal Health Office.

Upon completion of the recruitment processes of Neuro-Psychiatric Screening; Complete Background Investigation; Complete Physical, Medical and Dental Examination; Physical Agility Test and Drug Test; applicants must pass the PRO8 Recruitment Screening Committee Interview.

Successful applicants will be appointed to the initial rank of Police Officers 1 (PO1) with a basic monthly salary of P14,834.00 with allowances and non-cash benefits.

Oath-Taking of successful applicants is scheduled on September 30 and they will be turned over to the Philippine Public Safety College – Regional Training School 8 (PPSC-RTS8) to undergo the mandatory Public Safety Basic Recruit Course (PSBRC) for six months after which the trainees will undergo six months Field Training Program (FTP).

All interested applicants may call (053) 323-8814, visit www.pro8.pnp.com.ph website, e-mail at pro8_rphrdd@yahoo.com or visit PRO8 ORPHRDD for more details. (PINSP ROMUEL NACAR)

The Philippine Coconut Authority (PCA) is conducting an inventory of active farmer’s cooperative in Eastern Visayas that will be tapped in processing these two alternative products.

“After the assessment, we will submit a list of active farmer’s cooperatives. They will be given funding assistance for processing coco milk and coco cream,” said PCA Regional Manager Edilberto Nierva.

According to him, there are hundreds of coconut farmer’s groups in the region but only less than 50 of them are functional until this year.

“We are promoting these two products because of the huge potential both in the local and foreign markets. This is one effort to diversify because of the price of copra is unstable,” Nierva said.

Coconut milk is the milky white extract from freshly ground and testa pared matured nuts. It has a characteristics milky flavor and aroma of fresh, natural coconut. The product is processed using modern sanitary processing methods under strict quality.

Coconut cream is very similar to coconut milk but contains less water. It has a thicker, more paste-like consistency, while coconut milk is generally a liquid. Coconut cream is used as an ingredient in cooking, having a mild non-sweet taste.

The country has been shipping these two coco-based products abroad.

Eastern Visayas, the second largest coconut producing region of the country, has average output volume of 1.7 billion nuts from 2009 to 2012.

According to PCA, 80% of the nuts harvested are processed into copra, which is vulnerable to unstable trading price. (Sarwell Q. Meniano)