By Samira Gutoc , YMPN (24-Oct-2009) 

(Part of MYSPEAK, with support of The Asia Foundation) 

Presidentiable NOYNOY AQUINO  leads rivals in  Facebook  with 155,471 friends , Chiz has 59929,  Villar has 42,834 , Gibo has 5851 (Boo Chanco, Star). Remember when Barrack used social networking having entered 16 such sites and sending more than 1 billion emails. The power of new media may just make the NEW PRESIDENT.

The Asian Muslim Action Network’s AMANA Magazine features the Muslim world –Western World and extols United States (US) President Barrak Obama’s Cairo speech ,The Power of Words, to bridge the long-strained relationship between US and the Muslim communities due to the war policies in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Election operators beware. Wala na kayong sideline this elections.  Commission on Elections (COMELEC) Chairperson Jose Melo assuaged fears that election officials , mostly EOs  from Mindanao, particularly  ARMM’s Lanao del Sur, embroiled in the GARCI  scandal of the past elections will be participants in the 2010 elections. “Everything will be automated untouched by human hands. They could no longer do anything about it. They cannot invade all the machines.”

Settlers affected by Ondoy in the National Capital Region prefer to resettle in Manila than go back home to the provinces. Tsk, tsk. Masikip pa rin ang Manila at tuloy ang Trapik.

Marawi makes history again as the first city to see electoral violence when a grenade exploded in the City Hall. And to think the three fatalities were not even natives of the place.

Remember the shoe-thrower against then United States (US)  President George Bush? Iraqi journalist Muntadhar al-Zeidi was welcomed in  grand fashion in Geneva after release from a nine-month detention in Iraq. In a press conference, he condemned the US saying it played a role in one million deaths and forcing five million people to flee, referring to Arab places where US forces have occupied .

Welcome the US. The Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) urges US participation in the resolution of the Southern conflict because the US supposedly understands the “roots of conflict.”

While government financial entities are providing breathing space in collection of taxes and other  liabilities from affected residents of ONDOY (even World Bank is giving the RP time to pay its loans), oil companies SHELL and PETRON are being assailed for increasing pump prices . Shell defends that it is because of the spike in Arab crude.

Maranao cellphone traders in flood-stricken Marikina and Rizal would be glad that GLOBE has offered assistance packages to its retail sellers especially those whose SIM cards have been swept by water. GLOBE will also offer one-month free mobile service to identified postpaid subscribers and one-week fee load for identified prepaid subscribers.

While  the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) gear up to LAUNCH its historic human rights body  , Speaker Prospero Nograles hails the possible firming up a China-ASEAN Free Trade Area that will open exportation of Davao’s bananas, Bukidnon’s pineapples and other products like dried mangoes, pili nuts and the likes into the 600 million people region. With China, the trade market is 1.9 billion or ONE-THIRD of the world !

2015 is the target date for ASEAN to have an “integrated” market. Trade is the major agenda yesterday in the ASEAN Summit of 10 heads of state held in Thailand.

Kidnapping in Sulu, GLOBE site blasted in Parang, the Greenbelt robbery, Marawi grenade blasts. It’s not yet 2010 and the syndicates or criminal groups are as brazen as ever. Tonight in Marawi City, the same restaurant is held-up twice in just ONE WEEK! Tsk, tsk.

By Allah, I swear to uphold the Constitution says Indonesian President former general  Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono who  was sworn as after winning a second five-year term  cementing his place as the figurehead of the post-SUHARTO reform era. While fellow Muslim presidentiable Hamid Karzai in Afghanistan may not make it because of questions on the 1 million votes alleged to be INVALID because of fraud.

Registration of VOTERS and FIREARMS are ongoing as the Philippine National Police (PNP)  warns holders of loose firearms to have them licensed by the PNP  them before it is too LATE. Hmm, special operations are needed in the ARMM where the most number of loose firearms are just that – loose.

The MORO ISLAMIC CHALLENGE by lawyer SOLIMAN SANTOS , an ardent observer of the Moro and government peace negotiations, is on its second reprint.

 Thank you to all those who email their reactions to my SEVEN-year or so old MORO NOTES from as far as Paris. Keep them coming. And keep your eyes and ears open for the latest bubuwit in Moro homeland. If we act blind, then change we cannot find.