Boohoo, we can’t get photo with Erap

It’s cataclysm for Joseph Estrada’s spokesman Rufus Rodriguez. Candidates of the Opposition can’t get themselves photographed with the boss-chief because of unusual custody restrictions. It’s so unlike the 2004 campaign, sobs Rodriguez, when Estrada bets freely defied rest house arrest rules to get their hands raised for poster pictures. "Many of them won because of those posters," his shoulders shake as if to foretell disaster that will befall 2007 aspirants because deprived of the same privilege. If only the police would let anybody and everybody visit Estrada, instead of restricting them only to relatives and lawyers. If only they would allow him free use of his cell phones. If only...

Rodriguez is said to be one of the more brilliant products of the UP College of Law. If so, it makes one wonder if mastery of the law is license to flout it. Estrada, as everybody knows, is facing charges of plunder, no bail. He shouldn’t be in his private resort on a hill in Tanay, Rizal, to begin with, but in a state detention facility like the police camp in Sta. Rosa, Laguna. That he is in special quarters is a privilege granted by the court to a former President. It doesn’t mean he may abuse the favor by frequently smuggling in cell phones or transforming jail furloughs to visit his ailing mom into political powwows. If Estrada somehow got used to breaking confinement rules, like entertaining election candidates with loose guards in 2004, it doesn’t mean replays are demandable. Rodriguez knows that. Now if he happens to be representing a victim of heinous rape, he certainly would ensure that the accused remains in true jail, and not be able to party at whim. There’s such a thing as equality in the eyes of law.

Rodriguez was also a campaign strategist for Estrada candidates in 2004. But it is doubtful if that made him an expert on posters and thus be in position to gauge if they won on the strength of pictures of Estrada raising their hands in support. It is even more doubtful if Estrada’s 2007 senatorial bets would want to be photographed with him. Why, they’ve already changed their name to Grand Coalition because the old title of United Opposition talks too much of Estrada’s desire for political comeback. Surely, Noynoy Aquino wouldn’t want to have Estrada in his poster, for it would only highlight his political opportunism of now siding with the very wealthy leader he had helped to oust in 2001. Really, would Alan Cayetano or Sonia Roco, Loren Legarda or Koko Pimentel want to be pictured with Estrada after their leading role in his impeachment in 2000? Would military reformist Antonio Trillanes want to be linked to a traditional politico? Have not Manuel Villar and Kiko Pangilinan distanced themselves from Estrada by running as independents?

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Recruiters may be raising various issues against the labor office’s new rules on overseas employment of domestics, but it all boils down to placement fees.

The Labor Code forbids recruiters from collecting placement fees from domestics, and so does the International Convention on the Protection of Rights of Migrant Workers. Recruitment costs and services must be charged to employers.

It has been the practice in many countries, however, for employers to welsh on such payment rules. To make up for the loss, recruiters illegally charge the domestics. Many years ago, overseas employment authorities even issued a rule limiting the fee collected from domestics to only the equivalent of a months’ pay — which was tantamount to flouting Philippine and international bans.

Labor Sec. Arturo Brion is simply reverting to the law, yet is getting the flak for it.

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As soon as news broke of the US decision to make Manila a site for its nursing licensure exams, former Philippine Nurses Association president Marilyn Yap made two announcements in Manila. One was that the fraud that marred RP’s own board tests in June 2006 had no untoward effect on its bid to have the US exam held in Manila. Another is that the PNA "can ensure the security and management of the (US exam’s) information systems and database."

For the record, Yap was not involved in the RP bid to hold the US-NCLEX (Nursing Council Licensure Examination) in Manila. She was not with the delegation that went to Chicago last week for final grilling by the US-National Council of State Boards of Nursing. Half of that two-hour session was devoted to Philippine moves to punish the June 2006 test leaks, including Yap’s predecessor, and prevent recurrence of fraud. The other half was on Philippine copyright rules as upheld by the Intellectual Property Office and Enforced by the NBI. As past and present PNA presidents Ruth Padilla and Leah Samaco Paquiz will attest, the nurses’ group will have no role in administering the exams. Loose statements might jeopardize the holding of the NCLEX in Manila by mid-year.

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