Cory: When disillusioned with this country, look up to the youth

There was perhaps more talent assembled in Cory Aquino’s lemon yellow conference that day than in the Batasang Pambansa.

For calling on the former president was a formidable group: Pulitzer prize winner for news photography Cheryl Diaz Meyer (a Filipina now with the Dallas Morning News); UP co-ed Patricia Evangelista, who won the Public Speaking Competition of the English Speaking Union in London and the members of the Ateneo de Manila debating team, which won first prize in the Philip C. Jessup International law Moot Court competition held in Washington DC. The Ateneo team, which represented the Philippines, bested schools from 94 countries (including Harvard) to bring home the trophy to the Philippines.

"I have not lost faith in this country, and seeing all your bright faces makes me believe in it even more so," the former president said. At the time the young achievers called on her, uncertainty hovered like a dark cloud on the canvassing in Congress. But Cory was confident more congressmen would act like statesmen and proclaim a president by June 25.

She was worried about investors holding back their business because the political climate was as brittle as eggshells. She recalled how painful it was for investors to hold back, or pull out their business from our struggling economy.

"Before the bloody December 1989 coup attempt our economy was doing very well, our economic growth had surpassed the eight percent mark, our highest ever," Cory recounted to her young guests. It will be recalled that then Col. Gregorio Honasan, who would eventually become senator, had led a coup against the Aquino government, laying siege to some buildings in the Makati Business district for days. Economic growth was stunted abruptly in the aftermath of the coup.

Diaz-Meyer asked Cory how she would like to be remembered. "I used to say I’d like to be remembered for the restoration of democracy in the Philippines. But more and more I am thinking, when I die, would it still matter? I will be up there, praying for all of you. But I guess what matters to me now is that from this time to the day I die, that I do not make any mistakes that will tarnish my name."
Patricia delivered before Mrs. Aquino and the other winners in the group her prize-winning speech on a "Borderless World." Perfect silence enveloped the room as Patricia delivered her speech. The other women in the audience, which included Cory’s daughters Ballsy Cruz and Pinky Abellada and former Press Undersecretary Deedee Siytangco, were misty-eyed.

"They should clone you," the former president congratulated Patricia after her speech.

Fannie Aldaba bags another international award

It isn’t just the young making waves in the international scene. Recently, the eminent diplomat and educator Dr. Estafania Aldaba Lim – a former social welfare secretary and UN Special Envoy for the International Year of the Child – was bestowed the "Woman of Outstanding Achievement" award by the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts (WAGGS). The award, given once every three years only, was presented to Tita Fannie in Hong Kong.

On hand to witness Tita Fannie’s shining hour were her daughters Cheche Lazaro and Nina Yuson (who was elected last May as chairman of WAGGS Asia-Pacific); Cheche’s husband Del and Nina’s son Chino.

Tita Fannie started her voluntary work with the Girl Scouts of the Philippines in 1948. She was elected president of the Manila Girl Scout Council, served as international commissioner for the Girl Scouts of the Philippines for several years and was elected national president in 1978. All in all, Tita Fannie has been active with the Girl Scouts for five and a half decades now!

"Before you and I were born, God had already a purpose and plan for each of us here on earth. Part of this plan was my involvement in Girl Scouting. I married a man whose father was the founder of the Boy Scouts of the Philippines and whose mother, one of the founders of the Girl Scouts of the Philippines," she said when she accepted the award.

Tita Fannie believes that by serving others through Scouting, we honor "the great purpose which God gifted all of us."