SM to deploy roving 'magic stick' guards, more crime-fighting CCTVs

Monday, January 28, 2013 0 comments





Be afraid, criminals. Be very afraid.

Starting this week, guards armed with the latest state of the art sticks will be dispatched to roam the corridors of SM stores everywhere to check mallgoers' belongings.

The changes were made in response to the Jan 26 robbery in SM Megamall in Mandaluyong, where several men fired shots into the air-conditioned air to provide distraction while they escaped after a jewelry store heist.

"This is to make sure that our loyal patrons are provided with utmost security," SM spokesperson Ian Mathay said in a statement.

"The newest batons are longer, sleeker, made from 100% pure wood, and would enable our personnel to analyze the contents of our visitors' bags much more efficiently than the old models did," Mathay said.

He added that their newest equipment have been imported from the leading security agencies in Somalia.


Up to 30 extra security guards will roam the malls in the updated SM plans, acting like barangay tanods, asking anyone suspicious---which would include goths and hiphop wannabes--- to open their belongings for a quick scan.

To complement this, the management has also approved the purchase of 200 additional CCTV cameras for each mall, which the security staff expects to boost their surveillance and intelligence-gathering capabilities.

"This gives us the ability to observe these criminal elements while they commit crimes inside our premises in real-time," Mathay said.

Netizens, however, have lambasted SM's newest security measures.

"Those magic sticks are useless! Why not use chopsticks?" sekyu214 tweeted.

Ricky Lo to interview The Fast and The Furious stars for Manila premiere

Thursday, January 24, 2013 0 comments



Controversial celebrity troll Ricky Lo has been tapped by Solar Entertainment to interview the cast of The Fast and the Furious 6 for its Asian premiere in Manila May 14.

"We are confident in Mr. Lo's ability to get the most out of his subjects while treating them with the beloved Filipino wit and hospitality," Solar president Wilson Tieng said in a statement.

Lo, who has a friend in the Philippines named Lea Salonga, recently caught flak from netizens who thought his Jan 19 interview with Anne Hathaway was "awkward," "painful to watch," and "makes jumping on Oprah's couch hysterically look socially acceptable."

A veteran of over 200 claims of celebrity interviews, Lo began the four-minute cringe-fest with a question about Hathaway's weight, which the actress declined to answer. She also turned down his queries about her privileged background and preparations for the role, as well as his BFF invitation.


Later, the visibly irritated Les Miserables star wrapped things up by suggesting Filipino fans might prefer Lo inviting them to watch her movie, causing the interviewer serious burns.


"Personally, I thought it was amusing," Lo wrote in the Philippine Star Jan23. 

Local hacktivisit group Anonymous Philippines tweeted a link to the said column, citing their admiration for Lo's trolling skills.

For his newest high-profile subjects in May, however, Lo said he is optimistic and excited.

"I can't wait to ask Vin Diesel why he hasn't won any Oscars yet," the showbiz columnist said, "and if he knows my friend Manny Pacquiao."

Floating library runs aground in Pasig River

Monday, January 21, 2013 0 comments

 

Barely a week since a US Navy minesweeper got stuck in the Tubataha Reef in Sulu Sea, another foreign ship has run aground in Philippine waters, this time in the Pasig River.

MV Doulos, the 98-year old freighter that last visited the country in 2009 as a floating library, got stranded on a mass of trash and feces near the Jones Bridge in Manila early morning yesterday.

Bookshop manager Walker Moller said the ship was navigating upstream to Laguna de Bay to supply books for impoverished illegal settlers along the river and the lake when it hit the floating mass.

"Knowledge is the greatest wealth because it can never be stolen from you," Moller said by phone. He added that the ship offers affordable books ranging from P100 to P2000 on all kinds of topics from the life of Jesus Christ to the Disadvantages of Family Planning.

"Of course, to be able to do that, we have to get out of this mess first."

MV Doulos has been stuck in the Pasig river for more than 12 hours now. While the ship is still reportedly in a good shape, some of its crew members have already contracted leptospirosis and herpes courtesy of the infamously filthy river.

Efforts by authorities to evacuate the ship have failed, largely due to the inability of MMDA equipment to get in the Pasig River without sinking.

Palawan Representative Antonio Alvarez, a vocal critic of the USS Guardian that ran aground in the Tubataha Reef last Wednesday, also voiced his disapproval of the latest antic of MV Doulos.

"I thought this ship has already been retired to become a restaurant in Singapore two years ago?" he said in a statement. "What is it doing there taking a joyride through the sewers of Manila?"

Reports surfaced over the weekend that the wreckage of MV Logos Hope, the purported replacement of MV Doulos, was found floating 15 miles off the shores of Paracel Islands in a pool of its own books.

Number of executive jobs in the Philippines severely lacking --fresh graduates

Tuesday, January 15, 2013 0 comments




 

Reacting negatively to recent reports that unemployment in the Philippines is bolstered by "choosy" applicants, unemployed college graduates blasted the country's lack of available executive and managerial jobs.

"The ones available either offer meager starting salaries and positions, or are unsuitable with our personal desires," Kiki Mateo, 24, a gynecology graduate.

"There are a lot of jobs out there, but are those quality jobs? We didn't stay up studying and drinking Starbucks for countless nights just to hand out fliers in the mall. We deserve to be handed those fliers!"

The National Statistical Coordination Board (NCSB) said Monday that job openings in the country are plenty and enough, but are often left vacant by qualified applicants demanding too high salaries.

"Incidentally, in Manila, this is the same statistical group that purchases a quarter of smartphones in the city," said NSCB secretary-general Jose Albert.

The statements caused great uproar among unemployed college students, who soon took to social networking sites to protest, and because they have nothing else better to do.

A Facebook page called "1 Million Likes for Jobs for College Graduates" was put up hours after NCSB released its report. It quickly raked in more than a million "likes," but gradually lost half of it when the page started spamming ads from Teleperformance and IBM Philippines.

A second Facebook page titled "1 Million Likes for Good Jobs for College Graduates" followed suit and currently has more than two million likes and counting. As of presstime, none of the members are believed to have been employed since the page's inception.

Downed drone proves that It's More Fun in the Philippines ---DOT

Wednesday, January 9, 2013 0 comments




The drone found off the shores of Masbate last Sunday is evidence that the Philippines is indeed the top tourist spot in 2013, Tourism Secretary Ramon Jimenez Jr. said yesterday.

"Even unmanned aerial vehicles want to take a dive in our beautiful seas," he said, adding that the drone even swam all the way from a US naval exercise in Guam just to see the world-renowned coasts of Masbate.

The drone, an orange BQM-74E used for target practice, was first sighted in the Philippine Sea by fishermen who thought it was a powerful bomb or a rocket. They decided to tow it to the beach so the children and other villages could see it as well.

The incident has now become just the latest in a series of high-profile affirmations that Filipinos have convinced themselves with regarding the country's spot among the beautiful in the world.

Conde Nast Traveller magazine recently set the population on fire by putting the Philippines second among the top travel destinations in 2013.

Conde Nast Traveller is the best and most trusted travel magazine in the world, according to a poll in pinoypride.ph.

The drone didn't inspire fun and merrymaking among others. Renato Reyes Jr of the militant group Bayan called the discovery of the UAV a "violation of our national sovereignty."


"For now, it's just American drones visiting our country, but soon, it will be American troops, companies, investments, products, movies, abortion, fashion, atheists, and others," he said.

To safeguard against this, Reyes said his group is petitioning the House of Representatives to draft a bill that would declare US President Barack Obama persona non grata for his drone attacks. It would be be the third such proposal of the group since yesterday.

PNP gives up hunt for criminals in honor of PCGG

Friday, January 4, 2013 0 comments


Manila, Philippines-- Inspired by the Presidential Commission on Good Government giving up the hunt for the Marcoses' ill-gotten wealth, the Philippine National Police announced yesterday they no longer want to chase criminals, saying that "a lot of them have already been elected to Congress and Senate, anyway."

PNP Director General Alan Purisima said that the costs of pursuing criminals have amounted to "major major" millions of pesos every year, "an amount not even our kotong system can sufficiently support."

Purisima was echoing PCGG chairman Andres Bautista, who proposed Tuesday that the commission end its 30-year hunt for the billions of dollars believed to have been siphoned by the dictator. In the face of insurmountable costs, Bautista said the effort "had become a law of diminishing returns."

In PNP's case, Purisima said that criminals "have refused to diminish, and just continued to return."


Half of the audience left the press conference to protest the line.

Asked what would become of the 100 thousand-strong police force if it were to be disbanded, Purisima said he would recommend to the president that it be reorganized into an anti-jaywalking task force.

Fewer firecracker-related incidents for 2012 disappoint scavengers in Manila

Wednesday, January 2, 2013 0 comments





Manila, Philippines---With the number of injuries caused by firecrackers in Metro Manila slashed by at least 17% compared with the same period last year, scavengers in the metropolitan had to make do welcoming 2013 with less of their anticipated new year's day treats.

"Usually, by this time, there'd already be at least two dozen freshly severed fingers in trash cans outside hospitals everywhere," says Xavier Villalose, 26, who's been wandering the streets of the capital since being fired from a call center in 2009 after he tried to bully his boss for a raise. 

"Last year, I found three barely torn ears in garbage bins around East Avenue Medical Center. One even tasted like a mestizo's!" he reminisces. "This year, you'd be hard-pressed to find a thumb! And I gotta tell you, most thumbs don't taste good!"

Xavier blames PNoy for his misfortunes.

"Because he's bald and gay."

Dr Eric Tayag of the Department of Health was not apologetic for the likes of Xavier, however. The assistant secretary smothered television cameras in December grinding to Psy's Gangnam Style to convince Filipinos that sacrificing body parts is not necessary to enjoy such visual entertainment. 

The department considered it a cracking success, as only 413 fireworks-related injuries from December 21, 2012 to January 1, 2013 were reported, compared to 498 in the same period last year.

The tally does not include starvation casualties which might eventually include Xavier before the week is over.

*****

Photo courtesy of: http://article.wn.com/view/2010/12/06/Educating_Manilas_rubbish_dump_children/

 
Philippine Daily Instigator © 2011 | Designed by RumahDijual, in collaboration with Online Casino, Uncharted 3 and MW3 Forum