Here’s hoping for a peaceful SONA

We learned that the president’s State of the Nation Address (SONA) will be around 4 p.m., this means it’s way past our deadline for our column today so we’ll just talk about the preparation for the SONA, after all, it is the third SONA President Rodrigo “Digong” Duterte delivered and yes, despite his uncontrolled speeches, like when he blasphemed God, saying that “God is an idiot,” (he already apologized for this) his popularity remains high.

So today, it is the 17th Congress who will hear his third SONA. Expected to hear the SONA are the 3,000 guests including foreign and local dignitaries as well as hundreds of local and foreign media from different organizations. Of course, top security measures are now in place at the Batasang Pambansa.

The Batasan is now on lockdown. Security is so tight that guards are closely checking the SONAidentification card of any person trying to enter the compound.

Like all previous SONAs the Philippine National Police expects a huge number of demonstrators. So will there be violence? This will depend largely on the demonstrators who are allied with the Communist Party of the Philippines which, unfortunately, has failed to have peace talks with the Duterte administration. Let us just hope that it will be a peaceful SONA.

Incidentally, I also hope that President Rodrigo Duterte also signed the Basic Bangsamoro Law (BBL) because that is something that the Muslims have always wanted to come into being even before the Duterte presidency. But then the BBL won’t work if the whole nation won’t federalize, something that President Duterte must endorse in the SONA.

Now whether President Duterte keeps his speech at 35 minutes is something people want to know. He usually throws away his speeches and opts to say things within his heart. But then doing so often creates trouble for the president. So it would be best if he sticks to his prepared speech.

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Last Friday evening, the Aboitiz Construction, Inc. received a worldwide safety excellence award from the Global Engineering Company, the JGC Corp. for achieving 1.5 million safe man-hours without lost time incident for the construction of the Sarangani General Santos City 105-megawatt coal-fired power plant. This project began in August 2017 and is expected to be complete by September this year.

Aboitiz Construction has been a partner of JGC for 15 years and as Alberto Ignacio Jr. President and CEO of Aboitiz Construction pointed out: “Creating a safety culture starts at the top with employees who recognize the need for processes that are easy to follow. This is what we practice and consistently implement to ensure that our workers and staff return safely to their homes every day.” The awarding ceremony was done at the Radisson Blu Hotel. I talked with VECO’s Aton Perdices who was there about Aboitiz Power’s getting the Naga thermal power plants. But this report was so new, he promised to have me interview the person involved in that project. Indeed, things are moving forward for Aboitiz Power.

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Last Sunday evening I finally went to see for myself the report that I have been getting about the book sale of the Big Bad Wolf at the International Convention Center. Actually, I went there at 3 p.m. on Sunday, but there was heavy traffic in the streets, so I decided to go in the evening and it was truly a huge surprise for me to see thousands of people inside the IEC searching for books to buy.

Come now, Filipinos buying books is something I have always believed was not a reality. I have been to Bangkok, Malaysia, or Taiwan and every time I go to these cities, I end up visiting bookstores and they are always full of people. But go to Fully Booked or National Book Store and there are very few people there. So last Sunday night at the Big Bad Wolf was quite a pleasant surprise for me that I was wrong about Filipinos. We just don’t have good book stores to serve us. I got some 22 books, which I have to find time to read. Yes I spent a lot, but the books I got were all worth it and I got them at a good price from the Big Bad Wolf.

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For email responses to this article, write to vsbobita@gmail. com. His columns can be accessed through www.philstar.com.