German envoy ‘deeply impressed’ by village pantry

MANILA: Anke Reinffenstuel, the German Ambassador to the Philippines, said she was “deeply impressed” by the solidarity of Filipinos in times of crisis when she visited the pioneering “community or village pantry” in Metro Manila set up to help bring food to the tables of poor families suffering from the pandemic.

“Been at Maginhawa community pantry today donating food items. Deeply impressed by the solidarity spirit of the Filipinos. Great respect for the volunteers and the initiators,” Reinffenstuel wrote in her Twiter on April 21.

Reinffenstuel said she met the organiser Ana Patricia Non who earlier said she was forced to temporarily stop operation due to security concerns when a senior military officer admited they were conducting a background check on her for possible links to communist insurgents.

But lawmakers, educators and netizens ganged up on and denounced Lieutenant General Antonio Parlade, the spokesman of an anti-insurgency task force, for “Red-tagging” Non which, they said, put her life in danger.

“Red tagging places people in harm’s way and shames those who are helping others in times of need,” said Fidel Nemenzo, the chancellor of the state-run University of the Philippines in suburban Quezon City, Metro Manila where Non graduated.

In this light, a netizen urged Parlade to also conduct a character check on the German ambassador for her “possible” links to Philippine communist insurgents by visiting the village pantry in suburban Quezon City, donating food items and talking with Non.

Whether the netizen was joking or serious was not known. But even amid accusations of “Red-tagging,” General Cirilito Sobejana, the chief of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP), has expressed support for Non’s initiative that resulted in the replication of community pantries across the country.

Sobejana announced he was seriously considering the possibility of each of the soldiers to donate their daily allowance for the village pantries despite Parlade’s suspicion that the project was communist front.

Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana, a retired military general, likewise waded into the issue and expressed support and assistance for the project as he pointed out: “Kindness is everyone’s color. Whatever your belief as long as you help you’re giving is from the hear, we will support that.”

Non’s community pantry has literally taken the country by storm that resulted in the seting up of similar facilities which, at latest count, totalled more than 350 throughout the country - and still growing.