Room‘s softest — yet loudest — voice

Her supporters will argue that her trip includes official engagements while her lawyers can speak on her behalf. I see something else: an impeachment trial treated as an inconvenience to work around rather than a process demanding her personal attention.

A Vice President under impeachment does not merely represent herself; she represents the office she occupies. And when that office appears physically distant from the proceedings meant to judge it, questions about accountability become louder than any defense presented within the Senate chamber.

— Jason Mago

No room for improvement

While everyone is busy watching the impeachment trial, senators getting arrested, senators fighting one another, and Big Binondo challenging the Philippines, a far more important crisis continues.

The country still lacks 166,000 classrooms.

President Marcos once called the shortage “pitiful” and promised to build 40,000 classrooms before his term ends. Yet progress remains painfully slow. According to the EDCOM report, we’re talking about only a few hundred classrooms being completed each year. At that pace, what the f*** is that supposed to solve?

Pitiful, indeed. More importantly, infuriating.

Imagine buying uniforms and notebooks, paying for transportation, waking your child before sunrise and preparing breakfast. Only to have your child spend the day crammed inside a classroom packed beyond capacity.

Then ask yourself another question. Are those classrooms even safe?

There are reports of newly built classrooms becoming unfit for use after only a few years. Imagine a major earthquake hitting while students are packed like sardines inside those rooms. How would they even get out?

We celebrate the biggest education budget in Philippine history. Great.

Now where are the classrooms?

Then we wonder why children are falling behind. Why discipline is deteriorating. Why crime among the youth exists. We blame the kids while failing to give them something as basic as a decent classroom.

My nephew goes to a private school. But can every Filipino family say the same?

That’s just another problem in this never-ending hellhole we call the Philippines. I still love this country, though.

The West Philippine Sea is ours. Palawan is ours. Batanes is ours.

Now let’s build the damn classrooms. — Carl Magadia

Keeping calm

Watching the impeachment trial of the Vice President is like a double-edged sword.

It can either make you wiser — or make you mistake volume for substance.

Inside the session hall are two kinds of people: those who raise their voices, and those who raise the quality of their arguments. You see it in the cross-examinations. In manifestations. In the debates.

The trial is a reminder that you do not have to be loud to be convincing. The loudest voice in the room is rarely the strongest.

Atty. Chel Diokno is calm. So is Atty. Michael Poa. They stand on opposite sides, yet both remain measured. Firm, but respectful. Assertive, but composed.

Diokno has corrected some senators on points of law. Yet he never comes across as condescending. He never hides behind his credentials. He never plays the “you don’t have a law degree” card.

Mind you, he is a Diokno — a name that is synonymous with law in the Philippines. One of the country’s premier law schools carries his family name. If anyone in that room has earned the right to be arrogant, it is probably him.

Yet he isn’t. That says more about confidence than any raised voice ever could.

There is no need for shouting. No need for theatrics. No need to perform outrage just to prove a point.

The strongest arguments are often delivered in the calmest voice.

Perhaps that is the biggest lesson the impeachment trial has taught me.

Composure is not weakness. It is confidence under control and humility in command.

— Vivienne Angeles