JeepneyShop opens!

JeepneyShop is our new Alumni Shopping feature! Better than Shoemart, bigger than Rustans!

We're launching it with some great books, CDs and videos related to the Philippines.

Books: Works of fiction like Cryptonomicon

CDs:

Email us your favorite Books that depict the Philippines!

Write to webmaster@jeepneygang.com

Optimism!

The following was written by INTEL General Manager Robin Martin about The Philippines:

Filipinos (including the press, business people and myself) tend to dwell too much on the negative side and this affects the perception of foreigners, even the ones who have lived here for a while.

The negative perception of the Philippines is way disproportionate to reality when compared to countries like Columbia, Egypt, Middle East, Africa, etc. Let us all help our country by balancing the negative with the positive

Especially when we talk to foreigners, whether based here or abroad. Looking back and comparing the Philippines today and 1995 (the year I came back), I was struck by how much our country has progressed physically.

Consider the following:

1. The great telecom infrastructure that we have now did not exist in 1995. 1995 was the year the telecom industry was deregulated. Since then billions of dollars have been invested in both fixed line and cellular networks producing a system with over 5,000 kms of fiber optic backbone at a world competitive cost. From a fixed line capacity of about 900,000 in 1995 we now have over 7 million. Cellular phones practically did not exist in 1995; now we have over 11 million line capacity.

2. The MRT, many of the EDSA flyovers including the Ayala Avenue flyover), the SKYWAY, Rockwell and Glorietta 4, the Fort, NAIA terminal 2 and most of the new skyscrapers were not yet built in 1995.

3. If you drive to the provinces, you will notice that national roads are now of good quality (international quality asphalt roads). I just went to Iba, Zambales last week and I was impressed that even a not so frequently travelled road was of very good quality.

4. Philippine exports have increased by 600% over the past eight years. There are many, many more examples of progress over the last eight years. Philippine mangoes are now exported to the US and Europe.

Additional tidbits to make our people prouder:

1. INTEL has been in the Philippines for 28 years. The Philippines plant is where Intel's most advanced products are launched, including the Pentium IV. By the end of 2002, Philippine operations are expected to be Intel's biggest assembly and testing operations worldwide.

2. TEXAS INSTRUMENTS has been operating in Baguio for over 20 years. The Baguio plant is the largest producer of DSP chips in the world. DSP chips are the brains behind cellphones. TI's Baguio plant produces the chip that powers 100% of all NOKIA cellphones and 80% of Erickson cellphones in the world.

3. TOSHIBA laptops are produced in Santa Rosa, Laguna.

4. If you drive a BENZ, BMW, or a VOLVO, there is a good chance that the ABS system in your car was made in the Philippines.

5. TREND-MICRO, makers of one of the top anti virus software PC-Cillin (I may have mispelled this) develops its "cures" for viruses right here in Eastwood Libis, Quezon City. When a virus breaks in any computer system in the world, they try to find a solution within 45 minutes of finding the virus.

6. By the end of thIs year, it is expected that a majority of the top ten U.S. Call Center firms in the U.S. will have set up operations in the Philippines. This is one area in which I believe we are the best in the world in terms of value for money.

ALUMNI DATABASE AT 775

We're constantly making improvements to it thanks to volunteers like Linda Hardman '65 and Suzie Dimblad '81. Kudos to them!

Sige na, spread the word and ask your classmates to sign up!

ALUMNI DATABASE:
http://www.jeepneygang.com/database

Thriller in Manila: Plotline of a Coup Transfixes Philippines

Ex-President, a Former Actor, Is Given Role of Villain; Mortal Kombat in Jail

By James Hookway
9 September 2003 The Wall Street Journal

MANILA, Philippines -- Joseph Estrada, the jailed ex-president of the Philippines and former B-movie actor, has found himself typecast as the leader of an unsuccessful plot to restore himself to power. The case is about as weird as his movies.

Under heavy guard in a hospital suite where he has been locked up on corruption charges since 2001, Mr. Estrada claimed the role of innocent.

"The government's legal case against me [on corruption charges] isn't going well, so they are harassing me and my family with these coup charges," he said, wearily lighting a Lucky Strike.

On the TV set behind him, the nation's National Security Adviser was alleging that a quickly aborted mutiny by about 300 soldiers on July 27 was an attempt to topple President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo and reinstall Mr. Estrada.

The corruption charges involve allegations that Mr. Estrada had accepted millions of dollars in kickbacks from illegal gambling syndicates. Now, the apparent coup attempt has Filipinos wondering along with the security adviser: Could the putsch have been scripted by the raffish ex-president who sports an Elvis pompadour and pencil mustache and spends much of his hospital incarceration playing Mortal Kombat on his PlayStation?

A rapt national audience following the unfolding cop thriller on the airwaves has been fed a couple of tantalizing hints: Police recently filed a criminal complaint against one of Mr. Estrada's mistresses for allegedly storing the plotters' ammunition. Mr. Estrada's wife and one of his 11
children are under suspicion of transporting it. Police officials say they have yet to find evidence directly linking Mr. Estrada to the uprising. They are still looking.

But the star of "King of Goons" and "Dodong the Tricycle Driver," who specialized in playing thugs with a heart of gold, says he doesn't need to stage coups: In his mind he is still president of the Philippines. He still wears his familiar white wristband embossed with the Philippine presidential seal. And he still delivers his lines with executive brio, beginning most sentences with: "As duly elected President of the Republic, . . . ." Throughout his career, Mr. Estrada has lived at the crossroads of show business and politics. When the armed forces turned against him in 2001 and joined a "people power" uprising on the streets of Manila, it barely tarnished his appeal among poor Filipino voters far from the center of power. They remembered Mr. Estrada's underdog movie roles, and they benefited from his subsidized food programs.

Mr. Estrada was never formally impeached under the Philippine constitution, though the Supreme Court has confirmed Ms. Arroyo as the sitting president. Allegations of the sort against Mr. Estrada are typical of politics in the Philippines. Often, the truth is left unknown.

Filipinos say they don't know whether to laugh or cry about the daily sensational media reports. Some blame a culture built on Spanish Catholic moralism unshackled by American pop culture -- a legacy of America's 48-year rule here, which ended after World War II.

"Three hundred years in a convent, 50 years in Hollywood: that's us," says Miguel Pereira, who runs a small electrical-repair store in Manila and watches televised inquiries into the coup attempt on a portable TV set on his counter. Yet this latest episode in the Estrada saga has even the most jaded observers transfixed. Inquiries into the coup attempt are broadcast live on national television. Newspapers and Internet sites carry blow-by-blow reports. The latest shocker: Officials dared Estrada ally Sen. Gregorio "Gringo" Honasan, already accused of planning the coup, to show his armpit in public. The mutineers, it seems, marked their underarms with a distinctive symbol from the Philippines' pre-Hispanic alphabet as part of a
loyalty ritual.

There is a serious side to all this. The political free-for-all is unsettling investors, who worry about whether the country's politicians can buckle down to pass legislation and strengthen the nation's fragile economy.

Two weeks ago, the Philippine peso slumped to record closing lows. Many businessmen fear Mr. Estrada's populism. In Mr. Estrada's hospital suite, where old movie posters compete for space with crucifixes on the walls, he receives a steady stream of longtime allies and supplicants. One recent afternoon, the mistress and mother of three of his 11 children, Laarni Enriquez, turned up to talk legal strategy. One of his sons, J.V. Ejercito (Estrada is a stage name), also arrived.

Mortal Kombat would have to wait. Shuffling around his suite, Mr. Estrada --
66 years old and arthritic -- said he isn't playing political games or engineering coups. He said he plans to ignore the noise and await his acquittal in his corruption trial while working through the memoirs of Richard Nixon and Jimmy Carter and reflecting on his own post-presidential
career. He faces the death penalty if convicted.

"Nixon was a peacemaker, he helped end the Cold War," Mr. Estrada said. "Carter builds houses." If freed, he hopes to move to the southern region of Mindanao and bring peace to Christians and Muslims who have fought a brutal guerrilla war there for more than 30 years.
First, though, he has to clear his name. The cornerstone of Mr. Estrada's defense, he explained over a lunch of prawns and smoked fish, is that he is an elected official immune to prosecution. "I've made many mistakes in my life, but I've never engaged in corruption," said Mr. Estrada, who was elected to a six-year term as president in 1998.

Ever since his imprisonment, Mr. Estrada has tried to make his voice heard, employing a variety of tactics. Most memorable was an hour-long video titled "Father of the Masses," in which Mr. Estrada describes his incarceration over a jarring backdrop of baton-wielding riot police and water cannons. In the background, a pair of break-dancing dwarfs rap about how the media
conspired to bring him down: "Yo!" the dwarfs chant. "The media is a weapon blatantly abused by intrigue sowers and a tool to influence the minds of the people!"

July's botched rebellion is providing Mr. Estrada with fresh lines to deliver. Mr. Estrada pondered whether he still has the star appeal to influence the nation's future. "Yes," he finally decided. "I think I do." But he won't return to Philippine movie screens, he vowed. "Nobody wants to see me play grandfather roles."