Delegates attending an international conference in the Philippine capital might not see what they came to discuss: abject poverty.
A makeshift, temporary wall has been erected across a bridge on a road from the airport to downtown Manila that hides a sprawling slum along a garbage-strewn creek.
Presidential spokesman Ricky Carandang defended the wall’s installation, saying yesterday “any country will do a little fixing up before a guest comes.”
Photo: EPA
He expressed hope that this week’s annual meeting of the Asian Development Bank (ADB) Board of Governors, which includes finance ministers and senior officials from 67 member states, will show the Philippines is open for business. The lending institution, which is headquartered in its own walled compound in Manila, aims to cut poverty in the Asia-Pacific region.
“We need to show our visitors that Metro Manila is orderly. We owe it to ourselves,” Metro Manila chief Francis Tolentino said. “I see nothing wrong with beautifying our surroundings. We are not trying to keep the poor out of the picture.”
There was no immediate comment from ADB.
The Philippine Communist Party recalled that former Philippine first lady Imelda Marcos — notorious for living an ostentatious lifestyle — was ridiculed for trying to hide squatter colonies. She erected similar whitewashed walls along the route of foreign visitors to the Miss Universe pageant in Manila in 1974, and other international events.
“The government should face reality. If they don’t, how will they know the problem, how will they solve the problem?” asked Renato Reyes, secretary general of the largest left-wing group Bayan. “By covering the truth, they lose the energy or intention to resolve the problem.”
About a third of Manila’s 12 million residents live in slums, and a third of 94 million Filipinos live below the poverty line of US$1.25 a day. Overall, more than half the population in Asia remains poor.
ANGER: A video shared online showed residents in a neighborhood confronting the national security minister, attempting to drag her toward floodwaters Argentina’s port city of Bahia Blanca has been “destroyed” after being pummeled by a year’s worth of rain in a matter of hours, killing 13 and driving hundreds from their homes, authorities said on Saturday. Two young girls — reportedly aged four and one — were missing after possibly being swept away by floodwaters in the wake of Friday’s storm. The deluge left hospital rooms underwater, turned neighborhoods into islands and cut electricity to swaths of the city. Argentine Minister of National Security Patricia Bullrich said Bahia Blanca was “destroyed.” The death toll rose to 13 on Saturday, up from 10 on Friday, authorities
Local officials from Russia’s ruling party have caused controversy by presenting mothers of soldiers killed in Ukraine with gifts of meat grinders, an appliance widely used to describe Russia’s brutal tactics on the front line. The United Russia party in the northern Murmansk region posted photographs on social media showing officials smiling as they visited bereaved mothers with gifts of flowers and boxed meat grinders for International Women’s Day on Saturday, which is widely celebrated in Russia. The post included a message thanking the “dear moms” for their “strength of spirit and the love you put into bringing up your sons.” It
DEBT BREAK: Friedrich Merz has vowed to do ‘whatever it takes’ to free up more money for defense and infrastructure at a time of growing geopolitical uncertainty Germany’s likely next leader Friedrich Merz was set yesterday to defend his unprecedented plans to massively ramp up defense and infrastructure spending in the Bundestag as lawmakers begin debating the proposals. Merz unveiled the plans last week, vowing his center-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU)/Christian Social Union (CSU) bloc and the center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD) — in talks to form a coalition after last month’s elections — would quickly push them through before the end of the current legislature. Fraying Europe-US ties under US President Donald Trump have fueled calls for Germany, long dependent on the US security umbrella, to quickly
In front of a secluded temple in southwestern China, Duan Ruru skillfully executes a series of chops and strikes, practicing kung fu techniques she has spent a decade mastering. Chinese martial arts have long been considered a male-dominated sphere, but a cohort of Generation Z women like Duan is challenging that assumption and generating publicity for their particular school of kung fu. “Since I was little, I’ve had a love for martial arts... I thought that girls learning martial arts was super swaggy,” Duan, 23, said. The ancient Emei school where she trains in the mountains of China’s Sichuan Province
RSS