Way into the digital age: PH’s President Aquino and his Communications office have no email? Check this out.

Way into the digital age: PH’s President Aquino and his Communications office have no email? Check this out.

From: Jagunos, Bern
Sent: Monday, October 31, 2011 1:31 PM
To: consul.general@philcongen-toronto.com
Subject: Complaint re-Presidential Communications Operations Office staff response to concerns raised about killing of Fr. Tentorio – Request to Consulate to Forward to DOJ

Dear Consul General Pedro Chan,

I’ve been trying to reach you since last week, but with no success. Similarly, I’ve had no success in obtaining from the Consulate email addresses and fax numbers of the President’s office and the Secretary of Justice which work. The email addresses and fax numbers published in the government’s official website are NOT working.

Since I could not get the information from the Consulate, I asked CONTAK – a partner of The United Church of Canada in the Philippines – to forward the letter to the offices of the President and the DOJ. The response of a staffperson from the President’s Office to her request for contact information was appalling and inexcusable. See the message of our partner below. Said staffperson told her that the Office of the President has no email address and instructed her to send to the address of the President’s Communications Operations Office, which does not work as well or send by postal service or hand-mail, adding that the letter “malamang ay dagdag sa mga itatambak nilang papel.”

I ask your Consulate Office to forward the complaint of The United Church of Canada to such callous and unprofessional response of a staffperson of the Office of the President to our concerns and those of many other global churches and human rights organizations regarding the killing of Fr. Fausto Tentorio.

The behaviour of a member of the staff of the Office of the President does not appear to us to be consistent with the position and response of Secretary Leila de Lima to organizations raising concerns about human rights cases. The head of The United Church of Canada, Moderator Mardi Tindal, who had the opportunity to meet Secretary de Lima last year as part of a human rights delegation of the World Council of Churches, felt very positive about the openness of the Secretary to dialogue with churches and other groups. Moderator Tindal, like the other members of the WCC delegation, also had the impression that the Secretary is well-intentioned to take action on cases of human rights violations by state agents.

For this reason, we ask, you Consul General, to bring this matter to the attention of the DOJ Secretary.

I ask that I be copied of your official communication to the DOJ about this and will be waiting for a reply from her office.

The response of a member of the staff of the Office of the President to our partner’s request also makes me wonder if it somehow explains the difficulty I have in obtaining from the Consulate the “working” email addresses and fax numbers for the offices of the President and the Justice Secretary. Is there a directive to government offices to withhold contact information and access to the President’s office and members of Cabinet?

Sincerely,
Bern Jagunos
Regional Coordinator, Asia
Partners in Mission
The United Church of Canada

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From: CONTAK Philippines [mailto:contakphilippines@gmail.com]
Sent: Friday, October 28, 2011 4:33 AM
To: Jagunos, Bern
Cc: Mervin Toquero; Norma Dollaga
Subject: Re: Please forward UCC letter to President Aquino

Hi Manang Bern,

I`ve cc-ed you the letter addressed to Leila de Lima. Called the Office of the President and was advised that the office has no email address and was referred instead to the Presidential Communications Operations Office. ang sabi wala din daw silang email address at ang pupuwedeng gawin ay postal mail o personal na i-receive nila. na malamang ay dagdag sa mga itatambak nilang papel.

ingat,
agong

———————

Subject: CONTAK Philippines: ON THE KILLING OF FR. TENTORIO

28 October 2011

Hon. Leila De Lima
Secretary
Department of Justice

Dear Sec. De Lima,

Our warmest greetings of peace! I am Iris Ann Agustin from CONTAK Philippines, an ecumenical Church-based organization primarily involved in linkages and solidarity work with organizations here and abroad on common issues and concerns particularly on social justice and peace advocacy.

We are writing in the aftermath of the brutal killing of Fr. Faustino “Pops“ Tentorio, PIME whose life and mission revolved around upholding and advocating life and dignity especially of the Lumads in Aracan Valley, North Cotabato. We are, at the least, aghast over another victim of extra-judicial killing under the present administration and quite appalled by the inability of the government to apprehend perpetrators who are in the continuous rampage of killing with impunity.

Various organizations and individuals here and abroad have registered their strongest condemnation and call on government`s immediate action to putting an end to the culture of impunity and ensuring justice is served to the thousands of victims of human rights violations.

Enclosed please find statements from United Church of Canada, a program partner of CONTAK Philippines, and Pilgrims for Peace, a broad alliance of peace advocates in the Philippines. We pray that you continue to provide a venue where we can bring to your office our appeal for redress and justice. We have high regard of your personal capacity and the institution you represent as one of the remaining bastions of hope in this continuing era of darkness.

More so, our belief remains unwavering that you will help realize our dream of living without fear or imminent danger as we continue our mission of restoring the vineyard here and now.
More power to you and your colleagues.

Sincerely,
Iris Ann Agustin

CONTAK Philippines
(Church Office for International Networking in the Philippines)
3/F National Council of Churches in the Philippines
879 EDSA, West Triangle
Quezon City 1104

———————

Congen Chan replies

10 November 2011

Ms. BERN JAGUNOS
Regional Coordinator, Asia
Partners in Mission
The United Church of Canada

Dear Ms. Bern Jagunos,

May I first of all express my gratitude to you for bringing to our attention your inability and understandable frustration in not having been able to contact not only the Department of Justice but also the Office of the President in Manila, as well as the Philippine Consulate General here in Toronto. I also wish to thank you for your kind words about our Justice Secretary, Leila de Lima. I wish to assure you that I had the same very positive impression when I met with her in Manila shortly after she had assumed office as Justice Secretary; I am confident that she will continue to be held in high esteem not only by her colleagues in our government and by our people, but also by those abroad who have had dealings with her and her office, for her no-nonsense approach to her work and for her straightforward dealings with issues and personalities.

On the part of the Consulate, I wish to apologize for our having failed to entertain your call/s to the Consulate’s telephone lines. This is sometimes due to the inadequacy of our current office telephone system (about which I have asked our Head Office in Manila for some remedy and relief), but very often due to the extremely heavy traffic of incoming calls we receive and the outgoing calls we have to make to our very large public clientele here in the Greater Toronto Area which is estimated to number as high as 250,000 to 350,000 Filipinos and Filipino-Canadians — not including the non-Filipino clients — who have to transact business with the Consulate day-in and day-out. To help remedy this tight situation, may I give you my celfon number (1-647-286-8116) through which I may be contacted on a 24/7 basis. I have resorted to giving out my celfon number from the time I assumed office here barely four months ago in my desire to help relieve our telephone connection problems and the heavy traffic of telephone calls. That way also, I am able to be directly informed of certain urgent concerns and to address those concerns more immediately.

May I inform you that I have immediately passed on your letter to the Department of Foreign Affairs in Manila with an urgent request that your valid concerns be transmitted to the offices you have mentioned, namely, the Department of Justice and the Office of the President. Should we receive a reply to your letter, please be assured that we will inform you about it soonest.

(original signed)
PEDRO O. CHAN
Consul General