Tag: Pandemic Propaganda

Notes on: What next? #Covid19 #TerrorLaw #Protest

July 19, 2020 by
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We all already agree that the Duterte government’s handling of this public health crisis is probably one of the worst in the world—and certainly the worst in Southeast Asia—as both the facts and numbers reveal.

But this government is much much worse. It has used this pandemic and to declare de facto martial law. The policies on the Bayanihan We Heal As One Act are the tip of the iceberg; what is worse than the words that are there is how it is implemented on the ground, where military might and police power are king. We of course had this coming: we watched the past four years as Duterte appointed military men into the Cabinet, one after the other; we watched as he emboldened the police by telling them to kill, and condoning their abuses; we watched as he jailed Leila de Limaunseated CJ Serenojailed activists on trumped-up charges; we watched as the body count grew.

This pandemic was all Duterte’s government needed to get all its other unjust, extrajudicial policies to happen. Cancel the ABS-CBN franchise based on the President’s personal gripe? Check. Pass the anti-terror law that will legalize the tagging of activism as terrorism among the violation of our rights? Check. Put Charter Change back on the table? Check. Allow the Aerotropolis airport in Bulacan to push through despite displacing fisherfolk and it environmental repercussions? Implement the jeepney phaseout that will disenfranchise thousands of jeepney drivers who are being made to go into debt for a modern vehicle in this time of crisis? Check. Disallow protests, and arrest without warrants any group, no matter how small, that dares do a protest? Check.

The latter is of course key: the past five months, we have seen how incompetent and violent, how shameless and thoughtless this government is. At any other time we would be out on the streets, raising a fist. In the time of pandemic, we are disallowed from doing so, and with a Terror Law now in place, acts of resistance like that can easily be construed as acts of terrorism. The fear is valid, but so is the anger.

Especially since it get worse. Duterte’s propaganda machinery is so head of us, with it’s game so strong, that it has been able to control the narrative of this pandemic and the government’s contingent abuses.

Click here for the rest of it.

Ask FASSSTER

May 2, 2020 by
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There are truths, there are lies, and there are statistics.”

The fate of 109 million Filipinos hangs, apparently, on nothing more than an econometric Lego set.

There is a model developed by the DOH, the Dept. of Science and Technology, Ateneo de Manila and UP called Feasibility Analysis of Syndrome Surveillance using Temporal  Epidemiological Modeler for Early Detection of Disease or  FASSSTER. The model is an “evidence based” predictor of COVID under varying assumptions. I understand it is the basis by which the Government decides whether to impose a quarantine, enhance it or modify it. Below is the April 20 iteration of FASSSTER. I am told it was part of an IATF presentation.

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