H A word war whenever and wherever it takes place is irritating. It can happen between former two friends in the room or in the streets. It can happen between two groups in a conference room or in the plazas and parks. When a word war is waged by groups to carry out a cause or an ideology, this word war becomes a propaganda war and it is a hundred times irritating because it is distractive to the uninitiated. But no matter how irritating, a word war or a propaganda war is a thousand times better than a shooting war such as what is taking place in Zamboanga City now on its 13thday between the MNLF of Nur Misuari and government forces. Let alone the number of dead and wounded which is already in the hundreds, a shooting war stops the economy and there is no way of measuring the loss to everything. This is why even the most detestable PDAF or pork barrel scam that has hugged the headlines for months now has been eclipsed by the shooting war in Zamboanga. Some wags say that the Zamboanga siege was deliberate to divert the attention of the public from the pork barrel scam and its derivative issues. Whether that is true or not, it certainly did because more than a hundred thousand evacuees are now going hungry in dump an overcrowded evacuation centers there.

This is why I still consider the propaganda war that is now slowly unfolding in Bohol a none issue compared to the news of the bloody rebellion in Zamboanga. I am referring to the unfolding propaganda war now being waged in the only daily tabloid in Bohol – the BDDN. For some weeks now too, the exchange of news releaseson what happened in Brgy. Villaflor in Carmen is slowly turning into a propaganda war. We always recognize one when we see one. The news complaining about the “fake rebel returnees”, the “desperate military”, and the half bake PPM was to prepare the government for the renewal of mass actions in urban centers. True enough, a few hundred rallyists from Ubay, Trinidad, and Mabini converged at Plaza Rizal the other week to commemorate the anniversary of the death Victor Olayvar who was slain in an ambush in Danao town a few years ago. It was also an opportunity to arouse the anger of the people against the pork barrel scam. From the newspapers, the propaganda being waged by cause-oriented groups and or legal fronts against government is now being shifted to the streets, reminiscent of the old mammoth rallies of the past that usually turned bloody sometimes.To some extent, this shift is to test the waters of readiness of supporters to this kind of propaganda war.

We have nothing against mass actions or rallies as an expression of one’s belief or cause. It is be an effective tool for propaganda. But as an advocate of the rights of children, we certainly object to the use of children to express a sentiment especially thru a mass action like a rally and on weekdays when children have to be in school. Those children were placed unnecessarily in harm’s way. What if violence erupted in the course of the rally? Rallies evoke heightened emotions that could lead to violent clashes such as what we’ve seen and experienced before in the metropolis and other big cities.During the Peace and Order Council meeting last Tuesday, Mayor Baba Yap said that the children were prepositioned in front and would be the first to be in contact with policemen in case dispersal becomes a course of action. That is saying the children were put in the “first line of defense” which is putting them in harm’s way which, clearly, is a violation of children’s rights as defined in the Declaration of the Rights of Children adopted by the United Nations of which the Philippines is a member and signatory. Yes children have the right to be listened to. But they must be heard first in their homes by their families and in schools, not in an environment where they can be exposed to danger and harm. The organizers of that rally and the parents of those children must be faulted for violating the rights of children. They were supposed to be in school attending classes so that they could attain their full development as human persons and not be dragged to participate in the activities to thresh issues that not even all adults can discuss and address.

NOTES. Yesterday angry Filipinos once more gathered in many areas of the country to denounce the pork barrel scam. It is just to be angry at the unconscionable raid on the money of the tax payers. The immediate reaction is to abolish PDAF or pork barrel of the legislators that gave the occasion for the scam to happen. I call it a knee jerk reaction because it is something that one does without thinking when exposed to the stimulus. So let’s put some thinking into it. If we abolish PDAF, where will the money be lodged? Abolishing PDAF will not make the fund now in the budget vanish into thin air so that nobody,who is not authorized and supposed to, could benefit from it anymore. The fund, no matter how it may be called, will have to be allocated somewhere in an office. Which office will now hold the money? Unless systems and procedures for its use, release and implementation or expenditure are drastically changed to make them transparent to be accountable, you are just transferring it from the hands of one scoundrel and son of a *&#”… corrupt legislator, implementing agency, and NGOs like those organized by Janet Napoles to another scoundrel and NGO yet to be identified or organized. So let’s have some concrete suggestions other than just abolition of PDAF.