Textbook crusader on threats: ‘I am not afraid’

A self-styled crusader for better textbooks in schools said yesterday he is not afraid of the death threats he received over the past several months.

"I am not afraid! I just want the truth to come out," Antonio Calipjo Go told The STAR in a telephone interview.

He is the academic supervisor of Marian School of Quezon City and has been with the school for the past 10 years.

He said that in October last year, he received a "corona" or a floral wreath given to the dead during wakes. The wreath was hung at the school gate one morning.

Go also said that he started receiving threatening phone calls a few months back. The perpetrators have not been identified.

"It’s not about me. This is about the textbooks!" he said.

Earlier this year, Go released his independent findings that two of Phoenix Publishing House Inc.’s releases — "Harnessing English Arts Today" and "Simply Science in the Next Century" — were full of errors.

The firm’s president, Ma. Erlinda Sibal, said they had not received any adverse comments from the over 200 schools currently using the textbooks.

She said the two books had been reviewed and Phoenix Publishing had "taken note of the items that have to be improved." Correction booklets are now in the process of being distributed nationwide.

Sibal said that three English experts from the Ateneo Department of English reviewed "Harnessing English Arts Today" while "Simply Science in the Next Century" was evaluated by the National Institute for Science and Mathematics Education Development (NISMED) of the University of the Philippines.

She said the two textbook series were voluntarily submitted for evaluation to the National Book Development Board (NBDB) last February, but Go belied her claims.

"It’s not true that the publisher voluntarily went to the NBDB to have their books reviewed. They had their books reviewed when I called (it to) their attention," he said.

"It was I who called their attention to the errors in these books in January."

He alleged that the NBDB sided with Phoenix Publishing when the board cleared the publisher of any major fault in connection with the errors found in the two textbooks.

"The NBDB is cleaning (up) the evidence," Go said, adding that the board "should be the police. They should be objective."