Congressional medal for Inouye

Appreciation for the "many, many acts of friendship, assistance and support" given by US Senator Daniel K. Inouye to the Filipino people was expressed by Speaker Joe de Venecia at a luncheon he tendered for the visiting solon yesterday. Mr. Inouye is known for his espousing of World War II Filipino veterans’ causes, and has helped in securing social security and medical benefits for them through laws passed in the US Congress. Lately, he has filed an amendment in the Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act S. 2611 which was passed last May in the US Senate; his amendment on Filipino Veterans Family Reunification (FVFR) is asking for the allowing of children of World War II veterans to join their parents in the US.

Speaker de Venecia said that at his recent meeting in Washington which was attended by top guns from the International Monetary Board and the World Bank, Senator Inouye showed his agreement and support for the Speaker’s debt-to-equity proposal.

At yesterday’s luncheon, Mr. Inouye said that US congressional actions on the treatment of Filipino veterans had caused him embarrassment and shame, and he vowed to rectify those errors by working for laws to benefit Filipino veterans. He also expressed appreciation for the Philippine government’s anti-terrorism policy. The Filipino and American military forces fight terrorism "with an iron fist," but also "by extending their hand in friendship, to win hearts and minds."

Highlight of the luncheon was the conferment of the Congressional Medal of Achievement to the senator. The decoration, said Speaker de Venecia, was approved in Resolution No. 453 by the House of Representatives. He said it is the second highest award for Mr. Inuoye, who as a World War II combat veteran, earned the American nation’s highest award for military valor – the Medal of Honor.

The text of the decoration mentioned Mr. Inouye’s being born and raised by Japanese immigrant parents in Honolulu, Hawaii. He enlisted, at age 19, in the US Army’s 442nd Regimental Combat Team of soldiers of Japanese ancestry; fought in the Italian campaign and in the French Vosges Mountains; won a battlefield commission, and lost his right arm to an exploding grenade while leading his platoon against German machineguns in northern Italy in April 1945.

He finished law school under the G.I. Bill of Rights. He was elected as the first congressman for the new state of Hawaii in 1959. Elected to the US Senate in 1962; he is serving his seventh consecutive term. He became internationally prominent in the 1970s as a member of the Watergate Committee and, in 1987, as chair of the Iran-Contra Committee.

His concern for Philippine interest in the US Senate has been seen in his espousal of the Philippine Defense Reform Program, the country’s counter-terrorism campaign, and the Mindanao peace process; his support of "robust levels" of US assistance for the Philippines, especially in foreign military financing and in economic support funds, and his legislative pieces seeking to rectify the wrongs committed against Filipino veterans of the Pacific war.

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Everyone in the population and reproductive health field knows Ben de Leon, the quiet, gentle-mannered president of the relatively new NGO, Forum for Family Planning and Development Inc. (FFPD). The other evening, Ben gave a welcome party for the new country representative of the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), Ms. Suneeta Mukherjee. UNFPA has been supporting population programs of NGOs, among them the Forum, and the Philippine NGO Council on Population, Health, & Welfare, Inc. (PNGOC), which Ben had chaired for nine years.

Ben’s involvement in population programs includes serving as executive director of the Commission on Population (1979-80), also as executive director of the ASEAN Population Coordination Unit in Jakarta, Indonesia, and as project expert (on secondment by the Philippine government) of the Population Division, ECAFE (now ESCAP), in Bangkok, Thailand. He served as presidential assistant for social development (undersecretary) of the Office of the President, in which capacity he did liaison work for President Fidel V. Ramos, including attending numerous population conferences in the country and abroad. He was also executive director of the Philippine Legislators’ Committee on Population and Development Foundation, Inc. (PLCPD).

Ben’s commitment to population issues began early; his decision to take up the bachelor and master of arts in social welfare at the University of the Philippines led to his employment as a social worker at the US Veterans Administration for nine years; then as social caseworker at the Philippine Mental Health Association, and military welfare service representative at the Philippine National Red Cross. Expectedly, he was convinced about the relationship between poverty and population problems.

Ben agrees with his peers in the population circle that "the absence of any government policy on population will set back the nation’s progress, especially if the highest leaders in the country do not give population programs their full support."

Ben says, "Population cuts across all developmental dimensions. There’s an imbalance between population and resources. If there is no balance between these two, how can we speed up the building of more infrastructure, schools, playgrounds, bridges?" He adds: "There’s a relationship between population and criminality. An even if we spend so much money on development, without balancing population and development, it’s difficult."

Interestingly, he said the late President Ferdinand Marcos knew the interrelationship of population and development. "But he was also to a certain extent, doing a carrot and stick act with the church."

Ben considers information and education as necessary in helping people understand population issues. When he was executive director (with the rank of undersecretary) of the Agno River Basin Development Commission under the Office of the President (1998-2004), his main job, he said, was making people understand and appreciate the advantages of the government’s construction of the San Roque dam. He saw to it that people’s questions were answered by government agencies involved in the project.

Ben is grateful for the active involvement of NGOs in population programs. Foreign agencies, particularly private organizations, continue to support family planning programs. PNGOC, for example, is one such beneficiary. It is a big umbrella of 85 NGOS involved in credible projects.

Ben resigned from PNGOC recently to work full-time with the Forum, a non-profit NGO composed of experts, well-known personalities and population, reproductive health and family planning supporters who are highly committed and motivated to spearhead a program for the convergence of activities and efforts towards a highly effective population program.

Its mission pronouncement state that is seeks to "debunk misinformation about family planning and reproductive health and their relation to poverty, development, and society’s well-being."

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