ASEAN: Landmark accords for a better future

With the 12th ASEAN Leader's Summit virtually over, we have all the reason to celebrate the Sinulog Festival this week and yes, Cebu City is fully ready to celebrate its famous fiesta, which has been dubbed the country's biggest tourism drawer. Indeed, the Sinulog Festival every year has only gotten better and brings more and more people to come for our fiesta.

In the past six years of our show, we've always had guests talk about the Sinulog festival. Today, we continue with this tradition. Tonight we bring you a History of the Sinulog Dance with no less than Cebu's famous choreographer Valentino Sandiego of the Sandiego Dance Troupe, a consistent winner in all the Sinulog Dance Festival contests who've danced the Sinulog ever since we began celebrating it with all the pomp and color. So watch this special Sinulog Presentation tonight on SkyCable's channel 15 at 8:00pm and learn more about the history of the Sinulog Festival.

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Yesterday at the height of the 12th ASEAN Leader's Summit, the weather finally eased and Cebu saw its first sunshine in almost two weeks! Sunday really gave our foreign guests and dignitaries a glimpse of a sunny Cebu. We hope they enjoyed the facilities especially those staying at the Mactan Island's Shangri-La Resort and Spa. Traffic was bad where the roads were closed, but hey, no one was complaining!

Today is the final day for the ASEAN Summit and all events will be held at the Cebu International Convention Center (CICC). It begins with the Opening Session of the 2nd East Asia Summit followed by the signing ceremony for the Cebu Declaration on Energy Security. Then Pres. Gloria Macapagal Arroyo would do her official farewell to the delegates and a final Press Conference will be held at 3:30pm.

Four landmark agreements were forged during the ASEAN Summit. The most basic was the adoption of the blueprint for the ASEAN Charter. If and when this is signed either this year or in next year's Summit, ASEAN will now follow the footsteps of the European Union (EU) and pave the way to a unified economic growth and stability. This is the step in the right direction as it is sending the message that ASEAN means business not only as a trade bloc but also in its membership. Myanmar signed this declaration. Let's see how far ASEAN will go on the Burma question.

Perhaps the most significant ASEAN declaration is on the fight against terrorism. As chairperson for the 12th ASEAN Summit, Pres. Arroyo moved for the implementation of the Vientiane Action Program (VAP) to hasten the region's quest for a zone of peace and security. Almost all ASEAN member nations except Singapore have problems with terrorism and this declaration promises a closer cooperation between ASEAN members.

Pres. Arroyo also used the Mindanao experience of the Philippines as a model on how the ASEAN members can work together to achieve its peace initiatives. While this model is far from perfect, I agree with the President that we can use the Mindanao experience for the simple reason that the two religious factions belonging to the Shiites and Sunnis are also here in the Philippines and they are living together with Christians. This cooperation on our fight against terrorism means that terrorists groups can no longer use our "back door" to go in and out of the Philippines.

Earlier ASEAN adopted the Cebu Declaration on the Protection and Promotion of the Rights of Migrant Workers. This declaration was embraced by the ASEAN member nations as a lot of the people living within ASEAN work in foreign soil. ASEAN also met with its dialogue partners, India, Canada, South Korean, Japan, China and Australia, whose leaders have come to Cebu. I'm pretty sure that new agreements would be made that would make their Cebu sojourn quite unforgettable.

I spent most of Saturday and Sunday afternoon at the CICC and while most of the meetings of the foreign leaders were done at the Shangri-La, the majority of the international press used the CICC as its headquarters as only a pool of journalists were allowed access at the Shangri-La. But the CICC was a beehive of activity for the international and local press.

I had a chance to have a cup of coffee with Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita and he told me that his defense for former DOJ Secretary Nani Perez was based on the time-honored principle that a man is considered innocent until his guilt is proven. Well in the case of Sec. Nani Perez, this was Justice in slow motion. But when former Batangas Governor Tony Leviste admitted to shooting his aide, Mr. Rafael delas Alas allegedly in self-defense, Makati Mayor Jejomar Binay declared this a closed case. Hmmm, how we wish ASEAN could also help fix our problems with our Justice system.