Best foot forward

The Filipino fans of Hollywood’s top activist actress Angelina Jolie were in high gear on the social media. Jolie breezed through Manila last week to attend one of the prequel events leading to the Leaders’ Summit of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) currently taking place here in our country as host and chairman of this year’s annual meeting.

Jolie flew in last Tuesday and left two days later, tersely describing her brief stay as “wonderful.” She is the famous screen better half – later his wife in real life – of Holly-wood hunk Brad Pitt in the action-packed “Mr. & Ms. Smith” in 2005. Sadly, their marriage ended in a typical Hollywood-style bitter divorce.

Jolie served as a featured speaker at the 2026 ASEAN Inclusive Growth Summit where she spoke alongside Cambodian filmmaker Rithy Panh in a session titled “From Memory to Possibility: Cambodia, Courage and the Power of Staying.” She discussed with Panh her decades of humanitarian work and community recovery in Cambodia.

Cambodia is very close to the heart of Jolie. It was in Cambodia where she filmed “Lara Croft: Tomb Raider” in 2000. When she returned to that strife-torn country to volun-teer at local schools two years later, she first met and later adopted her eldest son, Maddox Chivan. Maddox was seven months old at the time and living in an orphanage.

Google says Jolie subsequently established the Maddox Foundation (originally the Maddox Jolie-Pitt Foundation). The organization began by clearing unexploded landmines in northwestern Cambodia and now works with the government to protect over 60,000 hectares of forest while funding local schools and clinics.

Maddox, now 25, has worked alongside his mother in filmmaking. In her talk at the 2026 ASEAN Inclusive Growth Summit in Manila, Jolie recalled feeling an immediate sense that her son was there and that she needed to find him.

Among the 11 member-states of the ASEAN, the Philippines and Cambodia are lagging behind in terms of economic growth as measured in annual gross domestic product (GDP). According to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) World Economic Outlook as of October 2026, the Philippines ranked No. 7 with projected real GDP growth of 3.4 percent, while Cambodia ranked No. 8 with 3.0 percent. Vietnam topped with projected real GDP of 8.4 percent in the ASEAN.

As the Philippines turns over the chairmanship of ASEAN to Singapore, our country proudly caps its hosting in Manila this year with a grandiose presentation. Amid the heavy impact of the continuing Middle East conflict, the Philippine government is cashing in again on our patented Filipino hospitality and resiliency to face the prevailing economic difficulties.

And typical of Filipino mentality of doing things at the last minute, the belated clean-up and beautification campaign around Metro Manila incurred instead the ire of many people. The visible changes were pleasing to the eye. Many of us, in fact, were awed to realize these things can be done. But why did it take an ASEAN Summit being held in our capital to clean and put order in our surroundings?

Take the case of the crowded tents of vendors occupying the whole service road in Baclaran Church. Lo and behold, they were gone last week. And we finally saw that ser-vice road on Roxas Boulevard with black-and-white painted road dividers. But where are the vendors?

For years, the vendors have been selling their wares in these makeshift colorful tents, with oversized beach umbrellas dotting the service road. It will be at the height of naivete to believe our police and local government authorities do not see such blatant road obstructions.

For all we know, our poor vendors have been at the mercy of “kotong” cops. Instead of being used for vehicular traffic in that busy intersection of the cities of Parañaque and Pasay, law enforcement authorities turn a blind eye on this wide section of Roxas Boulevard turned into one big vendors’ road. In the past, hauling illegal vendors out of Baclaran has been the regular activity of the Metro Manila Development Authority (MMDA). By what modus vivendi this has been operating there, we don’t know.

Why can’t our national, especially local government units (LGUs), provide them with decent, safe and convenient space inside permanent building structures? It is a win-win for both our vendors/traders and the LGUs. Our vendors can sell more and earn better while LGUs at the same generate revenues from rent, business permits and local taxes.

Unfortunately, however, we learned later the vendors were apparently lured and convinced by P10,000 ayuda. Distributed to them by the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD), the ayuda is supposed to tide them over until they return to the street stalls on Nov. 20.

 Another great improvement that we saw from the ASEAN Summit was the sprucing up, re-painting and replacing busted lights along the underpasses in the entire stretch of EDSA. We regularly cruise along EDSA every week. And within one week, we saw the transformation of the Ayala, EDSA and Shaw tunnels, restored to its colors and new tiles, to boot.

Newly grown chinese bamboo trees sprouted in the plantboxes, southbound along the stretch of Roxas Boulevard from the streets of P. Ocampo to T.M. Kalaw. They look nice at night with ground lights.

These things should be done on a regular maintenance basis and not just to show off to our guests.

From the comments of Jolie fans: Angelina understood what our politicians still seem unable to grasp. “Don’t just make the Philippines look beautiful for the world. Make it a better place for the Filipinos who call it home.”

With hashtags: #angelinajoliefans #ASEAN2026 #Philippines

But there was no such statement made by Jolie. It appears the quote was internet-generated, or a user-attributed line overlaid onto social media posts and circulated in fan graphics. Perhaps this is a wishful statement. We could only echo the hope that we should stop at just always putting our best foot forward for visitors.