Goma goes after the gold

“DISCRETION is the better part of valor,” a quote from William Shakespeare’s history play Henry IV, really means it’s important to be cautious before rushing into doing something. Wise advice that everyone, including those in public office, should bear in mind.

We’re reminded of this after actor/athleteturned-politician Richard “Goma” Gomez apparently wanted to run to the ground the largest agricultural facility in the Visayas and Mindanao regions with a terse statement, “Walang kaibigan, trabaho lamang.”

This was obviously intended to please the peanut gallery, but not the more than 500 executives and rank-and-file employees of the DBSN Farm Agriventures Inc. owned by the family of Mayor Ramon Oñate of Palompon, Leyte.

Gomez came out with guns blazing against the Oñate couple and DBSN for alleged violations of the country’s land use and environmental laws.

He first initiated an inquiry in the House of Representatives.

Then, he asked the state-run Land Bank of the Philippines to cancel DBSN’s loan and file a case against the borrower for misuse of the funds, ignoring the fact that LandBank is a very reputable and financing institution that would not lend money without conducting due diligence.

If LBP trusted the Oñates with a sizable amount of cash, it must have gone through the loan application with a fine-toothed comb and decided that the applicant was worth every peso of the credit line.

And did Gomez imply that the Department of Environment and Natural Resources was grossly remiss in discharging its duties by filing complaints against DBSN?

But more importantly, did Gomez even think that his actions would suddenly leave over 500 DBSN workers jobless if DBSN is padlocked?

If he manages to put the DBSN and its owners out of business, that would certainly mean economic dislocation of the workers and their respective families.

Executives of the Albuera, Leyte-based DBSN insist that they have maintained good housekeeping and best business practices as the core values of their company which grew steadily over the years from a modest beginning in 2016. The agri firm emphasizes its operations are geared towards “protecting and preserving the ecosystem and returning favors to your host communities to make a difference in the lives of the general public and the stakeholders without losing sight of your corporation’s mission and vision.”

If LBP trusted the Oñates with a sizable amount of cash, it must have gone through the loan application with a fine-toothed comb and decided that the applicant was worth every peso of the credit line

DBSN is a poultry processing plant that counts as its top client the giant San Miguel Foods Inc. bearing the Magnolia Chicken brand.

It has gained the reputation of being one of the most modern and the biggest automated poultry processing plants south of the Luzon mainland, with an output capacity of about 60,000 dressed chicken daily.

At present, it employs mostly local villagers.

DBSN is also accredited by the National Meat Inspection Service for “Good Manufacturing Practices” and was granted AAA rating by the Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (HACCP) as an exclusive poultry dressing facility in the region.

DBSN likewise passed with flying colors a performance assessment by an independent audit firm led by Engr. Aldwin Camance.

Double horror: Ukrainian returnees come back to war

The approaching Iranian-made drones, which sounded like a sputtering “old motorcycle,” prompted the family to rush away from the windows, while Vladyslav found himself shielding his child with his body.

One drone slammed into a technical college nearby, shaking their house and leaving cracks in the walls. Another crashed nearby, leaving their fence pocked by shrapnel. Their backyard, festooned with flowers and Valery’s toys, was still littered with pieces of mangled debris.

“When you live in Kharkiv you can get hit any time,” Filipova said. Tears Her experience underscores how those displaced by the war and later returned to Kharkiv are being exposed once again to bombing raids that have increased since Ukraine launched its counteroffensive hundreds of miles away.

Authorities last week announced mandatory evacuations of the frontline Kupiansk district, where growing hostilities have raised the spectre of a second Russian occupation.

Victoria Revenko, 38, said her two children, 11 and 9, blamed her for the loss of their father, who volunteered to fight after returning to Kharkiv from the capital Kyiv, their refuge from the early days of war.

“My son says: ‘If we had stayed in Kyiv, this would never have happened”,” Revenko said. Refusing to come to terms with their father’s recent killing on the eastern Lugansk frontline, the children still send text messages to his phone hoping for a response. Sobbing during the interview with AFP in a park, Revenko said she holds back the tears at home to avoid further upsetting her children.

Fatalism

About 1.2 million people now live in Kharkiv city from a low of around 300,000 after the war erupted, mayor Igor Terekhov told AFP, citing official estimates. That is close to the pre-war population of about 1.5 million.

Some residents instead measure the influx in terms of ballooning traffic jams.

Ukraine’s second biggest city, located around 30 kilometers from the Russian border, was never occupied but it is filled with bomb-scarred monuments to a savage war -- museums scarred by shrapnel, universities without roofs and streets with gaping craters.

Returnees found a city with few job opportunities surrounded by settlements where mines and unexploded ordnance left behind by the Russians make life dangerous even without the fresh attacks. The repopulation illustrates the “fatalistic” attitude of people who refuse to believe the war will last for long or struggle to blend into other places and yearn for home despite the dangers, Kharkivbased political analyst Nataliya Zubar told AFP. ‘War and death’

A running joke is that Kharkiv natives can be

Due to their interdisciplinary nature, the essence of green skills is sometimes expressed, partly if not wholly, through other associated terms like “skills for the future” and “skills for green jobs.”

While green skills are relevant for people of all ages, they have heightened importance for younger people, who can contribute to the green transition for a longer period.

Four key climate change indicators –greenhouse gas concentrations, sea level rise, ocean heat and ocean acidification – set new records in 2021.

This is yet another bold sign human activities are causing planetary-scale changes on land, in the ocean, and in the atmosphere, with dramatic and long-lasting ramifications.

Earlier on. the United Nations said the youth’s “green skills” are essential to a successful transition to the green economy.

The UN defines “green skills” as “knowledge, abilities, values, and attitudes needed to live in, develop and support a sustainable and resource-efficient society.”

According to data released by the International Labor Organization, a green transition could yield 8.4 million jobs for young people by 2040.

“The Plant (DBSN) was compliant with all the required permits for its operations. It has an ECC (Environmental Compliance Certificate) which was amended with the operations increased in production. It has a discharge permit and a permit to operate air pollution devices (for its standby generator). It has a hazardous waste (facility) for its used oil and used oil containers,” the audit report stated.

DBSN officials point out their main objective is to be recognized as a “world-class and dynamic company that is most admired for its people, products, purpose and performance.”

They also said the firm seeks to “drive the quality and safety of their products and services exceeding the needs and expectations of our (clientele) through a management system with competent personnel.”

Mayor Oñate has dared Rep. Gomez to present his case in the proper forum—the courts of law—and not in the bar of public opinion. He wants court hearings to “clear the air once and for all the malicious and baseless accusations being hurled against me over the family-owned poultry dressing plant.”

“The courts are the right forum for both accused and accuser to face each other instead of in the bar of public opinion where the truth can be easily distorted and the untruth touted to the maximum to serve vested interest,” Oñate stressed.

“There must be a deeper motive for Congressman Gomez to sue us other than our alleged liabilities as he had raised in a legislative hearing and through press releases to the media, but we shall leave it at that.

“What is at stake here is my reputation and integrity both as an entrepreneur and public servant, as well as the viability of a multimillion-peso business venture and the job security of our more than 500 employees,” the mayor said. En garde, Mayor Oñate seems to be saying to the ex-fencer.

But perhaps the latter should brush up on Shakespeare instead?

(Email: ernhil@yahoo.com) easily distinguished in a crowd of Ukrainians because they are often the least responsive when air raid sirens wail.

Many see no point in hiding as being so near the border means missiles often land before the warning sounds.

Alina Ostrykova, an NGO worker who returned to Kharkiv this summer with her toddler despite having the means to leave the country, echoed the sentiment by pointing to a woman in heels outside a trendy bar.

“She knows it won’t be easy to run to a shelter in heels,” Ostrykova, 31, told AFP. “What option do people have? Just keep running?”

In a way, Ostrykova added, it is the fatalism of the people who have returned or refused to leave that saved Ukraine from collapsing after the invasion.

A similar sentiment reigns in Filipova’s home, recently renovated at great expense despite the risks of war.

The family plans to stay put after the recent strikes and, for now, are happy for their child to mistake the explosions for thunder.

“I don’t think a three-year-old can grasp the concept of war and death,” Filipova said. “It’s better she thinks it’s thunder.” AFP