30 houses damaged in Marilao factory blast

MALOLOS CITY—At least 30 houses were damaged in an explosion at a factory in Marilao town early Wednesday morning.

No one was reported injured but residents reported trauma suffered by children, most are still have to see a doctor.

The Provincial Fire Marshall of Bulacan started yesterday morning a thorough investigation following statements from the Marilao Fire station that there is no need for an investigation claiming the explosion was caused by lightning.

Other issues that still to be resolved by investigators is to determine what kind of chemical contained in the tank that exploded inside the compound of the WT Treat Chemical Corporation located at Barangay Loma De Gato in Marilao town.

BFP records showed that the tank contained hydrogen peroxide, but journalists who saw to tank said it was marked “sulfuric acid” which some residents also claimed.

Rufino Concepcion, a village councilman said no less than 30 houses were damaged in the blast.

In a telephone interview, Concepcion said he was asleep when the explosion occurred.

He said it was so loud that it woke him and his wife, while it opened their steel window.

Concepcion’s house did not suffer damages, but others suffered especially the one owned by Julia Abiertas, a 75-year old widow.

Located less than 100 meters from ground zero, Abiertas’ house suffered the most damage.

Not only that, her three grandchildren living with her suffered trauma, not to mention that Abiertas herself said in a telephone interview that she is suffering from dizziness  since the explosion.

Like Concepcion, Abiertas was also sleep when the explosion occurred, but her grandchildren, especially youngest one was still awake.

She said that her five year grandchild was eating when the explosion rocked their house.

“He thought we were bombed that why until now he keeps yelling “help,” said Abiertas in vernacular.

As this developed, Fire Superintendent Romeo Rillo, the fire marshal of Bulacan went to the blast site yesterday morning following statement of local fire department that they will no longer investigate.

This made Rillo furious noting at least 30 houses were damaged.

He also vowed to discipline the firemen who made the statement.

Ochoa to lead Barasoain freedom rites

MALOLOS CITY—Executive Secretary Paquito Ochoa Jr., is set to lead the 115th Independence Day celebrations at the historic Barasoain Church here on Wednesday.

This came as Foreign Affairs Secretary Albert Del Rosario declined the invitation of the National Historical Commission of the Philippines (NHCP).

The theme for this year’s Independence Day celebration will focus on “Ambagan Tungo sa Malawakang Kaunlaran.”

Neth Jimenez, curator of the Barasoain Museum here, said that everything is ready for Wednesday’s celebrations.

He said that hundreds of Bulakenyos led by local elected officials along with teachers from different schools are expected to participate in the annual celebrations.

Last year, President Benigno Aquino III led the 114th Independence Day celebration here. He will lead the same at Liwasang Bonifacio in Manila on Wednesday.

Jimenez said that as guest speaker Ochoa is expected to highlight the importance of the One Bulacan Program Rapid Industrialization and Development (PRIDE) which he help engineered.

One Bulacan PRIDE is a mechanism that will push development projects in the province.

In includes seven strategies namely: construction of facilities for education and technology, establishment of showroom for jewelry industry in the province, construction of a food terminal, construction of mineral processing zone, conversion of the towns of Plaridel,Pulilan, and Baliwag into highly urbanized district, establishment of tourism economic zones, and satellite government center in the mountain town of Donya Remedios Trinidad in eastern Bulacan.

Earlier, Gov. Wilhelmino Alvarado said that plans for One Bulacan PRIDE will replicate the industrialization program implemented in Shenzhen in Southern China.

Shenzhen is one of the most successful economic zones in the world that developed at an unprecedented rate.

Alvarado said that Shenzhen is a small fishing village in 1983, but today it is a sprawling and high technology manufacturing service city.

Its population grew from 351,000 in 1982 to 14,500,000 in 2012.

Alvarado added that as special economic zone established in 1979, Shenzhen is a brain child of the late Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping.

It is now home to more than 6,000 design companies with over 60,000 employees.

Alvarado to PNP: STOP THE KILLINGS

By Dino Balabo

MALOLOS CITY—Gov. Wilhelmino Alvarado issued over the weekend marching orders to the Bulacan police to stop the spate of killings in the province. 

The killings which started before the May 13 polls left at least six persons including two village chairmen, a businessman and his wife.

“We cannot allow the killings to go unpunished,” Alvarado said in an interview, adding that he orders to Senior Supt. Joel Orduna, acting provincial police director, to undertake “immediate and definitive action.”

The governor said that the killings appeared to have a pattern. The village chair from San Miguel town was killed days before the elections, while in Balagtas town, Ernesto Ventura, the village chief of Barangay Santol, was shot to death earlier this week.Both cases involved assailants on board motorcycles.

“The pattern is clear, the suspects are riding in tandem,” he said.

Similar pattern is reported in the killing of a businessman and his wife in Malolos City on Monday afternoon.

Based on reports, the victims had just withdrawn more than a million pesos from a bank when they were ambushed at the Blas Ople Road here on their way home to Hagonoy town.

According to Alvarado, the police are looking at the “possible connection” in the cases.

He said that the suspects in an earlier killing in Meycauayan City were nabbed in the province of Laguna.

“The Bulacan Provincial Police Office are also looking at the modus operandi including the robberyand murder case in Calumpit,” Alvarado said.

When asked if he is planning to relieve local police officers for negligence of duty, the governor said that the election ban prohibition is still active.

“Even if we wanted to relieve some officers, there is still the election ban,” he said, but stressed that “criminals cannot be bolder than our law enforcers.”

Earlier this week, a teenager from Baliwag town was beaten up by suspected drug addicts in Plaridel town.

The boy died four days later from severe head injuries.

No tuition fee hike at Bulacan State University

MALOLOS CITY—The Bulacan State University (BulSU) here may be the only state university in Central Luzon that has not increased its tuition fee since 2007.

This is due to subsidy provided by foreign students including Chinese and Taiwanese nationals.

Aside from the above, the university implemented the provisions of the Republic Act 8292 or the Higher Education Modernization act of 1997 which allowed them to implement income generating projects (IGP).

“We don’t need to raise our tuition fees because we have enough money,” said Dr. Mariano De Jesus, president of BulSU.

He recounted that in his first inaugural speech in 2007 when he was first appointed as President of BulSU, he vowed to exhaust all other means to avoid tuition fee hike.

De Jesus’ decision is contrary to current situations in other schools in the country today which hiked their tuition fees.

“It’s all in the strategy which was provided by RA 8292,” he said in disclosing the secrets of non-tuition fee hike in the last six years.

 

One of the keys is the opening the BulSU international programs in Hongkong, China, Macau, South Korea, Malaysia, Singapore, Vietnam and even in Addis Ababa in Ethiopia in East Africa.

Foreign students enrolled in BulSU international programs are taking post graduate courses.

“For every student, let say a Chinese or Taiwanese, we charge them three times the tuition fee paid by our local students,’ De Jesus said.

 This means, he said, for every foreign student, they subsidize tuition fee of two Filipino students.

For other income generating projects, De Jesus opened part of the campus especially the area fronting the MacArthur highway here to commercial establishments.

He said that the university is earning about a million pesos every month for rentals of the commercial establishments that includes a Caltex gas station, a mini-mall with over 100 tenants, and space rented by McDonalds, an international fastfood chain.

According to the president, income generated by the university allowed them to partly subsidize students’ tuition fees, instructors’ salaries, and built ne facilities like a gymnasium a hostel and additional classroom.

The said facilities, especially the gymnasium and the hostel are also being used by some organizations from time to time, wherein the university still able to generate income by charging for rentals.

However, as the biggest state university in central Luzon with student enrollment of at least 35,000 last year, De Jesus said that BulSU is still visited by problems.

As enrollment begins, the president admitted that his biggest problem now is how to reject students.

“We expect that out enrollment will reach to 37,000 this year and we are avoiding it to reach 40,000, otherwise, quality of education will suffer,” he said.

At present, BulSU maintains satellite campuses in the towns of Bustos, Hagonoy, Bulakan, and in the City of San Jose Del Monte.

They are not eyeing the possible opening of a BulSu extension class in the nearby Guiguinto town.  Dino Balabo

Fisherfolk to Senate today

MALOLOS CITY—Hundreds of fisherfolk are set today to hold an early morning fluvial parade on Manila bay and storm the Senate building’s waterfront.

Dubbed as “Bangkaan para sagipin ang pangisdaan,” the fluvia parade will start at 7 o’clock at the C-4 terminal in Navotas City and at the Freedom Island in Parañaque, an hour later.

All parade participants will be on at least 40 large boats and will converge in front of the Senate in Pasay City.

This will coincide with today’s celebration of Fisherfolk Day based on of Presidential Proclamation No. 261 signedin 2000 by then President Joseph Ejercito Estrada.

Invited to the activity are Director Asis Perez of the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (BFAR) to address concerns on overfishing and reelected Senator Gringo Honasan to address the fisherfolk with regard to the National Land Use and Management Act that is pending in the Senate.

Pablo Rosales of the Save the Fisheries Now Network however said that fisherfolk have nothing to celebrate as they are one of the basic sectors that have remained marginalized.

In a statement, Rosales said that fisherfolk are considered to be the poorest of the poor with 41.4% poverty incidence as cited in the latest National Statistical Coordination Board (NSCB) report.

 He also said that that the country’s fishing grounds are heavily exploited by commercial as well as foreign fishers like the Taiwanese and Chinese fishing vessels that encroach on Philippine seas.

On the other hand, seaweed farmers, mostly women, are disenfranchised by aggressive coastal real estate development as traditional areas for seaweed and fish drying are converted into private beach resorts, adding that fisherfolk settlements are practically not implemented nor respected.

He said that aside from these concerns, his group will also demand the passage of the National Land Use and Management Act, presently pending at the Senate,a proposed bill that will establish a separate Department of Fisheries, the Marine Protected Area Bill, the End the Reclamation that Destroys Marine Biodiversity bill and a call to end overfishing. Dino Balabo

Back-to-school trade fair and discount caravan in Bulacan

MALOLOS CITY—Still looking for school supplies at discounted prices?

Worry not.

The Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) Bulacan provincial office will launch its 8th Back-to-School Trade Fair and Diskwento Caravan at the Bulacan Capitol grounds on Wednesday, May 29.

Aimed at providing affordable school supplies like note books, pens, pencils, bags, garments, shoes and others, the event  was organized in partnership with the Provincial Cooperative and Enterprise Development Office (PCEDO) and the Bulacan Small and Medium Enterprises Development (SMED) Council.

Rhine Aldana, DTI provincial director, said they planned the launch of the trade fair in time for the release of employees’ month-end salaries.

“It’s our 8th annual trade fair aimed to help Bulakenyos as class opening approaches,” Aldana said.

She added that that it also encourages cooperation of Bulacan-based companies with a sense of corporate social responsibility.

She said the annual trade fair is conducted to assist local MSMEs to generate sales and also to provide assistance to low-income earners avail of reduced prices of basic and prime commodities.

Aldana said DTI-Bulacan will also invite other government agencies to extend their services like TESDA to provide free massage, foot spa and haircut along with other government agencies like the Social Security System (SSS), Philippine health Insurance Corporation (Philhealth), Pagibig and the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) for information assistance of their services as an added attraction to the event. Dino Balabo

BULACAN GOVERNOR & VICE-GOVERNOR winning candidates

PROVINCIAL GOVERNOR of BULACAN

Candidate	Party	Votes
SY-ALVARADO, WILHELMINO (NUP)	NATIONAL UNITY PARTY	894593

PROVINCIAL VICE-GOVERNOR of BULACAN

Candidate	Party	Votes
FERNANDO, DANIEL (NUP)	NATIONAL UNITY PARTY	914960

SOURCE: Comelec-Bulacan