Quezon City, Philippines – Pollution watchdog EcoWaste Coalition raises alarm on the proposed  Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) bill on plastic packaging waste and asks President Rodrigo Duterte to scrap said proposed bill.

“Institutionalizing EPR mechanisms is a welcome development in our push for a plastic-free Philippines. Sadly, the proposed EPR bill by congress promotes greenwashing and false solutions allowing plastic polluters to just continue their wasteful business practices at the expense of the environment and our communities,” said  Coleen Salamat, Plastic Solutions Campaigner of EcoWaste Coalition.

According to the group, a genuine EPR follows the concept of ‘polluters’ pay principle’ that  puts greater responsibility on those who pollute more, such as the plastic industry and producers of fast-moving consumer goods.

“The current trend on the initiatives of consistent top polluters like Nestle, Procter and Gamble, Unilever, Coca-Cola, still heavily rely on cement kilns, chemical recycling, and other false solutions that burn or melt single-use plastics. These false solutions are not just a threat to the environment but also a public health concern. Schemes like these do not reduce or prevent waste but also contribute to worsening of air pollution,” said Salamat.

“The current EPR bill is not a precedent that polluters will be held accountable since it does not penalize producers for prohibited acts on the production, use, distribution, and importation of non-environmentally acceptable products and packaging,” added Salamat.

In 2019, a research by Nature Climate Change found that if plastic was a country, it would be the fifth largest emitter in the world.

“We urge President Duterte to stay true to the Philippines commitment of 75% reduction of domestic emission by 2030. We are in a defining moment for our climate, we need lasting zero waste solutions that do not further contribute to the warming of our planet,” said Salamat.

# # #

For more information, please contact:
EcoWaste Coalition
info@ecowastecoalition.org

LAIKO Conversation on the Pentecost:

Rev. Fr. Benjamin Alforque, MSC

Prior to the May 9, 2022 elections the mechanisms for deception, cheating, fraud and usurpation of People’s Power in favor of the tandem of dictatorship and tyranny were already in place.

The Structure of the Cheating Machinery:

1. Imee Marcos chaired the Senate Committee on Electoral Reforms and People’s Participation.

2. The COMELEC was staffed with commissioners identified with the present Malacañang occupant as classmate, or schoolmate, co- provincianos from Davao and a former Marcos lawyer.

3. COMELEC printed more than 40 million ballots and configured SD card for the Smartmatic machines without any party representative or watchers present.

4. F2 Logistics, a company of the crony of the Malacañang occupant handled the transport of ballots, voting machines, SD cards, election returns and other election paraphernalia from the COMELEC to the precincts and back.

5. One presidential candidate boasted of having met governors and local executives, asking them to count the votes correctly and assuring them of help in their programs for their constituents.

In Philippine electoral realities, it is common knowledge that governors, representatives and local officials have mastered the SOPs of cheating, such as, but not limited to: (a) changing of COMELEC officers not favorable or beholden to them; (b) filling up of ballots and stuffing the boxes with these pre-shaded votes; and (c) even using the Sangguniang Kabataan officers and members to do these tricks by quarantining them for days prior to election day.

6. Red-tagging and creating fake public scandals were tools to discredit and destroy candidates, discourage their supporters and weaken their political machinery. The first target has always been the Left, and then the opposition, by linking the Opposition with the Communists.

7. The Coup-Martial Law-No Elections Options: there was a move to prevent a LeniKiko and Tropa victory, at all cost. This time politicians and the military came up with a fake excuse of a communist violent disruption of the electoral process which could force government and the military to postpone the elections, or declare no elections, until 6 months to a year, from May 9, 2022. In fact, massive opposition rallies were tagged as rehearsals for a new People Power Revolution, instigated by the Left.

Behind the scene was the huge army of trolls in the social media that were paid cultural apparatus tasked to glowingly paint the son of the dictator and the daughter of the tyrant as positive campaigners for unity, that Martial Law was the golden age of the Philippines and that the present Malacañang occupant picked up the progress of the country neglected by succeeding presidents after Martial Law.

A the same time these aggressively demonized most especially the LeniKiko tandem, the Tropa and Makabayan candidates with the most vile language, most hateful charges and lies ranging from the most laughable and degrading commentaries to the most immoral concoctions and demeaning sexual gossips. This use of social media included the mind- conditioning surveys that must be proved by the “results of the actual canvassing of votes, so quick and so massive, so that these results would appear unassailable and acceptable that, confused, the opposition and the masses would have no room to suspect and complain but be sad and lick their defeat in sorrow and grief and powerlessness and utter defeat!”