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The Old Water Tower and the City Museum
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Ex- Mayor’s E.O. No.2010CGJ-21: How well was it?
During the past administration of the city’s former mayor, Constantino ‘Tinnex’ Jaraula, the government of Cagayan de Oro has imposed a smoking ban at the Divisoria Night Cafe and Night Market last April 9, 2010. Under Executive Order No. 2010CGJ-21, all the people, government agencies, and business enterprises are to adhere and bear the tobacco-free Divisoria Night Café and Market.
In his hopes, Mr. Jaraula said that the smoking ban would drive an influential global message that the city is stern about the change for a better living.“The Divisoria Night Cafe and Night Market is one event, which is nationally and internationally acknowledged as among Cagayan de Oro’s famous attractions, that will generate the necessary attention and interest if used to showcase the city’s pursuit of healthy living”,he said.
Sir Tinnex also noted that a tobacco-free Divisoria would provide a venue to promote the benefits of healthier, tobacco-free lifestyle and surroundings.
In line with the smoking ban, selling of cigarettes or any form of tobacco is prohibited within Divisoria. Consumers would also be barred from smoking within the area for the duration of the tobacco-free night.
As the smoking ban issue was boiling, the locals tend to not smoke during Saturdays and Sundays while wandering in Divisoria. During the other days, they seem to be free whenever and wherever they wanted to smoke. At this very moment in time under the administration of the recent City Mayor Vicente Y. Emano, smokers are everywhere. It seems like the E.O. No.2010CGJ-21 has been out to waste and issues concerning smoking have been so rampant.
This addictive tobacco is a plant grown for its leaves, which are smoked, chewed, or sniffed for a mixture of effects. It has more than 19 cancer-causing chemicals, of which most are known as tar. More than 4,000 other chemicals and at least 400 toxic substances are also contained in a cigarette.
According to researches, a cigarette burns at 700°C at the tip and around 60°C in the core. This temperature breaks down the tobacco to create various toxins. The ingredients that are most harmful are the tar which is a carcinogen that causes cancer and carbon monoxide that may cause the reduction of oxygen levels in the body. Nicotine is an addictive component that would increase cholesterol levels in the body.
Smoking affects how long you live. Studies have shown that smoking reduces life expectancy by seven to eight years. On average, each cigarette shortens a smoker’s life by around 11 minutes. Though many smokers come to depend on the upbeat effects of nicotine, such as boosting their mood, improving short-term memory and attentiveness, and producing a sense of interests, a lot of its risks have been noted.
Blood clots in the brain which can direct to strokes and coronary artery disease that brings about heart attacks are the familiar heart and blood vessel problems caused by smoking.
Ninety percent of lung cancer cases are due to smoking. One out of ten light smokers and almost one in five heavy smokers, those who smoke more than 15 cigarettes a day, will die of lung cancer. The more cigarettes you smoke in a day, the higher are your danger of lung cancer. If you smoke, the risk of contracting mouth cancer is four times higher than of a non-smoker. Other health threats are also visible to smokers like the decreased ability to taste and smell, and the loss of sight. Tooth and gum diseases and the wrinkling of the skin can also be observed in smokers. Moreover, smoking can harm the sperm, eventually leading to infertility.
It’s one good thing that the Northern Mindanao Medical Center (NMMC) offers therapies for all smokers to ease the obsession to smoking. Dr. Roy Sasil Jr., officer-in-charge of the Smoking Cessation Clinic, said that the treatments consist of counseling and pharmacological healing.
According to Dr. Sasil, patients will go through a sequence of counseling sessions that will help them deal with their addiction.
”But the person must possess personal conviction or commitment to stop smoking so that it will be effective”, Mr. Roy said. He also emphasized that the rehabilitation will be of no use if the patients are not willing to submit themselves to quit smoking. “Many people contacted the clinic but some patients discontinued the sessions and never returned,”he assumed.
On the other hand, the Framework Convention Tobacco Control Alliance (FCAP), a non-government organization, supports the movement against smoking tobacco in Cagayan de Oro. The Regional Tobacco Control Network (RTCN) and the Department of Health (DOH) intend to create a city that is smoke-free. With that, Joyce Sierra, FCAP communications officer, said that to help harden their advocacy, it would be of great advantage if Mayor Emano would end smoking. The Mayor should leave smoking to serve as an example to his people.
FCAP commits in saving the lives of the millions of people by preventing smoking.
”Thirty million Filipinos suffer with the debilitating diseases and painful deaths due to smoking and another 30 million suffers the same due to second hand smoke. The smokers are not the enemies here and that they are mere victims of life-long addiction to smoking. Our fight here is to engage with the House of Representatives, Senate, national government agencies and local government units by passing laws against tobacco”, Miss Sierra said.
Climate change is anticipated to knock developing countries the toughest. The average pattern of weather changes constantly for millions of years. Scientists had distinguished several causes that contribute to the change in climate.
The burning of fossil fuels like coal, oil, and gas is most expected to have a huge impact on the climate. Burning makes carbon dioxide gas. Since people began burning large amounts of coal and oil in the early 1800s, the amount of carbon dioxide in the earth’s atmosphere has increased by almost 30%. According to a continuing temperature analysis initiated by the scientists at NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS), the average global temperature on Earth has increased by about 0.8° Celsius (1.4° Fahrenheit). Two-thirds of the warming has occurred since 1975, at a rate of about 0.15° to 0.20° Celsius per decade.
Activities of men that boost possible climate change include deforestation. Besides the carbon dioxide that is freed, human expulsion of methane and nitrous oxide can also throw in almost half as much warming. According to the 2006 report by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), our diet, particularly, the meat in them causes more carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide to discharge into the atmosphere. Records from the FAO found out that recent production levels of meat contribute between 14 to 22 percent of the 36 billion tons of greenhouse gases that the planet is producing every year.
The effects of climate change on higher temperatures, changes in rainfall pattern, rising sea levels, and weather-related catastrophes are common. Other consequences get serious. In some places, the changes could harshly hit various necessities to human life. Consequently, threats on livelihood, food security, and water stability are likely to happen.
Over 70% of workers in Africa rely on small-scale farming that is dependent on direct rainfall. Food security can be susceptible by even the least alterations in weather patterns. If climate change is not avoided, 80 to 120 million people will be at risk of hunger. Furthermore, much of the population of Latin America is experiencing inadequate food security. According to the 2005 Human Development Report, approximately 10% of the population of Latin America and the Caribbean is malnourished.
Transportation and housing are at risk to climate change as many people live in environmentally minor areas. The New Economics Foundation says that more than 60% of Asians will be living in urban areas by 2015. The World Bank had estimated that between 25 to 40% of all urban residents in developing countries live in areas with little or no access to clean water. It is also considered by The New Economics Foundation that water stress is one of the major impacts of climate change. Records show that incidents on flooding increase the chances of contamination of fresh water supplies.
The possibilities of human-derived carbon dioxide to adversely change the Earth’s climate had resulted in attempts on the international level to standardize global carbon dioxide emissions. The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the Kyoto Protocol are some that are noted.
The UNFCCC was established on March 21, 1994 to make moves on how to address climate change issues. The convention intends to look for information on GHG emissions and national policies. It also plans to initiate strategies that will encourage GHG emission reduction and adaptation to the unfavorable effects of climate change.
In support to that, a number of nations agreed for the Kyoto Protocol. This system, which was made active on February 16, 2005, is an international union that sets a target reduction of GHG emissions for 37 industrialized countries and European communities starting from 2008 to 2012. To support the countries in achieving their targets, the Kyoto Protocol allows emissions trading or the selling of excess allowable emission of carbon dioxide of a country to another country. The protocol also offers the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) which allows countries to meet their targets by implementing emission-reduction projects in Non-Annex I countries. Parties under this annex belonged in the low-income group, or the developing countries.
Emission trading is an environmental strategy which uses the markets to produce a cleaner environment (Sharon Beder, ‘Emissions Trading: A Vehicle for Achieving Greenhouse Targets’, Engineers Australia, August 1999, pp. 28-9). It is a market-based system for environmental development that allows parties to buy and sell permits for emissions, or credits for emission reductions of certain pollutants, in which would limit the production of greenhouse gases. A cap-and-trade scheme depends on a cap that lessens emissions over time. If the cap is set too high, too much emission will enter the atmosphere. If the cap is set too low, allowances are insufficient and exspensive.
As of 21 November 2011, 3583 projects have been registered by the CDM Executive Board as CDM projects. These projects trim down greenhouse gas emissions by an estimated 538 million ton of carbon dioxide equivalent per year (Hepburn, C. (November 2007). “Carbon Trading: A Review of the Kyoto Mechanisms”. Annual Review of Environment and Resources 32: 375–393).
Though CDM allows developed countries to invest in emission reductions, there is a developing process directed to developing countries that will remove greenhouse gases in the air. In answer to that, the Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation in Developing Countries (REDD) is initiated to limit the GHG emissions by not cutting their carbon- rich forests, or by reducing their deforestation and forest degradation rates. Encouraging incentives were planned to reduce gas discharges in response to the 9 to 13 million ha of forests that are destroyed each year according to Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).
With the factors that help spur deforestation in tropical countries which include agriculture, logging, mining, monoculture plantations, oil extraction, and road expansion, an estimated 4, 500 gigatonnes of carbon is stored in forests, of which 50 % of that amount is emitted from Indonesia and Brazil, the top greenhouse gas emitting countries.
The implementation of REDD is still on progression and so are the debates. On the lighter side, it presents several benefits. First, the emission reductions and ecological impact of REDD could be significant for forest management. Also, REDD could have positive developmental effects by channeling investments to some of the world’s poorest since according to UN, the richer nations pay the inferior ones not to cut down their forests.
REDD, however, also entails numerous conflicting views. It does not include the rights of the indigenous peoples who are living in the forests. Too much government intervention has limited the access of the local people to the forest. Besides, their tenurial rights aren’t protected, even violated.
Battle cry: Amend R.A. 9344
Street children and the juvenile offenders are very much contributing to the societal problems. Exposed to unlawful rudiments, those kids are susceptible to immoral actions like drug addiction, prostitution, and other crimes like homicide, murder, physical injury, rape, robbery, and theft. The act of committing these crimes is basically an effect of the great poverty that they are in.
Republic Act 9344, whose key author was Senator Francis Pangilinan, has set 15 as the maximum age of exclusion from criminal liability. Minors above the age of 15 are also exempted and can only be subjected to an intervention program unless he or she acted with judgment. Authorities shall discharge right away a 15 year old or below child who has taken into detention. The law says that the child will be of his parents’, guardians’, or closest relative’s care.
The local social welfare officer will be the one to determine what appropriate programs are suited for the child. If the teenager has no parents or his family rejects him, he may proceed to non- government organizations or religious groups. This law also covers that those children under the age of 18 are not to be prosecuted for prostitution and sniffing of rugby.
A child’s sentence is suspended if he is found to be below 18 years old. When he gets to 18, the court will then decide whether to release him, carry out the sentence, or extend the delay of the sentence until he reaches 21. The child will be placed under probation or be in a farming site. He may also be under any other training facility instead of being jailed. Moreover, the law bans authorities from subjecting minor offenders to physical, psychological and emotional maltreatment.
A large percent of the total crime rate in the city has involved the youngsters, and though a lot of national officials and police officers had said yes to R.A. 9344, City Police Director Gerardo Rosales was one of the many who opposed the said law.
“In Cagayan de Oro alone, between 46 to 48 percent of crimes are being committed by minors. There are a lot of minors, from age 16 to 18, committing faults but cannot be imprisoned because of that law”, said Mr. Rosales.
Sir Gerardo added that Rehabilitation Centers in the city need expansion, yet the local government units do not have the capacity and funding.
“If that is the case, it is evidently seen that these immature offenders will be hired and persuaded by crime groups since they are not accountable of committing crimes, hence can be pulled out from jails”, he assumed.
Moreover, Cagayan de Oro Representative for the 2nd District, Rufus B. Rodriguez supported the proposed alteration on R.A. 9344. On his interview with Sun Star Cagayan de Oro, he asked to cut the age of criminal liability from 15 years old to nine years old.
These minors, if under arrest, will not be put to prison and could not be charged of the crime they have committed since they are protected by the law.
“I’m in favor of amending R.A. 9344 and to file charges against parents who are tolerating their children in committing such crimes,” as emphasized by Councilor Ian Mark Nacaya, chairperson of the City Council’s committee on police, fire and public.
As what I stand for in support for the revision of the R. A. 9344, these minor offenders, should not be taken for granted in view of the fact that a lot of those criminal minds have wandered into the community. Children who are under the shield of this law are to be used as noxious arms for prevalent crime activities. In this course of action, parents should be accountable of their children’s deeds. They are the ones to foster them with the indispensable values and endow with them the groundwork of being upright individuals.
I ain’t that book geek, bookworm, or whatever people would want to label it since reading books has been out of my routine the moment I left my childhood. I used to read a collection of bible stories way back. In high school, I got hooked on Sweet Valley High and Hardy Boys. Later in college, I got to surprise myself by reading a Katherine Paterson- fiction novel.
Paterson and I have few things in familiar. In my recent years, I’m pretty off sure of what I wanted to become. I badly wanted to become someone! I could relate when I was in my elementary days, I would desire to be a nurse. When I reached my teenage years, I also feel like becoming a marine biologist or an astronaut perhaps since I would love to study space and heavenly things. But when I was in college, I wanted to be a teacher and avoided math whenever possible, just like Katherine.
In her earlier years, she never imagined herself becoming a writer. She would dream of becoming a movie star and a missionary. But when she’s in her 20’s, she wanted to marry and have plenty of children.
I like how Katherine writes, though I only read Bridge to Terabithia, because she lets her characters walk into her imagination and begin to take over her life. I admire her for not having writing habits, as she would say “You can’t wait for inspiration to strike. It’s like lightning”. After which, she then spends time in knowing those characters and telling their stories, making every story and character real.
It’s a splendid thing how this American novelist could bring me back to my early days with her children’s and young adult fiction novels and stories. In Paterson’s novels, I see that we must learn to conquer through self-sacrifice. Despite her characters face terrible situations, Paterson writes with kindness and understanding. After facing baffled events, her characters would prevail in triumph and redeem themselves and their aspirations even though they faced hard situations mostly on their own.
Katherine Paterson wrote Bridge to Terabithia in a creative and magical manner. This world of imagination and learning opened me in so many ways. To create a world on your own, a secret one, where you can be in power, is just amazing. As a daydreamer, I dreamt of big things. Often times, I would play scenes and kill people in my head, fearless and angry. But at the end of the day, I always go home to the sick reality. With that, one can simply escape their depressions and frustrations as they shift to their magical kingdom.
Katherine Paterson wrote Bridge to Terabithia because her son David’s best friend, an eight-year-old named Lisa Hill, was struck and killed by lightning. She wrote the book to try to make sense out of a tragedy that seemed senseless. She found the responsibility to create characters that are not just models of good behavior, but are real ones. She creates characters that speak and act to people, like real people. The respect she has for her characters and her readers made me realize how great she is as a writer and as a person.
What I learned is that no matter how we turn away, we must discover how to face the kicks in life to win over them. It’s not forever that we stay on our comfort zones, we have to take risk.
