Press Release
June 20, 2009

Press statement of Senator Loren Legarda

On Protect the children

Our children are our future and our source of pride and joy, so much so that we must provide them a good education so they can realize their full potential. But first, we must keep them alive.

The statistics cited by a report quoting the UNICEF representative to the Philippines is most alarming -- that a Filipino child dies every hour from accidents like drowning, road mishaps, poisoning, falls and burns.

This problem must be resolved because it is the duty of everyone, of every adult to ensure the safety of children whether they be at home, schools or elsewhere. There is a pressing need for all Filipinos to realize the value of making our environment child-safe, which should start at home and which government must help ensure in public places.

I, thus, laud an initiative by the City of Tarlac and the Department of Health to pioneer a program in Barangay Maliwalo towards child protection, with 40 percent of the 12,000 residents of the said village being children.

I urge the DOH and all local government units to adopt this program because protecting our children from harm, most of which are preventable, is of grave importance. It is something that needs to be done now, not tomorrow.

On Comelec must look on complaints vs Smartmatic

The Comelec must not leave unresolved nagging doubts on the ownership, capitalization and track record of Smartmatic, the foreign partner of the joint venture that bagged the commission's poll automation contract.

The Comelec must give due course to the complaints and not brush them aside as mere sourgraping, just because two losing bidders raised the issues.

No less than the future of our country is at stake here, so the Comelec must act with dispatch on this matter, while Smartmatic must be prompt in answering point-by-point the complaints against it.

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