A local official disclosed that the prices of fruits have increased to as high as 25 percent here.City Agriculturist Diosdado Palacat said this is due to the increase in demand as most of the people buy fruits during the Yuletide Seasons, especially for the New Year’s Eve.

SIAY, ZAMBOANGA SIBUGAY — The Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR)           reported to have distributed 7.2 million hectares of land in the Philippines to some 4.5 million farmers over the past 20 years, much of it through the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP).

A 4.7-magnitude earthquake rocked parts of Mindanao        before noon yesterday, state seismologists said. No casualties and damages to infrastructure were reported as a result of the tremor.

by ben blin gregorio

The Supreme Court has taken cognizance of the petition to stop the implementation of the state of emergency in the province of Sulu and required the respondents to submit their remarks in ten days after notification of the court’s decision.

BY Atty. BATAS MAURICIO

DENR PURSUES LAND FOR THE LANDLESS PROGRAM: The Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) under Secretary Jose L. Atienza is pursuing the issuance of land patents to Filipinos who have no lands of their own yet, under the DENR’s “Handog Titulo Program”.

BY BOB JALDON

SAN PEDRO, Ca. — We’re about to end 2008 and everybody is looking forward to what Mayor Celso L. Lobregat has got to say during his SOCA on the second session day of the City Council in 2009. I won’t be there to listen to what hizzoner will say, but I promise you his speech is going to take more than 45 minutes. His accomplishments this year are many — from infrastructure, agricultural development, social amelioration, to education and health.

By FR. ROY CIMAGALA 

We have to learn how to blend these two elements. We cannot be simplistic and put them always in conflict. Yes, there are dangers to avoid. But we have to distinguish the good from the evil involved in the use of money. Otherwise, we might throw the baby out with the bath water.

Men of the City Police Office under OIC-City Police Director Sr. Supt. Mario Yanga rescued an eight-year-old girl few minutes after she was seized by two suspected kidnappers near their residence in Sta. Catalina last Monday night.

Local religious leaders have been challenged to take a more pre-eminent role in helping society resolve Mindanao’s Bangsamoro conflict, particularly amid the impasse in the negotiation between the          Philippine government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF).

by Allen  Abastillas

A four-year-old girl who was abducted in Lamitan, Basilan last Sunday night was released at past noon yesterday inTuburan town.
Basilan Vice Gov. Al-Rasheed Sakkalahul  lauded officials of Lamitan and Tuburan, the Philippine Marines, Philippine National Police for the safe release of Andrea Cuevas Diman.

By MENARDO WENCESLAO

The renewed terrorist attacks on soft targets in City City have been condemned by the government and surprisingly by the Moro Islamic Liberation Front as a handiwork of the devil.

BY BOB JALDON
SAN FRANCISCO, Ca. — By the time you get to read this piece, Christmas would probably be over, and all the shopping hours that you’ve spent in the malls or bazars buying all those Christmas presents for your loved ones are gone with a click of the clock. There’s not much spending in the U.S. as everybody is saving up for the worse. People here just wait for bargain sales before hitting the malls. Even the price of jewelry has plunged, that for a $300 bracelet, you can now get it for $40. Cameras? Really, really low priced.

By FR. ROY CIMAGALA

Now that we are again ending a year and beginning a new one, we have to remember that the event is not simply a matter of changing the calendar. We have to see the bigger picture. We should not be economical with the truth involved.
This ending-and-beginning routine strongly reminds us of the value of time, of its relation to eternity, of the kind of being we all are. These are the kind of truths—ultimate, some people call them—that seem dead and buried, victims of our daily grind of earthly and temporal concerns.

BY Atty. BATAS MAURICIO

PHILCOA’S ROLE IN HELPING THE COCONUT INDUSTRY: Among the 300 or so government agencies of the Philippine bureaucracy, the Philippine Coconut Authority (Philcoa, or PCA as it is now officially called) seems to be the only one I have seen that extols its connections with the Bible.

BY MIKE S. APOSTOL

It is Christmas day, a day of love, care, understanding or forgiving and a day of softening the hearts of stone among us and the taming of the tearless souls. But, above all it is a day to remind all of us, that our Creator born on this day but died because of us and became alive again for all to remember, that the Kingdom of His Father awaits us but gave us, also, the right to choose while we live in his world. Today is Christmas and we must have a choice, to do good no matter how hard the choice is and for the bad to reform so others will be spared from the wrath of evil.