The Philippine Public Transparency Reporting Project (PPTRP) held its 6th training on advanced transparency and anti-corruption reporting called “Numeracy for Journalists, Civil Society Organizations and Citizens” on May 23 at the Top Plaza Hotel in Dipolog City.

The Philippine Public Transparency Reporting Project (PPTRP) held its third training on advanced transparency and anti-corruption reporting called “Numeracy for Journalists, Civil Society Organizations and Citizens” on March 18 in Legazpi City.

A total of 15 persons took part in the training. Of the 15 participants, 14 were full-time journalists while one is affiliated with the Karapatan human rights group.

SEN. NINOY AQUINO, Sultan Kudarat — It is in places such as these that the role good quality roads play in helping to improve people’s livelihoods is so easily understood.

Norman Lucero, 47, is the driver of a Mitsubishi commuter van which ploughs the 85-kilometer route between Isulan and Kulaman (recently renamed Senator Ninoy Aquino) in Sultan Kudarat, Mindanao. It would be wrong to call this a road since it remains far from completed and is the reason Norman can only charge his passengers PhP 150 (USD 3) for the one way trip that can take up to four or even five hours.

Trumpeting an agenda of fighting the country's perennial problem on corruption, the Aquino administration claims it has laid out several programs to walk the talk. One of these programs is the adoption of the so-called "zero-based budgeting" (ZBB) system.

It may be recalled that in his first State of the Nation Address (SONA) in July last year, President Benigno Aquino III vowed to shift from the old "incremental" system of budgeting to the ZBB approach. The latter, he said, would substantially reduce, if not totally eliminate, money spent on unnecessary projects or programs, as well as money lost to corruption.