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Category: Frontiers
Frontiers

End Sex Tourism

While a young girl was recovering from a horrific life of sexual abuse and trafficking, President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo gave the state-of-the-nation-address to the Philippine Congress and enumerated the many achievements of her government for the past year; curtailing the trafficking of women and children is not among them. She is the most politically powerful women in the country and could deal a deadly blow to the pimps and pedophiles, the sex traffickers and foreign mafia that enslave the children in their sex bars and clubs. However, the politicians behind the sex industry are powerful allies. The rich property owners that rent the buildings housing the sex dens, bars and clubs are influential. The hotel owners fill their double beds with sex tourists and the emaciated bodies of impoverished children and women. They have influence and the Department of Tourism goes along with them. Sex, even sex with children, is big business and the laws are ignored and not enforced. Even police own clubs and bars.

Shay Cullen | PREDA Foundation
Frontiers

A Terrible Man-Made Tragedy

The storm clouds were dark and threatening, weather stations had raised and broadcast danger signals, the radio was announcing the approaching onslaught of “Frank,” or by its official international name “God of the Winds,” a massive typhoon packing 150 kilometer-an-hour wind. And yet, the ill-fated ferry MV Princess of the Stars put to sea with 862 passengers and crew amid treacherous waters from Manila to Cebu City last 21 June.

Shay Cullen | PREDA Foundation
Frontiers

A One-Sided Report

There was no comfort in the Philippine report to the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva for 14-year-old Felix Avila, emaciated, half-staved, brutalized, shocked and dazed as he was helped walk from behind the bars of a police detention center in Metro Manila. Like a skeletal survivor of Auschwitz, he was helped walk on weak unsteady legs to a rescue van and away to freedom. Rescue, because it was as if he was released from the pains of hell to the joys of heaven. Heaven was when they stopped at the first restaurant and he devoured his first proper meal in months.

Shay Cullen | PREDA Foundation
Frontiers

A Day in the Life of Anna Maria

Anna Maria, 15, is recovering at the PREDA Center. She goes to school and loves to learn. She travels to school with 35 other children who are also recovering and overcoming the trauma of abuse. Given care, affirmation support and good therapy, victims are not damaged forever. They can recover and make a success of life. That is the goal of the Childhood for Children Life Recovery Program. There are 53 children recovering in PREDA at present, not all are ready for school.

Shay Cullen | PREDA Foundation
Frontiers

Priest, Prophet Or Politician

Is he a prophet, priest, politician or a popular uncorrupted elected leader? These are the questions that run through everyone’s mind when they hear that Father Ed Panlilio, 54, a Catholic priest on a leave of absence from regular priestly duties, is now the elected governor of Pampanga Province in the Philippines. Father Ed, as he is affectionally called by the hundreds of thousands who supported his bid for election last May, won against the traditional dynastic families that have ruled for generations. It was a powerful message from the people who had almost despaired of finding an honest independent candidate to oppose the elite. The people want to end the corruption and the culture of vice that the traditional politicians had fostered. Father Ed Panlilio has been named Filipino of the Year 2007 by a leading daily.

Shay Cullen | PREDA Foundation
Frontiers

The International Criminal Court

It is good news that The International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague has put several high level political and military suspects on trial for the abuse and exploitation and torture of children. This is a very new and welcome development for victims of violence, abduction, exploitation, abuse and trafficking. “Child offenders, beware; your days are numbered” is the slogan of the children’s rights defenders. Investigations, still secret, are targeting Filipino officials and eventually international arrest warrants could be issued according to human rights campaigners.

Shay Cullen | PREDA Foundation
Frontiers

Abused Children Can Become Violent

I see from 35 years of experience helping young people overcome the traumatic effects of childhood violence – be it psychological, verbal, physical, economic, military, emotional and sexual abuse – that it seriously damages lives, restricts full human development, reduces potential and can lead to childhood psychosomatic illness. It causes teenagers to become violent, bullies, teenage shooters, indulge in criminal behavior and suffer from adult neurosis. In others, children grow into aggressive and violent teenagers and adults. The absence of parental and family acceptance, understanding, nurturing, and affirming love creates a vacuum and vulnerability for negative and violent influences to dominate the lives of these children and youth.

Shay Cullen | PREDA Foundation
Frontiers

The Political Power Of GM Seeds

Chairman Mao once said that all political power grows from the barrel of a gun, another said it grows from a barrel of oil, and now it looks like it is going to grow from a barrel of seed. For a generation, many believed that “they who have the oil will rule the world, and if not, they will kill for it.” The thousands of dead women and children, soldiers and civilians in Iraq is strong evidence that it is true indeed.

Shay Cullen | PREDA Foundation
Frontiers

Pope’s Islamic Stumble

Pope Benedict is learning the hard way that interreligious dialogue these days is a complex and delicate business. Though he has affirmed his respect for Muslims, in a long quotation from the official policy enunciated forty years ago by Vatican II, his decision to quote a polemical medieval text against Muhammad and the Qur’an during a lecture remains puzzling.

Daniel Madigan | Jesuit
Frontiers

God Was With The Poor

When I first went to Calcutta to work in the houses for the dying of Mother Teresa, among the lepers and with the hungry street kids that populated the railway stations, I was a temporary chaplain to the Brothers of Charity founded by Mother Teresa.

Shay Cullen | PREDA Foundation
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