Faces of the News: October 6, 2024
Claudia Sheinbaum
“It’s time for transformation, it’s time for women,” Claudia Sheinbaum declared during her inauguration as Mexico’s 66th president on Oct. 1. Her message wasn’t lost on her countrymen—and the rest of the world. She is after all the country’s first female president in 200 years. The 62-year-old is also the first Jewish leader in a country that is largely Catholic, although reports say she rarely speaks about her personal background. Getting a boost from the popularity of outgoing President Andrés Manuel López Obrador and their Morena party, the former Mexico City mayor won nearly 60 percent of the vote in the June 2 presidential elections. Before she jumped into politics, she was a climate scientist. With a Ph.D. in energy engineering, she was part of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change team that shared a Nobel Peace Prize with former US Vice President Al Gore in 2007. But not everyone is celebrating her victory. Feminists said her election did not guarantee she would govern with a gender perspective. —TJ BURGONIO
Jimmy Carter
Jimmy Carter is an American president of many firsts. He was the first future president to be born in a hospital, according to CBS News. Last Oct. 1, when he turned 100, Carter became the oldest living former president and the longest living US president, People reported. The 39th US chief executive crossed the century line and achieved a feat of sorts when he marked his birthday more than 19 months in home hospice care. The average period of time of patients in palliative care is 63 days, according to CBS, citing the National Institutes of Health. Carter served only one term from 1977 to 1981, which was highlighted by Iran seizing 52 Americans and holding them for 444 days. CBS recalled that they were released a day after Carter left office in 1981. While his presidency had its moments of chaos, his life after the White House proved more remarkable. He spent his later years building homes and supporting humanitarian causes into his 90s. “I had only one life to live, and I wanted to live it as a civilian, with a potentially fuller opportunity for varied public service,” he said in his memoir, “White House Diary.” —CENON BIBE JR.
Mary Ann Maslog
Mary Ann Maslog escaped possible conviction in the 1998 textbook scam case after the Sandiganbayan in 2019 was informed of her “death,” but the National Bureau of Investigation found that she was alive all along—and arrested her on Sept. 25 in Quezon City. This time, it was over complaints involving an P8-million investment scam. Maslog allegedly posed as a supplier of water systems and medical supplies using the alias “Dr. Jessica Francisco,” and enticed the complainants to invest in her projects before paying them with fake manager’s checks. Years ago, Maslog was an agent of the textbook company Esteem Enterprises, and worked together with two former officials of Department of Education, Culture and Sports (the precursor of the Department of Education) to falsify documents from the budget department in order to secure P24 million in payments for books and supplementary materials made by her company. She also gained notoriety in 1999 for her bribery attempt where she brought a box containing P3 million in cash to Malacañang. —GILLIAN VILLANUEVA
Juan Ponce Enrile
Juan Ponce Enrile on Friday became the third and last senator to be exonerated by the Sandiganbayan in connection with the cases arising from the pork barrel scam first exposed by the Inquirer in 2013. Citing the weakness of the prosecution’s case, the antigraft court’s special Third Division granted his demurrer to evidence, dismissing the plunder charge against Enrile. Now 100 years old and serving as the chief presidential legal counsel of President Marcos, he said he was vindicated by the decision and was confident of being acquitted from the very start. The antigraft court also cleared Enrile’s former chief of staff Jessica “Gigi” Reyes and businesswoman Janet Lim-Napoles (who had been convicted in other pork scam cases and is now serving her sentences). Aside from Enrile, two other former senators—Jinggoy Estrada and Ramon “Bong” Revilla, Jr.—were charged with plunder in connection with the scam but were also eventually acquitted. The scam involved drawing funds—and kickbacks—from the lawmakers’ pork barrel for the “projects” of Napoles’ bogus nongovernmental organizations. —KATHLEEN DE VILLA
Dalia Pastor
Authorities must once again enforce the arrest warrant against Dalia Pastor, an alleged coconspirator in the 2014 murder of her husband, international racing champion Ferdinand “Enzo” Pastor, following a Supreme Court ruling that revived the parricide case against the widow. In a decision made public on Oct. 3, the Supreme Court’s Second Division overturned the 2020 Court of Appeals ruling that dismissed the case. The high tribunal thus reinstated both the arrest warrant and hold departure order previously issued by a Quezon City court, saying the case merits a full-blown trial to test the multiple accounts linking Dalia to her husband’s killing. On June 12, 2014, Enzo was driving a truck to Clark, Pampanga, with his mechanic when he was shot dead by a lone gunman at the intersection of Visayas and Congressional avenues in Quezon City. Police Officer 2 Edgar Angel was later charged as the shooter, while Domingo de Guzman III and Dalia were identified as the masterminds. Angel and De Guzman were arrested, while Dalia remained at large. —JANE BAUTISTA
