Invention that eats garbage?

Batas Mauricio

THE noise about Filipino inventor Gregorio Zara having invented a prototype of Skype and other Internet calling devices such as Facebook messenger, Viber, and Line, among others, in 1954 yet, deserves the attention of every patriotic Filipino.

This kind of an information not only confirms the amazing intelligence, ingenuity, and vast talent for creation and invention among many Filipinos, but it also recognizes the fact that Filipino inventions can help greatly in finding new ways of generating electricity or gasoline substitutes, of growing our food and ensuring potable water supply, and in effectively fighting global warming and climate change as well.

Unfortunately, the government cannot be expected to support Filipinos who have the talent for inventing, largely because many of its top officials have compromised the interest of the country and its people with their ties with businessmen who will be affected by new inventions. We, the people, must therefore be the ones to help Filipino inventors, by buying their inventions.

Along this line, I remember a fellow Rotarian from District 3810 of Rotary International who invented two earthshaking devices that could decimate electricity blackouts, and run cars on water alone. The Rotarian told me in an interview about four years ago that companies affected by his inventions threatened to kill him.

Because of the threats against his life, the Rotarian stopped mass-producing his inventions. The invention that could stop power outages appeared ridiculous at first glance, and maybe a little expensive at the start, but it is actually a power plant in the size of a lawyer’s brief case.

That brief case-power plant can generate electricity to support an entire household with at least two air-conditioning units which has two horsepower engines. The invention that turns water as power fuel for cars is actually an improvement of an earlier invention by another inventor, but was opposed by powerful businessmen.

And there are more stories of Filipino inventions that could have truly made our lives more comfortable, and more economically viable, like the machine that literally eats up any kind of garbage, thereby affording us the opportunity of a totally clean environment.

Unfortunately, however, these inventions failed to take off, as it were, in our own country, and ultimately found their way in other countries which seriously developed them and which are now giving enormous benefits to their own citizens.

Indeed, what many Filipinos lacked in physical size and attributes were compensated by God in the brilliance of their minds, in their capacity to see visions of what is yet to come, and in having the courage to concretize what they have thought about, even if many would instead ridicule them for their pioneering spirits. Perhaps, we should ask God to help our inventors!

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I certainly hope I can believe Bro. Armin Luistro, the outgoing secretary of the Department of Education (Deped), when he said that the opening of School Year 2016-2017 could be considered as one of the best school openings in the history of the country. But, with due respect, I cannot do so, and for a very grave reason.

The fact is that, Luistro used all his strength and power as secretary of education, in the waning days of his term yet, to block the efforts of Christian Born Again churches across the Philippine archipelago to continue operating their church schools under special permits granted by previous Deped secretaries, apparently to pave the way for the closure and ultimate demise of these church schools.

Since when is the opening of elementary and secondary classes in any given school year to be considered as “the best opening ever,” as Luistro unabashedly claimed in June 13 when thousands of Born Again elementary and high school students were deprived by Luistro’s Deped of their constitutional and legal right to education simply because the church schools where they were studying were ordered closed by Deped?

This closure of Born Again church schools has not reached the attention of the media and of the concerned sectors of Philippine society yet, it would seem, because nothing can be read or be heard from newspapers or from radio and television networks about this problem.

But the fact cannot be denied. As School Year 2016-2017 started, hundreds and hundreds of Born Again church schools where thousands and thousands of Born Again children were enrolled were barred from either opening their schools, or from accepting for enrolment their former students or students from other schools.

What was more problematic for the church schools and their students–and the parents of the students as well–was the failure, or perhaps outright refusal, of Deped to provide an acceptable alternative for the students who would be missing school for the next one year or so.

Assuming that Deped was right in closing down the Born Again schools which is still highly debatable, it should have, at the very least, come up with remedial measures to help the students who would be displaced by its own orders. Now, the students have nowhere to go, appearing to have been punished for something they did not even do!

Truly, it cannot be denied that Born Again church schools serve a very good function in educating Filipino children. Not only do these schools provide extraordinary academic training to their students, but they even instill spiritual values and direction among children whose minds and hearts are still largely impressionable, and capable of being molded towards godliness, probity, and righteousness.

Deped is totally aware of this, and its persecutory actions against church schools tend to indicate that this is one agency of government which is gripped in the neck by forces which do not like our children to be taught about God and His commands. DepEd has just proven it is a part of overall efforts to reject God and the power and salvation He gives to His believers!

E-mail: batasmauricio@ yahoo.com