Dana Batnag: I Am But A Small Voice
Our friend Dana Batnag is now the news. She is being tagged by anonymous PNP intelligence (oxymoron!) sources as the one aiding and abetting a rebel military leader so he can escape from Manila Pen last November. She was supposed to be handing him a press ID (Aha! so we are carrying blank IDs all the while!) so he can leave the premises as a media person and escape the eagle eyes of 1,500 police officers.
Dana was tagged for having long curly hair. Ha ha ha. We know Dana for a long, long time. Sometimes I tease her by singing "I Am But A Small Voice." When she was in elementary, she composed this poem that won a UN contest. Roger Whittaker turned it into a song which he included in his Greatest Hits. I remember her being interviewed and she said she wanted to be a police detective. He he he. It was also in Channel 9. Maybe they find that old footage and use it against you. Her father was from Besao, Mountain Province and her mother is with a national language commission. Dana has a sister who was a journalist for Daily Globe. Dana worked with Philippine Graphics before becoming the one-person news agency bureau known as Jiji Press which is based in Japan. She also teaches at UP Diliman. Oh boy! Dana B, sikat ka na naman.
Part of her winning poem goes:
Dana was tagged for having long curly hair. Ha ha ha. We know Dana for a long, long time. Sometimes I tease her by singing "I Am But A Small Voice." When she was in elementary, she composed this poem that won a UN contest. Roger Whittaker turned it into a song which he included in his Greatest Hits. I remember her being interviewed and she said she wanted to be a police detective. He he he. It was also in Channel 9. Maybe they find that old footage and use it against you. Her father was from Besao, Mountain Province and her mother is with a national language commission. Dana has a sister who was a journalist for Daily Globe. Dana worked with Philippine Graphics before becoming the one-person news agency bureau known as Jiji Press which is based in Japan. She also teaches at UP Diliman. Oh boy! Dana B, sikat ka na naman.
Part of her winning poem goes:
May ngiti sa araw
At kung umuulan
Makapagtampisaw
Malayang daigdig
Ng kawalang malay
The sun is smiling and when it's raining, we can wade on the
puddles without any care for the world.
Yes, we knew that part of our youth
But stupid police.
Labels: ethics, journalism, nostalgia
posted by Unknown at 9:42 AM
4 Comments:
i was just wondering on the whereabots and whathappenedkaya of "the girl" who wrote "lea salonga's" i am but a small voice. remembered her as a batnag based in singapore. thanks for the update, frank.
-anonimousse forever. (can't overcome my cyber-shyness)
you noticed in the lyric sheet that dana's real name is "odina"?
i thought that's her psuedonym!
excerpt of news you mentioned:(for your other readers, obviously not you ha....)
Who is that?’
http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/breakingnews/nation/view/20080130-115669/After-curly-hair-PNP-hunts-PLDT-lineman
Earlier, the PNP had said a female reporter was caught on video helping one of Trillanes’ cohorts, Marine Capt. Nicanor Faeldon, escape from the hotel.
The reporter was not officially named or charged, but PNP sources speaking on condition of anonymity identified her as Dana Batnag, a wire service reporter.
However, the video footage merely showed Batnag in what appeared to be an interview with Faeldon.
Up until Tuesday, Razon refused to name the reporter. Asked if the PNP would withdraw its case against Batnag, he said: “Who is that? I don’t know what you are talking about. We have not filed anything.”
In a statement issued on Monday, the Foreign Correspondents Association of the Philippines (Focap) said it viewed with grave concern the allegation against Batnag.
“As journalists, we are appalled that the authorities have allowed and even encouraged this claim to float around unsubstantiated for weeks, in the process putting a cloud of doubt on the professionalism not only of Ms Batnag but also of media people in general,” Focap said.
It said its members had adhered to the highest standards of accuracy, objectivity and independence in their reportage since the martial law years.
Classmate ko si dana sa law school pero nung isang linggo ko lang nalaman na sya yung nagsulat nung song ni Lea. Ni-check ko sa internet and sya nga. LOL
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