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(March
22, 2006
/ Manila) Ms. Laura Thornton-Olivry, former resident director of
National Democratic Institute for International Affairs (NDI)
and currently an NDI consultant met with representatives of the
Council of Asian Liberals and Democrats (CALD) and the Liberal
Party of the Philippines as part of NDI’s Philippine assessment
mission.
Among those present during the meeting were former CALD Chairman
and Education Secretary Florencio Abad, Liberal Party Chairman
and Senate Majority Floorleader Senator Francis Pangilinan,
former Undersecretary and MP Jose Luis Martin Gascon, CALD
Executive Director John Coronel, LP Director General Concepcion
Asis, National Institute for Policy Studies Executive Director
Lambert Ramirez and CALD Program Officer Paolo Zamora.
Aside from Ms. Thornton, the other members of the mission
included Ms. Nelia Agbon, NDI-ARMM resident senior program
manager and Ms. Myrna Cestina, NDI-ARMM finance/operations
assistant. The team would also meet senior representatives of
the national government, election monitoring groups, political
parties, civil society organizations and members of academia and
the media.
CALD and NDI jointly worked on two regional workshops that
focused on internal and external strategies for political party
reform in Asia. In 2004, there were also election missions as
joint ventures of the two organizations to Taipei, Seoul, Manila
and Jakarta. |
