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CALD Participants
Hon. Franklin M. Drilon
Former Senate President and
Chairman of the Liberal Party of the Philippines
Hon. Franklin Drilon is the former President of the
Philippine Senate. His first stint in government service was
in 1986, and, under President Corazon Aquino’s presidency,
served as Deputy Minister of Labor, Secretary of the
Department of Labor and Employment, and later as the
Secretary of the Department of Justice in 1990. Hon. Drilon
was drafted to run in the 1995 senatorial elections, in
which he placed fourth in his first attempt at a national
election. At the start of the second half of his six-year
term, he assumed the post of Senate Majority Leader and
subsequently the Presidency of the Philippine Senate. He has
also served as Chairman and later President of the Liberal
Party between 2004 until 2007. He is the past previous
Chairman of the Council of Asian Liberals and Democrats.
In 2005, Hon. Drilon was elected Chairman of the 112th
General Assembly of the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU), the
international organization of the parliamentarians of
sovereign states. He finished his Bachelor of Arts in
Political Science and his Bachelor of Law at the University
of the Philippines.
Amb. Kasit Piromya
Director of International Affairs
Democrat Party of Thailand
Ambassador Kasit Piromya is the Director of International
Affairs of the Democrat Party of Thailand and advisor to the
party leader, Mr. Abhisit Vejjajiva. He was the former
Ambassador of the Kingdom of Thailand to the United States
of America from 2004 to 2005. He obtained his Bachelor’s
degree in the School of Foreign Service in Georgetown
University in 1968 and a Diploma in International Relations
at the Institute of Social Studies in The Hague, Netherlands
in 1971. His previous postings as Thai Ambassador include
the following countries: Russian Federation, People’s
Republic of Mongolia, Republic of Papua New Guinea,
Federation Republic of Germany, and Japan.
Ms. Bi-Khim Hsiao
Former Member of Parliament
Director of International Affairs
Democratic Progressive Party of Taiwan
The Hon. Bi-khim Hsiao is a previous elected Member of the
Legislative Yuan (LY) and co-chair of the Foreign Relations
Committee. She also serves as the Director of the Department
of International Affairs for the Democratic Progressive
Party as well as the Director of International Affairs for
the Frank Hsieh 2008 Presidential Campaign. She served as
the Secretary General of the Council of Asian Liberals and
Democrats from 2004 to 2005, and was also elected Treasurer
of Liberal International in 2003. Ms. Hsiao is a Vice
President of LI, a position she held since being elected as
the LI Bureau’s youngest and sole Asian member at its 53rd
Congress in Sofia, Bulgaria.
Aside from founding the Taiwan Association for Women in
Sports (TAWS), the first Taiwanese NGO specializing in
women's rights in sports, she is also a Board Member of the
Taiwan Foundation for Democracy, and Vice Chairperson of the
Taiwan Tibet Exchange Foundation. Ms. Hsiao received her MA
in Political Science from Columbia University and a BA in
East Asian Studies from Oberlin College.
Ms. Chee Siok Chin
Singapore Democratic Party
Ms. Chee Siok Chin is a member of the Singapore Democratic
Party Central Executive Committee. She has been a democracy
advocate for many years, and as a result she has been
targeted by the Singaporean government. Beside arbitrary
detention by the Singaporean police, she was also forced
into bankruptcy by the Attorney General in a constitutional
matter that she brought up to the Supreme Court. Under
Singaporean law, she will be unable to run for parliament as
a bankrupt person. Before entering politics she was in the
education field for 12 years and was a Senior Education
Officer. Out of her desire for reforms in education, and her
belief in justice and the democratic system, she quit her
job in 1999 and joined the SDP. Ms. Chee has a Bachelor of
Arts in Education Studies from the University of Southern
Queensland and is a founding member of the Women Democrats,
the women’s wing of the SDP. Ms. Chee is also sister to Dr.
Chee Soon Juan, who she often represents in international
conferences and seminars as Dr. Chee is regularly prohibited
from traveling overseas by the government.
Dr. Rajiva Wijesinha
Secretary General,
Secretariat for Coordinating the Peace Process
Liberal Party of Sri Lanka
Prof. Rajiva Wijesinha is the Secretary General of the
Secretariat for Coordinating the Peace Process and former
President of the Liberal Party of Sri Lanka and
Vice-President for Liberal International. He is a writer and
is also Senior Professor of Languages at the University of
Sabaragamuwa.
After his first degree in University College, Oxford, he
moved to Corpus Christi College, Oxford as an EK Chambers
Student and obtained a B Phil in English and a doctorate on
the subject of women and marriage in the early Victorian
novel. His recent works include Declining Sri Lanka, 2007
and Political Principles and their Practice in Sri Lanka,
2005.
Datuk Dr. Toh Kin Woon
Member, Central Committee
Parti Gerakan Rakyat Malaysia
Dr. Toh Kin Woon is a previously elected member of the State
Legislative Assembly, Penang and Penang State Executive
Councilor for Education, Economic Planning, Human Resource
Development, Science, Technology & Innovation. He received
his M.A. in Development Economics at the University of
Leeds, United Kingdom with distinction and later on his PhD
in Economics at the University of Malaya.
Recent awards that he has received are the 2005 Outstanding
Individual Award for Human Resource Development from the
Asian Regional Training and Development Organization, Lim
Lian Geok Spiritual Award for 2007 and the Asian Public
Intellectual (API) Fellowship for 2008/2009 by the Japan
Foundation for research in the Philippines and Japan.
Mr. Phirum Keo
Sam Rainsy Party
Mr. Keo is the deputy chief of cabinet of the Sam Rainsy
Party. For six (6) years he served as the treasurer and
executive member of the New Zealand National Party, Kaikoura
Electorate. In New Zealand he has been involved with various
business enterprises. He received his Bachelor of Commerce,
Major in Accounting from the Nelson/Marlborough Institute of
Technology in New Zealand; Certificate in General Psychology
from the International Correspondence Schools;,
and Certificate in Computer and Data processing from Otago
Polytechnic.
Nyo Myint
National Council of the Union of Burma
Mr. Nyo Ohn Myint is the Chair of the Foreign Relations
Committee of the National League for Democracy (Liberated
Area) and a Member of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the
National Council of the Union of Burma. He grew up in
Rangoon, Burma, and received his BA (Honors) in History from
Rangoon University where he also served as a history tutor
from 1985 to 1988. He actively participated in the 1988
popular democratic uprising and later served as Daw Aung San
Suu Kyi’s press official and personal bodyguard before the
National League for Democracy was formed. He co-formed its
youth wing, became its central youth leader and was later
promoted to the NLD Central Committee.
Since his exile, he had been a visiting researcher at the
Harvard Institute for International Development from
1995-1996 and earned his second Bachelor’s Degree in Asian
Studies and Economics at the University of Texas in 1997.
Dr. J. R. Nereus O. Acosta, PhD
Secretary General
Council of Asian Liberals and Democrats
Dr. J.R. Nereus Acosta is the current Secretary General of
the Council of Asian Liberals and Democrats and the former
Secretary General of the Liberal Party of the Philippines.
He was a third term representative of Bukidnon province in
Northern Mindanao to the House of Representatives, and was
the principal author of the groundbreaking Clean Air Act
that has become a model of environmental legislation in
Asia. Dr. Acosta recently served as Chairman of the
Committee on Ecology and Vice-Chairman of the Committees on
Science and Technology, Human Rights, and Foreign Relations
of the House of Representatives. He has represented the
Philippines in numerous international forums, including the
United Nations Special Assembly on HIV/AIDS and the Asian
Forum of Parliamentarians on Population and Development,
where he now serves as the Deputy Secretary General.
An academic and civil society stalwart, he earned his PhD in
Political Science from the University of Hawaii as an East
West Center Scholar. He received his MA in Public Affairs
(International Relations and Political Studies
concentration) from the Indiana University of Pennsylvania
and attended the special courses on Leaders in Development
Program, June 1999 and Environmental Economics, May 2002 at
the Kennedy School of Government of Harvard University. In
2004 he was awarded the prestigious World Fellows Program of
Yale University.
Mr. Paolo Antonio A. Zamora
Senior Program Officer
Council of Asian Liberals and Democrats
Mr. Paolo Zamora is the Senior Program Officer of the
Council of Asian Liberals and Democrats (CALD). He started
working with CALD in 2002 and was tasked to help organize
CALD conferences, workshops and missions. He was part of the
joint-projects with the National Democratic Institute for
international Affairs (NDI) on political party
accountability and transparency. He has also worked on
several electoral missions organized by CALD together with
NDI and with the Democratic Progressive Party of Taiwan (DPP).
Paolo is a member of the UNESCO Youth Network for
Peace-building, PHILCORPS Organization of the Indigent and
an individual member of the Young Liberals and Democrats of
Asia. He graduated from the University of the Philippines
with a Bachelor’s degree on Political Science.
Mr. Carlo Religioso
Program Officer
Council of Asian Liberals and Democrats
Mr. Carlo Religioso is the newest CALD Program Officer.
Prior to his CALD posting, he was with the Japan
International Cooperation Agency (JICA) Philippine Office as
Program Assistant of the administration section. He has
participated in different trainings and conferences held in
India, Slovenia, Lithuania, United Kingdom, France, Cyprus
and the Czech Republic. He has presented a paper on youth
empowerment during the 8th UNESCO Asia Pacific
Program of Education Innovation for Development (APEID) in
Bangkok on November 2002. Mr. Religioso finished his
Bachelor of Arts major in Consular and Diplomatic Affairs at
the De La Salle University—College of Saint Benilde in
Manila, Philippines. |
