Meet Mong Palatino. To Global Voices readers, he is the Regional Editor for Southeast Asia and Oceania. In his native Philippines, however, he is known by his full name, Raymond Palatino, President of the Kabataan (Youth) Party and a new member of the House of Representatives in the Philippines. Photo from www.arkibongbayan.org This fact makes Raymond “Mong” Palatino the first blogging politician in the Philippines and one of Global Voices’ first contributors to be elected to public office. Although only 29 years old, Raymond “Mong” Palatino’s CV already runs pages long. He writes a column for an international press syndicate; he’s served as president of the National Union of Students of the Philippines; he’s been a major player in groups like Filipino Youth for Peace, the Estrada Resign Youth Movement and Kabataan Kontra-Kartel, known as Youth Against the Oil Cartel. Mong began with Global Voices halfway through 2006, covering his home country. By that time he had already been blogging at Mongster’s Nest for more than a year. He moved up to Regional Editor at Global Voices in April 2008. An office of the UN has compared him to Edgar Jopson, the most famous student leader in Filipino history. He helped usher in TXTPower, a national consumer rights advocacy group. He has long been at the forefront of marrying new technologies to help foster political change. In a profile in the Washington Post on the use of social media in Filipino politics, Mong admitted that during his work mobilizing students in opposition to President Joseph Estrada in 2001 taught him the importance of tools like texting. But one could argue it’s the plight of the Filipino youth who fuel the many aspects of his work. In 2005, Mong wrote these words: “The debilitating effects of the labor and education policies of the government account for the cynicism and hopelessness which many young Filipinos feel today. They leave the country in droves because they sense no bright future for them in the Philippines. Those who remain are resigned to the destituteness of the country. “ Two years later, he ran his second national election campaign. His Kabataan Party garnered 225,000 votes on a platform of youth empowerment and the fight against corruption, inequality and promoting social justice. This showing pushed Kabataan past the threshold of two percent of total national votes, making it eligible to sit in the House of Representatives under Philippine’s sectoral allocation law, which provides seats to parties representing minority voices. A recent Supreme Court ruling increased the number of these “sectoral” seats in the House of Representatives from 22 to 55, paving the way for the Kabataan Party to join the House of Representatives. As Partylist leader, Raymond was sworn in and immediately began work. (A recent tweet has him testing the wi-fi at the House of Representatives. He reported it “seems ok.”) And a blog post from those first hours in office portrays him tackling the nuts-and-bolts of Filipino politics. I attended a higher education committee hearing in the afternoon. The committee tackled HB 2380 – Protecting the rights of students requiring professional licensing examinations to enroll in review centers of their choice and providing penalties thereof – which is principally authored by Rep. Teddy Casiño of Bayan Muna. I’m supporting this measure. Most likely this bill will be passed by the committee. During the hearing, Rep. Teves of Negros revealed that there is a school in his province requiring students to live in the school dormitory for two months in order to attend review classes. Schools should not require students to attend review classes. Enrolling in review schools should not be made as a graduation requirement. Review classes are acceptable if they are part of the curriculum. But the popular practice today involves schools which force students to join expensive review classes. I had a conversation with Mong regarding the power of the youth and social media in the Philippines. With all you have happening in your life, why work for Global Voices? I was invited by Preetam Rai (former Global Voices Southeast Asia editor) to join GV in 2006. I immediately agreed to write for GV. During that time, I was already a fan of GV. I was impressed with its mission to highlight the views of bloggers in different parts of the world. By joining GV, I could more effectively articulate the issues espoused by Filipino bloggers. My initial articles were about reproductive health, nurse migration, election reform and illegal deployment of Filipinos in Iraq. For two years, I contributed 2-3 GV articles per month. I attended the GV summit in New Delhi in 2006.