By Goliath Letterman

(No Relations to David Letterman)

Dateline New York City, Dec. 28, 2010, Coconut News Network (CNN Kuno), 2010 “Niños Inocentes” Lampoon Edition

News Flash: Loida Lewis to Wed Romy Marquez?

A ccording to this reporter’s “Deaf (sic) Throat,” Loida Nicolas-Lewis, the NaFFAA’s national chair emeritus, is now allegedly engaged to Romeo P. Marquez, the Toronto, Ontario, Canada-based investigative reporter. People are skeptical about the report, as Mr. Marquez is said to be the NaFFAA’s number-two critic, after this website’s editor, Bobby M. Reyes.

The NaFFAA is the acronym of the National Federation of Filipino-American Associations (www.naffaa.org).

Reyes, who is a childhood friend of Ms. Lewis, says that if indeed the report is true, then it must have been “love at first fight,” oops, sight. He says further that Ms. Loida could have fallen in love looking at the photo of Mr. Marquez in his blogs,   1. http://currentsbreakingnews.blogspot.com/ 

2. http://torontonewsroom.blogspot.com/

3. http://timecircumstance.blogspot.com/

4. http://travelsthemes.blogspot.com/ 

5. http://gotchajournalist.blogspot.com/ .

Romy Marquez is a six-footer with silvery hair and a reputed ladies’ man in his former domicile, San Diego, California. Bobby Reyes says further that Ms. Loida would have found Romy’s height to be a welcome sight, after dealing all those years with the so-called NaFFAA’s Seven Dwarfs.

Ms. Lewis could not be contacted as of press time. This reporter has sent several e-mails to her known online addresses. However, Ernie Gange of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, told this writer that he doubts if the website’s so-called “Deaf Throat” heard Ms. Lewis right. “Apo Ernie” Gange says that he was in a meeting recently with Ms. Lewis and several other NaFFAA national officers in New York. He heard her say, “I will engage Romy Marquez in a fruitful dialogue before I weed him out later from our community’s Court of Public Opinion.” Did “Deaf Throat” misunderstand the words “engage” and “weed” to connote “engagement” and “wedding”? That will be settled in the next report.

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Now the NaFFAA Has a New “Unofficial” Slogan

Ed Navarra, the retired engineer from Ford Motors, is now the new national chairman of the NaFFAA. He was elected on Nov. 20, 2010, at the recent NaFFAA national convention in San Francisco, California. His first alleged but unofficial act was to send an e-mail to the NaFFAA e-lists and tell the federation regional officers and members of the NaFFAA’s new slogan.

Mr. Navarra said allegedly that he wanted to change the supposed “unofficial” slogan that its number-one critic, Bobby Reyes, coined. Reyes’s slogan was “NaFFAA-ka sakit, Kuya Eddie” (It hurts too much, Elder Brother Eddie). According to an unconfirmed report, the new slogan would be: “NaFFAA-ka kulit ni Engineer Ed.”

With a twinkle in his eyes, Engineer Navarra reportedly said that “Ku-kulitin ko ang mga (I will be stubborn, persistent and determined in requiring the) NaFFAA chapters to submit at their earliest convenience their financial reports from the very beginning of their existence as chapters of the federation.” He is pledging to enforce strictly the ATIC principles. (As Reyes coined it, ATIC means “accountability, transparency, integrity and credibility”.)

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Chairman Navarra Appoints Apo Ernie Gange as Membership Committee Chair

C hairman Ed Navarra is tapping the expertise of Ernie Gange as the new chairman of the NaFFAA’s long-dormant “Membership Recruitment Committee.” Mr. Gange, who is fondly called “Apo Ernie” by his friends, is a NaFFAA cofounder and former Pennsylvania state chairperson of the federation. He was also the first Filipino-American member of the Board of Trustees of the Pearl S. Buck Foundation.

Observers and critics alike say that the selection by Chairman Navarra of Apo Ernie is a wise move. “It’s like finding a Genghis Khan to recruit an army of volunteer soldiers,” says Bobby Reyes, who used to be an adversary of Apo Ernie. Once Reyes dubbed him as “Mr. ‘Ganges Khan’ Gange.” People expect Apo Ernie to deliver more-than a horde of new NaFFAA members.

As of press time, another report from San Francisco, California, said that Ben Menor, a former NaFFAA national executive officer, wanted the Membership Committee chair. This author still has to talk with Mr. Menor to verify the said report.

However, is there truth to the other report that Apo Ernie welcomed the designation of Mr. Menor as his co-chair? Mr. Gange allegedly said that he (Gange) “could be in-charge of adult-and-senior members and Ben could take charge of the Menor-de-edad recruits.”

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Chairman Navarra Demonstrates Solomonic Wisdom in Pacifying Lorna Dietz

N aFFAA National Chairman Ed Navarra showed the Filipino-American community his version of King Solomon’s wisdom. This was after Ms. Lorna Dietz demanded that she be named the NaFFAA’s Communications Director or else she would leave the federation.

The position of Communications Director is presently occupied by Jon Melegrito, who doubles also as the Public-relations Director of the NaFFAA.

Chairman Navarra proposed the sharing of the position with Mr. Melegrito being called “Mr. Communications Director” and Lorna Dietz being dubbed “Miscommunications,” oops, “Miss Communications Director.”

At least now in the NaFFAA under new management, "all is well that ends well," to use an oft-quoted adage. Thus, with his Solomonic wisdom, Ed Navarra hurdled easily the first crisis in his chairmanship. # # #