NAGA CITY --- City Mayor Jesse M. Robredo has been invited as one of the key discussant/panelists in the focused group discussion with Gen. Jose Almonte slated on March 28 at the Ateneo Professional Schools, Rockwell Center, Makati City.

        Almonte, one of the top presidential advisers on matters of security and foreign affairs during the time of President Fidel V. Ramos, is regarded by peers as a brilliant strategist and deep thinker.

        Gen. Almonte is currently advocating for a new political order based on excellent local governance.

        The West Point-educated Almonte who has roots in Albay is developing a road map so that the small islands of good governance (which include Naga and other dynamic cities and LGUs) can become the basis of central governance.

        Sharing the Naga City experience on local governance, Robredo will lead discussions on what makes true achievers.

        Robredo, in many of his speeches here and abroad, said that a leader or achiever must always lead by example which he believes is a surefire formula to earn the people’s trust and lead them towards a noble purpose.

        “When I first got elected as mayor, the first thing I did was to wage a no-nonsense battle against the decadent ways that had inflicted the social, political, and moral fabrics of our city which I have seen and felt since I was a student: rampant illegal gambling, indecent entertainment, crime, occasional abuse by powers-that-be, poor tax collection, rising unemployment and sheer indifference,” Robredo was quoted as saying by renowned journalist Lorna Kalaw-Tirol in her book-compilation of profiles of Ramon Magsaysay awardees that has been published in 2006 by the Ramon Magsaysay Foundation.

        As a progressive minded local leader and advocate of people empowerment, Robredo said that democratic societies are distinguished by their emphasis on citizen participation.

        The concept of self-government, he explained, rests on the idea that ordinary people have a right, even an obligation, to involve themselves in the affairs of the state. Under his watch, in Naga City was born the award-winning People Empowerment Ordinance, Naga City People’s Council, and recently, the soon-to-be implemented Local Sectoral Representatives in the city council.

        Also among the discussants is former Finance Secretary Bobby de Ocampo who will lead the talk on how to inspire Filipinos to move as one towards a better future.