New leadership at Filipino Canadian press club

TORONTO –The Philippine Press Club of Ontario has a new leadership with the election of Hermie Garcia as president and Rose Tijam as vice president in special elections held Sunday, March 3 at Mayette’s Restaurant in Toronto. Immediately after winning the elections, Garcia and Tijam took their oath of office with Consul General Junever Mahilum-West officiating.

Garcia and Tijam won over Mogi Mogado and Tess Cusipag, Associate Editor and Publisher and Editor of Balita, respectively.

The winning candidates will continue the remaining terms of resigned PPCO officers until May 2014.

Philippine Press Club of Ontario is an organization whose members are from the Filipino media community in Ontario. These are journalists, writers, photographers, publishers and support staff of Filipino Canadian publications, broadcast and digital media. PPCO was established in 2001 in Toronto.

Garcia is the publisher and editor of The Philippine Reporter, a twice-a-month Filipino-Canadian newspaper published in Toronto since 1989 that is now marking its 24th year of publication. The paper was awarded four times for “Best Editorial and Design” from 2003 to 2009 by the National Ethnic Press and Media Council of Canada, a national association of more than 600 ethnic publications and broadcast and digital media organizations in Canada. The Philippine Reporter is a member organization of the NEPMCC, where Garcia is Vice President for Human Rights and Free Speech.

Before he started his Toronto-based newspaper, Garcia had several years of experience in journalism in the Philippines, starting as a community newspaper editor in Dumaguete City, a senior writer for the weekly Observer magazine in Manila, and a desk editor and editorial writer for two Philippine daily newspapers — The Times Journal and Times Mirror — and a senior writer for Business Page magazine.

Garcia’s pre-election campaign emphasized the need for the PPCO’s acronym to represent a “Principled Press for Camaraderie and Openness” in words and actions. Before being elected as President, Garcia served four terms (8 years) as a member of the PPCO Board of Directors, winning four consecutive terms in general elections, and and was briefly its VP

Rose Tijam has a master’s degree in Mass Communications from the University of the Philippines. In the Philippines, she was with the faculty at UP Los Banos and was Council Secretary of the National Food and Agriculture Council. She was editor/writer of various agricultural publications as well as a radio broadcaster.

In Canada, she was a staff writer in Stockmen’s Recorder and World of Beef publication, The Limousin Leader magazine and two other trade publications in Calgary, Alberta. She was an associate editor at Balita and at The Philippine Times, both community publications based in Toronto.

Tijam is currently a freelance writer. She was a former president of the PPCO before being elected VP. While she exercises her passion for journalism, Rose Tijam is also a fulltime counsellor at a facility for women and children.