Indonesia drug mule, Licuanan on K-12, Germanwings pilot | The wRap

Today on Rappler:

• The parents of the Filipino drug mule on Indonesia’s death row say she was duped by a friend.
• Commission on Higher Education chair Patricia Licuanan says the extra years in the K-12 system are worth it.
• The Germanwings pilot who crashed the plane was treated for suicidal tendencies.

FILIPINA DRUG MULE ‘DECEIVED’ BY GODSISTER – PARENTS
The family of the Filipina on Indonesia’s death row says she was deceived.
Mary Jane Veloso’s parents say her recruiter was her godsister they referred to as Tintin, who allegedly duped their daughter into a fast-track job placement in Malaysia and later on dragged her into a drug syndicate operation.
Veloso was arrested, tried and sentenced to death in 2010 for attempting to smuggle 2.6 kilograms of heroin into Indonesia.
Her story began to make headlines in January, after Indonesian President Joko Widodo or Jokowi rejected her request for clemency.
The Philippine government vows to exhaust all legal remedies to help Veloso and intends to file a second petition for judicial review.

LICUANAN: EXTRA YEARS IN K-12 ‘WORTH IT’
Commission on Higher Education chair Patricia Licuanan defends the K-12 educational system.
Licuanan says the extra two years are worth it.

PATRICIA LICUANAN, CHAIR, COMMISSION ON HIGHER EDUCATION: We kept chickening out and postponing it and postponing it so now the argument of are we really prepared and say we will never be totally prepared but the best thing is to go and start and just do it.
The advantage of these extra two years is that they will be better prepared for college, they will be better prepared for work, and they will get the subject matter in a way that is better learned.

Licuanan also lobbies for tech-intensive subjects in higher education, which she says primes students for both theory and practice and turn each digital native into a techpreneur.

PATRICIA LICUANAN, CHAIR, COMMISSION ON HIGHER EDUCATION: What we need are those nerds, those technical people, S&T people, those engineers who can develop products that will eventually make it to the market. So basically we’ve embedded in the engineering curriculum some courses on entrepreneurship so that eventually they will also be creators of innovation that will grow the economy.

TYPHOON MAYSAK INTENSIFIES
Typhoon Maysak intensifies as it moves toward eastern Philippines Tuesday.
Weather Philippines says the storm could possibly reach super typhoon status within 12-24 hours.
State weather bureau PAGASA says Maysak as of 4PM is at approximately 1,690 kilometers east of Surigao City, Surigao Del Norte
with maximum sustained winds of 175 kilometers per hour near the center and gusts of up to 210 km/h.
Maysak is still outside of the Philippine Area of Responsibility or PAR and is moving west northwest at a speed of 20 km/h.   
Maysak is expected to enter PAR by Wednesday evening or early Thursday.

ALPS CRASH PILOT HAD SUICIDAL TENDENCIES IN PAST – PROSECUTORS
The co-pilot of Germanwings flight was treated for suicidal tendencies before obtaining his license.
Investigators say the co-pilot deliberately crashed the plane into the French Alps.
But German prosecutors on Monday said Andreas Lubitz appeared more stable recently.
Investigators sifting through the plane wreckage and body parts resume their search for the second black box, hoping to identify more DNA from the 150 passengers who all died.
Investigators say Lubitz allegedly locked his captain out of the cockpit and slammed the plane into the Alps last Tuesday, killing all on board.

ROACH TAPS EX-MAYWEATHER TEAMMATE AS PACQUIAO’S SPARMATE
Boxing coach Freddie Roach enlists Floyd Mayweather’s former teammate as one of Manny Pacquiao’s sparring partners.
Roach reveals his new recruit had a terrible break-up from the Mayweather camp but did not disclose the fighter’s identity.
Last October, Mayweather’s camp fired a Cuban-American boxer named Luis Arias.
Rappler tried to reach Arias for confirmation, but he has not replied.

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