It was in the late ‘90s or early 2000s that Cato was first considered in the annual Kapampangan honors derby, in the field of journalism. Having at that time already gone, excellently, through all the zigzags, byways and avenues of the craft – from beating deadlines to writing headlines, from blue-pencilling to putting the paper to bed – be it in Pampanga, in Metro Manila, Saudi Arabia and Indonesia.
For whatever unreason of the Capitol at that time, the MOKA eluded Cato. I personally took that as some wrong that needed righting. At the right time.
In May 2015, I wrote here:
BAGHDAD-BOUND to assume his post as charge d’affaires en pied of the Philippine embassy in the war-torn country, H.E. Elmer G. Cato, despite his hectic preparations, made sure to have his day with former peers in the media and friends in government here.
Congratulations – to the incoming de facto ambassador – were the order of the day at his call on Gov. Lilia G, Pineda and members of the provincial board.
The Gov and BM Rosve Henson wondering aloud how the diplomat could have been missed in the annual Most Outstanding Kapampangan Awards.
Prior to this latest posting, Consul Cato served as minister and consul at the Philippine Embassy in Washington D.C.
In 2012 he was bestowed by the DFA one of its highest awards – Gawad Mabini with the Rank of Dakilang Kasugo for braintrusting the establishment of consular offices in shopping malls which generated a lot of savings for the agency as well as provided more accessible and convenient locations to the public.
Yes, if only for that, he should have won the MOKA hands down…
Five days into Baghdad, Cato survived a car-bombing of the hotel he was staying in where over a dozen were killed. He has since acclimatized himself to the daily bombings in the Iraqi capital and went about his work in his usual excellent ways, from looking after the interest of the Filipino community in the capital as well as in the regional areas such as Kurdistan, to enhancing relations with the host country. The smooth repatriation of distressed OFWs in Iraq, makes but one definition of Cato’s brand of diplomacy.
In December 2015, I entered Cato’s MOKA nomination. Which he instantly shot down, upon learning a senior diplomat was also nominated in the same category.
It was the same last year.
Hence, his MOKA’s finally coming overdue by three years. Actually, all of nine years, as affirmed in this column I wrote on June 7, 2008 which formed part of the main body of my nominations through all those years.
Excellence defines Cato
KAPAMPANGAN DIPLOMAT and former journalist Elmer G. Cato has been elected vice chairman of the Fourth Committee of the 63rd Session of the United Nations General Assembly.
A signal accomplishment not only for the Kapampangan race but the Filipino nation as well. It does not take just any diplomat to get elected to a committee of the UN General Assembly, and one with concerns on the issues of decolonization, peacekeeping, information, outer space and Palestine at that! Really, really heavy stuff there. Palestine alone is one helluva concern.
Every Kapampangan should find some pride in Cato’s election. But proud and happy as I am, I was not the least surprised about this event.
Why? It was really bound to happen sooner than later.
Excellence has always defined Elmer G. Cato.
From his days at the Chevalier School where he found his nursery in journalism and where, as a delegate to a regional secondary schools press conference he came under my and Ding Cervantes’ tutelage, albeit very shortly, being lecturers-evaluators, to his De La Salle University days editing the school papers, excellence already found an expression in Cato.
That such a pa-burgis an institution as DLSU had social unrest in the pages of its official publication could only be attributed to the spunk that Cato brought to his craft.
Into the vortex of provincial newspapering Cato found himself after college, covering Pampanga for Malaya and the Manila Chronicle while at the same time stringing for a number of wire agencies, Kyodo News among them.
It was in the reportage of the communist insurgency that Cato sank his teeth most, and as was the usual, he excelled most.
He had the closest and most credible link to the insurgents, earned through forays in their mountain lairs and urban nests be it for plenums, anniversaries, or simple press conferences.
This of course did not endear Cato to the military and its right-wing vigilante groups.
He was – in 1988 – one of three Pampanga newsmen (mis)identified by the vigilantes as “propagandists of the CPP-NPA and cardbearing members of the NDF” and promptly marked for “neutralization.”
Think what the country would have lost if the standing order for Cato’s execution was ever carried out! It was also in this period that Cato put up the intrepid Angeles SUN weekly that readily grabbed the premiership among local publications.
From provincial newspapering, Cato moved on to the national stage with editorial stints in the Daily Globe and Today; and beyond the national borders, to the Middle East via section editorship in the Saudi Gazette and later in an Indonesian newspaper.
Journalism’s loss was the foreign service’s gain when Cato passed with excellence the foreign service examinations and joined the DFA in 1998.
Even as a junior foreign service officer, Cato already showed his streak of excellence, serving as special assistant to Foreign Secretaries Domingo L. Siazon and Teofi sto L. Guingona Jr.
It was Cato too that effected the transfer of the regional consular office from the fl oodprone Paskuhan Village in San Fernando to its current site at the Clark Freeport when he served as consular officer there.
As officer-in-charge of the Presidential Commission on the Visiting Forces Agreement, Cato stood toe-to-toe with a ranking US Embassy official when the question of Filipino rights in one of the joint military exercises was raised, never blinking once even when that American ranted and raved with SOBs and jackasses generously thrown in Cato’s direction.
As a diplomat with the Philippine Mission at the United Nations, Cato fi rst gained notice when he served as Alternate Representative to the Security Council during the Philippine membership to that body from 2004-2005.
Excellence has always defi ned Elmer G. Cato. This has given the Kapampangan one more source of pride and joy. It is truly a wonder why the Kapampangan has not returned the favor.Like making Cato a Most Outstanding Kapampangan Awardee.
And so, on the evening of Monday, Dec. 11, at the capping event of the Aldo ning Capampangan, Elmer G. Cato was bestowed with the MOKA in Government Service.
