Which Experts Cover Philippine Affairs for Our Readers?
The people behind our reporting on national policy, regional developments, public health, security, and the economy — and how each of them approaches the work.
Our Editorial Experts
Good coverage of Philippine affairs rarely comes from a single vantage point. A libel case moving through the Court of Appeals reads differently to a political analyst, a security editor, and a data journalist. Each sees a different part of the same story.
That is the logic behind how we built this team. We assigned beats not by job title alone but by the kind of question each writer is best equipped to answer. Some track institutions over years. Others sit closer to the ground, in clinics and provincial offices, watching how national decisions land.
The result is a small group with deliberately different habits of mind. What follows is who they are, what they cover, and the lens each one brings.
Beats overlap by design. When a story like the Brillante libel conviction touches courts, local politics, and unpaid damages at once, more than one of our specialists may weigh in.
Senior Political Analyst
National policy is our most senior beat, and for good reason. A law passed in Manila can reshape budgets in a barangay on the order of a thousand kilometers away, and tracing that line takes someone who reads the politics in context.
Claire Delacroix
Senior Political Analyst
I analyze Philippine national policy through comparisons with governance trends across Southeast Asia. I focus on what policy shifts mean for communities, agencies, and Filipinos following events from abroad.
Delacroix leans on comparison rather than commentary. When a national reform surfaces, her first move is to ask where else in the region something similar has played out, and what happened next. That regional frame is what keeps her work useful to readers watching from outside the country as much as those inside it.
Public Health, Data, Regional and Security Specialists
Below the national desk sit four specialists, each owning a distinct slice of the map. They report independently but feed one another constantly — a public health rollout has a budget story inside it, and a security question often becomes a justice question by the time it reaches a courtroom.
Aditi Narayanan
Public Health Policy Analyst
I report on public health by following real cases from clinics, barangay health stations, and policy rollouts. I translate technical health decisions into practical implications for families and local responders.
Hana Al-Mansour
Data Journalist
I use data and benchmarks to explain Philippine economic and public policy trends. I focus on figures that matter to households, workers, local governments, and overseas Filipinos.
Kenji Watanabe
Regional Affairs Correspondent
I cover regional affairs by comparing local government decisions across island and upland communities. I prioritize grounded reporting that connects provincial developments to national policy debates.
Nikos Papadopoulos
Security and Justice Editor
I cover security and justice through comparative institutional analysis. I look at enforcement, court capacity, and civil safeguards with attention to the communities most affected by state power.
Consider how this division of labor handles a single court ruling. When the Court of Appeals upheld a libel conviction against a former Makati vice mayor and kept a hold departure order in place over unpaid damages, Papadopoulos would read it as a question of court capacity and civil safeguards. Al-Mansour would notice the figure attached — damages exceeding half a million pesos — and ask what that signals about how libel penalties are scaled. Two writers, one document, two stories worth telling.
None of these beats is airtight, and we don't pretend otherwise. Philippine governance moves fast, and the line between a regional story and a national one shifts with each news cycle — so our writers trade sources and second-read each other's drafts rather than guard their territory. You can reach any of them through our Contact page, or learn more about our standards on the About Us page.