Issuu

“WE imagine the anguish of the families.”—French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault, after an EgyptAir flight from Paris to Cairo with 66 passengers and crew onboard crashed in the Mediterranean Sea. AP

MEDIA PARTNER OF THE YEAR

“AND rape.”—Donald Trump to Fox News Channel host Sean Hannity, when discussing past allegations of sexual misconduct involving former President Bill Clinton. AP

“I WAS elbowed in the chest by the prime minister, and then I had to leave. It was very overwhelming. I missed the vote because of this.”—Ruth Ellen Brosseau, an opposition member of the Canadian Parliament, after Prime Minister Justin Trudeau made physical contact with her, an incident for which he later apologized. AP

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UNITED NATIONS

2015 ENVIRONMENTAL MEDIA AWARD LEADERSHIP AWARD 2008

A broader look at today’s business

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Saturday, May 21, 2016 Vol. 11 No. 224

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Tokyo, Seoul reaffirm commitment to ¥1-B ‘fund to help ‘comfort women’

B A M

Japan Times, Tokyo (TNS)

APANESE and South Korean officials on Tuesday reaffirmed their commitment to setting up a ¥1-billion fund to assist former “comfort women.” The girls and young women forced to work in wartime Imperial military brothels are now elderly and in dwindling numbers.

Kimihiro Ishikane, director general of the Asian and Oceanian Affairs Bureau at the Foreign Ministry, met with his South Korean counterpart, Chung Byung-won, director general for Northeast Asian affairs at the South Korean Foreign Ministry, to discuss progress. Under a bilateral pact reached at the end of last year, Seoul is supposed to set up a foundation to distribute ¥1 billion provided by the Japanese government to the former sex slaves. Seoul has said it will create the foundation as early as June, but on Tuesday Chung stopped short of giving a date. “We will set it as soon as possible,” he told reporters after the meeting. “Both governments are working together to recover the honor and dignity and heal the psychological wounds of the grandmothers.” The dispute over the wartime sex slaves has long strained bilateral relations. Still, both parties have adhered so far to the agreement, which promises to settle the matter once and for all. One of its provisions is the two sides cannot exchange barbs over the wartime episode. Officials from the two countries discussed the matter at a

meeting last month in Seoul of vice foreign ministers and at a separate meeting there of director generallevel officials. Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida and other officials have hailed a major recent improvement in bilateral relations. Still, uncertainty remains over the implementation of the agreement at a time when the power base of President Park Geun-hye has weakened. Her Saenuri Party suffered a landslide defeat in last month’s parliamentary election. Lee Byung-kee, Park’s chief of staff, tendered his resignation on Sunday, apparently taking responsibility for the drubbing. Lee is seen as the chief architect of the comfort-women agreement. But on Monday in Tokyo, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said Lee’s exit does not affect the implementation of the agreement. Meanwhile, it remains unclear whether a statue of a girl symbolizing the young victims that stands outside the Japanese Embassy in Seoul will be removed. At the time of the agreement last year, Seoul said it would try to resolve the issue, but it has not yet announced progress on this matter.

Manhattan tower planned for older people accustomed to luxury living

T’S not an accident that Manhattan’s newest senior-living facility will rise just blocks away from the gilded co-ops of Park Avenue. Their residents might live in the building someday. Welltower Inc., the biggest US senior-housing owner by market value, is seeking to push into New York, where there’s a dearth of options available for the elderly and those with cognitive issues. Last month it teamed with luxury developer Hines to buy a site at 56th Street and Lexington Avenue, and is planning a tower to accommodate wealthy Manhattanites in need of assisted-living and memory-care services. “You take someone who’s lived at 88th and Park their entire life and you, all of a sudden, say I’m moving you to New Canaan, Connecticut, because that’s the closest assistedliving facility I can get you into— that is unacceptable,” Welltower CEO Thomas DeRosa said in an interview. “You will kill that person.” A slowdown in the city’s luxurycondominium market—which has dominated building and pushed up land values in recent years—gave Toledo, Ohio-based Welltower an opening to enter Manhattan, DeRosa said. The company and Hines together paid $115 million for the two-parcel site, where they plan to erect a 15-story building. The concept they’re planning is “a little bit unproven,” said John Kim, an analyst covering real-estate investment trusts with BMO Capital Markets Corp. in New York. Like anything built in Manhattan in an era of record land prices and soaring construction costs, the price of living at the eventual

tower will be exclusive. Monthly rent at the facility, which will cover the costs of a room, medical care and food, is likely to top $20,000, DeRosa said. It isn’t covered by insurance, which means residents will be paying out of pocket. The price is competitive when compared with the combined monthly expense of hiring full-time caregivers at home and the costs of maintaining a residence in Manhattan, DeRosa said. “There is a huge population of people who will need to live in this building who live on Park Avenue,” he said. “This will be the reasonable alternative. These are people who will have the income. It will not be a hardship for them to pay for this.” While there are other assisted-living facilities in Manhattan—Ventas Inc. has one on West 86th Street and Brookdale Senior Living Inc. owns one in Battery Park City —the idea of building a ground-up project now, at a time when many New York builders struggle to make their developments profitable, “has some risk,” Kim said. “There’s going to be a little bit of a learning curve on the demand side to see if residents are willing to pay those kinds of prices,” said Kim, who has an underperform rating on Welltower shares. Welltower, which owns about 1,500 senior-housing and medical-office properties across the US, the UK and Canada, had wanted to get a foothold in Manhattan as part of its strategy of building in markets with high barriers to entry. The company estimates that there are only 70 beds across the borough available to people with Alzheimer’s or other forms of dementia who need full-time care.Bloomberg News

SERVING THE PUBLIC Officer Von Harold C. Layao, who is in field training in Baguio City, helps an elderly woman cross the street in the city’s business

district. MAU VICTA

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Mandaue City’s 15,836 senior citizens start getting P2K cash

ANDAUE CITY— Mandaue City’s 15,836 senior citizens started getting the first tranche of P2,000 each of their P6,000 financial assistance on May 16 and 17. Michael Pelago, focal person of the Office of Senior Citizens Affairs (Osca) of Mandaue City, said the distribution of the cash aid continued on May 18 and 19. Pelago said the second tranche will be given in August and the last will be in December. “The first tranche was supposed to be given in April, but because of the election ban, it was moved to May 16,” Pelago added. Pelago said the distribution was conducted in the different barangays in the city. The Mandaue City Council last year approved an ordinance increasing the yearly aid for senior citizens from P3,000 to P6,000. PNA

Loneliness hurts: Senior health about more than diseases

ASHINGTON—Grandma’s cholesterol is lay, but maybe the doctor should be asking about her social life, too. Think about health during the senior years, and a list of common ailments pops to mind. But that’s not the whole story. New research suggests factors such as loneliness and whether they’ve broken any bones since middle age also play a role in the well-being of older adults. In fact, layering on that extra information better predicts whether a senior’s next five years will be fairly robust or whether they’re at higher risk for death or disability than just focusing on what chronic diseases they have, researchers reported on Monday in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. “Aging is not a linear process of wear and tear,” said University of Chicago biopsychologist Martha McClintock, who led the study. “It’s a different way of thinking about aging.” Using a gover nment study of 3,000 middle-aged and older people, the researchers compared the medical conditions that doctors look for in the average checkup—blood pressure, cholesterol, diabetes, heart disease, cancer— with information about psycho-

logical health, mobility, hearing and other sensory capabilities, and additional characteristics of day-to-day functioning. Of course, having a cluster of serious diseases and being frail can mean a greater risk of death. Having uncontrolled diabetes and high blood pressure was particularly risky on top of other illnesses. But factoring in the extra harder-to-measure characteristics showed some seniors with chronic diseases actually were more likely to survive the next five years than their medical charts indicate. And about half who, by disease diagnoses alone, would be considered healthy really were more vulnerable to decline, the study found. Those extra factors “are harbingers; they’re canaries in the coal mine of some biological processes that are aging,” said McClintock, who hopes the findings spur policy-makers to focus more on these other nondisease conditions of aging. The work may help redefine how doctors determine older patients’ vigor and quality of life, said Dr. John Haaga of the National Institute on Aging (NIA), which funded the research. “We really have to look at more

than the collection of diagnoses that they have. We’ve got to look at some of these life circumstances and really ask a few questions about mental health, about recent events, that will help trigger more watchful care,” he said. Among the findings: Poor mental health, which affects one in eight older adults, makes people more vulnerable to certain illnesses. The researchers weren’t measuring a diagnosis of depression, long known to complicate overall health. Instead, they asked whether people feel lonely, if they’re socially isolated, if they have trouble sleeping, if they’re anxious or stressed or have low self-esteem. Why did that matter? Separately, McClinton has studied the biology behind social isolation in rats caged separately or in groups, and found the loners got more aggressive breast cancer sooner, with a worse prognosis. The isolation triggered physiologic changes—hormones that overreacted to the stressors of everyday life, and differences in fatty breast tissue that supported the growth of cancer cells. Breaking a bone any time since age 45 is a marker of future health problems. That’s surprising, and needs further study, said

NIA’s Haaga, adding that, meanwhile, it’s something doctors might consider. A broken hip during the senior years has long been known to send patients on a downward spiral. But this study implicated long-healed fractures of any type as early as middle age to poor health later on. Those breaks might be an early signal of bone-thinning osteoporosis, or the beginning of balance and muscle problems that increase the risk of later frailty, Haaga speculated. Good mobility—no trouble walking quickly or getting up from chairs—is one of the best indicators of well-being. Indeed, prior fractures were a risk for poor later mobility. Obesity seems to pose little risk to seniors as long as they’re otherwise in good physical and mental health—without the diabetes or heart disease that so often accompanies extra pounds. Haaga noted there’s controversy about whether being overweight in the senior years is helpful. Sensory function—problems with hearing, vision and smell— also plays a role in seniors’ vulnerability. McClintock said it contributes to social isolation, mobility and nutrition. AP

EgyptAir crashes with 66 aboard

OUR TIME

Italian woman, 116, seen as last living person born in 1800s

ER B A N I A , It a ly— Su r rounded by relatives and friends, Italy’s Emma Morano greeted with a smile the news she, at 116, is now the oldest person in the world. Not only that: Morano is believed to be the last surviving person in the world born in the 1800s, with a birthdate of November 29, 1899. That’s just four-and-a-halfmonths after Susannah Mushatt Jones, who died on Thursday in New York, also at 116. Journalists on Friday descended upon Morano’s home in Verbania, a northern Italian mountain town overlooking Lake Major, to document her achievement, but had to wait until she finished a nap to greet her. Morano lives in a neat one-room apartment, which she no longer leaves, and is kept company by a caregiver and two elderly nieces. “I am doing fine —116!” she told well-wishers from her bed Friday. “I finished school and I went to

TERRORISM EYED IN CRASH Saturday,May May 21, 21, 2016 B4 Saturday, 2016 • Editor: Efleda P. Campos B2-4

EMMA MORANO poses next to a picture depicting her when she was young in Verbania, Italy, on May 13. Surrounded by relatives and neighbors, Morano greeted with a smile on Friday the news that she, at 116, is now the oldest person in the world. ANTONINO DI MARCO/ANSA VIA AP

work. I used to sing. I had a beautiful voice,” she added, summing up her life in a frail voice. Her physician of 23 years, Dr. Carlo Bava, delivered the news earlier that she was officially the world’s oldest person.

“She was very, very happy” and sitting up in a chair, he told The Associated Press in a phone interview. “She was all proud and contented.” For the occasion, he brought flowers as well seven Easter cakes called Colomba, an Italian specialty

Our TheTime World BusinessMirror BusinessMirror

An EgyptAir jetliner bound from Paris to Cairo with 66 people aboard crashed in the Mediterranean Sea early Thursday after a mysterious series of extremely abrupt turns

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‘POSSIBLE EXPLOSION ON BOARD FROM A BOMB OR A SUICIDE BOMBER’ Mandaue Tokyo, Seoul reaffirm commitment briefsseniorCity’s citizens start Officials: Terrorism more 15,836 Bto ¥1-B ‘fund to help ‘comfort women’ getting P2K cash CHINESE GOVT BACKED SOCIAL MEDIA USERS FLOOD WEB

ISRAELI DEFENSE MINISTER ANNOUNCES RESIGNATION

likely in EgyptAir crash 10k ft C

EIJING—China’s government fabricates and posts several hundred million social-media posts a year to inB A M Japan Times, Tokyo (TNS) fluence public opinion about the country, according to a new paper by US researchers examining one of the most opaque aspects of the Communist Party’s rule. The academic study, led by Harvard political scientist Gary King, claims to be one of the first in-depth looks into the inner workings of China’s push to influence public opinion by flooding social media with posts portrayed as if they were coming from ordinary people. Besides possessing highly sophisticated censorship controls to find and delete content outright, China’s government has long been known to employ a huge group of Internet workers, known colloquially as the “Fifty Cent Party,” to influKimihiro Ishikane, meeting last month in Seoul of vice ence discourse in subtler ways. Thedirector name general of athe Asianrumor—never and Oceanian foreign ministers and at a separate originates from popular Affairs Bureausuch at the Foreign Minmeeting there of director generalsubstantiated—that people are paid level officials. istry, with his South 50 cents permet progovernment post. Korean counterpart, Chungwhich Byung-won, Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida The research project, took ad-director for Northeast Asian and other officials a mavantage of ageneral trove of government e-mails, Investigators said have it washailed too soon affairs atand the South Korean recent improvement in bilateral spreadsheets work reports from Foreign a proto jor rule out any possible causes for Ministry, discuss progress. relations.disaster, Still, uncertainty remains paganda office intocentral China leaked onThursday’s but suggested Under a bilateral reached at that over the implementation the line in 2014, concludes thatpact an estimated terrorism was more likely of than the end ofposts last ayear, Seoul isthe sup- a technical agreement at a time when the power 488 million fake year “enables failure. posed to set up a foundation to base of President ParkanGeun-hye government to actively control opinion EgyptAir Flight 804, Airbus distribute billion provided hascarrying weakened. Her Saenuri without having to¥1 censor as much as they by A320 56 passengers andParty 10 the Japanese government to the crew suffered a landslide defeat in last might otherwise.” members, left Paris’s Charles former sex slaves. Seoul has said it parliamentary The researchers also reached a slightly de month’s Gaulle Airport for Cairoelection. at about will create theabout foundation early 11:10Lee Park’s chief of surprising conclusion the goal as of the p.m.Byung-kee, on Wednesday. as June, butto on Tuesday Chung staff, resignation massive operation: “distract the public” Greektendered air-traffichis controllers wereon stopped short of giving date. taking responduring politically sensitive newsa events. theSunday, last toapparently make contact with the “We will it as soonperception as possible,” plane, sibility for 2:30 the a.m., drubbing. Lee is That counters theset widespread at about as it passed seen the chief architect of of the told employs reporters after the meeting. that he Beijing Internet workers to over theas island of Kea, just south are working thecomfort-women shut“Both down itsgovernments critics on online forums. Greek mainland. agreement. But together to step recover the honortheand on in Tokyo, Chief Cabinet “They do not up to defend TheMonday pilot did not mention any dignity its and heal and the their psychological SecretaryKostas Yoshihide Suga said the Lee’s government, leaders policies problems, Litzerakis, grandmothers.” exitofdoes not affect implemenfromwounds criticism,of nothe matter how vitriolic; inhead Greece’s civil the aviation deTheseem dispute over controversial the wartime partment, tation oftold thereporters. agreement. deed, they to avoid issues entirely,” authors write. Shortly after entering Egyptian sex slavesthe haspaper’s long strained bilatMeanwhile, it remains unclear “Letting argument die, or changing the airspace, theaplane made 90-degree eralanrelations. Still, both parties whether statue of aagirl symbolsubject, workssomuch better to the theyoung left, then a 360-degree izing victims that stands haveusually adhered far to the than agree- turn picking an argument and getting some-the circle to the dropping fromin ment, which promises to settle outside theright, Japanese Embassy one’smatter back up.” 15,000 feet, Greek once and for all. One of its 37,000 Seoulfeet will to be removed. At the time The paper detailed antwo elaborate Panos provisions is the sidesmethcannot Defense of theMinister agreement lastKammenos year, Seoul odology used bybarbs the research which said at aitnews in Athens. exchange over team, the wartime said wouldbriefing try to resolve theItisemployed its own army offrom research radar at episode. Officials theas-two disappeared sue, but itfrom has not yetscreens announced sistants. After gaining a glimpse into howat a about 10,000onfeet, said. countries discussed the matter progress thishematter. China’s Fifty Cent operation organizes itAt 2:50 a.m., air-traffic controlself from leaked documents, the research lers confirmed they had lost contact group created numerous fake accounts with the plane, Egypt’s Civil Aviaof their own to ask large samples of sustion Minister Sherif Fathi said at a pected government workers an elabonews conference in Cairo. rate set of questions to confirm that the He cautioned that it was too posters were indeed getting guidance soon to draw conclusions about from authorities. happened the plane. But T’S not an accident that Manhattan’s what tower will be to exclusive. Monthly One of the three coauthors, Margaret acknowledged thatwhich the possibilnewest senior-living facility will rise he rent at the facility, will cover Roberts from the University of California, of acosts terrorism attack medical was “highjust blocks away from the gilded itythe of a room, care San Diego, in anAvenue. e-mail that thanfood, the possibility a co-ops said of Park Theirexaminresidents er and is likely to of tophaving $20,000, ing leaked or interviewing fortechnical mightdocuments live in the building someday. DeRosafailure.” said. It isn’t covered by inmer participants could offerthe a biased viewUS The calamity immediately brought Welltower Inc., biggest surance, which means residents will of the operation, but “large-scale statistical mind the disappearance a Russenior-housing owner by market to be paying out of pocket.of The price analyses of online data allow us to directly Airbus over the Sinai Peninsula value, is seeking to push into New sian is competitive when compared with observe and summarize people October, a crash that Moscow saidof York, where there’swhat a dearth of withoptions lastthe combined monthly expense in the system are doing.” AP was probably the result of a bomb.

APANESE and South Korean officials on Tuesday reaffirmed their four hours commitment to setting up aAIRO—Nearly ¥1-billion a flight from Paris to fund to assist former “comfortinto women.” Cairo, an Egyptian passenger The girls and young women forced to work in wartime Imperial military plane with 66 people aboard brothels are now elderly and in dwindling abruptly swerved and plunged numbers. thousands of feet before vanishing

exploded inside. “One thing is certain, it happened suddenly. There was no message, no signal.… The pilots had no time to say anything, it happened so quickly.” French President François HolThe height of the jetliner lande called an emergency meeting when it was still intact, at the Elysee Palace. Prime Minister radar data suggested Manuel Valls said “no theory can be ruled out” as a cause of the accident. President Barack Obama’s top counHollande spoke to his Egyptian terterrorism adviser, Lisa Monaco, counterpart, Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi, briefed him at the White House early early Thursday. Afterward, Holon Thursday. lande’s office said the two countries In France the suddenness of the would cooperate to find out what aircraft’s disappearance also raised had happened. suspicions of foul play. Jean-Paul Egyptian and Greek defense auA senior US law-enforcement ofTroadec, former president of the thorities mounted a search in the ficial who was briefed on Thursday’s French air accident investigation Mediterranean. crash also said investigators were bureau, told Europe 1 radio that it At Cairo International Airport, leaning toward a terrorist act but was unlikely to have been a mechananguished relatives of the plane’s had not ruled out other scenarios. ical failure. passengers and crew gathered at SERVING THE PUBLIC Officer Von Harold C. Layao, who is inafield training in Baguio City, woman cross thefor streetnews in the city’ s business Investigators were examining “There’s strong possibility ofhelps an an elderly dawn hoping about their district. MAU VICTA several possible reasons for the explosion onboard from a bomb or a loved ones. abrupt turns, but the theories all suicide bomber,” Troadec said. One woman, in tears, emerged had holes that might not be filled “We could also consider a missile, from the building with her husuntil the wreckage and cockpit voice which is what happened to the Maband. She said that her son-in-law and data recorders are retrieved, aclaysia Airlines aircraft in July 2014. was one of the security personnel cording to the US official, who was If the crew didn’t send an alert sigon the plane. ASHINGTON—Grandlogical health, what mobility, hearing than thedon’t collection diagnoses not authorized to comment publicly. nal, it’s because happened was “We know of anything,” she is lay, inbut and sudden.” other sensory capabilities, that have.understand. We’ve got to A bomb ma’s maycholesterol have exploded very said. they “We don’t Welook don’t and characteristics at some of these life circumstances maybebut the an doctor should side the aircraft, explosion “Aadditional problem with an engine orofa know what happened to the plane.” andAreally askwaiting a few questions about asking about her social life,have too. day-to-day functioning. atbe that altitude probably would technical fault would not produce an woman with her husband, mental health, aboutcollapsed, recent events, Think abouttohealth during the the Of course, having ahe cluster of secaused the plane disintegrate, immediate accident,” added. “In son and daughter oversenior said. years,Radar and adata list ofsuggested common rious diseases and frailwhich can that will help more watchful official this case, the crew didbeing not react, whelmed, intotrigger her daughter’ s arms. ailments to mind. But that’s not mean ausgreater risk death. Havcare,” heare said. the jetlinerpops remained intact at least makes think of an of explosion.” “We providing families of the until reached 10,000 Greek Defense Ministry passengers all the informathe it whole story. New feet. research sugingAuncontrolled diabetes andsource high Among thewith findings: A hijacker have tried said itpressure was alsowas investigating action available to us,” Fathi said. gests factors also suchcould as loneliness and blood particularlyan risky Poor mental health, which“If towhether commandeer aircraft, count a merchant ship captain someone wants to know what they’vethe broken anyresultbones on topfrom of other illnesses. affects one in eight oldernow adults, ing in amiddle struggle the play cockpit. But of seeing a “flame in in thethe sky”extra about happened to the plane, we can’t to tell since ageinalso a role in But factoring makes people more vulnerable that would have 130 nautical milescharacteristics south of the them since we stillThe do not know.” the situation well-beingprobably of older adults. harder-to-measure certain illnesses. researchers generated a distress Greek island ofseniors Karpathos. Of the 56 passengers, 30 were In fact, layeringcall. on that extra inshowed some with chronic weren’t measuring a diagnosis of It was also possible that a pilota Frenchactually Foreignwere Minister JeanEgyptian, 15long were from France, two formation better predicts whether diseases more likely depression, known to complimight have Marc Ayrault guarded in fromoverall Iraq, and one each fromthey Britsenior’s nextintentionally five years willcrashed be fairly to survive thewas nextmore five years than cate health. Instead, the plane. what the atUShigher Nahis assessment. Afterindicate. visiting And pasain, Belgium, Sudan, their medical charts robust or That’s whether they’re asked whether Saudi peopleArabia, feel lonely, if tional Transportation Safety Board sengers’ families crisis center Chad, Portugal, Algeria,ifKuwait and risk for death or disability than just about half who, at by adisease diagthey’re socially isolated, they have concluded in 1999, when near de Gaulle Airport, Canada.sleeping, At least iftwo babies and an focusing happened on what chronic diseases nosesCharles alone, would be considered trouble they’re anxious anthey EgyptAir flight from Los Angeles Ayrault calledwere formore solidarity and older child or were onlow theself-esteem. flight. have, researchers reported on healthy really vulnerable or stressed have toMonday Cairo crashed into theofAtlantic compassion for the “anguished Nodid Americans were listed on the in Proceedings the Nato decline, the study found. famWhy that matter? Separately, Ocean 60 miles south of Nanilies” and said speculation and theopassenger manifest. But US tionalabout Academy of Sciences. Those extra factors “are harMcClinton has studied theofficials bioltucket Island, Massachusetts, killrizing should stop. canaries in the werebehind checking further to confirm that. “Aging is not a linear process of bingers; they’re ogy social isolation in rats ing all 217 Egyptian “We have remain extremely Adding to theorfamilies’ anguish wear andpeople tear,”onboard. said University of coal mine of to some biological procaged separately in groups, and authorities blamed an unspecified careful beforearecommenting exwere athe series of conflicting statements cesses that aging,” saidorMcChicago biopsychologist Martha found loners got more aggressive mechanical failure. pressing about hapissued by Egyptian andwith GreekaauthoriClintock,theories who hopes thewhat findings McClintock, who led the study. breast cancer sooner, worse US a counterterrorism officials pened,” he said. ties during the of thetriggered day. “It’s different way of thinking spur policy-makers to focus more prognosis. Thecourse isolation were running a former French EgyptAir changes—hormones initially said that the about aging.” the names on the onJean theseSerrat, other nondisease condiphysiologic flightUsing manifest through terrorist commercial pilot, told France’s planeoverreacted sent out a distress two a gover nment study tions of aging. that to the signal stressors watch lists middle-aged to see whether of BFMTV theremay were only three realhours after life, the and last differences confirmed in raof 3,000 andany older The work help redefine how of everyday the passengers or crew maycompared have existic hypotheses: aircraft was dar contact, but that Fathisupported said this people, the researchers doctors determineThe older patients’ fatty breast tissue tremist ties, another US official hit by aand missile, there was asaid “major wasgrowth an error and that the medical conditions thatsaid, docvigor quality of life, Dr. the of cancer cells.no emerspeaking onfor condition of anonymity technical incident” that led Instito it gencyBreaking calls were madeany from the tors look in the average checkJohn Haaga of the National a bone time Los Angeles Times/TNS toup—blood discuss the pressure, investigation. exploding midflight, or something plane.age cholesterol, tute on Aging (NIA), which funded since 45 is a marker of future

from radar screens over the Mediterranean Sea, officials said.

Manhattan tower planned for older people accustomed to luxury living

available for the elderly and those with cognitive issues. Last month it teamed with luxury developer Hines to buy a site at 56th Street and Lexington Avenue, and is planning a tower to accommodate wealthy Manhattanites in need of assisted-living and memory-care services. “You take someone who’s lived at EVADI VILLAGE, India—For 88th and Park their entire life and two years, the farmer was you, all of a sudden, say I’m moving hopeful. He borrowed hunyou to New Canaan, Connecticut, dreds of thousands of rupees (thoubecause that’s the closest assistedsands of dollars) to build a pipeline that living afacility I can youofinto— connected local dam to hisget fields cotunacceptable,” Welltower CEO ton that and is sugarcane. Two years ago, the Thomas DeRosa saidkept in angrowing. interview. water stopped. The debts “Youmonth will kill that person.” This Srikrishna Pandit Agee slowdown the in city’s luxurywalkedAout into his in fields Marathcondominium market—which wada, a central Indian region devas-has dominated building and pushed tated by two successive failed mon- up land values in recent years—gave soons and a crippling drought, and Toledo, Ohio-based Welltower an hanged himself from a tree. opening tofailure enter Manhattan, DeR“Constant of crops. Very said. He Thecouldn’t company and Hines low osa produce. recover the together paid million investments, could$115 not pay backfor thethe two-parcel site,why where they himplan to bank loans. That’s he killed a 15-story building. conself,”erect his brother Umesh PanditThe Agee planning is “a little said.cept Thethey’re widow of the 41-year-old satbit said John Kim, an anawithunproven,” her three young children, holding lyst covering real-estate investment a framed photograph of her husband. Markets The trusts familywith still BMO must Capital pay back the Corp. in New loans or risk losingYork. their land. Like400 anything built in ManhatSome farmers have killed tan in ansoera record themselves farofthis yearland in prices the and Marathwada soaring construction costs, parched region, which is thetoprice at the eventual home aboutof19living million people. It’s in the otherwise prosperous Maharashtra state. And it’s not alone in its sweltering misery. The dry wells, shriveled stubble of sugarcane fields and withered fruit trees across the region reflect the suffering of hundreds of millions of

hiring full-time caregivers at home and the costs of maintaining a residence in Manhattan, DeRosa said. “There is a huge population of people who will need to live in this building who live on Park Avenue,” he said. “This will be the reasonable alternative. These are people who will have the income. It will not be Indians across at least a dozen other a hardship for them to pay for this.” states that are under the grips of a seWhile there are other assisted-livvere drought. ing facilities in Manhattan—Ventas Monsoon showers, which norInc. has one on West 86th Street and mally run from June to September, Livingwhere Inc. owns areBrookdale crucial inSenior a country 60 one in of Battery Park City —the ideainof percent the population works building a and ground-up project agriculture less than halfnow, theat a time when many New York builders farmland is irrigated. struggle make their developments For the to average farmer, who lives profitable, “hasseason some risk,” Kim said. and earns from to season, a be amust littlebe bit poor “There’s monsoongoing meanstofood of a learning on he thehas demand carefully rationedcurve because little side to see if residents are willing to money to spend. pay those kindsofof aprices,” Kim, With dreams good said harvest, whosmallhas anand underperform rating most medium-scale farm-on shares. ersWelltower borrow money, often at exorbitant Welltower, about 1,500 interest rates of which up to owns 10 percent per senior-housing andand medical-office month, to buy seeds fertilizers properties across the US, the UK and and hire tractors. Canada, had wanted to get foothold Consecutive droughts areaenough Manhattan as part of its strategy to inwipe out most small farmers’of building in markets withthem high into barrimeager savings and push ers to entry. The company estimates destitution. that there are only 70 beds the In Marathwada locals say across the curborough people Alrent droughtavailable is one oftothe worstwith in livingzheimer’s memory.or other forms of dementia who full-time Theneed situation wascare.Bloomberg so dire in thatNews in April the Maharashtra state government began sending millions of liters (hundreds of thousands of gallons) of water to Marathwada’s worst-hit Latur district on a “water train.” Small farmers have been pushed into poverty. Poor farm laborers, hired

JERUSALEM—Israel’s defense minister has announced his resignation, citing a lack of “trust” in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

ANDAUE CITY— Moshe Yaalon posted on Facebook Mandaue City’s 15,836 that he told Netanyahu on Friday that, senior citizens started “following his conduct in recent developgetting the first tranche of ments and in light of the lack of trust in P2,000 each of their P6,000 him, I am resigning from the government financial assistance on May 16 and the Knesset [Israel’s parliament] and and 17. a time out from political life.” taking Michael person Reports Pelago, over the focal past few days indiofcate the that Office of Senior Citizens Netanyahu intends to appoint Affairs Mandaue City, former(Osca) Foreign of Minister Avigdor Liebersaid distribution of the manthe to the post. cash Lieberman, aid continued on of May 57, is one the 18 country’s and 19.polarizing politicians. Over three demost Pelago the second cades, hesaid has, at times, beentranche Netanyahu’s will be given in August and the closest ally and, other times, a fierce rilast in December. val.will Thisbe week Netanyahu invited Lieber“The party first Yisrael tranche was to join his man’s Beitenu supposed to be given in April, narrow coalition. AP but because of the election ban, it was moved to May 16,” Pelago added. Pelago said the distribution was conducted in the different barangays in the city. The Mandaue City Council SINGAPORE—Singapore’s highest court last approved anappeal ordinance onyear Friday rejected an by a Malayincreasing theconvict, yearlyleaving aid forhim no fursian murder senior citizens from P3,000 to ther room for reprieve from execution. P6,000. The PNA Court of Appeal said it found no

MALAYSIAN DEATH ROW CONVICT LOSES FINAL APPEAL IN SINGAPORE

merit in the last-minute appeal by an activist lawyer representing Kho Jabing that challenged the constitutional legality of the death penalty in the city-state. The rejection concludes six years of legal twists NIA’s Haaga, that,sentenced mean- to during which adding Kho, 31, was while, it’swon something might death, appeals, doctors resentenced to life consider. A broken hip during thesenimprisonment and caning, and again tenced to death. senior years has long been known No date was seton for athedownward execution, and to send patients the court it would leave it to prison auspiral. Butsaid this study implicated thorities to fractures carry it out.ofExecutions long-healed any type in asSingapore are by hanging, arehealth usually carearly as middle age toand poor ried on. out before dawn at Changi prison. later Those breaks might beKho accused of using tree branch to assault anisearly signal ofa bone-thinning and rob a construction worker in 2008. osteoporosis, or the beginning ofThe worker and diedmuscle from multiple skull that fractures balance problems and Khothe was risk convicted and sentenced increase of later frailty, to deathspeculated. in 2010. AP Haaga

Loneliness hurts: Senior health about more than diseases

diabetes, heart disease, cancer— with information about psycho-

the research. “We really have to look at more

health problems. That’s surprising, and needs further study, said

Good mobility—no trouble walking quickly or getting up from chairs—is one of the best indicators of well-being. Indeed, prior fractures were a risk for poor later ISLAMABAD—Pakistani authorities say mobility. police acting on intelligence killed 14 alObesity seems toother posemilitants little risk Qaeda members and in two to separate seniorsshootouts as long as they’rePakistan. otherin central wise Ainstatement good physical mental issuedand by the Counter health—without the diabetes Terrorism Department said on or Friday heart that so often accomeightdisease al-Qaeda operatives and other milpanies Haaga noted itantsextra were pounds. killed near the city of Multhere’s about tan, incontroversy Punjab province, onwhether Wednesday. being overweight in the seniormanaged years Several of their accomplices is to helpful. flee, but were traced to the district Sensory of Dera Ghazifunction—problems Khan, where six were killed with vision andforces smell— in ahearing, firefight with security the folalso plays lowing day.aAProle in seniors’ vulnerability. McClintock said it contributes to social isolation, mobility and nutrition. AP

PAKISTANI POLICE KILL 14 ‘ALQAEDA MILITANTS’

CRIPPLING DROUGHT IN CENTRAL Italian woman, 116, seen as last living person born in 1800s INDIA LEAVES MILLIONS ON BRINK V D ER B A N I A , It a ly— Su r by middlemen to work on large farms, rounded by relatives and have been forced to work for little or friends, Italy’s Emma Mono money. Cattle farmers forced to rano greeted with a smile the news bring their herds close to water supshe, live at 116, now theand oldest person plies in is lean-tos cook over in the world. open fires. only that: Morano beInNot every village in the regionisthere lieved to belocked the lastand surviving perare several abandoned son in Tens the world born in the homes. of thousands of 1800s, people withbeen a birthdate of November 29, have forced to abandon their vil1899. just four-and-a-halflages andThat’s head to slums in bigger cities after Susannah Mushatt tomonths earn a living. Jones, who died on Thursday in Landlocked Marathwada has hisNew York, also at 116.water shorttorically suffered from Friday descendages,Journalists but decades on of poor agricultural ed upon Morano’s home in Verbaand water-management policies have nia, a the northern Italian mountain pushed region to the brink. town overlooking Lake have Major, to Scientists and activists long document achievement, but warned that her relentless groundwater had to wait until finished extraction has led to she a steep drop ina nap to greet her.India—the world’s water tables across Morano in a neat decline. one-room fastest rate oflives groundwater apartment, which she no longer In the village of Masurdi alone, leaves, is 70 kept company there are and about wells betweenby18a caregiver twodeep, elderly meters to 25and meters butnieces. they are “I am fine —116!” she told all dry, saysdoing the headman, Nana Berde. well-wishers from “Bore wells as deepher as bed 500Friday. meters finished school I went to have“Iall gone dry. The and underground water level has dropped so much that there is no water at all,” he adds. A recent agricultural shift has made things worse. Farmers who once grew millet, sorghum and other cereals have turned to sugarcane, which fetches more money, but is a water guzzler.

THE WORLD

that he managed to procure out of season to satisfy her sweet tooth until Christmas, when Panettone is available. The doctor said Morano has never had a very balanced diet, relying mostly on animal protein, the occasional banana and grapes in season. Her diet now includes two raw eggs and 100 grams of raw steak a day, which Bava prescribed after she had a bout of anemia some years back. Her nieces also make her apple sauce. Italy is known for its centenarians—many of whom live on the Mediterranean island of Sardinia—and gerontologists at the EMMA MORANO poses next to a picture depicting her when she was young in Verbania, Italy, on May 13. Surrounded by relatives and neighbors, Morano greeted with a smile on Friday the news that she, University of Milan are studying at 116, is now the oldest person in the world. ANTONINO DI MARCO/ANSA VIA AP Morano, along with a handful of Italians over 105, to try to figure work. I used to sing. I had a beauti“She was very, very happy” and out why they live so long. AN farmer sitsadded, in the front of his destroyed cotton, alongside road in he onetold of theThe drought of Marathwada, in theher Indian state of fulIndian voice,” she summing up crop ofsitting up in aachair, As-affected region Bava, who visits every FriMaharashtra. monsoons farmers inPress centralin India, leadinginterview. to crippling poverty and soaring suicides. Somethere’s 400 farmers have killed her life inFailed a frail voice.play havoc with millions of sociated a phone day, is convinced a genetic themselves this year in theofMarathwada region, home was to about millionand people. AP/MANISH SWARUP Her physician 23 years, Dr.which is“She all19proud contented.” component to Morano’s longevity Carlo Bava, news the until occasion, he brought addition her positive People like delivered sugarcane the worker BausFor to leave he recovered all of his in the rains to usually hit the attitude. southern tip earlierMajmule that shenow wasfind officially the flowers One herby sisters to be over burao themselves money,”as hewell said.seven Easter cakes of of India June lived 1, it typically takes world’s oldest person. called Colomba, an Italiandepartment specialty 100 andlate another tothis nearly AP to trapped between the middlemen who India’s meteorological until June for area100. to begin hired them and the farm owners who has said this year’s monsoon rains experience monsoon showers. paid for the labor. could be above average, as El Niño— But in Taka village, residents long “The contractor had taken more a warming of the eastern Pacific for that moisture and intend to make money from the owner, and we were Ocean that leads to dry spells in South the most of it. They are digging a well— given a small amount of it to work in Asia—recedes. not with any hope of reaching the wasugarcane factory. The contractor disIn the eight districts of Marathwater table, but to create storage space for appeared and the owner did not allow da, that is still a distant dream. Though when the rains finally fall. AP

@ _enren

LLOWING the National Food Authority (NFA) to monopolize rice importation is a feasible way to end smuggling, according to the agency, the Samahang Industriya ng Agrikultura (Sinag) and agricultural think tank Meganomics Specialists International Inc.

TOKYO, SEOUL REAFFIRM COMMITMENT OurTime

B M G P

INSIDE

Abrupt turns

Flight 804 left Charles de Gaulle Airport at 11:09 p.m. Wednesday local time. Flight entered Greek traffic control area. Controllers spoke to the pilot and everything appeared normal. At 2:27 a.m. repeated calls go unanswered.

At 2:45 a.m. Cairo time, the flight disappeared from radar.

Scheduled to land at Cairo International Airport 3:05 a.m. Cairo time.

The plane was 10-15 miles inside the Egyptian control area when it made a 90-degree left turn, then a full 360-degree turn toward the right, plummeting from 38,000 to 15,000 feet. It disappeared at about 10,000 feet.

360 degrees right

90 degrees left

The estimated value of smuggled rice from 2010 to 2014 However, the NFA and an analyst from the Philippine Institute for Development Studies (PIDS) warned C  A

Duterte’s 8-pt agenda to see 6-week vetting

Piece by piece, the members of the economic team would come in, and catch up with the holding of the consultation.” —L B M T. C | Mindanao Bureau Chief

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A CELEBRATION OF LIGHT DEAR Lord, in the procession that took place during the International Eucharistic Congress was a celebration of light, not just the lights of lingering Christmas decorations and the candles held by the more than a million participants, almost as a sign of defiance and protection from the impending night but also and especially the light that one could see shining brightly in the eyes of all—a reflection of the inner light that has its source in God, and which gives meaning and direction to the life of individuals and communities. May each one experience a celebration of light in our mind, heart and soul as we continue to live in the grace of God. Amen!

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Onboard EgyptAir Flight MS804 Total: 66 Crew: 7

Passengers: 56 Security officers: 3

Height: 38 ft. 7 in. Wing span: 117 ft. 5 in. with Sharklets Overall length: 123 ft. 3 in. Source: Flightradar24, AP, Airbus Graphic: Staff, Tribune News Service

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NEW TAIWAN PRESIDENT RESISTS ‘ONECOUNTRY’ PRESSURE FROM CHINA

AVAO CITY—The country’s energy situation, notably the power crisis in Mindanao, is likely to emerge a priority issue in this southern Philippine island, when the camp of incoming President Rodrigo R. Duterte submits its controversial eight-point economic agenda to a national consultation before he takes his oath of office on July 1. The Duterte camp already assured critics the economic agenda is not the agenda for his entire tenure, but would still be discussed in a national consultation “to ensure the economic gains in the past years would now trickle down to the majority of Filipinos.” Peter T. Laviña, spokesman for the Duterte campaign team, said the consultation would determine the priority issues to tackle. He said, while the agenda appears to mimic that of President Aquino’s, the end result of the agenda should be the final benefit going to the poor majority. “Power, energy would be a priority issue to be addressed by this administration,” he said, adding that the national consultation would actually determine the other priority issues. The Duterte camp has less than six weeks to conduct the consultation, but the economic team that would conduct it is yet to be fully constituted, pending the appointment of key economic advisers and prospective Cabinet secretaries. Laviña identified businessman and hotelier Carlos G. Dominguez and North Cotabato former Gov. Emmanuel E. Piñol as already in the team, “and could well start the consultation.” “Piece by piece, the members of the economic team would come in, and catch up with the holding of the consultation,” he said. Former National Treasurer Leonor M. Briones, lead convener of the non-governmental group Social Watch Philippines, has called on Duterte “to open discussions on fleshing out the details of the agenda to the public for further scrutiny and dialogue.” Briones noted a growth surge last year that she expected to manifest in the first half of this

TAIWAN’S incoming President Tsai Ing-wen (left) shares a moment with outgoing President Ma Ying-jeou during the swearing-in ceremony at the Presidential Office in Taipei, Taiwan, on Friday. TAIPEI PHOTOJOURNALISTS ASSOCIATION/AP

AIWANESE President Tsai Ing-wen said she will seek peaceful ties with China while resisting pressure from Beijing to acknowledge the idea that they are part of a single nation. Tsai said she would seek common ground with China and pledged to keep the peace, as she was sworn in as the island’s first female leader at the head of an independence-leaning party. “In 1992 both sides of the strait held the political concept of mutual understanding and seeking common ground while reserving differences, carried out communication and negotiation, and reached a number of understandings. We respect this historical fact,” Tsai said. Tsai, whose Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) also won control of the legislature, said Taiwan and China need to cast off the burdens of history and seek a relationship based on peace and stability. Taiwan’s benchmark Taiex index rose 0.7 percent as of 12 noon in Taipei trading. Beijing had been stepping up pressure on Tsai to openly endorse the “one-China” principle, the understanding that both sides belong to one China, even if they have different ideas about what that means. Tsai acknowledged the historic 1992 talks between the two sides, which she said should form the foundation for future ties with China. With the DPP controls both the executive and legislative branches for the first time in its nearly three decades, Tsai pledged to guide Taiwan’s regional economic integration and structural reform of its domestic economy. Taiwan’s economy has posted three straight quarters of economic contraction, dragged down by slower demand for its products from China and elsewhere in the world. Taiwan’s new president also emphasized the need for better care of the elderly, social justice and creating opportunities for Taiwan’s youth. “China is capable of sabotaging Taiwan’s economy and international presence if any relation deterioration causes it to act,” said Gordon Sun, director of the Taiwan Institute of Economic Research’s Macroeconomic Forecasting Center. “Social progress would be negatively affected if the economy is dragged down by cold China ties, as money is crucial.”

Bloomberg News

S “D’ - ,” A

n JAPAN 0.4261 n UK 68.4880 n HK 6.0324 n CHINA 7.1502 n SINGAPORE 33.9308 n AUSTRALIA 33.8527 n EU 52.4963 n SAUDI ARABIA 12.4940

Source: BSP (20 May 2016 )

A2 Saturday, May 21, 2016

BMReports BusinessMirror

NFA monopoly seen ending rice smuggling C  

that doing so could open the country to serious repercussions from the World Trade Organization (WTO) after the country’s quantitative restriction (QR) on rice expires in 2017. Recently, incoming Agriculture Secretary Emmanuel F. Piñol vowed that the Duterte administration will end rice smuggling in the Philippines by restricting private entities from importing the staple. NFA Spokesman Angel G. Imperial Jr. told the BusinessMirror disallowing the private sector to ship rice into the country is legal under Presidential Decree (PD) 4, series of 1972. “That’s possible. If you look at PD 4, it’s only the government, through the NFA, that is authorized to import. The NFA is the one that allows the private sector to import rice,” Imperial said in a phone interview Sinag Executive Director Jayson Cainglet also agreed, underscoring that the NFA is the body that issues importation permits to the private traders.

Solution to smuggling?

ACCORDING to Cainglet, private-sector importation opens an avenue for smuggling in the country. He noted that private-sector importation was originally intended to give rice cooperatives a chance to trade the commodity. However, financiers and consolidators are taking advantage of these cooperatives to smuggle and gain profit. “It’s not really the rice cooperatives who are importing rice. They are incapable because they don’t have the capital and the know-how. They are being used by financiers and consolidators,” Cainglet said. When push comes to shove, the industry leader said it’s always the rice cooperatives that are pressed for charges, while the consolidators get away scot-free. “In fact, Sinag is currently helping three cooperatives that have cases in the Court of Appeals, because their names were the ones indicated in the import permit. These rice co-ops, they can’t work, they can’t go out, whereas the consolidators are free and unpunished,” Cainglet lamented. Sinag said it has been pushing for the government to take over the importation of the commodity for yea rs now. He sa id i mpor t at ion t h rough t he government-to-government (G-to-G) scheme is easier to monitor. “All rice shipments that come in to the country that are not bought by the NFA will immediately be considered smuggled,” Cainglet said.

Sinag, citing data from the United Nations Comtrade, earlier revealed that, of the P200 billion worth of agricultural goods smuggled into the country since 2010—the start of President Aquino’s term—to 2014, P94 billion were rice imports. In terms of volume, 2.7 million metric tons (MT) of rice were smuggled from 2010 to 2014, the group added. Aside from capping the flow of smuggled rice into the country, Meganomics President and CEO Pablito M. Villegas said government procurement of rice also reduces the import cost of importation by about 10 percent to 15 percent. “G-to-G importation will not only curve smuggling, but will also ensure that the price of rice is just right. Meaning, they will be much cheaper than internationally traded rice that passes through the rigmarole of many intervening agents and middlemen,” Villegas claimed. On the other hand, PIDS Senior Research Fellow Roehlano Briones argued that it should be the done otherwise, or the private sector doing the importation. “The presumption is that the NFA can do the importation as equally well as the private sector. I submit, no,” Briones said. Briones pointed out that rice procurement done by the public sector will always be “a hostage of politics,” whereas the private sector will do it purely as a commercial transaction. “[Let the private commercial business] assess the amount of rice to import as a foresight, anticipation on their part. If they make a mistake, they get burned, if they get it right, they will gain profit,” he said. “The government doesn’t have that motivation. So that’s why I’m extremely skeptical that decisions by the NFA will be in any way superior than the market’s.” Briones also argued that simple countermeasures in the past were able to control smuggling, even with the private sector allowed to import. “I heard from a reputable Customs authority that smuggling used to happen in major ports, as Customs examiners just collected tariffs and allowed rice to come in even without import permits. That practice has already been stopped, and now smuggling in major ports has also stopped,” he cited. The expert called for the government to instead monitor shipments in small and nontraditional ports, where smuggling is happening now. “Allow the private sector to import, then make sure they pay the right taxes, right sanitary and

phytosanitary clearances...these are the basic things the government should check for,” he said.

WTO sanctions

IMPLEMENTING the kind of rice-importation policy where only the NFA is allowed to buy rice from abroad won’t be a problem for the country until 2017, according to Imperial. The Philippines, under the WTO, was granted permission to extend its QR until 2017. In exchange, the country has committed to increase its minimum access volume (MAV) for rice to 805,200 MT. Rice shipped into the country under the MAV scheme are slapped a tariff of 35 percent. “For now, there is no problem because what’s important to the WTO is that we import that MAV, [whether through the government or the private sector],” Imperial said. But when asked what will happen after the QR expires, the official said, “We have to observe what is the next administration’s stand about it.” After the Philippines scraps its QR, the assumption is that the country’s rice trade would become liberalized. Imperial cautioned the country could face sanctions from the WTO if it pushes through with its new riceimport policy. “There are a number of possible implications. Other members could join forces and disallow the entry of certain products from the Philippines,” he said. Briones also warned the Philippines could be sued by its comembers in the organization. “If you violate a provision of the WTO, then yeah, we are open to being sued. Another member can file a case against us in Geneva and then we’ll have to defend ourselves,” Briones said. But he said there is still a way to skirt this problem. “Basically, if you maintain an exclusive importation right to a state-trading entity, you have to show that the entity makes decisions purely on a commercial basis. So in a way, it will become like a private trader. Somehow, that concession to protection is still there in the WTO,” he explained. Villegas added it will be easy for the Philippines to explain to the WTO why the Philippines is allowing the government to monopolize rice imports. “All of these commitments should be done not against the interest of our nation. Our excuse is that liberalization is resulting in undue economic losses. When you do a lot of this importation, and allow smuggling to continue, you distort the price of rice against the interest of the local farmers,” Villegas said.

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Duterte’s 8-pt agenda. . . C  A

year due to election spending, but she said “it remains a question whether it will be sustained and create substantial impact for the poor and the unemployed.” “Expecting a 6.8-percent to 7.8-percent growth this year, increased activity during election season [i.e., election year and the year preceding it] create a picture of progress and upward growth,” she said in a statement posted online. “This is brought about by election spending which generates more jobs, such as in construction and campaign work, albeit temporarily. There is also an effect on banking and finance with the splurge of money circulating in the economy. It should be noted that Government Final Consumption Expenditure was at an average of 7.8 percent during full year [FY] 2015, compared to 3.3 percent in 2014,” she said. The GDP growth “even registered a higher rate during the fourth quarter of 2015 and 15.8 percent and 9.9 percent for the first quarter of 2016,” she said. Citing Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) report, Briones said the GDP grew by 5.9 percent last year. “However, its distribution remained dismal since the agriculture sector posted only 0.1-percent growth, while the major growth drivers in the services and industry sectors posted 6.8-percent and 6-percent growth, respectively.” The first-quarter figures this year were higher, “as GDP posted 6.9-percent growth with services [7.9 percent] and industry [8.7 percent] driving the economy, while agriculture languished further at -4.4 percent,” she said. “The PSA estimated poverty incidence among the Filipinos at 26.3 percent during the first semester of 2015, half a percent above the 2014 figures. This will fall short of the Millenium Development Goal target of 17.2 percent by 2015. Meanwhile, Social Weather Stations [SWS] found out 13.4 percent of the Filipino families experienced involuntary hunger last year,” she said. Now that the elections are over, the question is whether postelections growth will directly benefit the poor and the marginalized. “Will this be sustainable enough to lift people out of poverty?” Briones asked. Laviña said, “while experts forecast a 7-percent to 8-percent growth this year, we still have a poverty incidence of 25 percent to 27 percent to reckon with, and this is the crux of our agenda.” “This is not the final agenda, but the one that would come out after the national consultation would be the one to chart the next six years of the administration of Rodrigo Duterte,” Laviña told reporters at the Royal Mandaya Hotel on Thursday.

MEDIA FEDERATION HAILS DUTERTE’S CABINET PICKS

HE Federation of Provincial Press Clubs of the Philippines Inc. (FPPCPI) on Friday hailed presumptive President Mayor Rodrigo R. Duterte’s well-thought selection of his Cabinet members. “Incoming President Rodrigo R. Duterte has appropriately lined up a well-chosen members of his Cabinet, particularly the appointments of former journalist and North Cotabato Gov. [Emmanuel] Manny Piñol for agriculture; lawyer Salvador Panelo, press secretary; and Prof. Perfecto R. Yasay Jr. for foreign affairs,” said Allan T. Sison, FPPCPI president. A veteran broadcaster, Sison has been president of the Pangasinan Press Club and broadcast reporter of Manila-based broadcast networks. Sison said: “The appointment of Manny Piñol, an outstanding journalist, Manila-based newspaper editor and a noted supporter of Philippine press fraternities, like the National Press Club [NPC]; Panelo—an effective communicator and a known advocate of press freedom and a distinguished friend of media practitioners; and Securities and Exchange Commission former Chairman Yasay, a visionary scholar in world affairs and who possesses an untarnished record in public service, speak well of the selection of members of the Cabinet of President Duterte.” So far, Sison stressed, the line-up appears to be a powerhouse of prospective implementors of Duterte’s program for our country and people’s welfare. FPPCPI, the country’s provincial association, was founded in 1963 by leading pillars of the Philippine press spearheaded by Macario T. Vicencio, then-president of the NPC; former NPC presidents Teodoro F. Valencia, Jose D. Aspiras, Ernesto O. Granada, magazine publisher Mao Chanco, Central Luzon publisher Pacifico de Guzman, Tagalog columnist Vic Tagle, NPC Secretary Director Johnny Dayang, who acted as NPC organizing committee chairman. Sison said FPPCPI is convening a national press congress on the role of the provincial press in the Duterte presidency with Johnny Dayang, Jun Velasco, Jaime Vistar and Ben Diansay as convenors. Please contact organizing secretariat, Johnny Dayang 09491294777, Joseph Punay 09472985386 and Andy Vital. Expected to attend the countryside press congress are presidents and officers of press clubs, publishers, editors, columnists, photographers, TV-cable station staff members, social-media advocates and representatives of those institutions with interest in mass media.

news@businessmirror.com.ph

Economy BusinessMirror

Editors: Vittorio V. Vitug and Max V. de Leon • Saturday, May 21, 2016 A3

Talks start for bureaucracy-wide fiber-optic link

HE National Grid Corp. of the Philippines (NGCP) and the Information and Communications Technology Office (ICTO) have commenced discussions on the possibility of utilizing the former’s fiber-optic cable network to link and provide Internet service to all government agencies in the country.

“NGCP is in discussion right now with ICTO. We hope the talks between them would progress,” Commissioner Jose Vicente B. Salazar said in an interview of the Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC). ICTO, the government’s lead agency on ICT and related matters, had approached the ERC to facilitate a dialogue with NGCP on the matter. “Henry T. Sy Jr. is fully supportive of this. In fact, he has designated

one of his personnel to coordinate with us, with ICTO,” Salazar said. “Basically, ICTO is undertaking this project. We will just be assisting ICTO so it can discuss with NGCP [on] this matter. The transmission facilities are still owned by the government, and these can be utilized without affecting the operations of NGCP,” Salazar said. The ERC chief said any interconnection link

“would no longer pass through any of the facilities of the telcos [telecommunication companies],” and that this project is also being coordinated with the National Telecommunications Commission. “As a result, the telcos would step up in providing better Internet service to their customers. The share of the country’s penetration rate would also be higher,” Salazar said. Lenie Lectura

A4 Saturday, May 21, 2016 • Editor: Angel R. Calso

Opinion BusinessMirror

editorial

The new ambassador of US to the Philippines

HE selection and nomination of an ambassador from one nation to another can be a critical foreignpolicy decision. It often may reveal the status of relations, and even the foreign-relations agenda of the appointing country. The current US ambassador to Russia is John F. Tefft, whose previous appointment was as ambassador to Ukraine. Prior to Ukraine, he served at the same post in Georgia and Lithuania. If you follow the geopolitics of that region, then you know this was a clear message to Russian President Vladimir Putin. The same might be true for the Philippines. Kristie Kenney was the first woman sent to our shores as the US ambassador interestingly when then-President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s handlers were still unsuccessfully trying to promote her as the “Ina ng Bayan.” Kenny might be best known for being “heartbroken” at the thought of leaving the Philippines perhaps, in part, because—as she said—the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority warranted praise for keeping the capital clean and orderly. She also said, “We are not building any bases in the Philippines, we don’t have any plans to have bases, and we don’t need any bases.” The most recent US ambassador—Philip Goldberg—came to the Philippines in late-2013, and was visible during the many US Embassy events, from Arts in Embassies Program to cooking contests that tended to show Filipinos doing things as “American as apple pie.” It is also interesting that he was the US ambassador during our campaign season and election. Little mention was made that as US ambassador, he was kicked out of Bolivia by that government after declaring him persona non grata for allegedly funding opposition to President Juan Evo Morales. Morales had accused Goldberg of interference with Bolivia’s government, and even plotting against that government. The new US ambassador to the Philippines is an intriguing choice. He is Korean-born Sung Y. Kim, a Foreign Service officer with an interesting career. Kim grew up in Los Angeles and is a graduate of University of Pennsylvania, Loyola Law School and the London School of Economics. He was assigned to US Embassy in Seoul as the chief of Political Military Affairs, and then as political officer in Tokyo. Spy novels like to portray characters in either of those two positions as being intelligence officers. However, in 2008 he was appointed as the special US envoy for the Six-Party Talks to find a resolution to the concerns about the North Korean nuclearweapons program. Then he became US ambassador to South Korea. Further, he has recognized expertise on the region, and was a desk officer in the State Department’s Office of Chinese Affairs and staff assistant in the Bureau of East Asia and Pacific Affairs. The prior country postings of the last six US ambassadors to the Philippines included Bangladesh, Slovenia, Ecuador, Thailand, Palau, Egypt and Bolivia. Now, we suddenly get a US representative who has worked closely with the Chinese, and has experience in both political and military diplomacy. It may be likely that the days of the US Embassy’s “1-Earth Clean-up and Concert” and “The Great American Barbeque” are over.

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Figuring out stock-market moves John Mangun

OUTSIDE THE BOX

F you have watched it long enough, figuring out what is going to happen next on the Philippine Stock Exchange maybe even easier than the twists and turns on your favorite telenovela. That is not to say that you can predict the next day’s movement with any consistent accuracy. If fact, in my morning audio forecasts, I always warn subscribers that I will probably be wrong, and I usually am.

However, what is easy to forecast is the window or range for the following day. Both the upper and lower limits are more easily predicted than the weather two days ahead. Many market players were shocked that there was no positive reaction to the great economic numbers this past Thursday. The financial experts immediately justified the nearly 1.6-percent fall, because

of the potential, maybe in the future —meaning sometime between June and December—of a US Federal Reserve interest-rate increase. You can check today’s newspapers for why the market made another drop on Thursday. Maybe it was because Friday night is a full moon. Thursday’s 100-point fall was an easy scenario to figure out. The previous two days of trading left us with a virtually unchanged index,

after a massive run higher from May 10. Prices must stop going up before they go down, and that was exactly what happened. So the first scenario is that the market is going to go down very soon. Yet, a pause in the upward movement might be just that—a pause. So on Thursday morning the two scenarios I gave were either a small movement to the upside or a large move down. Either way, you do not want to be buying into either one of those possibilities, as the risk/reward equation is not favorable. As prices go higher, especially during a strong upward move, the potential “top” becomes farther and farther away. It is like driving a car. The faster you go, the farther you must look ahead down the road than you would if you were going slowly. With the market having had those two flat days, the upside window—as I said in Thursday’s audio forecast—was 30 to 40 points, and the downside window was 100 points.

But what about the direction that the market would probably move? If buying into the stock market does not make great sense—and buying stocks is the only reason they go higher in price—then, logically, prices will probably go lower. Believe it or not, there is a clear logic to stockprice movements, even if investors are not logical. As I have said before, investors waste too much time trying to figure out “events” and reactions to those events. That costs money and opportunity. You want to find a great restaurant? It is always the one with a line waiting to get in. You want to find great stock-market opportunities? Watch the money flow; the trading volume. In this case, volume dropped substantially in several major issues on Wednesday. E-mail me at mangun@gmail.com. Visit my web site at www.mangunonmarkets.com. Follow me on Twitter @mangunonmarkets. PSE stock-market information and technical analysis tools provided by the COL Financial Group Inc.

How to answer the Russians’ cheating in sports?

HEY were nicknamed East Germany’s Wundermadchen, a juggernaut that scooped up 10 of 12 gold medals in women’s swimming for the Soviet satellite at the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal. They were also pawns: Some were as young as 11 when East Germany’s state-run sports machine fed them steroid drugs as performance enhancers.

Years later, many East German Olympians had to cope with the fallout: infertility, breast cancer, stillbirths, heart conditions and other ailments. “The worst thing was that I didn’t know I was being doped,” former East German swimmer Rica Reinisch told a British newspaper in 2005. She was 15 when she won three gold medals at the 1980 Olympics in Moscow. She has endured two stillbirths and an irregular heart condition. “I was lied to and deceived.” It’s a tale of national greed and artifice that Russia should heed as it contemplates its fate within the international sports community. The latest allegations, reported by The New York Times: The onetime director of Russia’s antidoping laboratory says he was part of a state-run doping program engineered to give Russian athletes a decisive edge at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi. Athletes were given a concoction of steroids stirred into quaffs of Chivas or vermouth. The program avoided detection with the help of Russian intelligence agents, who swapped athletes’ urine samples tainted with performance-enhancing drugs with clean urine

samples obtained from the athletes months earlier. The agents and lab workers made the urine-sample exchanges at night at an Olympics testing laboratory, using a small hole cut into a wall near the floor to hide the exchange. They used a small cabinet to hide the hole. The conspirators also found a way to open the tamper-proof specimen bottles, so they could get rid of the tainted urine and pour in clean urine. At the 2010 Winter Olympic Games in Vancouver, Russia ranked just sixth in the overall medal count—a humiliating result for a country immensely proud of its athletic prowess. Four years later when the world came to Sochi, Russia ranked first in the overall medal count. The country’s antidoping director, Grigory Rodchenkov, blew the whistle on the program, but not before fleeing to Los Angeles. Predictably, the Kremlin’s reaction has been defensive. A spokesman for Russian President Vladimir Putin said of the disclosure, “All this simply looks like slander by a turncoat.” The Times quoted a deputy sports minister as saying Russia and the athletes named in the article might file a defamation lawsuit. The allegations against Russia

come just weeks after the World AntiDoping Agency accused the country of being responsible for more violations than any other nation in 2014. Last November doping allegations prompted the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF), track and field’s governing body, to provisionally suspend Russia from competition. The IAAF hasn’t decided whether to reinstate Russia before the Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro. There’s a lot of utility in negative reinforcement—something to keep in mind as the world contemplates how to deal with Russia’s penchant for cheating in sport. Now, following Rodchenkov’s revelations, a bigger question has emerged. Should Russia’s entire sports program be banned from this August’s Olympics? We think it should. Russia rarely responds to fingerwagging. When Russia invaded Georgia in 2008 and turned two breakaway provinces into de facto Russian territory, the US and Europe denounced the Kremlin’s behavior as a blatant breach of Georgia’s sovereignty. The Kremlin shrugged, and simply fortified its presence in Abkhazia and South Ossetia. Russia’s takeover of the Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula and its overt support of pro-Moscow insurgents in eastern Ukraine triggered economic sanctions from the West against Moscow. Yet, that hasn’t prompted Putin to change his ways. The sanctions, coupled with flagging oil

prices, have broadsided the Russian economy. Still, Russia hasn’t loosed its hold on Crimea or the eastern provinces of Luhansk and Donetsk. Banning Russia from the Olympics, however, may just leave a welt large enough to give the Kremlin pause. Russians take sports—particularly Olympic sports—very seriously. The veneration of Russian Olympic heroes approaches beatification. Gymnast Olga Korbut, GrecoRoman wrestler Alexander Karelin, pole-vaulting diva Yelena Isinbayeva, figure skater Yevgeny Plushenko all walk on water. To be barred from the Olympics would deal a harsh blow to Russia and especially to the Kremlin, which relishes the glow of the international spotlight. Between now and Rio, Russia may seek a reprieve with talk of sweeping reform, with pledges of winnowing out the bad apples. Don’t be surprised by a Potemkin show of remorse aimed solely at keeping Moscow’s visions of Rio glory alive. The international sports community shouldn’t be swayed. So much is at stake: keeping intact the dreams of athletes who do not cheat, and who sweat blood and tears for their moment in the pool, on the balance beam or on the track; sending a message to the international sports community that giving in to the lure of performance-enhancing drugs will set in motion harsh consequences; and reminding Russia that it won’t achieve the spotlight it so dearly covets through subterfuge. TNS

Opinion BusinessMirror

opinion@businessmirror.com.ph

Saturday, May 21, 2016 A5

From Aquino to Duterte 574 youth beneficiaries of YSLEP graduate this year administration Rev. Fr. Antonio Cecilio T. Pascual

Jemain Diaz de Rivera

FORWARD MOVING

URING the campaign season, church members campaigned or planned to vote for their respective candidates for president and vice president. Politics, like faith, is a very personal experience and, as we invest time, effort and money in the process, the experience becomes not only personal, but emotional.

Like most Filipinos, each of us at church voted for our candidate of choice for national and local positions. Due to the quick count, we all knew if our preferred candidates won or not. This brings to mind a few verses from the books of Romans and John: Every ruling authority that exists had been established by God. Human government is a derived authority. Those in authority are described as “the servant[s] of God” and “ministers of God.” It is also a limited authority. Those in power hold their power because of God, and can be removed by God. Such derived and limited authority is to be exercised for the good of all people. nnn

BEING a member of the Rotary Club —Pearl of the Orient, I found myself in discussion with a few foreign investors who were also members of Rotary. They are from Australia, the United Kingdom, Germany and the United States. They were all interested in the public policy of incoming President Rudy Duterte, which includes security, development (health, education, livelihood and shelter), and fare access to decision-making. They observed that Duterte is passionate about people addicted to drugs, pro-poor, and is planning to focus attention on airports (Ninoy Aquino International Airport, Cebu international airport), sea ports, and roads and bridges. The Philippines is a success story, and they noted that the Aquino administration has raised the global reputation of the country. The country is an emerging power, with a GDP that hits 6.9 percent in the first quarter of 2016. Economic Planning Secretary Emmanuel Esguerra said the Philippines is the fastest-growing economy among 11 selected Asean economies in the first quarter of the year, outpacing expansions in China (6.7 percent), Vietnam (5.5 percent), Indonesia (4.9 percent) and Malaysia (4.2 percent). Over the next few years our investor-friends plan to increase their investment in the country. The Philippines is struggling due to the fact that competition is not as wide as it should be. The Internet speed is one of the slowest in the world, because of the limited number of service providers. In the way that we interact with the world,

The Philippines is struggling due to the fact that competition is not as wide as it should be. The Internet speed is one of the slowest in the world because of the limited number of service providers. In the way that we interact with the world, the country needs to also prove that its legal system is fast, transparent and effective. the country needs to also prove that its legal system is fast, transparent and effective. They hope that the incoming administration opens the economy to foreign investment by raising the cap, feeling this is essential because of the speed of reform that Duterte wants, and this speed of delivery cannot be done by the Philippines alone. It will need foreign partners. Since our economy is in good condition, the country can tap foreign investors for much-needed capital. Finding the “jetski solution” to the West Philippine Sea dispute with China amusing, they are looking forward to when the international tribunal at The Hague hands down its ruling in June. In reality, no matter what the decision is, there has to be a way of living together, sharing the resources of the sea, looking after the environment, and making sure there is no impediment to navigation by air or sea. When Filipino fishermen are not permitted to travel or work in their own area by nationals from faraway lands, it does not take a genius to know that something is not right. When people are put in danger, when boats disappear in the Philippine area of responsibility by default, we are responsible. We will need the help of our neighbors to put things right. nnn

I do not know who my friends at church voted for, but when Duterte is sworn in as president, Filipinos will have his back. Our investor friends have their own interest in mind, which is why they wish us, Filipinos, all the best. E-mail: jemain_diaz_de_rivera@yahoo.com.

SERVANT LEADER

ARITAS Manila’s Youth Servant Leadership and Education Program (YSLEP) produced 574 servant leaders this year, with 10 percent of them marching with honors and leadership awards from their respective schools. The graduates are from the poorest areas and regions in the country, with 472 graduates from Luzon, 51 from the Visayas and 51 from Mindanao. Caritas Manila aims to continue reaching out to this vulnerable sector, especially in the poorest areas of the Visayas and Mindanao. About 31 percent of them obtained degrees in the fields of Agriculture, Social Work, Public Administration, Psychology and Social Sciences, comprising the highest percentage of the graduates this year. Meanwhile, 21 percent of the youth servant leaders are graduates in the field of Education,

and 19 percent are graduates in the field of Business Administration. Ninety-four, or 16 percent, are Information Technology graduates and 9 percent are from Vocational Technology, while 4 percent are in the field of Engineering. YSLEP is the flagship program of Caritas Manila, which extends financial assistance to poor but deserving youth. The program also trains and hones the youth not only for academic excellence but to become leaders with vision and values. Through YSLEP, Caritas Manila provides an integrated youth-development program that develops the youth’s knowledge, skills and

B M R. B | Bloomberg View

HE British electorate does not need Americans to tell them how to vote in the June 23 referendum, and I wouldn’t dare try. I have always had great admiration for the British people —and great respect for the country’s democratic traditions. But from across the Atlantic, we Yanks are watching the campaign closely— and many of us who have deep personal and business ties to the UK can’t help but take a close interest.

The special relationship between the UK and the US holds a special place in my heart, and not just because I had the great privilege of being named an honorary Knight of the British Empire by the Queen in 2014. I consider London my second home, my daughters hold British passports (thanks to their British mother), the company I founded employs nearly 4,000 people here, and we have long supported some of London’s worldclass cultural institutions. David Cameron and Boris Johnson, while on opposite sides of the debate, are both good friends and have assured me that no matter what the outcome of the vote, thanks to the Freedom of the City of London I was awarded in 2008, I will still have the right to herd sheep and cattle over London Bridge, and to carry a sword around Piccadilly Circus or anywhere else. Thank goodness for that! Of course, there is so much more at stake in next month’s referendum, economically and politically—first and foremost for the British people, but also for Americans and the world. I recognize that, as in most political campaigns, some of the rhetoric on both sides has been wildly exaggerated. But there is no disputing one fact: Given the uncertainty of

Brexit’s potential impact, a vote to leave is a risk. The question is: Is the risk worth taking? I should note: I’ve never been averse to taking risks. In 1981 I started a company to create a product that had no demand, with technology that didn’t exist. Twenty years later, I ran for mayor of New York when no one thought I had even the slightest chance of winning. Against the odds, both decisions turned out better than I could have ever dreamed of. But over the course of my career, there are certain risks that I have refused to take (including running for US president this year) after weighing the evidence and concluding that they were likely to produce more harm than good. Some risks are just not worth it. As the founder of a business that specializes in financial data, news and analysis, I have carefully evaluated the question of Brexit and concluded that the risks involved are troubling. No one can say for certain if an “Out” vote would shrink the financial-services industry, which accounts for about 12 percent of the UK’s economic output and the bulk of our customer base. But in my conversations with chief executives of banks and other industry leaders, with rare exceptions, they see Brexit

Jonathan Bernstein

BLOOMBERG VIEW

ONALD TRUMP’S release of a list of his possible Supreme Court choices raises a question. Why don’t most presidential candidates let voters know whom they will appoint to the court or the Cabinet or other high offices if they are elected? The main reason is that it’s a highrisk, low-reward maneuver. Trump has named 11 people he would put on the Supreme Court (although he’s already backed off to some extent). He isn’t going to help himself with swing voters, few of whom have ever heard of those listed. Now he’s on the hook for what the Democrats’ opposition research can dig up on the various names, whether it is an extreme position on policy (one judge is already be-

ing attacked for antigay and antitransgender positions) or personal misdeeds that might turn up. “This,” a general-election attack ad could ask, “is what Trump believes is appropriate for a lifetime appointment to our highest court?” Candidates are also reluctant to commit themselves, because every presidential personnel choice is what political scientist Richard Neustadt called a “vantage point.” A candidate who identifies who he or she would

ing the activities of Caritas Manila. Youth servant-leader graduates are now members of Caritas Society of Servant Leaders (CSSL). They continuously contribute their time and talent to Caritas community through their volunteer service as a way of giving back to the community. Last year YSLEP generated about P1.4 million from CSSL to give outof-school youth access to quality higher education. Caritas Manila is the Archdiocese of Manila’s lead social services and development ministry. Apart from YSLEP, Caritas Manila runs diverse projects that help the poor fulfil their human potential, such as the All is Well Health Program, Restorative Justice Ministry, Caritas Damayan, and social entrepreneurship programs Caritas Margins and Segunda Mana.

To know more about Caritas Manila, visit www. caritasmanila.org.ph. For your donations, please call our DonorCare lines 563-9311, 564-0205, 09997943455, 0905-4285001 and 0929-8343857. Make it a habit to listen to Radio Veritas 846 in the AM band, or through live streaming at www.veritas846.ph. For comments, e-mail veritas846pr@gmail.com.

Leaving Europe is a risk the UK shouldn’t take

Trump goes on the defensive

attitude toward self-leadership, moral integrity and social commitment to the poor. The future leaders of this nation could be among these youth from the marginalized sectors. We can help them to be the person they can be by giving them the access to higher education, and mold them to become servant leaders of this country. With 86-percent dropout rate in the Philippines due to poverty, YSLEP is the response of Caritas Manila to this problem, because it believes that education is the most effective developmental program for poverty reduction. For over 60 years, Caritas Manila was able to assist more than 10,000 out-ofschool youth and poor families to become professionals, productive citizens and servant leaders; and, currently, there are more than 5,000 youth nationwide under Caritas YSLEP. About 500 youth beneficiaries of YSLEP graduate every year, and 90 percent of them are employed six months after they graduate. Those who have been successful in their respective professions help in sustain-

TRUMP

name to every Cabinet or high court post would be losing the ability to use those nominations as bargaining chits while in office to promote other presidential goals.

The risks extend to the campaign, too. Those who want high-level jobs in the next administration might not work as hard for a candidate who has already committed to fill

as a serious complication that could lead some jobs to shift to the continent over time. Some in Frankfurt and Paris are rooting for Brexit for this reason. Bloomberg is building a new European headquarters in London. Whatever the outcome of the vote, we are committed to the UK. But if some of our clients move operations across the channel—and there is a good chance that some foreign exchange and derivative trading will migrate overseas—we may need to move more resources and personnel there, too. In addition, as the competition for talent intensifies, restrictions on free movement could force us to divert resources to other global technology centers, leaving fewer job opportunities for skilled British workers. I also worry that Brexit will leave our UK employees worse off. No one knows for certain how the UK would fare in trade negotiations with the European Union (EU), but we know Brussels would hold substantial leverage, given that the UK is far more dependent on the EU for exports than the EU is dependent on the UK. What price EU leaders would exact is impossible to predict, but deterring other countries from breaking away —not to mention the opportunity to punish an old rival—is likely to discourage them from looking sympathetically upon Britain. Even if fair terms are secured, achieving them may take years, and families may feel a pinch well into the next decade. Those are risks that, as an entrepreneur who has invested heavily in the UK, I find unsettling. And as an American who has served in public

office and seen the importance of international cooperation, the prospect of the UK leaving the EU is even more worrisome. At a time when liberal democracies are threatened by anti-Western terrorists, it is critical that we closely coordinate on security policies and intelligence. In the aftermath of multiple terrorist attacks, British leadership on counterterrorism and intelligence is all the more crucial. Yet leaving the EU would diminish the UK’s ability to lead on security matters. Strategically, having the UK in the EU is a vitally important asset for the US. The UK and US will always have a special relationship, but Brexit would leave the UK, America and the rest of the world in a weaker position to combat terrorism, promote trade and confront other global challenges, including climate change. In the face of foreign threats and domestic economic struggles, it is inevitable that some will call for a retreat from international affairs. In the States retreat from cross-border trade has unfortunately been a theme of candidates in both parties. One in particular, Donald Trump, has gone further, by scapegoating our foreign neighbors and competitors. Recently Trump has said that if he were casting a ballot on June 23, he would vote to leave. I’m not advising the British electorate how to vote. But for centuries the British people and the world have benefited enormously from a confident, forward-looking and outward-facing UK—and based on my desire to see the UK and US both grow stronger in the years to come, I’m hoping that tradition continues.

Trump is not a typical presidential candidate: What matters here is how much of a party outsider he is. Most Republican politicians and many party-aligned interest groups don’t trust him at all. Publishing his list is a way to assure them he will behave like a mainstream conservative in the Oval Office. While some conservatives may not trust him anyway, Trump presumably believes that what he gains in party unity is worth the risk he’s taking on the other counts.

lot less at stake if they break with the Trump campaign. Trump, of course, is not a typical presidential candidate: What matters here is how much of a party outsider he is. Most Republican politicians and many party-aligned interest groups don’t trust him at all. Publishing his list is a way to assure them he will behave like a mainstream conservative in the Oval Office. While some conservatives may not trust him anyway, Trump presumably believes that what he gains in party unity is worth the risk he’s taking on the other counts. He might not even have considered the downside of such a list. Perhaps, that’s why he quickly backed off on treating it as authoritative. What is certain is the pressure he is feeling from Republican-aligned groups, and this episode demonstrates why this could be a general-election liability for him—and a governing liability if he does win in November.

them with other people. That even applies to a list like Trump’s for the Supreme Court. Presumably, all 11 people on his list already knew they were potential court candidates. But quite a few high-profile Republican lawyers surely thought they were also in this pool. They now have a

A6 Saturday, May 21, 2016 • Editor: Dionisio L. Pelayo

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Ombudsman dismisses TRC, Nabcor execs in PDAF scam DOJ: No lead on Davao ‘death squad’ B J R. S J @jrsanjuan1573

HE Department of Justice (DOJ) on Friday admitted having no lead on the alleged existence of the Davao Death Squad (DDS), a vigilante group being linked to presumptive President Rodrigo R. Duterte. In an interview, acting Justice Secretary Emmanuel L. Caparas said the supposed witness was no longer with the justice department’s Witness Protection Program (WPP). “Tulad ng sinabi ko dati tungkol sa DDS, may lumilitaw [na saksi], tapos mawawala, tapos lumilitaw. It’s very difficult to proceed on that basis,” Caparas said. It can be recalled that former Justice Secretary and now Sen.elect Leila de Lima claimed that the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) was investigating the DDS, after a witness, who claimed to be part of the group, surfaced and expressed readiness to disclose everything he knows about its operation. De Lima earlier said the witness claimed having personal and direct knowledge about the killings perpetrated by the DDS. The witness, she said, was placed

in the custody of the WPP. “There is really nothing there anymore,” Caparas said, when asked about the status of its investigation on the DDS, which has been linked in the summary executions of more than 1,000 individuals between 1998 and 2008. Caparas added that he tried to look into the identity of the witness, but could not find any information anymore. “I tried to look into that myself. The witness is not there, what will I do,” Caparas said, adding that he does not even know the name of the witness. “What I understand, the entry to the program WPP is voluntary, so even exit to the program is voluntary, as well. If the witness is not there [WPP], he would have left voluntarily,” he added.

B J M N.  C @joveemarie

HE Ombudsman has ordered the dismissal of six government officials for their involvement in the multibillion-peso Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF) scam.

Dismissed from ser v ice were Dennis Cunanan, Marivic Jover and Consuelo Lilian Espiritu of the Technology Resource Center (TRC); and Maria Ninez Guañizo, Victor Roman Cacal and Rhodora Mendoza from the National Agribusiness Corp. (Nabcor). Ombudsman Conchita CarpioMorales said the dismissal orders were issued after they were found administratively liable for grave misconduct and serious dishonesty. Morales also ordered the forfeiture of all their retirement benefits and their perpetual disqualification from holding public office. She said Cunanan et. al., were liable for their indispensable cooperation and conspiracy in the anomalous utilization of the PDAF of Lakas Reps. Candido Pancrudo Jr. of Bukidnon and Reno Lim of Albay. “From 2007 to 2010, Pancrudo received P49.2 million in PDAF intended for livelihood trainings and kits on goat and swine raising, and banana and sweet potato culture; while Lim received P30 million in 2007 as his PDAF in-

tended for livelihood training resources,” she said. Morales, however, said the projects were bogus and that alleged beneficiaries denied being recipients of any livelihood training or kits. “The non-governmental organizations [NGOs] identified and indorsed by the congressmen were also of dubious existence and were chosen without complying with the rules on procurement,” she said. She added that “respondents [exhibited] a deliberate lack of care or diligence in the performance of their respective duties in such a way as to achieve the common design of defrauding the government.”

Anomalous utilization

MORALES also ordered the filing of charges against Nationalist People’s Coalition Rep. Thomas Dumpit Jr. of La Union for the allegedly anomalous utilization of his PDAF totaling P66.5 million from 2007 to 2009. Dumpit is set to face trial before the Sandiganbayan for 15 counts of violation of Section 3(e) of the Antigraft and Corrupt Practices Act (Republic Act 3019), nine counts of Malversation through Falsification of Public Documents and six counts of Malversation of Public Funds. Morales, citing the Commission on Audit, said Dumpit received a total of P66.5 million in PDAF to fund projects, such as d istr ibution of livelihood training kits, business clinics, m a rk et de ve lopme nt , l ive l i hood trainings, distribution of instructional and livelihood materials, grafted seedlings, hand tractors, water pumps, manicure sets, hairdressing kits and sewing machines. The projects were supposed to benefit the constituents of the Second District of La Union. “It was discovered that these were ghost projects as no kits

Respondents [exhibited] a deliberate lack of care or diligence in the performance of their respective duties in such a way as to achieve the common design of defrauding the government.”—M

were distributed, no trainings conducted and that the documents submitted to support the liquidation of the public funds were all fabricated,” she said. “Ombudsman investigators who went to La Union were also able to va lidate reports that the recipients listed as beneficiaries did not receive any kits, seedlings or trainings. Many of the purported beneficiaries whose names appeared on the list of beneficiaries are not even residents or registered voters of La Union. Public officia ls inter v iewed by invest igators certified that they were not recipients of the projects. Suppliers also denied issuing receipts and invoices used in the liquidation reports,” Morales added. She also said records show Dumpit identified the National Livelihood Development Corp., Nabcor and the Technology and Livelihood Resource Center as implementing agencies. Dumpit also indentified and endorsed the Aaron Foundation of the Philippines Inc., Kabuhayan at Kalusugan Alay sa Masa Foundation and Kasangga sa Magandang Bukas Foundation Inc. as NGOs and recipients of his PDAF, she said. Aside from being ghost projects, the Ombudsman also found that rules on procurement were repeatedly disregarded in the NGO selection process. Morales also directed that copies of the resolutions be forwarded to the Anti-Money Laundering Council for action on possible violations of the Anti-Money Laundering Act.

CA affirms arrest warrants vs suspects in Pestaño killing Coloma tells Duterte

HE Court of Appeals (CA) has affirmed the validity of the arrest warrants issued by the Regional Trial Court (RTC) in Manila against eight of the 10 Navy personnel charged in the 1995 killing of Ens. Philip Pestaño. In a seven-page decision penned by Associate Justice Nina G. Antonio-Valenzuela, the Special Sixth Division held that there was no grave abuse of discretion on the part of RTC in Manila Judge Josefina M. Siscar when she found probable cause to order their arrest. “In this case, the public respondent judge issued the warrants of arrest against the petitioners, after finding that probable cause existed by personally examining the records of the case,” the CA explained. “After reviewing the records of the case, the public respondent judge was satisfied that a crime had been committed, and the accused are probably guilty of murder,” it added. The appellate court did not

give credence to the claim of the accused that there was no probable cause for the issuance of a warrant of arrest against them, because the evidence of the case shows that the petitioners were not guilty ofmurder. The CA pointed out that at the stage of determining probable cause for the issuance of a warrant of arrest, a judge is not yet tasked to review in detail the evidence submitted during the preliminary investigation. “That merely determines the probability, not the certainty, of the guilt of the accused. He simply personally reviews the prosecution’s initial determination finding probable cause, to see if it is supported by substantial evidence,” the decision read. Among the Navy personnel issued with arrest warrants were retired Navy Capt. Ricardo Ordoñez, Cdr. Reynaldo Lopez, LCdr. Luidegar Casis, LCdr. Alfrederick Alba, LCdr. Joselito Colico, Hospital Man 2 Welmenio Aquino, Machinery

Repairman 1CL Sandy Miranda, retired Petty Officer 1 Carlito Amoroso, Petty Officer 2 Leonor Igcasan and retired LCdr. Ruben Roque. Roque and Amoroso were not among those who filed the appeal before the CA. The CA earlier affirmed its decision allowing the RTC in Manila to proceed with the trial of the murder case field against the Navy personnel. The CA also directed the transfer of the accused Navy officers from military custody to the Manila City Jail. The CA said it found no merit to the claim of the Navy officers that the RTC in Manila committed grave abuse of discretion and violated their constitutional right to due process and liberty, when it denied their motion to quash the murder information filed against them by the Ombudsman and directed their transfer to the city jail. The CA also pointed out that the transfer of the accused to the Manila City Jail is in compliance

with Republic Act 7055, a law that strengthens civilian supremacy over the military by transferring to the civil courts the jurisdiction over certain offenses committed by members of the Armed Forces. Records of the case showed that BRP Bacolod City, a Navy transport ship, left Tawi-Tawi on September 20, 1995. After seven days, the ship made a last stop at the Naval Station Sangley Point in Cavite and left the same day for its final destination, the Navy headquarters in Manila. Before the ship reached Manila, Pestaño was found dead in his cabin, lying on the bed with a single gunshot wound in his right temple with a purported suicide note to his family. Investigation conducted by the Senate and the Armed Forces ruled out that Pestaño committed suicide. It was also discovered that Pestaño had knowledge of illegal activities in BRP Bacolod City, which posed as a possible motive behind his alleged killing. Joel San Juan

Tesda gears up for Asean Skills Competition

HE Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (Tesda) will hold a training camp to select the best and the most competent crop of technicalvocational competitors and coaches who can represent the country in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations Skills Competition (ASC) 2016 in Malaysia this September. Gold Camp 2, which will start on May 23 and end on July 2, will gather technical-vocational experts from all over the country and their coaches to undergo a series of training and assessment in the first four weeks. After each assessment, the competitor with the poorest performance, together with his or her coach, will be eliminated from the program. On the fifth week, the remaining teams per skills competition area

will compete in the Philippine National Skills Competition (PNSC). The top 2 finishers in each of the 12 competition areas will represent the country in the 11th ASC. This is with the exception of Mechatronics and Industrial Automation, wherein only one team per country is allowed. The sixth week will be devoted for the preparation for the next training camp. The training camp targets to gather 82 competitors and 76 coaches in 12 competition areas. The skills competition areas are Welding; Graphic Design Technology; Mechatronics; Web Design; Industrial Automation; Information-technology Network Cabling; Mechanical CAD; Electronics; ITS Solution for Business; Refrigeration and Air-conditioning; IT Network System Administration; and Electrical Installations.

“ These training camps will produce a very short list of competitors for the ASC, only the best of the best will be given the opportunity to represent the country at this prestigious event,” Tesda Director General Irene Isaac said. She also said that, for a competitor, being part of the Philippine Team to the ASC is a great achievement by itself, and for a coach to have a winning ward at the competition is a career-building badge of excellence. “This will provide the national technical committee an opportunity to intensively assess the current competencies and potentials of each competing team aspiring to represent the country in the Asean Skills Competition,” Isaac said. “We want to make headway in terms of the readiness of our competitors by starting the training

early,” Isaac added. The Philippines bagged gold and a bronze medal during the 10th ASC held in Vietnam in 2014. Joshua D. Mina of the Central Luzon State University-Comupter Training Center Foundation in the Science City of Muñoz in Nueva Ecija, bested other competitors in Mechanical Engineering DesignCAD, getting the highest score in the trade area and securing the gold for the country. In the Industrial Automation trade area, Glenn Christopher B. Silang and Jemuel Gerson S. Isnec, both of the MFI Foundation Inc. (formerly Meralco Foundation Inc.), received the bronze medal. Eight other members of the Philippine delegation, who took part in different trade areas, were given the medallion of excellence during the competition. Claudeth Mocon-Ciriaco

to be more circumspect

AVAO City Mayor and incoming President Rodrigo R. Duterte’s frequent use of trash talk has a popular appeal among Filipinos, but it would take a little time for the diplomatic corps in the country to get used to it. This is why the Aquino administration’s communications chief had suggested that Duterte be more circumspect when making statements, which have foreign-policy implications, he being the President whose public pronouncements are binding with respect to foreign policy on certain international issues. “I think he should be more careful when making statements which have foreign-policy implications,” said Communications Secretary Herminio B. Coloma Jr. during the turnover ceremony of the Aliw Broadcasting Corp.’s extended legislative franchise in Malacañang this week. Coloma said Foreign Affairs Secretary Jose Rene D. Almendras had once called him and told him that he had never received so many phone calls from representatives of the international community in a single day when Duterte, though not yet officially the president, made a statement regarding the territorial dispute with China. According to reports during the campaign and after he had already been presumed to be the winner in the presidential race, Duterte’s stand on the territorial dispute with China is to hold bilateral talks with China if nothing comes out of it in terms of enforcing a forthcoming and hopefully favorable decision from the International Permanent Court of Arbitration, where the Philippines instituted arbitration proceedings against China to finally resolve the dispute in the West Philippine Sea. The resort to bilateral talks, which is what China had always been pushing for on the belief that it has better bargaining power when dealing with individual claimants than when dealing with a whole bloc of nations, does not necessarily mean

that the Philippines is renouncing its claim over the disputed territories, considering that Duterte had already promised to assert our claim, symbolically threatening to put the Philippine flag on one of the islands in the disputed territories aboard only a jet ski. Coloma said Duterte’s symbolic statements would definitely get across to Filipinos since we all more or less share each other’s culture, but many foreigners might not be used to such blunt language particularly directed at their race. During the campaign, Duterte cracked a rape joke about an Australian missionary who was gang raped and killed in Davao City in 1989. After he is widely believed to have already won the presidential race, Duterte said in a press conference that he would talk to the ambassador of India to ask for his help in stopping the usurious “five-six” lending scheme often resorted to by poor Filipino businessmen who have no access to credit from the formal banking system. Coloma, who handled the communications and messaging strategy of the Aquino administration during all its six years, said Filipinos are known to exercise “leeway” in trying to understand what Duterte wants to say, and indeed his messages are coming across to Filipinos. But he suggested that the incoming administration should make sure the foreigners do not get the wrong impression about Duterte’s public pronouncements, especially after such pronouncements had already gone through the news production process of the vibrant Philippine press. When asked what other suggestions he or President Aquino might have for the incoming administration, particularly on the plan to involve communist-leaning groups in the Executive branch, Coloma said Aquino would rather leave to the discretion of the incoming president the management of the country, since each president has his own management style. David Cagahastian

Editor: Jun Lomibao • mirror_sports@yahoo.com.ph

WILL HE, OR WILL HE NOT?

ING icon and newly elected Sen. Manny Pacquiao is seeking divine intervention and his compatriots’ PACQUIAO blessings as he ponders the possibility of performing his swan song, not at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, but at Riocentro Pavillion 6 in Barra, venue of the boxing competitions of the Rio de Janeiro Olympics in August. Pacquiao seeks another vote of affirmation from his fellowmen on another major decision in his life—whether or not to join Filipino athletes in shooting for the country’s first Olympic gold medal in Rio. If Pacquiao comes to a decision to fight for Olympic glory, he will probably compete in the light-welterweight (140 pounds) category, which he dominated in his pro career. Pacquiao will have to decide on or before May 27, the deadline for submission of entries for the final International Amateur Boxing Association Open-Olympic qualifying tournament in Baku, Azerbaijan, next month. “Hopefully, Manny says yes,” said Association of Boxing Alliances in the Philippines Executive Director Ed Picson, who met with Pacquiao at his Forbes residence last Wednesday. Pacquiao could qualify for Rio either through a wild-card invitation from the International Boxing Association (Aiba) and through an Olympic qualifying event. Pacquiao was a personal guest of Aiba President Dr. Wu Ching-kuo during the World Championships in Doja, Qatar, last October, and it was there that the offer to fight in the Olympics was reportedly relayed—an idea that apparently appealed to Pacquiao.

Sports BusinessMirror

NO JALALON, NO PROBLEM N B R O

O Jiovani Jalalon. Not exactly an easy game. But the Arellano University Chiefs got by with their other two incredible guards—Kent Salado and Donald Gumaru—to pip the San Sebastian College Stags, 80-78, in the Filoil Flying V Premier Cup on Friday at the Filoil Flying V Centre in San Juan. The Stags looked to stun the Chiefs with their strong drive-and-draw game plan that allowed for plenty of under-goal stabs en route to a 52-25 first-half lead. The Chiefs regroup and rattled off 11 fast-break points in the third period that saw them cut the lead, 64-60, heading into the final canto. In spite of coming close, Arellano University continued to be frustrated in its attempts to overhaul the lead. After a 24-second violation with 3:57 left, it looked bleak for the Chiefs as San Sebastian scored on a Michael Calissan short stab to make it, 73-68. The Chiefs started their final push on the defensive end with young power forward Lervin Flores atoning for an earlier miscue by coming up with a steal that saw Gumaru score on a lay-up. Flores came up big once more when a pair of blocked shots led to three triples—all assisted by Salado—by Gumaru.

Gumaru’s second triple gave Arellano University its first taste of the lead at 7675. After a pair of free throws by San Sebastian’s Alvin Capobres gave the lead back to the Stags, Gumaru again drilled a triple from the left corner, this time for a lead they would not surrender. Center Dioncee Holts added a free throw to notch the count at 80-78. The Stags rued their missed free throws and turnovers down the stretch that hurt their chances of bagging the victory. San Sebastian missed five free throws and committed as many turnovers in the final frame that ushered in their doom. They collectively connected 18-of-31 freethrow attempts while their turnover count went up from a mere seven in the first half to 11 more in the final 20 minutes. “It was a difficult game,” pronounced Arellano Coach Jerry Codiñera. “But this is a game we hope to learn from.” Codiñera added that the Chiefs just came off a difficult loss as well to Mapua in another league that coupled with their previous loss to Perpetual Help in the Premier Cup had his team in a funk. The Chiefs were without their star playmaker Jalalon, who is with the national team for the Stankovic Cup from May 22 to 28 in Bangkok.

Saturday, May 21, 2016 A7

CLYDE HANGS ON C

PERPETUAL Help University’s Bright Akhuetie (18) beats Far Eastern University’s Prince Orizu in a rebound battle. NONOY LACZA

LYDE MONDILLA slowed down after a record-setting feat with a bum stomach, settling for a one-under 71 and enabling Elmer Salvador to pull within three after three rounds of the P2-million Calatagan Invitational at the Calatagan Golf Club in Batangas on Friday. Mondilla, who stormed to a seven-stroke lead with a new course mark 64 on Thursday, actually padded his lead to eight with a birdie opening, but the Del Monte ace struggled a bit with his shots from there, fumbling with a double-bogey six on No. 5 and hitting just three birdies against a bogey the rest of the way. He also lost his putting touch that has anchored his sterling rounds in the first two days, muffing at least three birdie chances from close range that allowed Salvador and Jhonnel Ababa back in the hunt for the top P360,000 purse in the sixth leg of the tour. Though Mondilla remained in the lead with a 14-under 202 aggregate, Salvador moved within three at 205 with a bogey-free five-under 67 while Ababa, who also closed to within three in the early going but stumbled with a doublebogey on No. 6, birdied three of the last five holes

to card an eagle-aided 68 and stood another stroke farther back at 206. “Elmer played solid and I struggled a bit with my condition. But I’m still in the lead, won’t give up and will give it my best shot to win again,” said Mondilla, who moved 18 holes away from scoring a follow-up to his playoff victory over Jobim Carlos at the Manila Masters at Eastridge two weeks ago. He faces Salvador and Ababa again in the championship flight, hoping to recover lost grounds and nail a second straight win and fifth overall, while Salvador is out to sustain his comeback for a crack at the championship and an end to a yearlong title spell. Four adrift, Ababa also vowed to unleash a strong finishing kick and snap a longer drought on the circuit. The rest are too far behind and would need super low rounds coupled with a Mondilla meltdown to get back into the mix. They include Tony Lascuña, who rammed in three birdies in the last eight holes to shoot a 69 for a 208; Jay Bayron, who also carded a 69 for a 210; and Japanese Syotaro Onuki, who missed joining Bayron at fifth with a bogey on No. 17 for another 69 and a 211.

METRO TURF FILES DAMAGE SUIT AGAINST PHILRACOM

ETRO Manila Turf Club Inc. filed a P21.6-million damage suit against the Philippine Racing Commission (Philracom) and its officials, led by Chairman Andrew Sanchez, for allegedly implementing 53 unlawful and invalid resolutions since 2015 that hurt not only Metro Turf but the entire racing industry. In a civil case filed before the Mandaluyong Regional Trial Court (RTC) on May 6, Metro Turf,

through Senior Vice President and Director Jose Alexander Carandang, sought a writ of preliminary injunction to stop the Philracom board from implementing certain resolutions and to subsequently nullify them. Named respondents were Philracom Chairman Sanchez; Commissioners Lyndon Noel Guce, Victor Tantoco, Jose Gutierrez Santillan Jr., Bienvenido Niles Jr., Wilfredo JA de Ungria, Ramon Bagatsing Jr.; and Executive Director Andrew Buencamino.

“The implementation of the clearly unlawful and invalid 53 resolutions, if not immediately restrained or enjoined, will continue to cause grave and irreparable injury to Metro Turf, which has suffered immense losses to the brink of financial failure,” the petition said. The petition asked the RTC to order the respondents to pay Metro Turf actual damages of no less than P6,592,899, exemplary damages of P10 million and legal costs of P5 million.

Sports PERFECT 10! C BusinessMirror

| SATURDAY, MAY 21, 2016 mirror_sports@yahoo.com.ph sports@businessmirror.com.ph Editor: Jun Lomibao

Greipel rules Giro Stage 12

IBIONE, Italy—German rider Andre Greipel sprinted to his third stage win in the Giro d’Italia on Thursday then abandoned the race, while Bob Jungels had little trouble holding onto the overall lead during the 12th stage. Cranking his pedals in high gear, Greipel surged in front on the final straight of the entirely flat 182-kilometer leg from Noale to Bibione, which is near Venice, crossing the line in over four hours. Earlier, Greipel announced he would leave the Giro after the stage, which was one of the final winning opportunities for sprinters. Greipel was wearing the red jersey for leading the points competition that usually determines the best sprinter in the race. “I’m not happy to pull out of the Giro with the red jersey,” Greipel said. “But before the Giro, the plan was fixed to leave after the 12th stage.” AP

RIDE OF SILENCE

LEVELAND—Overshadowed as Golden State shot down history during the regular season, the Cavaliers are making this postseason their own. Perfectly. LeBron James recorded a triple-double and Cleveland improved to 10-0 in the playoffs with a 108-89 victory over the Toronto Raptors on Thursday night in Game Two of the Eastern Conference finals. James had 23 points, 11 rebounds and 11 assists, as the Cavs became the fourth team to start the postseason with 10 straight wins, joining the Los Angeles Lakers (1989, 2001) and San Antonio Spurs (2012). Playing at a different level than the rest of the field, the Cavs are now two wins from appearing in their second straight National Basketball Association Finals and trying to end Cleveland’s 52-

ILLIAMSTOWN, New Jersey— Bicyclists across the world have pedaled quietly in their annual ride to honor those injured or killed while cycling. The Ride of Silence took place on Wednesday in Williamstown, New Jersey, and more than 400 other locations to raise awareness that cyclists are sharing roadways with motorists. The ride is part of a global movement involving thousands of cyclists who ride on the third Wednesday in May without saying a word. Organizers say rides were held on every continent and in all 50 US states. They say zero words were spoken. AP

CLEVELAND’S LeBron James is sandwiched by Toronto’s James Johnson (3) and Bismack Biyombo (8) during the second half of Game Two on Thursday. AP

year sports championship drought. Kyrie Irving scored 26 and Kevin Love 19 for Cleveland, which swept Detroit and Atlanta and has beaten Toronto by a combined 50 points in two games. “I don’t think it feels like a streak,” James said of the Cavs’ rampage through the playoffs. “It feels like we won one game, we won the next game. We’ve taken one step at a time. We’ve tried to take care of business.” The Raptors managed to hang around longer than in Game One, when they were blown out by 31. But Toronto lacks the necessary firepower to stay with a Cleveland team playing its best basketball this season, one that James likened to a football team. “We play offense, we play defense and we’re great at special teams, as well,” he said.

Game Three is on Saturday in Toronto, where Raptors All-Star guard Kyle Lowry can only hope the rims at Air Canada Centre are kinder than the ones in Quicken Loans Arena.

Lowry scored 10 points and is shooting eight of 28 from the field, including one of 15 on three-pointers in the series. However, he isn’t hanging his head. “I’m super confident,” he said. “I missed countless threes that I thought were good and that I made last series. That’s why I’m not down on myself. We’ve got a game on Saturday, and I know I’m going to be much more effective. Simple as that. DeMar DeRozan scored 22 for the Raptors, who have had a disastrous debut in the conference finals to this point. “We’re not quitting,” Coach Dwane Casey said. “Everybody can bury us, but we’re not quitting. I refuse to believe that.” James moved past Shaquille O’Neal into fourth place on the career postseason scoring list, with 5,255 points. Next on the list are Kobe Bryant (5,640), Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (5,762) and Michael Jordan (5,987). It was James’s 15th playoff triple-double, secured when he ran down rebound No. 10 with 8:01 left. He scored on Cleveland’s next possession, and while sitting on the bench during a subsequent timeout, he saluted applauding Cavs fans by pressing his fingers to his lips and touching his heart. By then, the Cavs, who closed the first half with a decisive 16-2 run, were up 20 and coasting to another easy win in their so-far-spotless spring. Earlier in the day, James was asked if the Cavs might need a loss to get them ready for the finals. “We don’t want to lose,” he said. And the Cavs are playing like it under Coach Tyronn Lue, also a perfect 10 in the playoffs. “It’s not easy,” said Lue, who took over when the Cavs fired David Blatt in January. The Cavaliers, though, are making it look easy—too easy—during their pristine postseason. AP

FEDERER PULLS OUT OF FRENCH OPEN

ARIS—Roger Federer pulled out of the French Open on Thursday, ending his record streak of appearing in 65 consecutive Grand Slam tournaments—every one since the start of 2000. The 17-time major champion, who had a knee operation this year but returned to play at the Monte Carlo Masters in early April, has been dealing with a back problem that has limited his schedule in recent weeks. “I regret to announce that I have made the decision not to play in this year’s French Open,” the 34-year-old Federer said in a statement on his web site. “I have been making steady progress with my overall fitness, but I am still not 100 percent, and feel I might be taking an unnecessary risk by playing in this event before I am really ready.” He has been in Paris this week, practicing on the red clay and testing his back. Last week Federer played in the Italian Open and lost to Dominic Thiem in the third round. He withdrew from the Madrid Open the previous week because of back pain. The previous major tournament Federer missed was the 1999 US Open, when he failed to qualify for the main draw. “I am sorry for my fans in Paris, but I very much look forward to returning to Roland Garros in 2017,” said Federer, who lost in the French Open quarterfinals last year to eventual champion Stan Wawrinka. The third-ranked Federer, who has 88 career titles, won his only French Open title in 2009, completing a career Grand Slam. AP ROGER FEDERER’S record streak of appearing in 65 consecutive Grand Slam tournaments—every one since the start of 2000—ends. AP