BusinessMirror September 5, 2015

THE BEACH This view awaits beachgoers at

Anawangin Cove, reached via a 15-minute boat ride from the town proper of Pundaquit, San Antonio, Zambales, or a five-hour trek through the Pundaquit mountain range. NORIEL DE GUZMAN

BusinessMirror

THREETIME ROTARY CLUB OF MANILA JOURNALISM AWARDEE 2006, 2010, 2012

U.N. MEDIA AWARD 2008

A broader look at today’s business

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Saturday 18, 2014 Vol.5, 10 No. 40 Vol. 10 No. 331 Saturday, September 2015

P.  |     | 7 DAYS A WEEK

TETANGCO SAYS BSP READY TO ADJUST POLICY TO SUSTAIN FAVORABLE INFLATION PATH

BSP hints at tweaking rates soon U B C U. O  B C

PSIDE risks to inflation were top of mind among the economic managers on Friday, when the rate of change in prices edged still closer to zero in August to 0.6 percent from 0.8 percent in July.

INSIDE

OVERLY PHOTOGRAPHED Life

BusinessMirror

Editor: Gerard S. Ramos • lifestylebusinessmirror@gmail.com

Saturday, September 5, 2015

This development prompted the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) to drop yet again broad hints of an interest-rate adjustment sooner than some economists and observers anticipated, as year-to-date inflation averaged 1.7 percent or even lower than the 2-percent floor of the year’s target range.

“We will make adjustments to policy, if needed, to ensure just enough liquidity in the market so the favorable inflation path is sustained,” BSP Governor Amando M. Tetangco Jr. told financial journalists.

“We will continue to monitor developments in global oil prices, track El Niño, as well as coordinate with relevant agencies of government on mitigants to

A7

Musings on an overly photographed life B H S The Orange County Register

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DIDN’T take a photo of my daughter this morning before I dropped her off to begin seventh grade. It wasn’t really a conscious decision. We had to leave pretty early, and I spilled a smoothie on the corner of my husband’s keyboard, which set us back a bit, and we were both generally worried about making it to school on time.

Also, it seems indecent to take a photo before 7 am somehow. So, no photo.

The missed photo didn’t occur to me until I got to work and saw all the pictures of friends’ kids smiling in their crisp, first-day-of-school clothes on Facebook. I liked seeing their faces and thinking about their first days, mulling over the passage of time, the distance between us, that sort of thing.

It got me to pondering the overwhelming photographic archive we have of our lives today, and wondering how having so many photos affects us.

There is definitely no picture of me on my first day of seventh grade. The only one I can recall is the official school photo (big feathered hair, striped Izod shirt, braces), though I’m sure there are a few shots of me from that year with the family on a picnic, or in my band uniform holding my flute before a concert, or standing beside my sister in front of a Christmas tree.

You know, the old standards. But there is no document of my day-to-day life other than what lives inside my mind and on the pages of an old journal, which exists somewhere in my garage.

My daughter, Lux, on the other hand, has the photos I took at the beach this weekend, and the ones she and her friends snapped while goofing around in her bedroom, and the selfies she took of a cool makeup look she

was trying out for Halloween. And that’s just from one week of her life.

I love photos and I sometimes wish I had more from my childhood, but they can also feel like a burden. The constant image-making of today comes with pressures: to look good while doing everything, and to constantly think about what something looks like, rather than just how it feels. There’s also a thin layer of the future on all of these pictures, the weight of how each photographed day will be remembered and preserved.

Imagine the era of tintype or daguerreotype photographs, when people had to stand in a pose for several minutes while their image was being slowly copied onto a thin piece of metal.

Back in the 1800s, there was no such thing as a captured photographic moment. What was it like, then, to see an image yourself? It must’ve been a very odd experience.

You rarely see a smile in those very old photos. For one, it was difficult to hold a natural smile for as long as it took to take a photograph.

Also, it was considered bad taste to smile.

According to one essay on the subject by Cambridge lecturer Nicholas Jeeves, “By the 17th century in Europe it was a well-established fact that the only people who smiled broadly, in life and in art, were the poor, the lewd, the

drunk, the innocent, and the entertainment....

Showing the teeth was, for the upper classes, a more or less formal breach of etiquette.”

Add to this the fact that many people had rotten or crooked teeth and the lack of smiles makes sense. (Jeeves, however, says rotten teeth were so common in that early era of photographs that they didn’t even register as unattractive.)

I don’t long for an era of rotten teeth and stern expressions, but just imagine how freeing it must have been not to be surrounded by images at all hours of the day. Now we scroll through daily selfies of each other and of the

famous and beautiful. While I love photos of my kids and family and of friends and places I miss, I don’t like the constant barrage of images we all have daily and the way it lures me into comparing myself with other people and other lives. But how do we step out of society’s rapid stream of images without becoming hermits or missing out on the fun of shared photographs?

I’m sure that after school today, I will take a photo of my daughter. I don’t want to not have that first-day photo just to make some sort of point to myself.

Photographs tell a story. That is their power and their beauty. When we capture numerous

images on a daily basis, the story is sometimes diluted; the images begin to lack power.

But we are fortunate to have these pictures, to imagine other people’s lives and recall our own. The people in very old photos are so alien, so inscrutable. I’ve stared at old black-and-whites of my great-grandparents and of unknown relatives, willing them to tell me something, but they are mysterious and distant. Will our smiling selfies be just as impenetrable to people 150 years from now? There will be so many images for future generations to sift through; how will they even know which ones are important? ■

DISCOVER TRUE LOVE IN INTERRACIAL RELATIONSHIPS

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BELOVED Disney characters endear children of all ages on “Disney Live! Mickey’s Music Festival” at the Kia Theater in Araneta Center

MICKEY MOUSE AND HIS PALS ARE AT OUR DOORSTEP B JT N

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OR this week at least, call Cubao in Quezon City “Disneyland.”

With over 25 Disney characters flocking to this pocket of the metropolis for the inaugural show at Araneta Center’s brandspanking new Kia Theater, titled “Disney Live!

Mickey’s Music Festival,” fans around these parts can have their local dose of Disney magic.

The 90-minute production of singing and dancing features a lineup of Disney personalities, led by the iconic Mickey Mouse, along with characters from Aladdin, The Little Mermaid and Disney/Pixar’s Toy Story. The show, which is just one of the two Disney shows Sun is hosting this year, kicked off on Tuesday and will run until Sunday, with the weekend runs packed with three shows at 10 am, 2 pm and 6 pm.

“Everybody has an unforgettable Disney childhood memory—from the staples, such as Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck, to our favorite Disney characters, like Cinderella and Snow White,” Sun Vice President for Postpaid

Marketing Joel Lumanlan said in a statement.

“And while it’s easy for us to keep the memory alive with small doses of Disney, we’re giving the practical Pinoys the chance to relive the Disney experience and bring it to life.”

In a recent discussion with Lumanlan at Mario’s in Tomas Morato, he said that in terms of scale, this is Sun’s biggest engagement with Disney to date.

Aside from this show, Sun will also be hosting the highly anticipated “Disney on Ice: Disney Magical Ice Festival” this year, which will be staged at the Smart Araneta Coliseum from Christmas Day to January 3.

The annual ice spectacle is being hyped with the wildly popular characters from Disney’s phenomenal Frozen making their debut on the show, joining the fold of Disney princesses.

Lumanlan said they “have several treats and promos for [Sun subscribers]—mostly tickets, meet-and-greet with Disney characters,” adding they’re raffling off over a million worth of tickets for both shows to selected Sun plan and postpaid add-on consumers.

TEY.” “Exotica.” “P.S.S.” or “Pinay Success Story.”

These are just some of the words people associate with Filipino women who are in interracial relationships.

Often frowned upon or ridiculed, these relationships are often depicted with plain-looking Juanas clinging to old Caucasian men.

So what then if we feature the lives of these couples without the judgment? What really is their story?

TV5 and Unitel Productions come together to adapt to Philippine TV Randolph Longhas’s acclaimed indie film, Ang Turkey Man Ay Pabo Rin, which speaks about the trials, tribulations and triumphs faced by interracial couples. Through their newest Saturday sitcom, Kano Luvs Pinay, viewers will see a juxtaposition of the Filipino experience through the eyes of a foreigner and the realization of the American dream in the eyes of a Filipina. It is a celebration of love as a universal force that doesn’t discriminate against race, color, stature or culture.

Premiering on September 5 at 9 pm and every Saturday thereafter, Kano Luvs Pinay features TV5’s top comedienne Tuesday Vargas playing the role of Conchita Evelyn Bigoy, a.k.a. Cookie, a 30-year-old single mom from a middle-class family who’s into the direct-selling business as her means to provide for her son. She logs in to kanoluvspinay.com, a dating site for Filipinas looking for American bachelors, and there she finds the eventual love of her life, Matthew Adams, portrayed by Hollywood actor Lee O’ Brian.

As they get along, the Fil-Am couple encounters peculiar Filipino customs, showing various cultural differences that often lead to conflict—such as karaoke music, extended families, immigration laws and, eventually, the

choice between living here or abroad.

O’Brian talks up what makes their program unique from other sitcoms. “It may be a situational comedy, yet, it deals with many issues that both Filipinos and foreigners alike deal with when interacting.

I have not seen another show on Philippine TV that has crossed cultural borders this much. I’m really excited to see the reaction from both local Filipinos and Filipinos abroad, along with the people who are their significant others. It’s another benefit of this opportunity, to see how those crosscultural issues resonate with them.

“What our program is dealing with and minimizing is the tendency to see an interracial couple for something other than true love. Many times the people around the couple think it’s economically motivated, or it’s to get a visa, when in reality the two people just love each other.”

Will Cookie and Matthew’s love conquer all? Or will they eventually get lost in translation?

BusinessMirror

LEE O’BRIAN and Tuesday Vargas explore color-blind love in Kano Luvs Pinay.

LIFE

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news@businessmirror.com.ph | Saturday, September 5, 2015

UDAPEST, Hungary—Thousands of people desperate to reach Western Europe rushed into a Budapest train station on Thursday after police ended a two-day blockade, setting off a wave of anger and confusion as hundreds shoved their way onto a waiting train. But when it tried to drop them off at a Hungarian camp for asylum seekers, a bitter showdown began.

and whom his country had allowed to trickle out toward Austria and Germany only in recent days. People fleeing war and poverty in the Middle East, Asia and Africa rushed into the Keleti train terminal when police unexpectedly withdrew on Thursday morning, ending a blockade designed to stop migrants from boarding trains to their desired destinations in Germany and Austria.

In desperate scenes, people pushed each other to reach the train’s six carriages. Children caught in the melee cried in terror as parents or older siblings pulled them through open windows, thinking that getting on board meant they would be first to escape Hungary.

But instead of heading to the Austrian border, the overloaded train stopped at Bicske, a town northwest of Budapest that holds one of the country’s five camps for asylum seekers—facilities the migrants want to avoid because they don’t want to pursue asylum claims in economically depressed Hungary.

As the train platform filled with police came into view, those inside chanted their disapproval and their determination to reach Germany, their almost unanimous goal.

The crowd, angrily waving train tickets to Vienna and Munich, refused police orders to board buses to the asylum center, pushing their way past police and back onto the train. A daylong standoff ensued in which police and charity workers took turns handing food and water to the passengers, only to have them tossed out train windows in protest.

“We don’t need food and water!

Just let us go to Germany!” one man shouted. Children held up handwritten signs reading, “Let’s Go Germany.”

About 100 police kept watch on the train, barring media from the platform, but didn’t remove the migrants by force. The head of police border control, Col. Laszlo Balazs,

A MIGRANT lies on the track with her baby as she refuses to be placed in a camp for asylum seekers in Bicske, Hungary, on Thursday. AP/PETR DAVID JOSEK

said 16 people voluntarily checked into the asylum center, while about 500 others refused. He said officers were using loudspeakers to inform those who wouldn’t comply of “their legal obligations.”

“Nobody can avoid identity checks. Everyone must submit themselves to this measure, and the police are keeping this train in place until they do,” he said.

Back at the Budapest train station, announcements in Hungarian and English—but not Arabic, the language of most of those gathered inside—declared that all services from the station to Western Europe had been canceled. A statement in English on the main departures board said no more trains to Austria or Germany would leave “due to safety reasons until further notice!”

Conditions at Keleti station have grown increasingly unsanitary despite the efforts of volunteers distributing water, food, medicine and disinfectants. The numbers of those stuck there have swelled since Hungary reversed course on Tuesday after allowing more than 2,000 migrants to travel on trains heading

west the day before. Thousands were stranded after buying tickets costing €61 to €122 ($68 to $136).

Hungary’s rail company said on Thursday it was refusing to refund the tickets at the station, citing fears that some may be counterfeit. It said ticket-holders must file refund requests in writing and have the reimbursement mailed to them.

The waiting is taking its toll and has sparked occasional protests near the terminal entrance. The migrants survive on food handouts from Hungarian charities and individual donors, augmented by their own purchases from pizza stalls, kebab shops and burger joints. Sleeping overnight on the cold concrete proves fitful, leaving many semicomatose in a carpet of bodies by day.

Amid the human sprawl, children played and scavenged. One baby boy crawled away from his sleeping parents to eat breadcrumbs scattered on the pavement. Nearby, an unattended toddler walked to a pile of garbage and picked at discarded candy wrappers in search of a treat.

Engaging in cramped games of volleyball and soccer, children struck

their parents and passers-by with errant balls, laughing as they did so. Hundreds of adults took turns washing their clothes, hair, feet and brushing their teeth at a bank of five faucets with no sewage drain that was supposed to provide sufficient drinking water for the entire 3,000-member camp. Discarded clothing lay everywhere.

The question of how to manage the crisis was hotly debated on Thursday in Brussels at meetings between European Union (EU) leaders and Hungary’s prime minister.

His chief of staff, Janos Lazar, said 160,000 migrants had reached Hungary this year, 90,000 of them in the past two months alone, representing around half of all asylum-seekers in Europe. “We, Hungarians, are full of fear,” Orban told a Brussels news conference, warning that the acceptance of so many Muslims from Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere would erode Europe’s Christian bedrock.

Orban confirmed his government’s plan to send at least 3,000 troops to Hungary’s southern border with Serbia, where police patrols,

razor-wire coils and a 4-meter fence are already in place to deter new arrivals from the non-EU member.

The premier said he expected lawmakers to debate and pass a raft of government measures on Friday that he hopes will strengthen border security with Serbia starting on September 15. The package of legislative bills would authorize the troop deployment, create new criminal penalties for those who damage the border fence, stiffen prison sentences for smugglers and create new border asylum-processing centers with an emphasis on quick verdicts, limited appeals and a possible new deportation regime to Serbia.

Serbia’s prime minister, Aleksandar Vucic, warned that if Hungary drew a new line in the sand, this would simply create a new problem for Serbia, where virtually none of the migrants passing through want to claim asylum. Vucic said the EU needed a region-wide plan to ensure migrants received care and support if Hungary sealed its border.

“Otherwise...in 12 days we can face huge problems here.” AP and TNS

European residents offer support, homes to refugees B T Y Inter Press Service

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NITED NATIONS—As the migration crisis in Europe continues to grow and the government response remains slow, European citizens have taken it upon themselves to act by opening up their homes to those in need.

In a Facebook group, entitled “Dear Eygló Harðar—Syria is Calling,” over 15,000 Icelanders have signed an open letter calling on their government to “open the gates” for more Syrian refugees.

The open letter, initiated by author and professor Br yndis Bjorgvinsdottir on August 30, addresses Iceland’s Minister of Welfare Eygló Harðar and calls on the government to reconsider capping the number of refugees at a

mere 50. The weeklong campaign, which ended on September 4, aims to gather information about available assistance and to create pressure on the government to increase its quota. “Refugees are our […] best friends, our next soul mate, the drummer in our children’s band, our next colleague, Miss Iceland 2022, the carpenter who finally fixes our bathroom, the chef in the cafeteria, the fireman, the hacker and the television host. People who we’ll never be able to say to: ‘Your life is worth less than mine,’” the open letter states.

Many have posted their own open letters, offering their homes, food, and general support to refugees, to enable them to integrate into Icelandic society.

One Icelander posted on the group: “I’m a single mother with

a six-year-old son […] we can take a child in need. I’m a teacher and would teach the child to speak, read and write Icelandic and adjust to Icelandic society. We have clothes, a bed, toys and everything a child needs. I would, of course, pay for the airplane ticket.”

The open letter has sparked more people around the world to express words of support and to offer their homes to those in need.

One mother of a 19-month-old baby from Argentina wrote in the group: “I want you to know that I would like to help in any way I can, even if it is looking at the possibility of hosting some boy or girl in my house […]. I don’t have a comfortable financial position, but I can provide what is necessary and a lot of love.”

Similar efforts to house refugees have begun in other parts of Europe.

Refugees Welcome, a German initiative, matches refugees from around the world with host citizens offering private accommodation.

Once hosts sign up to offer their homes, Refugees Welcome works with local refugee organizations to reach out to find a “suitable” match.

Though only Germany and Austrian residents can currently be hosts, over 780 people have already signed up to help and more than 134 refugees from Afghanistan, Burkina Faso, Nigeria, Iraq, Somalia and Syria have been matched with families in the two countries.

Refugees Welcome also stated that the initiative has been picked up and may be expanded to the United States and Australia.

“We are convinced that refugees should not be stigmatized and excluded by being housed in

MIGRANTS receive a juice donation in front of the railway station in Budapest, Hungary, on Thursday.

Over 150,000 migrants have reached Hungary this year, most coming through the southern border with Serbia, and many apply for asylum but quickly try to leave for richer European Union countries.

AP/FRANK AUGSTEIN

mass accommodations. Instead, we should offer them a warm welcome,” Refugees Welcome says on its web site. European Union’s border agency Frontex revealed that

in July 2015 alone, over 100,000 people migrated into Europe. Germany has stated that it expects up to 800,000 asylum seekers by the end of the year.

THE WORLD

PHL STOCKS CAN’T ESCAPE REGIONAL CONTAGIONBPI

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B2-3

Hungary opens door to trains for migrants—but only to camps B One man threw his wife and infant son onto the tracks, screaming in Arabic, “We won’t move from here!” Police surrounded the prone family, pulled the husband away and handcuffed him as he wailed. His wife and diaperclad boy—apparently uninjured despite their stumbling descent onto the tracks—were freed and allowed to rejoin other migrants.

The scene of desperation was just one of many that unfolded on Thursday as tempers flared in Hungary’s war of wills with migrants trying to evade asylum checks and reach Western Europe, a showdown with consequences for the entire continent.

As Hungary’s antiimmigrant prime minister warned European partners that he intends to make his country’s borders an impassible fortress for new arrivals, his government struggled to coax thousands of unwanted visitors away from the Budapest transportation hub that has been turned into a squalid refugee camp.

German Chancellor A ngela Merkel became the first European head of state to say “welcome” succinctly. She was addressing a migrant and refugee crisis that has seen thousands drown in the Mediterranean and is now expected to bring more than 800,000 people to Germany in 2015. During a news conference on Thursday in Bern, Switzerland, Merkel said it was both an honor and a moral obligation for Germany to take in “die Fluechtlinge,” the refugees.

Because of that, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban on Thursday proclaimed them “Germany’s problem,” adding: “Nobody wants to stay in Hungary. All of them would like to go to Germany.”

He said this on Thursday in Brussels, speaking of the tens of thousands who had flooded in to the Keleti train station in Budapest

ceremonies held on September 3 at the Metrobank Auditorium. The 30 awardees were given appreciation due to their outstanding service and commitment to their career and their community. STEPHANIE TUMAMPOS

C  A

HUNGARY OPENS DOOR TO TRAINS FOR MIGRANTS The World

OUTSTANDING FILIPINOS The Metrobank Foundation Outstanding Filipinos, composed of teachers, police officers and soldiers, are shown at the conferment

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HE top-performing fund manager in the Philippines has almost doubled its cash holdings—betting that the nation’s stocks will extend their longest monthly losing streak since 2002—as China’s economic slowdown roils emerging markets, while the US is getting closer to raising borrowing costs.

The benchmark Philippine Stock Exchange index (PSEi) could retest a 14-month low, as a two-week rebound loses steam, said Smith Chua, who manages the four best-performing Philippine equity funds over the

past year as chief investment officer at the Bank of the Philippine Islands (BPI).

“Markets are persistently in risk-off mode, so we will spend our bullets wisely,” said Chua, who’s “nibbling selectively” at consumer, property and energy companies while increasing cash levels since the start of the year.

“It doesn’t pay to play too smart with the market, when there are external factors that are too unpredictable.”

The PSEi has declined every month since April, the longest S “PHL ,” A

Government told to address threats of El Niño as farm losses hit ₧3.32B B M G P

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HE El Niño has already wreaked havoc on the agriculture sector to the tune of P3.32 billion as of August 13, according to the latest report from the Department of Agriculture (DA).

The country’s corn industry posted the biggest production loss, at P2.21 billion. The report showed that 158,809 metric tons (MT) of corn were damaged in some 112,387 hectares of land, affecting 35,509 corn farmers.

Damage to the rice sector reached 58,485 MT, worth P1.09 billion.

About 28,734 rice farmers were affected in 30,665 hectares of land.

A total production loss of 1,086 MT in high-value crops, valued at P19.56 million, were incurred, while P11,000 worth of damage was reported in the livestock sector.

The same report showed Region 2 took the brunt of the drought’s impact, accounting for P1.16 billion of the total production loss. The affected areas reached 74,173 hectares, damaging 89,074 MT of crops. The DA said field validation is still ongoing in the region.

This was followed by Region 12, which lost 50,285 MT of crops,

valued at P980 million.

Region 10 lost 53,223 MT of crops due to the weather phenomenon, pegged at P762.07 million.

Agriculture Undersecretary for Operations and Agribusiness and Marketing Emerson U. Palad said in an earlier interview that the DA is implementing interventions to mitigate the adverse effects of the El Niño.

“We’ve been prepared since last year. Cloud-seeding operations in different parts of the country are still ongoing. We are partnering with local government units for their implementation,” he said.

C  A

Apec SOM3 focuses on infra financing, PPP B L S. M

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NFRASTRUCTURE development in the Asia-Pacific region will be discussed in Sunday’s so-called Third Senior Officials’ Meeting (SOM3) in Cebu City, with the highlight being placed on financing issues and the public-private partnership (PPP) initiative.

On its agenda, the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (Apec) said it will place a “particular emphasis on quality infrastructure as

PESO EXCHANGE RATES ■ US 46.7660

a necessary component of economic growth,” given that the region is gearing up for better connectivity by 2025.

Quality infrastructure directly supports efficient transportation and telecommunication services; air and sea ports; customs procedures, energy distribution; and farmto-fork logistics, among others.

Finance ministers are also set to discuss and launch the Cebu Action Plan on a Financial Road Map this month, with “Accelerating

Infrastructure Development and Financing” as one of its four pillars.

The 10-year plan calls on member-economies to set regional standards for PPP terms and practices, as well as to maximize the initiative’s role in infrastructure investment through collaboration with international organizations, such as the Asian Development Bank, the World Bank and the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development.

S “A,” A

■ JAPAN 0.3901 ■ UK 71.3509 ■ HK 6.0342 ■ CHINA 7.3480 ■ SINGAPORE 33.0105 ■ AUSTRALIA 32.8344 ■ EU 52.0739 ■ SAUDI ARABIA 12.4702 Source: BSP (4 September 2015)

News BusinessMirror

A2 Saturday, September 5, 2015

news@businessmirror.com.ph

‘Appointment of traffic czar a must’

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By Lorenz S. Marasigan

HE appointment of Cabinet Secretary Jose Rene D. Almendras as the point man of President Aquino in addressing the road congestion in Metro Manila— which is causing a P2.4-billion productivity loss daily—is not enough.

What this country needs, a ranking official of the Management Association of the Philippines (MAP) said, is a traffic czar.

Eduardo H. Yap, chairman of the MAP traffic, transportation and infrastructure committee, said his group believes that President Aquino needs to appoint an official with executive power to direct public funds to resolving the Metro’s traffic woes.

A mere coordinator, he said, is not sufficient. A single point of authority should be put in place.

“We need a traffic czar, not just to serve as a coordinator of different

agencies working together to ease traffic flow, but one who is empowered to exercise executive powers to mobilize resources of the different national government agencies in order to expeditiously and effectively implement measures to provide the earliest relief from traffic congestion gripping the capital city. Title is everything to many. A mere coordinator is an invitation to be ignored,” Yap said on Friday.

Almendras was directed by President Aquino to head the government’s initiative to improve the traffic in Metro Manila’s arteries. His appointment came a few days after

Iglesia Ni Cristo members staged a four-day rally that paralyzed Epifanio de los Santos Avenue (Edsa).

Mr. Aquino also directed the National Police’s Highway Patrol Group (HPG) to take charge of traffic enforcement with focus on declogging six major choke points along Metro Manila’s main road.

These measures are among those recommended by the MAP and their adoption is an indication that the government is receptive to suggestions from the private sector, Yap pointed out.

However, despite the progress, the group shall continue to “be proactive and constructively engage the government in helping and supporting efforts to alleviate the crippling traffic congestion in Metro Manila that affects the quality of life of residents and contributes to a loss of about P2.4 billion per day in the Philippine economy.”

Yap added that his committee recommends that concrete lane delineators be quickly installed at all bus stops along the entire stretch of Edsa to ensure efficient traffic flow without need for much human intervention.

This will enable HPG troopers to supervise other critical hot spots,

such as the problematic Edsa-Taft Avenue and Gil Puyat Avenue-Taft intersections.

“The coverage of the presidential directive must be expanded to include C-5, which is the second most important circumferential road that provides an alternate route to relieve traffic load from Edsa, and to other national roads, such as Katipunan and Commonwealth avenues. Choke points on these roads degrade their efficiency,” Yap said.

Equally important are Edsa’s radial roads, which allow circulation and distribution of traffic, he added, enumerating them as Gil Puyat, Shaw Boulevard, Ortigas Avenue and E. Rodriguez, among others.

“Solving this humongous traffic problem necessitates collective action. There should be symmetry of actions. The government must know what its left hand is doing.

Without a comprehensive trafficmanagement plan, traffic woes would still haunt us even after two or three years from now and we cannot be made to suffer for that long. Let’s unite, and solve this traffic-congestion problem as soon as possible,” Yap said.

Aside from addressing Metro Manila’s traffic-management

roblems, the government must also consider improving the traffic in other metropolitan cities throughout the Philippines.

Metro Manila’s neighboring provinces and cities are said to be losing P1 billion daily in productivity costs owing to congestion.

“We are seeing traffic congestion just about everywhere—even in Cebu, Tarlac, Pangasinan, Baguio, Davao and Zamboanga. Traffic is not just a problem of residents in Metro Manila, but is beginning to affect even those cities in the provinces.

Let’s nip this in the bud as early as now,” Yap emphasized.

The traffic situation in the Philippines was tagged as the fifth worst in the world, the 2015 mid-year report of crowdsourcing firm Numbeo showed.

Manila’s traffic index was at 201.31 points. It was measured based on the average time spent by a commuter to reach a destination, dissatisfaction and inefficiencies in the traffic system, and carbondioxide emission.

Metropolitan Manila Development Authority Chairman Francis N. Tolentino earlier predicted that traffic in the metropolis will continue to be messy in the next 15 years.

Dengue cases up by 9.15% from January 1 to August 8

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he Department of Health (DOH) on Friday reported that its latest cumulative data from January 1 to August 8, 2015, showed that the number of dengue cases in the country increased by 9.15 percent compared to the same period last year.

According to DOH Spokesman Dr. Lyndon Lee-Suy, a total of 55,079 suspected dengue cases were collected from all the regions in the country. Such figure was higher compared to just 50,462 reported cases during the same period of 2014.

Dr. Lee-Suy said Region 4A (Calabarzon or Cavite, Laguna, Batangas, Rizal and Quezon) has the highest number of dengue cases at 8,351.

Next to Region 4A is Region 3 (Central Luzon) with 7,165 cases, followed by the National Capital Region (NCR) with 6,090 cases; Region 10 (Northern Mindanao), 4,813 cases; and Region 2 (Cagayan Valley), 4,110 cases.

Data from the agency’s Epidemiology Bureau on Public Health Surveillance Division from the different regions that reported the cases showed the majority of the victims were males aged 5-14 years.

The DOH spokesman noted that the number of deaths resulting from dengue cases was placed

at 0.31 percent.

He said the number of cases might appear high at a glance because the data was cumulative, meaning the cases occurred in the different months or not simultaneously happening.

With this, the DOH official once again reminded the public to keep their surroundings clean in order to eliminate breeding sites of mosquitoes, the carrier of the disease.

He also said that as people attempt to store water because of water-service interruption, there is a need to ensure that they are storing them in covered containers or drums in order to prevent this disease-carrying insect from finding suitable breeding sites.

An infected daytime female Aedes aegypti mosquito transmits the viral disease to humans.

Among the signs and symptoms of dengue are sudden onset of high fever, which may last from two to seven days; joint and muscle pain behind the eyes; weakness; skin rashes, nose bleeding when fever starts to subside; vomiting of colored-coffee matter; dark-colored stools and difficulty in breathing.

The DOH advises people to immediately consult a doctor should they experience fever for more than two days so that they can be given early medication. PNA

MRT 3 prototype coach

Workers unload the Metro Railway Transit 3 (MRT 3) prototype coach at the Light Railway Transit 1 depot in Pasay City on Thursday. The prototype coach will undergo inspections and static testing in the next few days, as the government scrambles to find solutions to upgrade the efficiency and capacity of the mass-transport railway plying the Edsa route. The rest of the MRT 3 coaches are scheduled for delivery next year. Nonie Reyes

Army to train with Malaysian, Indonesian counterparts

By Rene Acosta

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HE Army will train with Malaysian and Indonesia armies this month as it strengthen its defense ties with forces with its regional neighbors.

Col. Benjamin Hao, Army spokesman, said the cross-training will focus on interoperability and counterinsurgency operations.

The 16th in the series of the Training Activity Land Malaysia-Philippines (Malphi), a yearly bilateral exercise between the Philippine Army and Malaysian Army, will be held from September 9 to 21 at the Peacekeeping Operations Center (PKOC) in Camp O’Donnell, Capas, Tarlac.

The training aims to enhance the interoperability of the Philippine Army and Malaysian army through a combined army operation exercise.

The participants include 76 Army personnel and 30 soldiers from the Malaysian army.

“Malphi aims to enhance the longstanding professional relationship and cooperation between the two armies,” said Col. Jose Faustino Jr., the Army’s assistant chief of staff for training and education.

The Army will also participate in the Training Activity Dolphine with the Indonesian army at the headquarters of Komando Pasukan Khusus (Kopassus) in Bandung, Indonesia, in a program that will end on September 6.

The Dolphine is a yearly bilateral training activity that focuses on the exchange of information, and techniques, tactics and procedures in the conduct of counterinsurgency operations.

Hao said 20 personnel from the Army’s Special Forces Regiment (Airborne) will train with 20 members of the Indonesian army.

The training activity also involves discussions and sharing of lessons learned in different military operations, including participation in humanitarian assistance and disasterresponse operations of Kopassus and the Philippines’s Army Special Forces, cross training and demonstration and use of the air operations training facilities of the Indonesian national army.

“These cross trainings are part of our international agreements that aim to develop and promote cooperative activities in the defense and security of our respective countries,” Faustino said.

In his command guidance, the Army commander, Lt. Gen. Eduardo Año, said the Army “will continue to participate in international defense and security engagements that will not only enhance the country’s military relations with allied and other foreign armed forces, but also provide impetus for capability development.

Iloilo LGU eyes Atienza: Making election service noncompulsory for public-school teachers advantageous to politicians Dumangas as new

By Joel R. San Juan

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A RT Y-LIST Rep. Lito Atienza of Buhay has expressed worry that a pending bill in the House of Reprentatives making election service noncompulsory for public-school teachers might be used by politicians for their own personal agenda if passed.

Instead, Atienza proposed that the honorarium for those rendering election service be increased from the proposed P4,000 to P8,000, to encourage public-school teachers to continue to serve.

Atienza explained that House Bill 5412, which seeks to make election service noncompulsory for public-school teachers, would allow the Commission on Elections (Comelec) to appoint national government employees, private-school teachers and any qualified Filipino citizen to

the Boards of Election Inspectors (BEI).

“This is a dangerous move, which could change the character of the entire electoral process and would be tantamount to practically handing over the electoral process to partisan politicians,” Atienza said.

“Public-school teachers have been rendering election service for decades in a nonpartisan manner. They have endured long hours without sleep and harassment from watchers of different political parties. It is but right that they be given higher compensation for their hard work and dedication,” Atienza added.

It can be recalled that the Department of Education earlier appealed to the Comelec to make election duty for teachers voluntary instead of mandatory for the May 2016 polls.

Education Secretary Armin A. Luistro had formally asked

the Comelec to make it a choice for public-school teachers if they want to be a members of the BEI or not. Luistro cited the continuous threats of election-related violence as one of the main reason some of the teachers are hesitant to be part of the BEI. The Comelec, on the other hand, expressed openness to the request of the DepEd, saying it is feasible under an automated elections since there will be clustered precincts numbering to about 100,000 nationwide.

Comelec Chairman Andres Bautista said this means that they will only need about 300,000 public-school teachers serving as BEI. There are currently 630,000 public-school teachers in the country.

Under existing Comelec rules, each BEI shall be composed of a chairman and two members, all of whom must be public-school teachers.

investment zone

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LOILO CITY—The provincial government here is eyeing the establishment of an investment zone in the the coastal town of Dumangas.

Provincial administrator Raul Banias, at the quarterly meeting of the Regional Development Council held on Friday, said Gov. Arthur Defensor Sr. had approved the identification of one area that would be turned into an investment zone.

He said that they hope to have the pre-feasibility study next year and its full version thereafter, with the assistance being provided by the University of Asia and the Pacific and the National Economic and Development Authority.

Boosting the potential of the area as an investment zone is the proposal to transfer the international port from Iloilo City to Dumangas.

Currently, a feasibility study is being undertaken to determine whether the proposal is doable.

The Philippine Ports Authority has shelled out some P110.8 million for the 3,800-square-meter port-expansion project in the area. Three roll-on, roll-off (Roro) ramps will also be constructed in the area. It has a newly completed terminal building that could serve passengers of Roro vessels, which traverses the nautical highway. PNA

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Animal-rights activists closely monitoring ₧135-M Clark zoo

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By Ashley Manabat | Correspondent

LARK FREEPORT—Animalrights activists are keeping a close watch on the P135-million zoo that will soon be established in this former US Air Force base.

Last week the Clark Development Corp. (CDC) has signed a lease agreement with Global Zoo and Theme Park Alliance Inc. (GZTPAI) President Romeo Siccion that would pave the way for the establishment of a zoo in this free port.

The CDC said the total leased land is 20 hectares and the project will employ about 140 workers in the next five years.

But animal-rights activists said that, what is labelled as a tourismrelated project could very well be another venue to exploit animals.

According to the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (Peta)—Asia Pacific, the proponents’ claim to educate people and

preserve species usually fall short on both counts.

Peta said “animals’ normal behavior is seldom discussed, much less observed, because their natural needs are rarely met.”

It pointed that “even the largest of zoo enclosures cannot compare to the vastness of an animal’s natural habitat and the signs on these enclosures provide little more information than an animal ’s species, diet and natural range.

The only thing zoos teach people is that it is acceptable to control every aspect of an animal’s life.”

C DC ’s M a rket i ng De pa r t ment, however, said the zoo project with GZTPAI would include the provision of a haven for

wildlife animals.

A theme park, but not limited to rides, adventure facilities and other recreational and commercial activities will also be put up, the CDC said.

CDC President and CEO Arthur P. Tugade said the soft opening of the project will be next year or within 12 months after the issuance of the occupancy permit by the CDC along with other permits that must be complied with by GZTPAI from other government and regulatory bodies involved in zoo operations.

Siccion reportedly has maintained a private collection of tigers since 2007, including the rare Albino tiger; some imported species of birds, reptiles; and other small animals that are in a mini zoo he established in the City of San Fernando.

He told Tugade that his vision is to create a place where love for animals could be advocated and shared to others and to educate Filipinos, particularly tourists, about wildlife conservation.

In its web site, the Peta Asia Pacific said “zoos present people with a distorted view of wildlife—we’re

better off watching nature documentaries, reading about animals in books or on web sites, or traveling to animals’ natural habitats.

In addition zoos often push animals over the brink of sanity. Animals in zoos despair so much over their lack of space, privacy, physical exercise, and mental stimulation that they often resort to self-mutilation and other abnormal and self-destructive behaviors, displaying a mental condition that experts call zoochosis.

As for conservation, Peta said “most animals kept in zoos are neither endangered nor being prepared for release into the wild.

Species that are endangered rarely benefit from zoos’ breeding programs, because the babies often die in captivity.

Ultimately we will only save endangered species by preserving their habitat and combating the reasons why they are killed by people in the first place.”

The CDC said Siccion is currently president of Zoo World Inc., a member of the Philippine Zoos Association and Southeast Asian Zoos and Aquariums.

Albay scores 3-peat in Galing Pook Award

By Johnny C. Nunez Philippines News Agency

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LBAY bag ged t he 2015 Galing Pook Award (GPA) for the third consecutive time, with its emergency response group Team Albay as its entry.

Its latest GPA assures Albay a niche in the Hall of Fame of the awards, considered the most prestigious recognition bestowed on local governments for best practices in good governance.

The awards are administered by the Galing Pook Foundation and the Department of the Interior and Local Government.

Albay Gov. Joey Salceda, who personally received the award, said Team Albay-Office of Civil Defense V (OCDV) represented four essentials: “giving back, equality, unity and constant kindness.”

In its 13 humanitarian missions since 2008, Team Albay had served some 103,642 families, or 518,208 persons, and produced 4,863,612 liters of potable water.

It took over operations of two hospitals in at least two of these missions, to restore order and health conditions of victims. It had also packed and distributed volumes of relief goods for the Department of Social Welfare and Development and from donors.

Albay previously received the prestigious GPA in 2008, for disaster risk-reduction management and 2011, for health strategy toward early attainment of the Millennium Development Goals. In the 2015 GPA on September 1, its entry was the now

popular humanitarian-response group Team Albay.

Team Albay is a composite service group organized by Salceda in 2008, primarily as a home-front emergency team. It has since then been conducting humanitarian missions in calamity stricken areas of the country as a way of “giving back.” Its most notable engagement was in Samar and Leyte in the aftermath of Supertyphoon Yolanda (international code name Haiyan) in 2013.

It arrived in Tacloban City two days after the super howler struck, with a complement of 179 personnel trained specially in various aspects of relief operations, backed by 17 vehicles and related equipment, including a lorrymounted water purifying machine under its water and sanitation unit, which produced 17,500 liters of potable water per day.

It was the first organized response group at Ground Zero.

Composed of members from the Bureau of Fire and Protection, the Navy and the Coast Guard, it recovered 628 corpses in all, took over the operations of the Eastern Visayas Regional Medical Center and operated a pharmacy.

The group was the very first to conduct “skilled personnelassisted ” bir t h del iver y; t he first to open a gasoline station; the first outside group to conduct a Monday flag ceremony in Tacloban City; and the first to conduct medical and health services, relief distribution, stress debriefing, sanitary engineering and distributed 1.5 million liters

of drinking water.

In December of the same year, Team Albay, led by Salceda, returned to Eastern Visayas and spent Christmas Noche Buena with Yolanda survivors in Basey, Samar, distributing relief goods and gifts to children.

The team’s other previous engagements and mercy missions were in Iloilo, 2008 (Typhoon Frank); Metro Manila, 2009 (Typhoon Ondoy); Isabela, 2010 (Typhoon Peping); Cagayan de Oro, 2011 (Typhoon Sendong); Guihulngan City in Negros Occidental, 2012 (earthquake); Catanduanes, 2012 (cholera epidemic); Samar, 2012 (earthquake); Compostela Valley and Davao Oriental, 2013 (Typhoon Pablo); Metro Manila, 2013 (Habagat); Laguna and Cavite, 2013 (Habagat); and Bohol and Cebu, 2013 (earthquake).

Salceda said Team Albay stands for four essentials. “The first is giving back. In 2006 Typhoon Reming flattened Albay and the entire country helped us get back to the mainstream. We now have Team Albay to help back and share what we have learned, to other areas victimized by climate change.”

Second, he said Team Albay stands for equality. “It believes the suffering of the poor is not the will of God who blessed everyone with human dignity and equality. It is our duty, thus, and within our powers to correct the historical and structural injustices especially those manifested so brazenly in the impacts of climate change.”

Team Albay, he added, also

means unity. “It’s all about teamwork and unity of purpose. We believe everyone has a contribution to make and together we can make a difference in the lives of the vulnerable. Thus, we believe in the ecosystem approach—the whole of government, whole of economy, whole of society and the whole of environment in delivering solutions for rescue, relief, early recovery, reconstruction and risk reduction,” he added.

Team Albay, Salceda also said, stands for “constant kindness” and believes in being “sensitive and open to the evolving realities in the community, both local and national, and is constantly prepared to respond to the challenges while transcending class origins, historical circumstances and differences.”

“Constant Kindness” is a name Salceda uses in his social media account, which had already earned a large following.

Team Albay was also a recipient of a recognition from the Publishers Association of the Philippines in 2014 “as the first and the most organized response” to Yolanda “amid extreme chaos” where it recovered a total of 622 bodies from the rubbles of the disaster.

Salceda, now on his third term as governor, said he envisions that Albay will become a more progressive, competitive and egalitarian society where development is “stronger, faster, higher and safer for everyone; where no one is left behind and where the potential and dream of every child will attain fulfillment.”

NBI raids office of firm linked to investment scam

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AGBILARAN CITY, Bohol—A National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) team swooped down the business office of Klikmart Shopping Mart Corp. on Palma Street, in this city, on Thursday night, for alleged violations of Republic Act 8799, or the Securities Regulation Code.

Led by NBI Special Investigator Agapito Gierran, the team arrived in the office of what is also known as Klikmart Rewards around 7 p.m. The raid was conducted on the strength of a search warrant issued by Vice Executive Judge Leo Moises Lison of the Regional Trial

Court in Tagbilaran City.

The search warrant was received by a certain Ruben Lurot and the raid was conducted until past 11 p.m.

The NBI team confiscated sales invoices; membership registration forms; official receipts; trust receipts; provisional receipts; ledgers; journals; and all other books of accounts and documents used in recording the investment.

It also confiscated money collected for the purported investment activities, flyers and other advertising manuals, as well as projector or visual aid, laptop, desktop computers and security cameras

being used by the company.

Employees of Klikmart Rewards said they have no idea that the company is conducting illegal operations because they immediately got returns on their investments, placed at a minimum of P1,500, and have started to receive P15,000 twice a month.

Section 8 of the Securities Regulation Code estates that, “Securities shall not be sold or offered for sale or distribution within the Philippines, without a registration statement duly filed with and approved by the Commission. Prior to such sale, information on the

Saturday, September 5, 2015 • Editor: Dionisio L. Pelayo A3

Senator seeks resumption of talks with NDF A S the Senate deliberates on the proposed Bangsamoro basic law, Sen. Loren Legarda said the government should also resume peace negotiations with the National Democratic Front (NDF).

“We need to pursue peace that is inclusive in order for it to be just and lasting. The government should initiate the resumption of peace negotiations with the NDF for the sake of the millions of Filipinos who will benefit from a peaceful and progressive nation,” Legarda said.

According to the Philippine Peace Center, the peace talks between the government and the left are suspended. The two negotiating panels have not sat together for formal negotiations since February 2011.

Moreover, the formal talks to resume discussions on Social and Economic Reforms scheduled for June 2011 did not materialize.

Subsequent efforts to break the impasse through informal talks between the two Parties and discuss an NDF proposal for truce and alliance (also referred to as the “special track”) began in late 2011, but, likewise, collapsed in February 2013.

“One may not necessarily agree with the NDF’s alternative vision of Philippine society, but no one can doubt the integrity of their patriotism or the depth of their commitment to help bring about a more just and a more humane society. That is why we want the government and the NDF to iron out their differences and address the root causes of the armed conflict,” Legarda said.

The Senator noted that the subject of the negotiations are concerns affecting Filipinos, such as poverty; lack of employment and livelihood opportunities, underemployment; lack of access to housing services; affordable health care; education and other social ser vices, corruption;impunity i n hu m a n-r ights v iol at io n s; e nv i ron me nt a l de g r ad at ion ; among many others. “ T he gover nment a nd t he NDF should resume peace talks to come up with an agreement that is agreeable to both parties and beneficial to the Filipino people. Our people have a huge stake in the peace negotiations, the success of which is a step towards a brighter future for generations to come, “Legarda said. Recto Mercene

Pro-life party-list legislator tells cops to stop crime wave

securities, in such form and with such substance as the Commission may prescribe, shall be made available to each prospective purchaser.”

Section 28 of the same law also estates that, “No person shall engage in the business of buying or selling securities in the Philippine as a broker or dealer, or act as a salesman, or an associated person of any broker or dealer unless registered as such with the Commission.”

The said law provides that violators will be fined P50,000 to P5 million, or imprisonment of seven years to 21 years, or both in the discretion of the court. PNA

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PRO-LIFE party-list congressman called on the National Police on Friday to immediately address the deteriorating peace and order situation in the country.

“We are deeply bothered by the recent spate of killings and other crimes all over the country. I call on the National Police to be more sensitive to the situation before government loses control. Efficient law enforcement is the first step toward restoring peace and order,” Party-list Rep. Lito Atienza of Buhay said.

Atienza was reacting to the increase in the number of killings, rapes and other crimes reported in the past couple of months, such as the judge who was shot dead in Baler, Aurora; the man who killed his three childen in Sampaloc, Manila; a 15-yearold boy who shot his former girlfriend’s new boyfriend in Marikina; a 10-yearold girl raped and killed in Tanay, Rizal; and a man who killed his wife and their four

children in Bukidnon.

Atienza pointed out that the police have acknowledged that almost 75 percent of crimes are drug related.

“What is government doing to combat this freewheeling selling of drugs in many communities?” he asked.

“There is a seeming inaction and insensitivity on the part of the police to the growing menace of the drug problem which is not limited to Metro Manila, but it is affecting the whole country,” Atienza said, adding that it would take a concerted effort on the part of government and law-enforcement agencies, local government units and the public to fight the drug menace.

“Tama na ang pagpapapogi by claiming that the crime rate has gone down by 15 percent, pero sunodsunod naman ang mga krimen na nangyayari sa iba’t-ibang lugar. Papayag ba tayo na malagay sa alanganin ang ating kaligtasan at kaayusan? ” Atienza asked.

A4 Saturday, September 5, 2015

Opinion BusinessMirror

editorial

09052015

China changes the rules…for the better?

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eveloping nations—including the Philippines—around the globe were crushed under mountains of debt in the last decades of the 20th century. While international lending organizations like the World Bank proclaim that they are “Working for a World Free of Poverty,” in many ways they did more to keep people in poverty than they care to admit.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank and regional institutions like the Asian Development Bank were not only lenders. They are also pushing their own economic agenda.

There is no question that loans to developing countries may have been granted with the best of intentions. That’s why the World Bank touts the success of loans to the Dominican Republic to provide a much better powersupply situation that has a positive effect on reducing crime and increasing the standard of living.

Good intentions notwithstanding, we also know that World Bank funds were misused through government incompetence and corruption, and the supposed benefits never reached the people. Yet, the people were stuck with the loan repayments that stretch for generations.

These institutions, as a part of a broader economic agenda, sought to foster the growth of freer markets and capitalism through the requirements laid down for giving out loans. Governments were expected to deregulate and privatize government-owned industries. However, in many cases, this was counterproductive and damaging to local economies.

Deregulation could take the turn of favoring large crony-owned companies over the ability of smaller companies to compete. Privatization often meant selling government assets at bargain prices to other cronies all in the name of free enterprise. There is little question that the global lenders turned a blind eye to potential abuses and the fact that these requirements hurt developing nations all in the name of their economic philosophy.

The new Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) formed by China has made it clear that it does not intend to pursue the same method of lending as the World Bank and the IMF. The AIIB will not insist on free-market economic policies for its project lending. The AIIB will follow the local conditions of each country.

There is a fear that future AIIB lending could slow economic reforms in some countries. But, as one example of past lending failure, development banks that financed a water-treatment plant required the price of treated water to be raised to recoup costs, even if the local conditions were not favorable to higher prices. The AIIB could avoid an increase in prices and rely instead on other sources of financing, such as limited government subsidies, to defray costs.

The potential benefits to the people could be much greater in the longer term than under similar loans from the World Bank and the IMF. As Susan Engel, a professor at Australia’s University of Wollongong who has studied the impact on the World Bank of free-market ideas, said, “It’s a religion—this commitment to the involvement of the private sector, even in sectors, where, in fact, their involvement is shown to do harm.”

Why not to worry about China (too much) William Pesek

BLOOMBERG VIEW

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his week’s holiday to commemorate the end of World War II couldn’t have come at a better time. For a global financial system traumatized by recent gyrations in China, the closure of mainland markets is a chance to take a breath and remember that the world is most likely not on the verge of another crisis.

There’s certainly more volatility ahead, perhaps as soon as Monday, when markets reopen, and there are many reasons to worry. As Asia’s biggest trading partner, China is wreaking particular havoc in emerging nations, as its once-voracious demand for commodities declines. The mainland’s $10-trillion economy, meanwhile, is a black box. No one outside President Xi Jinping’s inner circle really knows how close China is to the brink, or what policy tools are being marshaled to avert a crisis.

China’s managed markets

China’s travails also come at a time of unusually elevated concern about weak global growth and limited options for responding to a financial crisis. The Federal Reserve, Bank of Japan and European Central Bank have already cut rates about as low as they can go. Governments have pumped unprecedented fiscal

stimulus into economies to combat deflation. And remember, the International Monetary Fund could barely keep Greece from defaulting.

Good luck with China, where local governments alone have racked up debt exceeding Germany’s annual $3.9-trillion output.

But as many reasons as there are to panic, there’s good cause to believe China isn’t about to deal capitalism another near-death experience. In a new report, Gabriel Sterne of Oxford Economics finds comfort in two stabilizing forces. The first is the overwhelming determination in Beijing to avoid prompting a global collapse.

The second is the US recovery. “We are comforted that the US economy and balance sheets are in better shape than in previous episodes,” Sterne writes. “We do not see China as a Lehman moment.”

For starters, things are not as bad in China as they’re being made

out to be—at least, for now. In another recent report, economists at Gavekal Dragonomics ably refute several “fears that are overblown.”

They discount the possibility that China’s August 11 devaluation might trigger a foreign debt crisis, or that steep stock losses will cause systemic dislocations in the real economy.

Property prices aren’t collapsing, nor is unemployment surging.

Moreover, the world is in better shape to handle China’s troubles than before. That holds for Asia, too. Since the 1997 crisis, governments in the region have strengthened financial systems, internationalized banks, increased transparency and built up defenses against renewed turbulence, amassing trillions of dollars of currency reserves. That leaves the region better positioned to ride out China-related turbulence.

What’s missing from recent China-related panic is perspective. The reaction to last month’s yuan devaluation doesn’t even approach the scale of other bouts of market mayhem over the last 20 years—from the collapse of Long-Term Capital Management in 1998 to the tech bust in 2000 to the 2008 Lehman crisis. Sterne says advanced economy stocks have lost only about 13 percent on average. And don’t underestimate Xi’s determination to steady the economy. Nothing matters more than stability at home and the Chinese brand abroad. The obsessively choreographed pageantry on display

at Beijing’s massive World War II victory parade on Thursday is an apt metaphor for Xi’s ambitions and priorities. You can bet his team is working behind the scenes on a similarly huge scale to get growth back toward 7 percent and put a floor under the stock market.

Of course, those efforts could backfire in the long run. Fresh stimulus will fan already dangerous bubbles in debt and lending through the shadow-banking system. It may derail efforts to recalibrate China away from unproductive investment and exports toward a services-driven economy. It’ll be hard to curb the state-owned enterprises to which Xi is now turning to gin up gross domestic product. Bottom line, China’s actions today may set the stage for an even more spectacular blowup in a few years.

In the short run, jittery investors have the US to fall back on.

While no one is satisfied with the pace of its post-Lehman recovery, the US economy is again becoming a locomotive for world growth. In 1997, when Asia’s crisis was raging, then-Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan called America an “oasis of prosperity.” Today, for countries not entirely dependent on commodity exports, a steadily improving US should help make up for the falloff in Chinese demand. While there may be rough weather ahead, the global financial system should be able to withstand it.

Pope Francis makes it an exciting time to be Catholic

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By Carolyn Alessio | TNS

arlier this week Pope Francis made a historic visit via satellite feed to Chicago’s Cristo Rey Jesuit High School, where he reminded those of us in attendance that Catholic faith and education are capable of updating themselves.

Not surprisingly, he spoke about social responsibility, which he called “friendship in society.” But after a student in my homeroom described her challenging skin condition and mentioned a passion for music, the pontiff surprised the entire crowd by asking her to sing an impromptu song.

In my seat at the back of the school’s chapel, I sat stunned, not just by Valerie’s strength in singing a graceful Spanish song about the Virgin Mary on international TV, but by the refreshing, welcoming tone of this pope and his priorities for modern Catholics.

In the past, when I have mentioned to strangers that I taught at a Catholic school, they sometimes responded as though I had lost all capacity for independent thought. To compound matters, a recent study of the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate confirmed my status as the Typical American Catholic—down to my gender, age, education, income and middle name (Mary).

But the pope’s virtual encounter with our students and other American audiences this week was profound evidence of a personal connection with ordinary people’s stories and sources of courage they may not have known they possessed. His ministry has a special resonance in America’s Latino communities. The three venues included in the pope’s satellite visit indicated a lot about his areas of focus and overall vision for the Church: our school, which primarily serves the proud children of immigrant, lower-income families; a Texas parish near the US-Mexican border; and a group of people in Los Angeles who have experienced homelessness.

As the pope listened to stories of extreme challenge and living on the margins of society, he repeatedly reminded his subjects that they were not alone, and he urged them to remain courageous.

As a world leader who has famously broken with formal traditions and participated in such modern rituals as

“selfie” photos with tourist fans, the pope adeptly used screens and satellite technology to reflect back Americans’ devastating stories as well as their hidden strengths. Valerie’s song, so unscripted and uplifting, provided an apt soundtrack for the pontiff’s disarming, down-to-earth style and messages. He reminded us of Jesus’ humble origins.

When he spoke about forces in social justice, he further connected with his audience by using soccer metaphors to illustrate his points.

Back in Rome, the pope’s range and accessibility are spectacularly demonstrated in the Vatican Museums, which are home to both the Sistine Chapel and an exhibit of the pope’s autographed soccer jerseys from across the world.

One glorious morning last summer, I had the opportunity to view both.

Later, when I told my students about seeing the soccer jerseys autographed for “Francisco,” they were delighted and wanted to see photos. (Not to worry: We also study Michelangelo and “The Creation of Adam” at our high school.)

It is not surprising that tourism to the Vatican has more than doubled since Pope Francis took office, according to published reports.

While in Rome, I also had a chance to hear the pope address the crowd in Saint Peter’s Square from his apartment. As in

Chicago, the pontiff was mainly discernible on a large screen and sound system set up on the square. That day, Rome was celebrating the Solemnity of the Feast of Peter and Paul, the patron saints of the city. After the noontime Angelus, in which the pope offered a blessing and discussed the relevant gospel, he greeted the crowd. Speaking in everyday Italian, he mentioned his upcoming trip to Bolivia, Ecuador and Paraguay. He also encouraged the crowd to enjoy our lunch and to make sure we saw that night’s celebratory fireworks, whose proceeds would benefit a charity initiative in the Holy Land and countries of the Middle East. Squinting up at the papal apartment and over at the large color screen, I listened to the pope in the stark heat of Saint Peter’s Square and felt oddly at home. For the first time in years, my faith felt not just sustaining but exciting.

Earlier this week, when my Cristo Rey students rushed into homeroom, they were buzzing, but not about the recent surge of international attention.

The seniors were excited about signing up for opportunities to volunteer this fall, which includes helping out at the Chicago Marathon. Fresh from their unprecedented opportunity to speak with the celebrity pontiff, the students cared less about his fame than living out his values.

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Opinion

Economic nationalism

World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation

BusinessMirror

Rev. Fr. Antonio Cecilio T. Pascual

Cecilio T. Arillo

database

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OU can interpret it in many ways—this idea about economic nationalism.

To many, it’s a lifetime dedication to create economic power and serve the country’s interest.

To some, it’s some kind of protest.

To others, it’s just a trick.

Whatever you call it, though, it all really depends on the reputation of the person or company waving the banner of nationalism.

Turning 70 and going strong

When local cigarette maker La Campana, which later became Mighty Corp., now turning 70 this 20th day of the month and remarkably going strong, responded to allegations regarding its business practices, it did not only answer its rivals’ odious and malicious allegations point-bypoint, but also rightfully played the nationalist card.

Why not? It’s the only Filipinoowned cigarette company in the Philippines with no foreign partners, no expensive expat workers in its factories and offices, and pride itself as the firm with no outward remittances of income to pay royalties, existing much longer than most of the top local and multinational tobacco firms operating in the country.

As Irving Berlin once said, “A Filipino who truly possesses a nationalist bent follows the country’s laws and performs his/her duties and responsibilities as a decent citizen, like paying the correct taxes.”

It is also truly a Filipino boon if the company plays fair, creates jobs and generates activities that yield multiplier effects on the economy, and gives the government its rightful due.

Its giant multinational rivals often asked: Is Mighty not an illicit trader or tax evader?

Well, the burden of proof is on those who accused and spite it, not the other way around. To date, none of its detractors has filed a case against Mighty. Neither has the government charged or imposed a fine on it.

Indeed, Mighty’s official multibillion-peso tax records are verifiable with the Bureau of Internal Revenue and the Bureau of Customs.

Its roots

Mighty traces its beginning to La Campana Fabrica de Tabacos Inc., which was established by Wong Chu King and his partners Ong Lowa, Baa Dy and Ong Pay, as World War II approached to an end in 1945.

Undeterred by the devastation of war, they built their first factory that year on Tayabas Street, Manila, and produced native cigarettes. La Campana then specialized in Philippine-style cigars, known as matamis and regaliz. These two brands were made from a blend of dark, air-cured Philippine tobaccos sourced from Cagayan and Isabela provinces in Northern Philippines.

In 1948 they established their second factory in Pasong Tamo, Makati.

Acquisition began on 1951 of the present site of the company head office at 39 Sultana Street, Makati, Rizal, which is now 9110 Sultana Street, Olympia, Makati City.

In 1963 Wong Chu King founded the Tobacco Industries of the Philippines and, in 1995, transferred its manufacturing operation in a 9-hectare property in Baranggay Tikay, Malolos, Bulacan, as the high “labor-cost” in Makati City continued to increase.

The years 1965 to 1982 were, however, difficult for the company but, through the perseverance and ingenuity of Wong Chu King, it was able to reestablish its niche. In 1985 Mighty was set up to produce low-priced, aromatic and smoothblend brands. La Campana, meanwhile, expanded and cornered the native tobacco industry by buying the trademarks from Alhambra

Mighty Corp., now turning 70, is the only Filipinoowned cigarette company in the Philippines with no foreign partners, no expensive expat workers in its factories and offices, and prides itself as the firm with no outward remittances of income to pay royalties. It is much older than most of the top local and multinational tobacco firms operating in the country.

Industries, its main competitor that produced La Dicha, Rosalina and Malaya.

Between 2001 and 2007, the company expanded with the creation of its own filter-rod production; the building of its American blended filtered cigarettes; the acquisition of its first Protos machine to boost production; the modernization and upgrading of its entire Lamina and Stem lines; the purchase of its first modern GD packing machine that turn the firm into a fully integrated production facility in its Bulacan complex; and the first company that set up closed-circuit television cameras to closely monitor its operations in compliance with the Bureau of Internal Revenue requirements.

Management

WongChuKing remained active in the management and day-to-day operations of the company until his death in August 1987. The board of trustees is now headed by his widow, Nelia D. Wongchuking, a philanthropist, who sits as chairman of the board, together with their children Helen Wongchuking-Chua, Marietta Wongchuking-Co Chien, Alexander D. Wongchuking. Edilberto Adan, a retired lieutenant general of the Armed Forces of the Philippines, is the president, while retired regional trial court Judge Oscar P. Barrientos sits as the executive vice president.

Economy of scales

Mighty produces 12 brands, competing in both high- and low-end variants against its multinational and monopolist rivals.

If its rivals often wondered how it can sell its products cheaply, it’s because of its excellent practice in the economy of scales, which means, among other microeconomic variables, the reduction in the per-unit cost of production as the volume of production increases.

Corporate social responsibility

Mighty maintains its own CSR program anchored on charity and cultural work mainly through the Wong Chu King Foundation that is managed by the children, their relatives and volunteers. Lately, it granted 200 scholarships to the country’s deserving dependents and beneficiaries of the tobacco growers.

The foundation works closely with religious, educational and non-governmental organizations, and has donated immensely to restore historical churches and those that were damaged by the recent typhoons.

In essence, Mighty proudly represents itself as a nationalist beacon of hope for others competing in modern business environment largely dominated by monopolists and other foreign economic interests.

To reach the writer, e-mail cecilio. arillo@gmail.com

SERVANT LEADER

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ast Tuesday the Universal Church marked World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation, which Pope Francis has designated to be celebrated every first of September annually.

Pope Francis himself led a special Liturgy of the Word in Saint Peter’s Basilica, marking the Catholic Church’s first Day of Prayer for Creation.

The pope noted it follows the initiative of Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, the head of Orthodox Christians, who, for the past 25 years, has dedicated September 1st, the beginning of a new year on the Orthodox liturgical calendar, to care for the environment.

According to Pope Francis, “The annual World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation offers to individual believers and to the community a precious opportunity to renew our personal participation in this vocation as custodians of creation, raising to God our thanks for the marvelous works that He has entrusted to our care, invoking His help for the protection of creation and His mercy for the sins committed against the world in which we live.”

September 1 also opens the Season of Creation, which lasts till October 4, the Feast of Saint Francis of Assisi.

Below is Pope Francis’s letter, announcing the “World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation”: To my Venerable Brothers, Cardinal Peter Kodwo Appiah Turkson, president of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace; and Cardinal Kurt Koch, president of the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of Christian Unity.

Sharing with my beloved brother the Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew his concerns for the future of creation (cfr Encylical Letter.

Laudato Si, 7-9) and taking up the suggestion by his representative, the Metropolitan Ioannis of Pergamum who took part in the presentation of the Encyclical Laudato Si on the care of our common home, I wish to inform you that I have decided to set up also in the Catholic Church, the “World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation,” which, beginning this year, will be celebrated on the 1st of September, as the Orthodox Church has done for some time now.

As Christians, we wish to offer our contribution toward overcoming the ecological crisis which humanity is living through. Therefore, first of all, we must draw from our rich spiritual heritage the reasons which feed our passion for the care of creation, always remembering that, for believers in Jesus Christ, the Word of God who became man for us, “the life of the spirit is not dissociated from the body or from nature or from worldly realities, but lived in and with them, in communion with all that surrounds us” (ibid., 216). The ecological crisis, therefore, calls us to a profound spiritual conversion: Christians are called to “an ecological conversion, whereby the effects of their encounter with Jesus Christ become evident in their relationship with the world around them” (ibid., 217).

Saturday, September 5, 2015

Thus, “living our vocation to be protectors of God’s handiwork is essential to a life of virtue; it is not an optional or a secondary aspect of our Christian experience” (ibid).

The annual World Day of prayer for the Care of Creation offers to individual believers and to the community a precious opportunity to renew our personal participation in this vocation as custodians of creation, raising to God our thanks for the marvelous works that He has entrusted to our care, invoking His help for the protection of creation and His mercy for the sins committed against the world in which we live. The celebration of the day on the same date as the Orthodox Church will be a valuable opportunity to bear witness to our growing communion with our orthodox brothers.

We live in a time where all Christians are faced with identical and important challenges, and we must give common replies to these in order to appear more credible and effective.

Therefore, it is my hope that this day can involve, in some way, other churches and ecclesial communities and be celebrated in union with the initiatives that the World Council of Churches is promoting on this issue.

Cardinal Turkson, as president of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, I’m asking you to inform the Justice and Peace Commissions of the Bishops’ Conferences, as well as the national and international organizations involved in environmental issues, about the establishment of the World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation, so that, in union with the needs and the local situation, this celebration can be rightly marked with the participation of the entire People of God: priests, men and women religious and the lay faithful. For this reason, it will be the task of this dicastery, in collaboration with the episcopal confer-

End poverty in all its forms everywhere

By Charles Kenny

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eads of State will convene at the General Assembly of the United Nations this month to agree upon a set of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The first target of the first SDG proposed by the Open Working Group (OWG) of member-states is to “eradicate extreme poverty for all people everywhere” by 2030. The second target is to reduce at least by half the proportion of people living in poverty according to national definitions. These are noble and historic targets for global progress—they deserve their status at the top of the list. At the same time, they illustrate issues affecting a considerable number of the 169 development targets proposed by OWG, such as how do we measure them and are they plausible?

These two questions are linked. How we resolve the challenges of measurement will have a profound impact on the targets’ power to motivate, as well as on the likelihood that those targets will be met. Poverty lines at the national and local level are frequently revised upward, and there are good reasons for this. This approach, however, risks the possibility that steady development progress will not yield poverty reduction, simply because the poverty line keeps moving, too.

As OWG suggested, extreme poverty is “currently measured as people living on less than $1.25 a day,” although that is unlikely to be the case for long. The “official” extreme poverty line and the number of people living below it are calculated by a (well-meaning) cabal in the bowels of the World Bank headquarters. They are working on a revision that could have a dramatic impact on the dollar-consumption figure, declared as the “extreme poverty line,” as well as on the number of people living below that threshold.

In the past, the global extreme poverty line established by the World Bank was set to reflect the value of national poverty lines in the world’s poorest countries. The original 1990 “dollar a day” poverty line was “typical of low income countries” at the time. In 2008 it was updated to match the latest available average national poverty line of the world’s 15 poorest countries, converted at an exchange rate designed to reflect the different prices of the same goods

and services across countries.

The World Bank is in the process of proposing a new global line and other poverty numbers based on more recent national poverty lines, as well as on data from a 2011 global survey of prices. By the time the World Bank decides that it is ready to release the numbers—a process which has previously taken up to two years—the global extreme poverty line may be at $1.75 a day or higher. The new data suggest, however, that the prices of goods in poor countries are lower than we thought. This, in turn, may suggest a dramatic decline in the number of people living in poverty—by as much as a third (from 1.2 billion in 2010, a number based on the old price data and poverty line, to below 900 million, a number calculated using the new data provided by the Brookings Institution).

One thing is clear: If we are to “eradicate extreme poverty for all people everywhere” by 2030, we will have to use an entirely different approach to setting the planetary extreme poverty line than that used by the World Bank in the past.

Imagine that we are in 2030, and we are looking at the national poverty lines of the world’s 15 poorest countries. How likely is it that they will all be set at a level below the consumption of their very poorest citizens? They shouldn’t be set that low. The idea that countries, which most optimistically will still have an average income that is a fraction of that of the poorest people in Europe or the United States of America today, would declare that they have no poor is simply ridiculous. Under any international definition of extreme poverty based on the most recent national poverty lines of a number of countries, there will always be poor people in the world—including all of those living in poverty according to the national definition in the countries used to set the global “extreme poverty” line. This suggests that a zero poverty goal using the World Bank’s current methodology could never be met.

If we’re going to set a zero goal for global poverty on the post-2015 development agenda, it has to be an absolute goal, and not one set relative to national poverty lines, and the process of setting the new global poverty line should be open, transparent and participatory.

For years, the World Bank has kept

secret the data it uses to measure global levels of income and consumption. The bank decides when and how to incorporate data from income and price surveys, and it also chooses the method to calculate the poverty line. As part of the process of setting the sustainable development goals and the data revolution that must underpin it, shouldn’t the world’s poor and governments of developing countries have some input into defining “what is poverty”? The process is also urgent: We will set the goal in September 2015, after all.

Could we meet a target to eradicate absolute poverty below a certain threshold? That depends on the level at which it is set, of course. A number of analysts, however, have attempted to calculate the likelihood of wiping out the $1.25-a-day poverty line, using old prices and poverty numbers. If there was strong growth in the poorest countries over the next 15 years and those countries saw rapidly declining inequality, perhaps, as few as 2 percent of the population of the developing world would be left living below $1.25 a day by 2030. Of course, it is far too optimistic to predict that every poor country will see rapid growth and declining inequality over the next 15 years—some will fall victim to bad governance, low commodity prices, or civil unrest that derails progress. Thus, the real number will be considerably higher.

The gap could still be overcome with transfers—simply giving money to families which saw average incomes below the $1.25 threshold. The definition of who is poor, however, changes rapidly over time, depending on seasons, weather, health-care access, escalation of violence and just bad luck. Rather than the representative surveys currently taken every few years, maintaining a global $1.25 consumption floor would take many surveys a year covering the entire global population at risk.

More plausible than an accurately targeted program is one that provides support to a far larger group at risk of falling below $1.25 a day. That, however, would raise the price tag, of course.

We would then have to find a way to transfer the money: mobile banking has spread rapidly, but most of the world’s poorest people still don’t have access to

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ences, to set up relevant initiatives to promote and illustrate this day, so that this annual celebration becomes a powerful moment of prayer, reflection, conversion and the adoption of appropriate lifestyles.

Cardinal Koch, as president of the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of Christian Unity, I’m asking you to make the necessary contacts with the ecumenical patriarchate and with the other ecumenical organizations so that this World Day can become the sign of a path along which all believers in Christ walk together. It will also be your dicastery’s task to take care of the coordination with similar initiatives set up by the World Council of Churches.

Whilst I look forward to the widest possible cooperation for the best start and development of the World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation, I invoke the intercession of Mary, the Mother of God, and of Saint Francis of Assisi, whose Canticle of the Creatures inspires so many men and women of goodwill to live in praise of the Creator and with respect for creation. I support this pledge, along with my apostolic blessing, which I impart with all my heart to you, my dear cardinals, and to all those who collaborate in your ministry.

From the Vatican, 6th August 2015 Feast of the Transfiguration of the Lord

We will continue with the series on Laudato Si next week.

To know more about the programs of Caritas Manila, visit www.caritas. org.ph. For donations, call 563-9311.

For inquiries, call 563-9308 or 5639298. 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.

banking services. This is not to say that ending extreme poverty by 2030 is impossible, but rather that it would take an immense effort. In fact, to date, we haven’t even agreed upon a definition of “extreme poverty” that we could plausibly eradicate.

Meanwhile, there is a similar, if less severe, measurement challenge with the second poverty target of reducing at least by half the proportion of people living in poverty in each country according to national definitions. How those definitions are calculated varies considerably across countries. In the United States, for example, the number is meant to reflect the same (inflation-adjusted) income over time. In many other countries, however, the poverty line is explicitly or effectively a relative line. As average incomes increase, so does the income below which people are defined as poor. In those countries, halving the proportion of people living in poverty can only be accomplished through a dramatic reduction in inequality.

That’s not a bad thing, as inequality has been rising within countries across the world, and we should reverse the trend. The work, however, is yet to be done in order to show that the scale of inequality reduction required to halve the number of people living below a relative poverty line is plausible in most (or even many) countries. The last thing we would want the SDGs to encourage is to “lower the bar” of national poverty lines, whereby countries would meet the SDG target by making their official poverty line a steadily smaller proportion of average incomes over time. That speaks to the potential advantage of setting an explicit relative target at the country level—reducing the gap between the bottom 40 percent and the top 10 percent in every country by 25 percent, or closing the gap between the median income and the mean income by a third, as it might be.

Therefore, for the first two targets of the first of the Sustainable Development Goals, there is considerable work to do before September 2015. Before we set the goal, we should fix the goalposts.

Charles Kenny is senior fellow at the Center for Global Development, Washington, D.C.

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News

BusinessMirror

Saturday, September 5, 2015

PHL stocks. . .

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string of losses in 13 years, as overseas investors pulled a record $1.24 billion, amid concern that China’s economy is heading for a hard landing and the US will soon raise interest rates.

The measure has climbed 3.8 percent since falling to a 14-month low of 6,791.01 on August 24. The index dropped 0.7 percent to 7,051.78 on Friday, capping a sixth straight weekly loss, the longest losing streak since November 2007. The market needs a “trickle” of foreign funds to hold above 7,000 for the rest of the year, Chua said.

Overseas funds have been net buyers for only one of the past 19 days, selling a net $5.7 million of shares on Friday to cap a ninth straight weekly outflow.

“Foreign investors have basically left the Philippines for this year,” Chua said. “For the index to really recover to a higher level, we’d need a little bit of that flow coming back again to us.”

Volatility, which rose to a two-year high this week, also needs to ease before the exodus of foreign capital from equities ends, he said.

While the nation’s economy is more sheltered from China’s slowdown than others in Asia, Philippine stocks can’t escape the regional contagion, Chua said.

Bear markets

The Philippine economy accelerated last quarter as government spending increased. Gross domestic product increased 5.6 percent in the three months through June from a year earlier, according to official data on Thursday, compared with 5 percent in the first quarter. The MSCI Asia Pacific Index has tumbled 20 percent from its April high, with benchmark gauges in Taiwan, Hong Kong and Indonesia entering bear markets.

“In a scenario where there is lack of growth around the world, the Philippines is more resilient than others because of a market that’s relatively more domestic,” Chua said. “This fundamental strength isn’t filtering through because the Philippines is part of a region that’s hurting from slowing exports and falling commodity prices. Once markets have settled and this selling has passed, this market will be among those that will come up first.” Bloomberg News

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Apec. . .

BSP hints at tweaking rates soon Continued from A1

El Niño’s adverse impact. We are also mindful of global developments and their effects on domestic liquidity,” he quickly added.

Tetangco’s comments highlighted a barely perceptible shift in tone that, for economists and observers, represent forward guidance on monetary policy down the line.

“I think the governor struck a rather hawkish tone, hinting that he looks to get a hold of liquidity in the system,” Nicholas Antonio Mapa, research officer at the Bank of the Philippine Islands, said quickly in reaction.

At the National Economic and Development Authority (Neda), Economic Planning Secretary Arsenio M. Balisacan gave ample warning the El Niño weather disturbances could cause a significant increase in commodity prices toward year-end up to next year.

The Philippine Statistics Authority reported on Friday that inflation hit an all-time low of 0.6 percent in August 2015 from 0.8 percent in the previous month. Inflation a year earlier averaged 4.9 percent. Balisacan

said the El Niño, likely extending to 2016, could ramp up prices anew.

“We need to reinforce our El Niño preparations to ensure food security. The strong collaboration of the national government, local government units and the private sector is essential to the success of efforts to mitigate the effects of El Niño,” Balisacan said.

The Neda is now spearheading task force El Niño and has started drafting a road map to address the impact of El Niño or RAIN. “The careful use of the phrase ‘just enough’ belies his hawkish tone, as in the past he’s generally been accustomed to use words such as ‘ample,’ but his choice may show that he feels he needs to get a better hold of the bevy of liquidity in the system,” Mapa said of Tetangco, pointing out that the pace of expansion in liquidity has slowed to only 8.6 percent in July and considered quite “healthy” in absolute peso terms.

Mapa reiterated Tetangco’s comments hinted strongly of a shift in policy over the near term and likely to become more em-

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phatic going forward. “[The] Governor has been known to carefully plan and telegraph his moves well in advance, and this may be the first salvo in his message to the market,” Mapa said.

He also said a tightening makes sense, since this was in line with the anticipated US Federal rate hike, preparations for the implementation of a so-called interest-rate corridor next year, as well as a preemptive move against forecast higher inflation in the coming months as El Niño intensifies and as so-called base effects wane.

In August the Neda said downward price pressures in food, energy and oil rates helped limit inflation to no more than 0.6 percent, representing an all-time low.

At the national level, the housing, water, electricity, gas and other fuels index declined by 1.7 percent, while the transport index recorded a decline of 0.6 percent in August.

Apart from cheaper fuel and utility prices, food prices also slowed in August. Data showed that the food index alone slowed to 1.1 percent in August from 8.7 percent last year.

In 2014 Apec leaders endorsed The Action Agenda on Promoting Infrastructure Investment through PPP to offer an alternative to traditional procurement methods and address the issue of capital shortages for infrastructure development in the region.

The agenda further supports the work of the Apec PPP Experts Advisory Panel—established to promote the government’s capacity building in PPP project implementation and to support regional PPP Centers—and the ongoing implementation of the Apec Multi-Year Plan on Infrastructure Development and Investment launched in 2013.

Infrastructure is one of the key components of economic growth.

In the Philippines transport infrastructure is badly needed, as reflected on the state of the roads, airports, sea terminals and train systems.

Government told to address threats of El Niño as farm losses hit P3.32B

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The DA is also rolling out its watermanagement and production-support programs to help farmers deal with the impact of the drought. Pumps have been distributed and small impounding projects and diversion dams have been constructed, the agency said.

Multistress tolerant rice seeds (Green Super Rice), early-maturing rice seeds and heat-tolerant crops were also provided to the affected farmers. Palad said the DA has requested additional P900 million in funding for the agency’s El Niño-mitigation efforts.

“The DA has been using its regular budget for its El Niño-mitigation projects since 2014. We’ve so far been able to assist areas that are most vulnerable to the drought.

But now, we’re closer to acquiring a special budget of P900 million solely for El Niño purposes,” Palad said.

He said an El Niño task force was also formed to focus on the issue. This task force will hold meetings to assess the damage and decide for an action plan to minimize the damage brought by the drought to the agriculture sector. In an economic bulletin, Finance Undersecretary and chief economist Gil S. Beltran said the low in-

flation rates in the previous months could be reversed with the onset of El Niño from August to November this year.

“Sustained lower rates of inflation shall give policy-makers more headroom to respond to external and internal economic shocks. The onset of the El Niño, however, may undermine previous gains as it may exert upward pressure on food prices, water bills and hydroelectric-generation rates. The government and the private sector should cooperate in crafting the appropriate policy response,” Beltran said in his economic bulletin.

Inflation in August continued to go

down, from 0.8 percent in July to only 0.6 percent in August, mainly because of the lower international oil prices and electricity rates. Beltran said the possible measures that the government and the private sector must do to address higher inflation that could be brought about by El Niño are putting the necessary infrastructure in place, particularly irrigation systems and farm-to-market roads; getting ready to import products, the production of which will be affected by El Niño; and, for the most affected areas, shifting to crops and varieties that are most resistant to drought. With David Cagahastian

Editor: Gerard S. Ramos • lifestylebusinessmirror@gmail.com

Life

BusinessMirror

Saturday, September 5, 2015

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Musings on an overly photographed life B H S The Orange County Register

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DIDN’T take a photo of my daughter this morning before I dropped her off to begin seventh grade. It wasn’t really a conscious decision. We had to leave pretty early, and I spilled a smoothie on the corner of my husband’s keyboard, which set us back a bit, and we were both generally worried about making it to school on time.

Also, it seems indecent to take a photo before 7 am somehow. So, no photo.

The missed photo didn’t occur to me until I got to work and saw all the pictures of friends’ kids smiling in their crisp, first-day-of-school clothes on Facebook. I liked seeing their faces and thinking about their first days, mulling over the passage of time, the distance between us, that sort of thing.

It got me to pondering the overwhelming photographic archive we have of our lives today, and wondering how having so many photos affects us.

There is definitely no picture of me on my first day of seventh grade. The only one I can recall is the official school photo (big feathered hair, striped Izod shirt, braces), though I’m sure there are a few shots of me from that year with the family on a picnic, or in my band uniform holding my flute before a concert, or standing beside my sister in front of a Christmas tree.

You know, the old standards. But there is no document of my day-to-day life other than what lives inside my mind and on the pages of an old journal, which exists somewhere in my garage.

My daughter, Lux, on the other hand, has the photos I took at the beach this weekend, and the ones she and her friends snapped while goofing around in her bedroom, and the selfies she took of a cool makeup look she

was trying out for Halloween. And that’s just from one week of her life.

I love photos and I sometimes wish I had more from my childhood, but they can also feel like a burden. The constant image-making of today comes with pressures: to look good while doing everything, and to constantly think about what something looks like, rather than just how it feels. There’s also a thin layer of the future on all of these pictures, the weight of how each photographed day will be remembered and preserved.

Imagine the era of tintype or daguerreotype photographs, when people had to stand in a pose for several minutes while their image was being slowly copied onto a thin piece of metal.

Back in the 1800s, there was no such thing as a captured photographic moment. What was it like, then, to see an image yourself? It must’ve been a very odd experience.

You rarely see a smile in those very old photos. For one, it was difficult to hold a natural smile for as long as it took to take a photograph.

Also, it was considered bad taste to smile.

According to one essay on the subject by Cambridge lecturer Nicholas Jeeves, “By the 17th century in Europe it was a well-established fact that the only people who smiled broadly, in life and in art, were the poor, the lewd, the

drunk, the innocent, and the entertainment....

Showing the teeth was, for the upper classes, a more or less formal breach of etiquette.”

Add to this the fact that many people had rotten or crooked teeth and the lack of smiles makes sense. (Jeeves, however, says rotten teeth were so common in that early era of photographs that they didn’t even register as unattractive.)

I don’t long for an era of rotten teeth and stern expressions, but just imagine how freeing it must have been not to be surrounded by images at all hours of the day. Now we scroll through daily selfies of each other and of the

famous and beautiful. While I love photos of my kids and family and of friends and places I miss, I don’t like the constant barrage of images we all have daily and the way it lures me into comparing myself with other people and other lives. But how do we step out of society’s rapid stream of images without becoming hermits or missing out on the fun of shared photographs?

I’m sure that after school today, I will take a photo of my daughter. I don’t want to not have that first-day photo just to make some sort of point to myself.

Photographs tell a story. That is their power and their beauty. When we capture numerous

images on a daily basis, the story is sometimes diluted; the images begin to lack power.

But we are fortunate to have these pictures, to imagine other people’s lives and recall our own. The people in very old photos are so alien, so inscrutable. I’ve stared at old black-and-whites of my great-grandparents and of unknown relatives, willing them to tell me something, but they are mysterious and distant. Will our smiling selfies be just as impenetrable to people 150 years from now? There will be so many images for future generations to sift through; how will they even know which ones are important? ■

DISCOVER TRUE LOVE IN INTERRACIAL RELATIONSHIPS

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BELOVED Disney characters endear children of all ages on “Disney Live! Mickey’s Music Festival” at the Kia Theater in Araneta Center

MICKEY MOUSE AND HIS PALS ARE AT OUR DOORSTEP B JT N

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OR this week at least, call Cubao in Quezon City “Disneyland.”

With over 25 Disney characters flocking to this pocket of the metropolis for the inaugural show at Araneta Center’s brandspanking new Kia Theater, titled “Disney Live!

Mickey’s Music Festival,” fans around these parts can have their local dose of Disney magic.

The 90-minute production of singing and dancing features a lineup of Disney personalities, led by the iconic Mickey Mouse, along with characters from Aladdin, The Little Mermaid and Disney/Pixar’s Toy Story. The show, which is just one of the two Disney shows Sun is hosting this year, kicked off on Tuesday and will run until Sunday, with the weekend runs packed with three shows at 10 am, 2 pm and 6 pm.

“Everybody has an unforgettable Disney childhood memory—from the staples, such as Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck, to our favorite Disney characters, like Cinderella and Snow White,” Sun Vice President for Postpaid

Marketing Joel Lumanlan said in a statement.

“And while it’s easy for us to keep the memory alive with small doses of Disney, we’re giving the practical Pinoys the chance to relive the Disney experience and bring it to life.”

In a recent discussion with Lumanlan at Mario’s in Tomas Morato, he said that in terms of scale, this is Sun’s biggest engagement with Disney to date.

Aside from this show, Sun will also be hosting the highly anticipated “Disney on Ice: Disney Magical Ice Festival” this year, which will be staged at the Smart Araneta Coliseum from Christmas Day to January 3.

The annual ice spectacle is being hyped with the wildly popular characters from Disney’s phenomenal Frozen making their debut on the show, joining the fold of Disney princesses.

Lumanlan said they “have several treats and promos for [Sun subscribers]—mostly tickets, meet-and-greet with Disney characters,” adding they’re raffling off over a million worth of tickets for both shows to selected Sun plan and postpaid add-on consumers.

TEY.” “Exotica.” “P.S.S.” or “Pinay Success Story.”

These are just some of the words people associate with Filipino women who are in interracial relationships.

Often frowned upon or ridiculed, these relationships are often depicted with plain-looking Juanas clinging to old Caucasian men.

So what then if we feature the lives of these couples without the judgment? What really is their story?

TV5 and Unitel Productions come together to adapt to Philippine TV Randolph Longhas’s acclaimed indie film, Ang Turkey Man Ay Pabo Rin, which speaks about the trials, tribulations and triumphs faced by interracial couples. Through their newest Saturday sitcom, Kano Luvs Pinay, viewers will see a juxtaposition of the Filipino experience through the eyes of a foreigner and the realization of the American dream in the eyes of a Filipina. It is a celebration of love as a universal force that doesn’t discriminate against race, color, stature or culture.

Premiering on September 5 at 9 pm and every Saturday thereafter, Kano Luvs Pinay features TV5’s top comedienne Tuesday Vargas playing the role of Conchita Evelyn Bigoy, a.k.a. Cookie, a 30-year-old single mom from a middle-class family who’s into the direct-selling business as her means to provide for her son. She logs in to kanoluvspinay.com, a dating site for Filipinas looking for American bachelors, and there she finds the eventual love of her life, Matthew Adams, portrayed by Hollywood actor Lee O’ Brian.

As they get along, the Fil-Am couple encounters peculiar Filipino customs, showing various cultural differences that often lead to conflict—such as karaoke music, extended families, immigration laws and, eventually, the

choice between living here or abroad.

O’Brian talks up what makes their program unique from other sitcoms. “It may be a situational comedy, yet, it deals with many issues that both Filipinos and foreigners alike deal with when interacting.

I have not seen another show on Philippine TV that has crossed cultural borders this much. I’m really excited to see the reaction from both local Filipinos and Filipinos abroad, along with the people who are their significant others. It’s another benefit of this opportunity, to see how those crosscultural issues resonate with them.

“What our program is dealing with and minimizing is the tendency to see an interracial couple for something other than true love. Many times the people around the couple think it’s economically motivated, or it’s to get a visa, when in reality the two people just love each other.”

Will Cookie and Matthew’s love conquer all? Or will they eventually get lost in translation?

LEE O’BRIAN and Tuesday Vargas explore color-blind love in Kano Luvs Pinay.

Sports BusinessMirror

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ATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 5, 2015 mirror_sports@yahoo.com.ph sports@businessmirror.com.ph Editor: Jun Lomibao

HWANG RUNS AWAY WITH MALARAYAT CROWN

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MATEUR Hwang Min-jeong steeled herself up in the stretch and drilled in a 7-foot birdie putt on No. 16 to beat Princess Superal and Cyna Rodriguez by two and snare the Mount Malarayat Ladies Classic crown with a closing 68 at Mount Malarayat’s composite courses in Lipa City on Friday.

With the pressure mounting in the closing holes, Hwang showed poise rarely seen in a 14-year-old lass, knocking down that clutch birdie then watching Superal crack with a bogey after missing the par-4 16th green.

The two-shot swing all but settled the fierce chase for the crown that included Rodriguez, as Hwang stretched her shaky one-stroke lead to a big three-shot margin before parring the last two holes to clinch the win at six-under 210.

“There was so much pressure in the last three holes and I thought I would lose my lead and the title,” said

Small man Cruz a giant for Letran

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ARK CRUZ is making the most out of his last year as a Letran Knight.

Diminutive at 5-foot-5, Cruz buried five three-point shots all in the fourth quarter to power Letran past a rough-playing Lyceum side, 81-57, and into a share of the lead anew in the 91st National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Season 91 seniors basketball tournament on Friday at the Filoil Flying V Arena in San Juan City.

Cruz had a 17-point explosion in the final canto and wound up with 26 points, five rebounds and five assists in 32 minutes off the bench, numbers that augur well for his impending campaign as a rookie for Purefoods Star Hotshots, which drafted the Knight in the third round last month.

The victory, the 10th in 12 games, tied Letran anew with five-time defending champion San Beda atop the standings.

In Friday’s other seniors game, College of Saint Benilde snapped a five-game skid by beating hapless Emilio Aguinaldo College, 81-57, to stay in the Final Four hunt with a 3-9 record.

The Generals dropped to 2-10.

The Knights were in command in the first three quarters but lost steam early in the fourth, when the Pirates made a big run and wrest a 50-49 lead.

And then there was Cruz, who waxed hot and unleashed 17 points in the final period to zap the fight out of the Pirates.

A near scuffle happened in the third quarter when Lyceum’s Cameroonian big man Victor Nguidjol landed an accidental elbow and bloodied the nose of Letran’s Christian Balagasay.

A commotion also occurred between Nguidjol and Rey Nambatac after the final buzzer sounded with the latter making a fighting stance.

Hwang, who erased Superal’s overnight one-shot lead with a 35 at the front, moved up by one with a birdie on No. 10 then matched her fancied rival’s pars and a birdie in the next five holes before pulling away on the 16th.

“I actually didn’t watch Superal hit her shots and just concentrated on my game,” said Hwang, a mainstay of Riviera and Grade 9 student at Holy Infant School in Muntinlupa.

With her father Korean pro Hwang Yun-suk as her lone supporter, Hwang also bucked the pressure from the local gallery rooting for a Filipina victory.

It was a disappointing setback for Superal, who came into the final round upbeat of her chances for a second pro win after seizing control with a 70 in the second round. She fumbled with a bogey on No. 4 but went 2-up with a birdie on the par-5 No. 5, which Hwang bogeyed.

SPORTS PLUS DUTCH VAN POPPEL RULES 12TH STAGE

But she bogeyed the par-3 No. 8, which Hwang birdied, as the two amateurs tied again for the lead at four under before Superal dropped off the pace with a flubbed birdie putt from 6 feet on No. 10 then fell farther behind with another bogey on the 16th. She birdied the 18th to finish with a 71 and a 212.

In a flight ahead, Rodriguez, three behind Superal after 36 holes, rattled off two birdies at the front then birdied the 10th to tie Hwang in the lead but reeled back with a bogey-birdie-bogey-birdie roll from No. 12.

She also birdied the closing par-5 hole for a 68 and tied Superal for second.

HWANG MIN-JEONG shows poise »rarely seen in a 14-year-old.

DONDON SLAMS KIWIS D

ONDON HONTIVEROS sparkled for Gilas Pilipinas in overtime and lifted the Philippines to a come-from-behind 92-88 victory over New Zealand’s Wellington Saints on Friday in the William R. Jones invitational tournament at the Xinzhuang Gymnasium in Taiwan.

The 38-year-old Hontiveros hit three straight three-pointers in the extra period that allowed Gilas to seize control after being down by 16 points late in the third quarter.

Jayson Castro led the Philippines with

22 points and his drive sent the game to overtime, 78-all, with 19.3 seconds left in regulation.

Wellington Saints’ import Ray Turner had the chance to win it for New Zealand but missed a jumper from the corner.

Then Hontiveros, who, along with Asi Taulava, was part of the 2002 Busan Asian Games team, waxed hot, hitting one triple after another with the last one shattering the last deadlock of the game to give Gilas an 87-84 lead with 1:17 remaining.

The Wellington Saints, who dropped to 2-4

with the loss, lost steam and failed to respond.

Hontiveros sealed the win with two free throws.

The Cebuano hotshot finished with 21 points, his best game yet in the eight-nation tournament. He finished five-of-nine from the three-point territory.

Calvin Abueva provided the spark in the fourth quarter for the team of Coach Tab Baldwin and ended up with 11 points and 11 rebounds.

Gilas, reeling from a 74-65 loss to Iran, trailed 41-57, as the Nationals could not stop Brad Davis, who led all scorers with 31

points and 14 rebounds.

But Hontiveros, Taulava and Abueva teamed up in the final canto and erased Wellington Saints’ double-digit lead.

Gilas stayed in contention for the title with a 4-2 record behind the 5-1 mark of Iran, which played Taiwan’s training team late Friday. The Filipinos will face the USA Select Team (2-3) on Saturday at 5 p.m.

Terrence Romeo, the team’s leading scorer with over 17 points per game, sat out in the game due to a left-foot injury he suffered in the game against Iran. Joel Orellana

UAAP SEASON 78 ON AT BIG DOME B J O

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HE extended wait is finally over for the University Athletic Association of the Philippines (UAAP) with four teams that finished at the bottom half last year taking the floor on opening day on Saturday to kick off Season 78 at the Smart Araneta Coliseum.

AZKALS PREVAIL

Ashadh Ali (left) of the Maldives does everything in trying to stop Stephan Schrock of the Azkals during their international friendly at the Rizal Memorial Stadium on Thursday night. An own goal by Mohamed Samdhooh in the 48th minute and a conversion by Jerry Lucena in the 55th gave the Azkals a much-needed 2-0 victory ahead of their World Cup qualifier against Uzbekistan on September 8 at the Philippine Sports Stadium in Bocaue, Bulacan. ALYSA SALEN

Season host University of the Philippines (UP) opens hostilities in the centerpiece men’s basketball against a similarly groping University of the East (UE) at 2 p.m. and University of Santo Tomas (UST) going up against Adamson University at 4 p.m.

All four missed last season’s semifinals, with UE winding up fifth with a 9-5 won-lost record, UST 5-9 and UP and Adamson University languishing at the bottom with 1-13 records.

But before the basketball tip-off, UP has prepared a traditional hourlong opening ceremony that borders on the theme “Tumitindig, Sumusulong.”

UP and Adamson University are parading new coaches—Rensy Bajar for the Fighting Maroons and Mike Fermin for the Soaring Falcons.

Bajar is a former guard at San Beda and played seven seasons in the Philippine

Basketball Association (PBA), while Fermin was one of Kenneth Duremdes’s assistants in Season 77.

“I am excited to face a legendary coach in Derrick Pumaren [UE]. He’s one of my idols in coaching,” said Bajar, who took over Rey Madrid. “This is our first step toward our journey. Our aim is to reach the Final Four but we will take it one game at a time.”

UE has a practically new squad with no foreign reinforcement. Pumaren said five of his players are no older than 17, saying he is handling a ‘high-school team.’

“Last year when we faced UP, we were favored. But I think UP is now the favorite and we’re the underdogs,” Pumaren said.

Growling Tigers Head Coach Bong de la Cruz is hoping that his players have gained valuable experience from last season.

Kevin Ferrer is returning for the España-based team after

BIG COMEBACK FOR MURRAY

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EW YORK—Before they stepped on court, there was nothing to suggest Andy Murray would have any trouble against Adrian Mannarino in the US Open’s second round.

Murray, after all, is seeded No. 3, owns two major championships including at Flushing Meadows in 2012, and had reached at least the quarterfinals at the last 18 Grand Slam tournaments he’d entered. Mannarino, meanwhile, is ranked 35th, has never won a tour-level title, and only three times in his career has even managed to win more than one match at a major.

So it certainly came as a surprise when, in Thursday’s opening game, Mannarino broke Murray. About an hour later, Mannarino grabbed the opening set. And 45 minutes after that, the Frenchman took the second set, too.

“I just had to kind of tell myself that I would get there eventually,” Murray said. “I had time to get back into it.”

Despite a stuffy nose and scratchy throat, and generally looking as if he might be ready

to wilt on another steamy day at Flushing Meadows—two more mid-match retirements, including by 28th-seeded Jack Sock of the United States, raised the total to 12 in the men’s draw so far—Murray put together his eighth career comeback from a two-set deficit and beat Mannarino, 5-7, 4-6, 6-1, 6-3, 6-1.

“He was looking for his rhythm,” Mannarino said, “and then I think that finally he found it.”

Roger Federer had his rhythm from the start, compiling a 46-8 edge in winners while beating Steve Darcis of Belgium, 6-1, 6-2, 6-1, at night, before 2014 runner-up Caroline Wozniacki was stunned by 149thranked Petra Cetkovska of the Czech Republic, 6-4, 5-7, 7-6 (1), in the day’s last match, which ended after midnight. Wozniacki held four match points but each was erased by a winner from Cetkovska.

Against Murray, Mannarino, a lefty, delivered 12 of the match’s first 14 forehand winners and repeatedly found success with drop shots. AP

missing some games in the eliminations due to a hand injury. He is playing his final tear along with Karim Abdul.

“Kami ng Adamson, pareho kaming galing sa ibaba last year and we both want to win our first game,” he added.

Fermin is a relative newcomer in the UAAP and he admitted he does not have the most talented roster this season.

“The players are upbeat. We’ll try to be competitive every game,” Fermin said. “ The heavyweights clash on Sunday at the Mall of Asia Arena with defending champion National University facing De La Salle at 2 p.m. and last season’s runner-up Far Eastern University battling Ateneo de Manila at 4 p.m.

Tickets for both games will be sold separately, according to the UAAP. AUSTRALIA’S Bernard Tomic executes a between-the-legs shot against countryman Lleyton Hewitt on Friday. Tomic won, 6-3, 6-2, 3-6, 5-7, 7-5. AP

LLEIDA, Spain—Danny van Poppel of the Netherlands won the 12th stage of the Spanish Vuelta in a mass sprint for the finish line, while Fabio Aru remained in the red jersey on Thursday.

Van Poppel recovered well after repairing a tire 10 kilometers (from the end of the 173-kilometer mainly downhill ride from Andorra through the Pyrenees Mountains to Lleida.

Daryl Impey of South Africa was second, and Tosh van der Sande of Belgium third, both on the same time as van Poppel.

“When you’ve got the chance you’ve got to go for it,” van Poppel said. “In the end, it was a really nice sprint.”

His father Jean-Paul was also a sprint specialist, while his mother Leontien van der Liended, and his older brother Boy— who finished 153rd on Thursday—are also professional cyclists.

Van Poppel said the repair was inevitable: “It wasn’t a puncture, but it was slowly going down, so I changed it, and my teammates did a great job to bring me back,” he said.

“I suffered a lot yesterday, and I really wanted to win today.” AP

CANNONDALE RECALL NEW YORK—More than 23,000 Cannondale mountain bicycles are being recalled because a steering tube can fail and can cause riders to fall off.

However, no incidents or injuries have been reported, the US Consumer Product Safety Commission said on Thursday.

The recall is for model years 2011 through 2015 of the Flash, FSi , F-4, F-5, F-29, Lexi, RZ, Scalpel and Trigger Cannondale mountain bicycles. They were sold at Cannondale dealers between July 2010 and July 2015 for between $2,000 and $10,000.

About 23,000 were sold in the US, and 800 were sold in Canada. AP

ATENEO VS N.U. GIRLS ATENEO and National University (NU) finally come face to face in what could be a preview of the championship, with the Lady Eagles seeking to formalize their claim on No. 1 via a sweep and the Lady Bulldogs trying to steal the top spot heading to the semifinal round of the Shakey’s V-League Season 12-Collegiate Conference at The Arena in San Juan City.

The league’s top 2 teams are coming into the keenly awaited 12:45 p.m. duel on Saturday brimming with confidence following three emphatic victories in the quarters, with the Lady Eagles dropping just one set in disposing of University of the Philippines, Arellano University and Far Eastern University, and preserving their unbeaten run and a 6-0 slate.

DUEL FOR SEMIS SLOT DE LA SALLE and National College of Business and Arts (NCBA) clash on Saturday in a knockout duel for the fourth and last semifinal seat in the Spikers’Turf Season 1-Collegiate Conference at The Arena in San Juan City.

The Wildcats missed clinching the outright berth when they bowed to the ousted University of the Philippines Maroons, 21-25, 25-22, 19-25, 25-23, 11-15, on Wednesday, enabling the Green Archers to force a playoff at 3-4 (won-lost) after the quarterfinals of the tournament, presented by PLDT Home Ultera.

De La Salle also squandered its first crack at the semifinals when it lost to the Emilio Aguinaldo College in four, also on Wednesday, making the knockout game at 5 p.m. a match to watch.

“We need to play with urgency,” said NCBA Coach Ernesto Balubar, who will pin his hopes again on guest players Reyson Fuentes and Edwin Tolentino and mainstays John Domingo, Jason Canlas and setter Jumbo Nidua.