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“Did China ask us if it was OK to devalue their currency, making it hard for our companies to compete, heavily tax our products going into their country [the US doesn’t tax them] or to build a massive military complex in the middle of the South China Sea? I don’t think so!”—Donald Trump on Twitter, days after China responded to his telephone conversation with Taiwan’s president by accusing the Taiwanese of playing a “little trick” on Trump. AP

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“I will not allow the vice presidency to be stolen. I will not allow the will of the people to be thwarted. I will continue to serve the Filipino family and fulfill their dream for a better life.”—Vice President Leni Robredo, a human-rights lawyer and respected political newcomer, in a statement saying that she will resign as housing secretary, an appointment made by President Duterte, but will stay on in her elected post as vice president. AP

“Look at us. No one is crying, everyone is happy, no need for handkerchiefs. It’s a party.”—Cuban exile Armando Garcia, 76, who left Cuba in 1963, said Fidel Castro’s funeral offered no simple closure for those people who left the country chafing under his rule. He joked that there was no sadness at the restaurant over Castro’s interment, calling it “the best funeral ever.” AP

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Tuesday, December 6, 2016 Vol. 12 No. 55

Changes in import rules to hurt US exports–report

By Jasper Emmanuel Y. Arcalas

@jearcalas

hanges in the process of securing import permits introduced by the Department of Agriculture (DA) will delay the arrival of food products from the US, according to the latest Global Agricultural Information Network (Gain) report.

inside

HOW TRUMP COULD QUELL HIS CONFLICT-OFINTEREST WOES

The directive issued by the DA that prescribed a new process for securing import permits The Gain report, prepared by the United States Department of Agriculture’s Foreign Agricultural Service (FAS) in Manila, also advised US exporters to “exercise caution” in planning their See “U.S. exports,” A2

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how Trump Could Quell his Conflict-of-Interest Woes

DonalD Trump, now the president-elect, addresses the american Israel public affairs Committee conference in Washington, march 21, 2016. Trump’s election is influencing markets, currencies and government policies as the world bets on how he will rewrite international rules. Doug Mills/The New York TiMes

By Andrew Ross Sorkin

Dear President-elect Trump:

he potential conflicts of interest between your huge business empire and your future job have been well documented. The possibility that corporate interests or foreign countries could try to bribe you, as president, in both large and small ways is substantial. Consider this small example: Over the weekend, the chief executive of one of the largest companies in the nation—who was a hillary Clinton supporter—told me he planned to have his staff stay at your new Trump International hotel on Pennsylvania Avenue as an “easy way” to ingratiate himself with your new administration. As far as I have seen, so far you appear unfazed by the headlines about kleptocracy. “Prior to the election, it was well known that I have interests in properties all over the world,” you wrote on Twitter. “Only the crooked media makes this a big deal!”

You have said that you have no plans to sell your companies or put them into a blind trust—which wouldn’t be effective anyway, since it’s impossible to blindly hold real-estate assets that have your name affixed to them. In the meantime, there are reports that you may lease multiple floors of Trump Tower to the Secret Service for millions of dollars, which you would pocket. The entire situation is—how else to put it?—untenable. You understand the conundrum. “In theory, I don’t have to do anything” to distance yourself from your business holdings, you told journalists at The

New York Times last week, “but I would like to do something—I would like to try and formalize something.” So, in the spirit of offering a constructive solution rather than demagogy, let me offer you an idea: Voluntarily agree to hire what is known as a “corporate monitor,” an independent overseer with unfettered access to your organizations who will provide regular reports to the public about any possible instances of conflicts. Many well-known companies have done this under regulatory and legal duress, but you could do it voluntarily and pay for it yourself, offering a jolt of trust to those who fear you could engage in self-dealing. I even have a suggestion for someone to take this role—someone who told me on the phone Monday that he would be happy to do so. (More on that later.) There is a clear benefit to you, Mr. Trump. You’ll be able to accomplish a lot more. If voters and the members of Congress perceive that your legislative proposals are meant to enrich you, your family or your business partners—even if that is not the case—you run the risk of undermining whatever progress you hope to make. Let me flesh out the idea. First, it would be preferable for you to sell your empire—which, by the way, you could do without having to pay taxes

on any profits. Rules designed to entice the wealthy into public service, which allow executive branch employees to dispose of their assets in certain defined ways to avoid conflicts of interest, would be a good option for you. henry Paulson used this option in 2006 when he left Goldman Sachs to become Treasury secretary. The next-best option would be the arm’s-length one, which was advocated in a recent article in The Economist. Trump, the magazine said, “must ring-fence his private interests and put them under independent supervision. It is the only fix that is both principled and practical.” But whatever you do, the most critical piece is the corporate monitor, someone with an impeccable reputation. The name of someone who could be that person: Kenneth R. Feinberg. As you’ll recall, he is the lawyer who oversaw the September 11th Victim Compensation Fund, worked as the special master for TARP executive Compensation, and served as a government-appointed administrator of the BP Deepwater Horizon disaster victim compensation fund. he also supervised General Motors and Volkswagen in their recall struggles. Feinberg’s reputation is considered beyond reproach. he is known as a straight shooter who cannot be bought or sold.

Admittedly, this is not a perfect solution, but assuming that the person selected for the role of corporate monitor is trusted, it would go a long way toward assuring the public that your political and business interests won’t overlap or compromise America’s interests. Yes, some of your critics will deride the corporate monitor as mere window dressing. And the fact that this would be a novel application of the corporate monitor role—such people are typically appointed as part of a settlement in a legal case, as a move by a company to ease the punishment—might give you pause. But appointing one would also suggest that you take the conflict issue seriously, not only to the American public but also to the rest of the world, which has long looked to the United States as a model of democracy. If your administration even raises the specter of corruption in the White house, that would undermine the entire country, as well as our economy. Companies like Apple, BP, Deutsche Bank, JPMorgan Chase, Siemens and Zimmer have been subject to corporate monitors. Typically, such a person is installed at the behest of the government after a business has been involved in breaking antitrust laws or foreign corrupt practices laws. For example, the hedge fund manager Steven A. Cohen was required to hire a cor-

porate monitor to oversee Point72, his family office, as part of an insider trading settlement. A corporate monitor traditionally provides reports to the Justice Department or the Securities and exchange Commission to make sure the company he or she oversees is in compliance with the law. When I called Feinberg to run my idea by him, he paused to consider it. We went over the positives and the negatives. he seemed to warm to it quickly. “The perfect is the enemy of the good,” he said. he told me, “You’ll get pushback” from critics who will say the monitor is “in bed with the guy paying him.” Still, he said the idea brought to mind a famous quote from Justice Louis D. Brandeis: “Sunlight is said to be the best of disinfectants.” Assuming the monitor has no operational authority and no bonus associated with performance, Feinberg said, “At least we know from an unimpeachable source, here is the way it is.” So, would Feinberg accept the position? “I’ll take the job,” he said with both a laugh and a genuine sense of sincerity. In that same spirit, I want you to know, Mr. Trump: I’ll happily waive my finder’s fee if you take up this idea.

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| Tuesday, deCember 6, 2016 mirror_sports@yahoo.com.ph Editor: Jun Lomibao Asst. Editor: Joel Orellana

Matsuyama holds on, wins Bahamas by two

RIGHT now, the Japanese star Hideki Matsuyama can’t seem to lose. AP

ASSAU, Bahamas—Hideki Matsuyama was only five when he first saw Tiger Woods, watching on videotape that 1997 Masters victory. Even sweeter was standing next to Woods in his Sunday red shirt to receive yet another trophy. Right now, the Japanese star can’t seem to lose. The return of Tiger Woods ended with Matsuyama winning his third straight tournament, and fourth out of his last five, in the Hero World Challenge. “I can’t say that I played well today, but I did win Tiger’s tournament,” Matsuyama said. “And what a great honor that is.” Matsuyama had a few nervous moments on the back nine at Albany when his seven-shot lead at the start of the final round was reduced to two shots over British Open champion Henrik Stenson with two to play. Matsuyama closed with two pars for a one-over 73 and a two-shot victory. Woods found plenty of positives from his first tournament in more than 15 months, though the final round featured three double bogeys and a 76—the highest score of the tournament—that dropped him to 15th place out of 17 players. “It feels good to be back out here playing again, competing and trying to beat the best players in the world,” Woods said. “I missed it. I love it.” Matsuyama is moving up in class quickly. His big run started with a three-shot victory in the Japan Open. He was runner-up in Malaysia, then became the first Asian to win a World Golf Championships title with a seven-shot victory over Stenson and Daniel Berger in the HSBC Champions. Two weeks later, he won the Taiheiyo Masters on the Japan Golf Tour by seven. And, except for a few mistakes on the back nine at Albany, this was another runaway. “It’s going to give him a boat load of confidence going into next year, and he’s going to be one of the top guys to beat for a very long time,” Woods said. Matsuyama, who finished at 18-under 270, won $1 million and remained at No. 6 in the world. He ended his streak of 17 consecutive founds in the 60s, though all that mattered was the trophy presentation with Woods. “It’s tough with a seven-stroke lead,” he said. “But somehow I was able to pull it off. Hopefully, this experience will help me in the future.” Stenson, playing with him in the final group, closed with a 68 and made Matsuyama work hard for this title. Matsuyama still had a six-shot lead going into the back nine when he went bunker-to-bunker around the 10th green and made double bogey. Then, he three-putted from about 18 feet on the 14th hole, where Stenson made birdie for a two-shot swing. Just like that, the lead was down to three with four holes remaining. And it looked like it would get even closer on the par-5 15th. Matsuyama was in a greenside bunker in two and didn’t quite reach the green. Stenson had a 45foot eagle putt. But the Swede left it about 10 feet short and three-putted for par, and Matsuyama matched him. Stenson also three-putted the 10th, costing him another chance to get closer. “Whatever he gave me on 14, I gave it straight back to him on 15,” Stenson said. Stenson drilled a 4-iron into 4 feet on the 16th for another birdie, and Matsuyama’s approach barely cleared the bunker, leading to par to stay two ahead. The tournament was still in doubt on the 18th hole. Matsuyama’s shot from the rough bounded over the green, while Stenson had 12 feet for birdie. If the Swede made and Matsuyama failed to get up-and-down, it was headed for a playoff. The Japanese star steadied himself with a good pitch to tap-in range, and that wrapped it up. “He hit a very classy chip there,” Stenson said. Matsuyama now heads home to Japan for a break, though he won’t put the clubs away for long. He starts back in Hawaii the first week of the new year, and already he is thinking ahead to April and Augusta National. AP

‘UNMATCHED DURABILITY?’ W OODBRIDGE, New Jersey—The country’s leading maker of artificial sports turf sold more than 1,000 fields to towns, schools and teams nationwide after its executives knew they were falling apart faster than expected and might not live up to lofty marketing claims, according to an investigation by a news organization. Montreal-based FieldTurf said that the turf it began selling in 2005 was revolutionary for its “unmatched durability” and that it would last a decade or more. But records obtained by NJ Advance Media show that as early as 2006, key FieldTurf executives became aware the turf, known as Duraspine, was cracking, splitting and breaking apart long before it should, and long before the public had been promised. FieldTurf—a division of publicly traded French flooring maker Tarkett—said it never misled or defrauded customers and called such claims “completely false.” The company stressed that the problem does not compromise player safety. Most of the fields, which fetched $300,000 to $500,000 or more, were paid for with tax dollars. FieldTurf sold 1,428 of those fields in the US to everyone from small towns to National Football League teams for an estimated $570 million from 2005 until the product was discontinued in 2012. Despite several internal e-mail discussions about their overblown sales pitches, which were reviewed by the news organization, executives never changed their marketing campaign for Duraspine fields. Company officials said in a statement that most Duraspine customers have never been told about the problem and how to identify signs that their field might be prematurely falling apart. The officials said the problem was better handled on a case-by-case basis. The company said that the problem has not affected the “significant majority” of Duraspine fields, and that failures came primarily in places like California and Texas, where intense ultraviolet radiation caused the product to break down after only a few years of use. “While we are sorry this happened and it has been a frustrating and disappointing experience, we believe that over the past six years we have been forthcoming with our customers given the challenging situation and legal

restrictions,” the company said in a statement. “We never hid from this problem and we strongly take issue with any attempt to suggest otherwise.” FieldTurf concedes nearly one of every five US Duraspine fields has been replaced under warranty— sometimes with Duraspine fields and sometimes with a new kind of turf. The true number of afflicted fields could be far higher, however, because many customers haven’t been notified, and the company does not proactively monitor all Duraspine fields for the problem. Only after customer complaints spiked in 2009 and 2010 did FieldTurf conduct an internal investigation and pin the problem on its supplier, a division of Netherlands-based Royal TenCate, according to a federal lawsuit. FieldTurf claimed TenCate altered the chemical formulation of the fiber, making it more susceptible to the harmful effects of ultraviolet radiation. TenCate denied the allegations, and the two settled the suit in 2014 for an undisclosed sum of money. Neither party admitted wrongdoing. Public schools and towns across the US have had to replace their expensive turf fields far sooner than expected and often much earlier than promised. In Oklahoma the superintendent of the Skiatook Public School District said it took three years to get FieldTurf to agree to replace its $300,000 field—and only after it threatened legal action. In Wisconsin Middleton-Cross Plains School District officials said they complained about their field in 2014, and FieldTurf reps told them there was no known issue with premature failure of Duraspine. FieldTurf declined to comment on specific customers or fields. Many stand by FieldTurf and its willingness to address problems. Erik Rosenmeier, the football coach at Cranford High School in New Jersey, said that his 2009 Duraspine field was “outstanding” and that the school’s experience with FieldTurf “has been extremely positive.” But in Newark, the football coach at Malcolm X Shabazz High School says that the turf was so bad last year that the school considered canceling games. “You grab it and it rips. It rips like grass,” Coach Darnell Grant said. “We deserve better, our community deserves better and our kids deserve better. Give the kids, give the community what they paid for.” AP

By Bianca Cuaresma

BIG PICTURE Tiger Woods grumbled about three more double bogeys in the final round of the Hero World Challenge. Considering how badly he has felt in the 15 months since he last played, he still was able to keep it in perspective.

TIGER WOODS showes no stress in his swing or in walking five straight rounds, starting with the pro-am. AP

By Doug Ferguson

The Associated Press ASSAU, Bahamas—The return of Tiger Woods was more about the big picture than any of his big numbers. And that started with the sight of that red shirt on Sunday. Woods grumbled about three more double bogeys in the final round of the Hero World Challenge. Considering how badly he has felt in the 15 months since he last played, he still was able to keep it in perspective. “It feels good to be back out here playing again, competing and trying to beat the best players in the world,” Woods said. “I missed it. I love it.” He even loved some of his golf at Albany. Woods made 24 birdies, the most of anyone this week. He also had six double bogeys, three of them in the final round. The last one on the final hole, his third of the week on the 18th, gave him a four-over 76. It was the highest score of the tournament, and he finished 15th in the 17man field. The other players were not about to measure him by his score—not yet, anyway. “The whole world is watching a couple of rounds of golf,” said British Open champion Henrik Stenson, who finished second to Hideki Matsuyama . “It’s great to see him back and healthy and playing. I want to see him up in contention and try to beat him when it matters the most. “Give him three or four tournaments, maybe six tournaments, maybe around the Masters,” he said. “It’s easy to overanalyze a very limited amount of golf.” Rarely has a December event attracted this much curiosity. Woods, the dominant player of his generation, had gone 466 days since his previous tournament because of two back surgeries. The recovery at times made it difficult for him to walk and led him to wonder if he would ever play. “Getting back to this point is beyond anything that I’ve ever experienced in my lifetime,” said Woods, who turns 41 at the end of the month. “The pain issues that I had, it was rough. Quite frankly, there some pretty dire times where I just couldn’t move.” Woods showed no stress in his swing or in walking five straight rounds, starting with the pro-am. He had plenty of length, at times going after his driver with a little more pop to clear a bunker. He holed a few long putts. He missed a few short ones. At times, he looked like he had never been away for that long. And at times it did. “It’s kind of new to me again, the feel of playing, the feel of adrenaline in my system, hitting shots,” Woods said. One day after he briefly pulled within two shots of the lead, it was clear early on this day would be a struggle. Woods was scrambling for pars instead of being in a position to attack pins. He twice made double bogey on a par 5, starting at No. 6 when he blasted out of the sandy area to the back side of a double green, forcing him to chip off the putting surface. Still, he rallied with three straight birdies to play the front nine in even par. He was never going to win the tournament—Matsuyama was too far ahead—but it was a chance to post a decent number and take more positives into what figures to be a two-month off-season. Instead, Woods added two more double bogeys and shot 40 on the back nine. He made his third double bogey of the week on the 18th hole without even going into the water. His tee shot landed in a thick palmetto bush, and he had to take a penalty drop to take it out. Just his luck, his drop in the sandy waste area settled right in front of the nub of another bush. He got that back to the fairway, went just over the green and took two putts from there for his 6. “What he did here showed that he’s certainly up for the task and his game is there. He’s ready to go,” Jordan Spieth said. “Even with Tiger, every time we set expectations, he exceeds them.” Woods at least starts his climb from No. 898 in the world, the product of not playing since August 23, 2015. He said he wants to play a full schedule in 2017—that typically means no more than about 20 a year—and will look at his options over the next few weeks. “I need to play more tournaments. Zero in 15 months is not a lot, so this is one,” Woods said. “I thought I made some good, positive things happen this week. Made a lot of birdies, also made a lot of mistakes. That’s something I know I can clean up.” His caddie, Joe LaCava, offered the best perspective. “I wasn’t going to compare him to the rest of the field. They’ve been playing all year and they’ve been playing great,” LaCava said. “Honestly, my goal was to get him through five rounds on his feet. That was big.”

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Part Two

ITHER at gunpoint or through a seemingly innocent e-mail, bank scammers continuously and cleverly evolve through the security maze of regulations to be able to steal the hard-earned money of consumers. And while the means of monetary

PESO exchange rates n US 49.7210

exchange and instruments evolved through time, information from the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) shows any monetar y medium— whether it be traditional bank notes, plastic money or checks—is susceptible to fraudsters and scammers.

Banknote security

AS old-design banknotes were losing Continued on A2

(From left) Second Secretary and Head of Chancery of the Bangladesh Embassy in Manila Probash Lamarong, Anti-Money Laundering Council (AMLC) Secretariat Executive Director Julia Bacay-Abad and AMLC member and Insurance Commissioner Emmanuel F. Dooc open a bag containing US dollars that was returned by Chinese casino junket operator Kam Sin Wong to Bangladesh and Philippine AMLC officials in Manila on March 31. Wong says he has returned $4.63 million of the $81 million that hackers stole from the Bangladesh central bank’s account in the US Federal Reserve Bank and laundered in Manila’s casinos in one of the world’s largest cyber heists. Jason

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BPOs and peso rate: Underscoring the positive

the entrepreneur Manny Villar

wo current developments that have gotten people because of their adverse impact on the economy prompted me to write this piece. These are the election of real-estate billionaire Donald J. Trump as US president and the weakening of the peso. News interest, in general, trends toward the negative, so the adverse effects of Trump’s surprise victory in the November 8 US presidential election and the drop in the peso’s value in terms of the US dollar caught first and wide attention. Continued on A10

Senate ratifies Philippine entry as founding member of AIIB

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By Butch Fernandez

@butchfBM

he Senate, voting 20-1 on third reading on Monday, finally ratified the Articles of Agreement formalizing the Philippines’s entry as a founding member of the China-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB). Proponents of the AIIB accord assert that Philippine membership in the AIIB is expected to open up additional funding sources for vital public-works projects intended to sustain growth through increased infrastructure spending. Casting the lone negative vote, neophyte Sen. Risa Hontiveros Baraquel said Congress should first repeal the law requiring automatic appropriations for debt servicing, which eats up a big chunk of the national budget. Hontiveros-Baraquel argued the Philippines, before joining another international financial institution, should first “put our house in order by verifying whether the loan agreements our country has entered into with these institutions are in accordance with the principles on responsible sovereign lending and borrowing published by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development.” Among others, she added, these principles make lenders responsible for making realistic assessments of the sovereign borrower’s capacity to service a loan based on the best available information, and following objective and agreed technical rules on due diligence and national accounts. She suggested that before joining another international financial institution, the Congressional Oversight Committee on Overseas Development Assistance should “conduct a debt audit to verify whether the loan agreements our country has entered into are legitimate.” Continued on A3 See “Senate,” A2

Arlan Raval/Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas via AP

n japan 0.4390 n UK 63.1755 n HK 6.4112 n CHINA 7.2164 n singapore 35.0148 n australia 36.9775 n EU 52.9379 n SAUDI arabia 13.2572

Source: BSP (5 December 2016 )

A2 Tuesday, December 6, 2016

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Regulators and bank scams: A game of cat and mouse Continued from A1

their security value and are getting easier to falsify, the central bank in early 2015 launched the demonetization of the old-design banknotes in exchange for new, more securely designed banknotes in an effort to maintain the integrity of Philippine tender. Along with the new design came new tactics of cash counterfeiters. Among the relatively new schemes, according to the central bank, involve the extraction of a genuine security thread from a low denomination bank note, say from a P20 bill or a P50 bill, and transferring these security threads to fake money bearing higher denominations like P500 bills and P1,000 bills.

More secure checks

CHECKS are also not spared from fraudsters.

US exports. . . Continued from A1

shipments to the Philippines because of the new rules. “Although the process [of securing import permits] is becoming more refined, further changes and consequent disruptions are likely,” the report read. “Specifically, exporters should expect longer lag times for issuance of new permits, and expect additional delays upon arrival. Port congestion has been reported and is likely to introduce additional delays until the end of the holiday season,” it added. FAS in Manila noted that the rules for securing new sanitary phytosanitary import clearances (SPS-ICs) have been changing “almost daily”. The DA first announced its decision to amend the process for the issuance of SPS-ICs on November 23. At first, the Gain report said the

In 2013 t he centra l ban k warned the public against reported unscrupulous persons who pass off fake checks as supposedly issued by the BSP or the Central Bank of the Philippines—the monetary authority’s former official name. As modus operandi, the scammers would pretend to be authorized BSP representatives and would ask for money from victims in exchange for fraudulent checks that are made to appear to be worth millions of pesos each. Aside from issuing public-information campaigns that the central bank does not issue, secure or guarantee checks, monetary authorities also recently announced new and more secure check designs. BSP Assistant Governor Johnny Noe Ravalo said the new check design—which will be called the Check Image Clearing System (CICS)—will be larger than size, DA imposed a total revocation of all permits, but was changed to a “revalidation” process after few days. Du r i ng t he “reva l id at ion” process, paperwork are delivered to the DA and picked up when processing was complete, it added. The importers were only allowed to clear their cargoes only upon successful re-validation of their SPS-ICs. “Official procedures for the new process have not been published and have been changing in their details almost daily. Initially, meat and meat products were the primary affected cargoes,” the report read. “However, trade reports that all agricultural cargoes are now affected, including feed ingredients, dairy products, frozen potatoes, and fresh and highly perishable cargoes,” it added. The Gain report said the “revalidation” process has introduced delays ranging from two to five days for clearance and that “sensitive” cargoes have been lost.

with a length of 8 inches and a width of 3 inches. The new check, according to Ravalo, will also contain new embedded security features to allow for security and integrity to prevent check fraud even if banks are not able to inspect the actual physical check. Some new security features will be visible to the naked eye. Some features, however, can only be seen through a scanner.

Latest scams

THE latest addition to the long list of scam techniques in the country now include the impersonation of BSP Deputy Governor for the Supervision and Examination sector Nestor Espenilla and other BSP officials. Nearly a month ago, the BSP issued an advisory warning the public of this new scheme. The BSP said it received reports “Industry sources report that new import permit applications are being processed; however, no new permits have yet been issued,” it added. The US is a major trading partner of the Philippines. Washington considers the Philippines as one of its top markets for food-and-beverage products in Asia.

More changes

The DA on Monday again tweaked the revalidation process for all SPSICs issued before November 23. In a notice posted in front of the DA Central office, the agency announced that starting December 5, all importers and brokers should abide by the prescribed schedule for the “revalidation” process of SPS-ICs. The DA said it will entertain requests for validation of SPSICs from Monday to Saturday, from 8 to 11 a.m., according to the notice. It added that the DA

that a scam is being perpetrated to target BSP-supervised financial institutions, particularly rural banks. The modus operandi of scammers include posing or representing themselves as Espenilla. “The swindlers, usually through telephone calls, pose as the deputy governor who would want to talk to the bank president or would request for the latter’s contact details,” the BSP said. “They use the name of Deputy Governor Espenilla Jr. for the purpose of soliciting donations for specific events or contributions of similar nature.” On the same week, the BSP also issued alerts also involving impersonators of Espenilla, this time targeting the depositors of closed banks, representing themselves as having the capacity to facilitate the immediate release of deposits from padlocked banks. “The BSP warns the public, eswill release validated SPS-ICs only from Monday to Friday, from 2 to 5 p.m. “Releasing date [of validated SPS-ICs]: one to two working days after receipt of the request,” the notice read. Earlier, Agriculture Secretary Emmanuel F. Piñol said the re-validation process will take less than 24 hours. The DA said they had to set a specific schedule for the revalidation process of SPS-ICs so that applicants would have a “uniform timetable” to follow. “This was done because the number of applicants for validation and authentication of SPS-ICs per day is not constant,” Agriculture Undersecretary Ariel T. Cayanan told reporters in an interview. “I think it will not have so much effect if there’s an additional [processing] day. But as much as possible, we try to finish everything within the day, within 24 hours,” Cayanan added. He said there is no

pecially depositors of closed banks, against such scam. Claims for payment of deposits in closed banks should only be coordinated with the Philippine Deposit Insurance Corp. [PDIC] which is the government agency responsible for the processing of claims and release of deposit insurance to depositors of closed banks,” the BSP said. AS the BSP moves to put regulations a step ahead from current scamming trends, Tetangco also cautioned in their move to adopt new technology citing the security risks that come with these technologies. The BSP governor said as the banking industry faces the dawn of the Asean regional banking integration, local players must be vigilant with the risks that comes along with the new innovations to be introduced to the market.

“As we consider supply chains and regional integration, we must be mindful of the trend of ‘disruptive innovation’,” Tetangco said in a recent speaking engagement. “In other words: finding new ways of doing old things. Technological improvements are helping define new ways for you to ‘enter’ into and be integrated in the supply chain.” Tetangco added that “in doing so, there is a need to be mindful that using financial technology could lead to new and unanticipated financial, business, consumer protection risks, as well as cybersecurity risks.” “This is why, even as we encourage technology solutions, we also admonish banks to do so with caution and without sacrificing financial stability and the protection of your ultimate customer, the consumer,” he added. To be concluded

backlog in terms of the SPS-ICs being revalidated and said the agency remains “on target”. Also, Cayanan said he has yet to receive reports that Memorandum Circular (MC) 5, which authorized the review of the validity of all SPSICS, resulted in port congestion. “I’ve met with the Bureau of Customs last Friday and they said there were no reports of port congestion,” Cayanan said. Under MC 5, the importers should submit to the SPS monitoring and evaluation Technical Working Group (TWG) their request for validation and authentication. Prior to the release of the imported items, traders must show a certificate of validity from the DA’s TWG. After meat importers about the new rules, the DA created a “green lane”, which prioritizes the release of validated SPSICs for inbound shipments containing perishable goods, such as chilled or frozen products. The

green lane may also be accessed b y “compl i a nt ” a nd i n st it u tional importers in the country, Cayanan said. On November 29 the DA released a memorandum instructing the facilitation of the release of highly perishable items. The perishable items covered by the memorandum are: live items, chilled items, dairy products, fresh fruits; vegetable and flowers except onions and garlic; hatching eggs; live plants and orchids; veterinary products and nutritional products. “Importers issued with SPS import permits covering said items/ products may directly process their documents at the respective quarantine offices of the port,” the memo read. “Validation of SPS import clearance shall be done directly at the Quarantine Office at the port of entry by authorized DA officers under the SPS Technical Working Group,” it added.

Asean technology

Senate. . .

Continued from A1

Pending the conduct of this audit, the Senator said, the payment of interest on questionable loan-funded projects should be held in abeyance. “In addition, before contracting additional sovereign debt, we should ensure that adequate safeguards are in place to protect the Filipino people from irresponsible sovereign lending and borrowing,” she said, suggesting that “one of the most important ways this can be done is by finally repealing the provisions in our statutes requiring automatic appropriations for debt servicing.” In sponsoring the measure ratifying the Philippines entry as the last founding member of the AIIB, Senator Loren B. Legarda earlier said membership in the China-based development bank would help the Philippines “attain growth targets through accelerated infrastructure spending.” “Development of infrastructure is crucial for enhancing our trade competitiveness. Resilient and adequate infrastructure will reduce the costs of trade and strengthen our competitiveness. These would impact on our future growth,” Legarda said. Citing the Philippines’s ranking (95th out of 138 economies in the 20162017 World Economic Forum’s global competitiveness index on infrastructure), Legarda said this highlighted how much the country has lagged behind other economies. “The absence of good infrastructure— from road networks, transportation systems, airports and seaports, electrification, water supply, to telecommunications—has had dire consequences on our nation’s growth; above all, on our people’s well-being,” Legarda said. She cited a World Bank estimate that a 10-percent increase in capital investment into infrastructure projects contributes to a one percent growth in GDP. Legarda affirmed the importance of being a member of the AIIB, which, like the Asian Development Bank (ADB) and the World Bank, is a multilateral lending institution, owned by sovereign-member countries, which aims to promote economic development in Asia.

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Students assail attack on Luisita farmers By Marvyn N. Benaning Correspondent

HE College Editors Guild of the Philippines (CEGP) on Monday condemned the attack against farmers of Hacienda Luisita in Tarlac allegedly perpetrated by goons under the employ of the Cojuangco-Aquino clan. Florida Sibayan, chairman of Alyansa ng Manggagawang Bukid sa Asyenda Luisita (Ambala), said drunken goons of the Cojuangco-Aquino family, led by Lourdes Barangay Chairman Edison Diaz, attacked and forcibly evicted Ambala members from their huts in Sitio Silangan, Barangay Mapalacsiao. The armed men allegedly fired their guns during the altercation. “We denounce the continuing harassment of the farmers perpetrated by the state itself. Despite orders from the Department of Agrarian Reform [DAR], the National Police in Tarlac condoned the violence by refusing to intervene by arresting Diaz and his men,” CEGP National President Jose Mari Callueng said. “The latest atrocity against impoverished peasants only shows the land-grabbing clan has no intention of relinquishing the land to its legitimate owners—the farmers of Hacienda Luisita. Despite the 2012 decision of the Supreme Court mandating the distribution of 4,915 hectares of the hacienda to the farmers and sugar workers, only a fraction has been awarded to farmers, no thanks to the CojuangcoAquino’s use of violence and dirty tricks to keep the property and the state’s continued callousness to the decades-long plight of farmers,” Callueng added. “Fascism at Hacienda Luisita must end. Ultimately, the CojuangcoAquinos must be held accountable for all the atrocities they committed to the farmers of Hacienda Luisita and even to the thousands of peasants in the country whose lives they have worsened—from the harassment, threats and intimidation; land-grabbing; and up to the enactment of bogus land-reform laws, such as the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program and the CARP Extension with Reforms,” he added.

Editor: Dionisio L. Pelayo • Tuesday, December 6, 2016 A3

Licuanan next on chopping block

By David Cagahastian

@davecaga

RESIDENT Duterte has also asked Commission on Higher Education (CHED) Chairman Patricia B. Licuanan not to attend Cabinet meetings anymore, fueling speculations that he is also asking for her resignation.

Licuanan issued a statement on Monday revealing that Cabinet Secretary Leoncio B. Evasco Jr. also sent her a text message relaying Duterte’s instructions to stop her from attending Cabinet meetings. “On Sunday, December 4, 2016, I received a text message from Cabinet Secretary Leoncio Evasco Jr. relaying

President Rodrigo Duterte’s instructions to stop attending Cabinet meetings starting this Monday, December 5, 2016,” Licuanan’s statement said. However, Licuanan does not see the ban on her attendance in Cabinet meetings as a veiled message for her to resign her post. During the weekend, Vice Presi-

LICUANAN: “On Sunday, December 4, 2016, I received a text message from Cabinet Secretary Leoncio Evasco Jr. relaying President Rodrigo Duterte’s instructions to stop attending Cabinet meetings starting this Monday, December 5, 2016.”

dent Maria Leonor G. Robredo resigned as chairman of the Housing and Urban Development Coordinating Council (HUDCC) after receiving a similar message to tell her not to attend Cabinet meetings. Licuanan said she would continue her work at the CHED, despite the apparent lack of confidence by the Chief Executive in her performance. “I assured Secretary Evasco

that I would comply. In the meantime, I will continue my work as chairman of the Commission on Higher Education,” Licuanan’s statement said. Licuanan was reappointed by former President Benigno S. Aquino III to another four-year term in 2014.

Gothic treatment

ROBREDO, meanwhile, slammed the gothic treatment she has been getting from Duterte as she quit as HUDCC chairman. Robredo had earlier bewailed the unprecedented P19-billion cut in the budget of the housing sector while the appropriations for Duterte’s pals who occupy Cabinet positions were increased. While Robredo fumed at the lack of urbanidad or breeding by Evasco, Bong Go and Duterte, the urban-poor group Kalipunan ng Damayang Mahihirap (Kad-

amay) said “Robredo’s brief tenure as HUDCC chief focused on the continuation of the probusiness trends made more prominent during the Aquino administration.” Robredo’s sudden resignation also rekindled reports about the HUDCC post being offered to defeated vice-presidential candidate Ferdinand Marcos Jr., who lost to Robredo by 263,473 votes. Marcos had accused Robredo and the Noynoy Aquino administration of cheating in the May 9 election, the first time in the country’s history that a losing Marcos heir has accused anyone of election fraud. As early as August 2016, reports about Duterte offering the HUDCC post next year to Marcos swirled but the heir and namesake of the dictator Ferdinand E. Marcos reportedly did not want the assignment. With Marvyn N. Benaning

Senators sort out conflicting drug Commuters seek probe investigation witnesses’ statements of Tugade’s link to Lam By Butch Fernandez @butchfBM

ENATORS on Monday took turns grilling witnesses on conflicting testimonies made at Monday’s marathon Senate inquiry into the multimillion-peso illegaldrugs trade said to have benefited ranking police officers and high government officials, alleged to include Sen. Leila M. de Lima when she was still the of justice secretary. Voicing frustration, neophyte Sen. Emmanuel D. Pacquiao put on record that he was on the verge of making a motion for the Senate to cite in contempt de Lima’s former chauffeur-paramour, Ronnie Dayan, amid doubts he was not telling investigators the whole truth. “Inu-unti-unti mo kami [you are giving us information in trickles],” Pacquiao said, warning he was inclined to move that Dayan be detained at the National Bilibid Prison. Sen. Panfilo N. Lacson, cochairman of the joint inquiry being conducted by the Committee on Public Order and Dangerous Drugs with the Committee on Justice and Human Rights, did not rule out the possibility that some of the witnesses, other than Dayan, could be cited for perjury. “Baka hindi nagsasabi ng totoo ang mga ito,” Lacson said during the third public hearing conducted by the committees also tasked to look into the killing of Albuera, Leyte, Mayor Rolando Espinosa at the Leyte provincial jail by a police raiding team, led by Supt. Marvin Marcos of the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group. At the outset, Lacson sought to “first resolve inconsistencies” in the testimonies made by Dayan and detained drug lord Kerwin Espinosa,

who earlier testified giving P8 million in payoffs to Dayan, purportedly as his “contribution” to de Lima's senatorial campaign in 2015. Lacson recalled testimonies in the previous hearing that Kerwin and de Lima met in Baguio, where Kerwin also requested to have a picture with de Lima at Burnham Park in Baguio City. “It is hard to believe it is a random meeting,” Lacson said, noting: “Dayan did not deny the payoffs claimed by Kerwin.” Senate Majority Leader Vicente C. Sotto III, likewise, lamented that the witnesses were giving testimonies “filled with blanks.” Before adjourning the hearing, Lacson confirmed the committee is adopting the motion to cite Dayan in contempt, but has yet to decide whether he would be detained at the Bilibid prison. Under questioning by senators, retired Chief Supt. Vicente Loot denied getting any drug payola from Kerwin, in exchange for police protection, through Chief Insp. Leo Laraga, as claimed in the previous hearings. “That statement is obviously perjurious [lie under oath],” Loot told senators. “I cannot offer protection that I do not have,” Loot said, adding, “I have a rich wife and these intrigues may have been triggered by her political foes.” For his part, Dayan claimed it was de Lima’s idea to raise funds for her senatorial campaign. In his testimony, Dayan testified he did not know Kerwin and it was his former employer-lover who gave the number saying, “may usapan na kami.” Dayan futher said that Kerwin’s contact number was already in a cell phone given by de Lima. Asked by Pacquiao why de Lima

advised him to hide from Congress as testified to by Dayan’s daughter at a House inquiry, Dayan replied: “I do not know what I did, but de Lima asked me to stay away from the House hearing.” Before the adjournment, de Lima took the floor to strongly deny the latest allegations against her, saying: “I do not know Kerwin’s number.” She insisted the witnesses were “ordered” to make false testimonies to destroy her.

Espinosa’s supplier surrenders

AN alleged drug queen identified by Kerwin Espinosa as his source of illegal drugs surrendered to the National Police on Monday. Lovely Impal Alam yielded to the police, escorted by a police official from Mindanao, according to Director General Ronald M. dela Rosa. Alam was the latest drug personality to surrender, amid the government’s intensified campaign against illegal drugs. Dela Rosa said Alam was escorted by Chief Supt. Agripino Javier, acting Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) police commander. “Right now, she’s being investigated by the AIDG [Anti-Illegal Drugs Group],” he said. “In fairness to her, she came here voluntarily,” dela Rosa added. He said investigators will determine how big the alleged drug queen’s participation is in the illegal-drugs trade. Dela Rosa also said police investigators are now checking if Alam is a subject of any warrant of arrest. “If she has no standing warrant of arrest, she will be allowed to go home,” he said. Alam was tagged by Espinosa as one of his sources of illegal drugs.

By Joel R. San Juan @jrsanjuan1573

N umbrella network of commuter stakeholders urged President Duterte on Monday to investigate Transportation Secretary Arthur P. Tugade over the biggest illegal online-gambling operations in Clark Freeport in Pampanga. Road Users Protection Advocates Chairman Ray Junia said it was during Tugade’s term as head of the Clark Development Corp. (CDC) when Jack Lam, one of the biggest gambling moguls in Asia, started his operations inside the Fontana Leisure and Casino Hotel flourish. “We call on the President to investigate Tugade and other CDC officials,” Junia said. “This illegal operation would not have happened without the approval, silent or otherwise, of Tugade and his team at the CDC,” he added. The Department of Justice (DOJ), meanwhile, ordered the Bureau of Immigration (BI) to cancel the investors visa issued to gaming tycoon Yin Lok “Jack” Lam, who has left the country even before Duterte ordered his arrest for alleged economic sabotage and attempted bribery in connection with his alleged illegal- gaming operations inside the Fontana Leisure Parks and Casino in Pampanga. Justice Secretary Vitaliano N. Aguirre II also directed Immigration Commissioner Jaime H. Morente to issue an Immigration Lookout Bulletin Order (ILBO) against Lam in order to monitor his itineraries and whereabouts. “Considering the gravity of the offenses allegedly committed and reports that he [Lam] has already left the country, there is a strong possibility that he may attempt to place himself beyond the reach of the le-

DELA ROSA: “Just last night [Sunday], the online gaming facilities of Lam at Fontana was already closed. It was closed by virtue of an order coming from the President, and it was implemented by Pagcor together with policemen.”

gal processes of this government by leaving the country,” Aguirre said. He added that the issuance of an ILBO was necessary not only to track down Lam, but also to carry out his arrest as directed by the President “if warranted.” BI records indicate that Lam left the country on November 29, or four days after 1,316 Chinese nationals were arrested in the online casino facilities operating in Fontana without permit from the Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corp. (Pacgor). Policemen accompanied by Pagcor personel shut down on Sunday night the online gambling facility of Lam in Clark Field, Pampanga. Director General Ronald M. dela Rosa, National Police chief, said policemen closed the gaming facilities of Lam inside the Fontana Leisure Park. “Just last night [Sunday], the online gaming facilities of Lam at Fontana was already closed. It was closed by virtue of an order coming from the President, and it was implemented by Pagcor together with policemen,” dela Rosa said. He said the the National Police will also shut down another gaming facility of Lam at the Fort Ilocandia in Ilocos Norte. Dela Rosa said Lam is facing arrest despite the absence of arrest warrant by virtue of the presidential order. With Rene Acosta

Salceda seeks creation of Metrology Institute By Johnny C. Nuñez Philippines News Agency

O effectively and efficiently adapt to the needs of contemporary times, PDP Laban Rep. Joey S. Salceda of Albay proposed the standardization and modernization of units of measurements to further enhance the “global competitiveness of Philippine products and services” and facilitate national economic progress. Salceda recently filed House Bill 4368 (HB 4368) in Congress that seeks to amend Republic Act 9236, known as the National Metrology Act of 2003, and strengthen the existing National Measurement Infrastructure System (NMIS) by creating a new agency, the National Measurement Institute (NMI).

“What you can’t measure is not important,” Salceda said, stressing the practical but vital requirements of being globally competitive, of which a standardized unit of measurement is among them. HB 4368, titled Enhanced National Measurement Infrastructure System, will accord greater consumer protection, transparency and confidence in measurements, which is a foundation of trade, science and technology, and quantitative research in many disciplines. The measure seeks to encourage the adoption of international best practices in measurements in response to future development and requirements, and “provide support to Research and Development” in Metrology, Salceda said.

The bill covers research and development in the fields of “environment and climate change, public health and safety, transport, information and communications technology [ICT], biotechnology-genomics, material science, Nanotechnology, photonics, metrology in chemistry, space technology applications and other emerging and enabling technologies.” HB 4368 “supports the harmonization of national metrological standards with international standards; mutual recognition arrangements and statistical controls as envision in the Asean economic integration, the World Trade Organization, and international accords and covenants resulting to globally competitive and quality products and services that conform with national standards,” he added.

READY TO RUMBLE Isuzu Philippines President Hajime Koso poses in front of

the Thrill Hill during the recently concluded Isuzu 4x4 Action Playground held in a mall in Quezon City. NONNIE REYES

Economy

A4 Tuesday, December 6, 2016 • Editors: Vittorio V. Vitug and Max V. de Leon

ADB reviews ‘graduation policy’ for Asia’s MICs By Cai U. Ordinario

@cuo_bm

he Manila-based Asian Development Bank (ADB) is now conducting a review of so-called graduation policy to allow middle-income countries (MICs) in the region to continue accessing assistance from the institution. In a report released on Monday, the Independent Evaluation at ADB said the review of the graduation policy will be helpful to MICs that continue to struggle with development constraints. MICs are faced with problems, such as unplanned urbanization, low productivity and competitiveness, stark regional disparities, lack of economic diversification, and achieving environmentally sustainable growth amid climate change. “Becoming a middle-income country doesn’t mean that less donor support is needed; in fact, quite the opposite,” said Marvin Taylor-Dormond, director general of Independent Evaluation at ADB. “Investments from public, multilateral and private sources running into trillions of dollars will be needed for a new wave of structural reforms and modernization programs to enable Asia’s middleincome economies sustain strong growth,” he added. The ADB’s graduation policy means disqualifying countries from assistance from the Manila-based multilateral development bank. This is based on three key factors. The factors are reaching a percapita gross national income (GNI) of $7,185 using 2013 prices and the availability of commercial capital flows on reasonable terms. The factors also include attainment of a certain level of development by key economic and social institutions. The ADB estimates that five years after these factors are reached by a country, it will “graduate” from the ADB assistance. “It considers graduation of a particular country as part of a process of an evolving relationship between ADB and that country. In keeping with the fact that MICs [including upper-middleincome countries] continue to face development challenges they have traditionally encountered, and are also confronted with new

development challenges, ADB is beginning a process to review this policy,” the Independent Evaluation at ADB said. Independent Evaluation at ADB said the bank must scale up its operations in MICs, prioritizing urbanization, particularly in the replication of successful city-modernization experiences; environmental management and climatechange mitigation; and boosting productivity, competitiveness and innovation by focusing on human capital and making labor markets work more efficiently. The evaluation notes that stakeholders in MICs expect the ADB to increase its engagement with local and regional governments, and to decisively support private sector and public-private partnerships. “Countries are demanding a lot more from their development partners as they try to sustain growth and, crucially, for many middle-income countries to tap new sources of growth,” Taylor-Dormond said. “To remain highly relevant, ADB should deepen its engagement with the region’s MICs and position itself to be the first choice for their knowledge needs.” The Independent Evaluation at ADB said all but three of 40 countries where the ADB has operations are now middle income. There was a sharp increase in the ADB lending to MICs—$3.5 billion in 2006 rising to $15.8 billion in 2015—reflecting their continued need for ADB support. Just as rema rk able is t he t r a n sit ion to up p er - m idd le income status, defined GNI per capita of $4,035 to $12,475, from four countries to 13 in the same period. Countries making this transition include the People’s Republic of China, Thailand and several Central Asia and Pacific countries. Despite facing many common challenges, Asia’s middle-income economies are highly diverse. East Asia’s main challenge is the result of decades of fast growth that, among other things, degraded the environment. South Asia’s challenge is to reduce inequality and bridge the urban-rural divide. Meanwhile, Southeast Asia’s challenge is to build on progress made in strengthening regional economic cooperation.

Chicken, pork inventory rose in November–NMIS By Jasper Y. Arcalas @jearcalas

he country’s chicken supply in November doubled by 100.26 percent to 37,503.89 metric tons (MT), from 18,727.57 MT recorded a year ago, according to data from the National Meat Inspection Service (NMIS). NMIS data showed that locally produced chicken accounted for three quarters, or 74.82 percent, of the November inventory at 28,062.35 MT. The figure was more than three-fourths, or 87.80 percent, of the 13,183.67 MT locally produced chicken recorded a year ago. The remaining volume consisted of imported chicken, according to NMIS data. The volume of imported chicken in cold storages expanded more than double, or by 149 percent, to 9,441.53 MT, from the 3,784.99 MT posted in November 2015. On a monthly basis, localchicken inventory as of November 28 was 13.75 percent higher than the 21,171.83 MT recorded in October. The NMIS said it surveyed only accredited cold-storage facilities. Fresh-chilled chicken, mechanically deboned meat were not included in the NMIS data.

Data from the attached agency of the Department of Agriculture also showed that frozen-pork inventory last month expanded by 22 percent to 14,106.42 MT, from 11,563.09 MT posted a year ago. Imports accounted for the bulk of the frozen-pork inventory. According to the NMIS, pork imports abroad reached 12,560.67 MT, or almost 90 percent of the total November inventory. The volume of frozen-pork imports is 19.34 percent higher than the 10,525.41 MT recorded a year ago. Local pork in cold storages also increased to 1,545.75 MT, from 1,037.68 MT recorded in November 2015. For the frozen-pork data, the NMIS said it included stock inventory in accredited commercial and in-house cold storage in slaughterhouses and meat-processing plants. Local traders are allowed to import chicken and pork under the so-called minimum access volume (MAV) scheme of the World Trade Organization. Pork imports within MAV are usually slapped a lower tariff. According to the Bureau of Animal Industry, traders have already used 62.93 percent of the MAV for chicken and 66.29 percent of MAV for pork.

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Davao City emerges as PHL’s new tourism, investment destination

AVAO CITY—This city is being eyed as the new tourism and investment destination for Chinese nationals with the expected visit of some 20 Beijing-based bankers and their spouses for a four-day, three-night tour anytime soon.

“This is the first organized Beijing groups to come here. We hope to get the market, as these are Chinese big spenders and not just ordinary tourists,” said Alex Divinagracia, vice president for Travels and Tours of the Davao Tourism Association (DATA). Divinagracia said this is an offshoot of the previous sales missions made by former Tourism Assistant Secretary Arturo P. Boncato Jr. There is an influx of inbound travel to the Philippines and one of the cities benefiting from this is Davao, he added. Jean Rose Tecson, city tourism officer, said there is also a group of tour operators from Xiamen that is now in the city from December 3 to 7. Meanwhile, a group of Chinese investors is set to visit Davao City next year to check out opportunities in infrastructure, real estate and tourism. Earlier, Davao City Council Majority Floor Leader Bernard Al-ag said Chinese investors are also expected to visit the city next year to look for

possible opportunities in real estate and other investments. “We offered them the Three Ridges Integrated Area Development [TRIAD] area, as this has been classified as a tourism-development zone,” he said. TRIAD includes barangays Catigan, Eden and Tagurano in Toril. The Department of Tourism in Davao region (DOT-XI) is also eyeing regular flights between Davao and Xiamen this month. This is in addition to the regular Xiamen-Manila and XiamenCebu flights. It can be recalled that Xiamen Air brought some 80 Chinese businessmen and tourists to the city a few months ago to test the waters. Tourism Assistant Secretary Eden David earlier said Davao is a viable market for Chinese tourists in the visiting friends and relatives (VFR) tourist sector. She added that there are other feeder markets that go to Xiamen, and a regular flight between Xiamen and Davao will help push the traffic between the said areas.

Jazmin Esguerra, previously the country’s attaché to China and now tourism consultant for the region, said it is possible to recapture the Chinese market now that a better relationship has been established after President Duterte’s visit to China. With the lifting of the travel advisory against the Philippines, Esguerra said the Philippines should try to get its share of the 120 million Chinese travelers (2015 travel data) with a total outbound expenditures amounting to $194 billion. Esguerra, however, said “we have to start again, more than 400 countries are promoting to the Chinese market, so we have to start at the bottom again.” She said it is not too late for the country’s tourism sector to lure the Chinese market, but it will depend on the quality and quantity of promotions that will be done by the government. “There are more than 620 million Internet users and more than 80-percent mobile-device users in China, so social media has a huge impact in the decisionmaking process of the Chinese tourists in choosing their desti-

nations,” she said. The top 10 outbound destination of Chinese tourists in 2014 are Hong Kong, Thailand, South Korea, Taiwan, Macao, Japan, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia and France. “There’s a problem in Thailand, since they are in mourning and has limited tourism promotion and offerings, and we should take advantage of this because we are nearer. They will come here for beach holidays, shopping and [see] the Philippine Eagle Center because they do not have that,” she said. Esguerra, however, said the Philippines is more expensive than Bali in Indonesia and Thailand, so we offer perks and improve our tourism products and experience. This is a big challenge, considering that the tourism budget has been reduced by 40 percent this year, she added. Among the tourism products in the Davao region, which could lure the Chinese tourists, are its natural environment, including the beaches and the mountain resorts but the experience has to be enhanced by bringing in fresh fruits and vegetables to cater to health-conscious tourists, as well as organic and grilled food. PNA

This is the first organized Beijing groups to come here. We hope to get the market, as these are Chinese big spenders and not just ordinary tourists.”—Divinagracia

Bill seeks creation of nuclear commission

lbay Rep. Joey S. Salceda has recently filed a bill in Congress seeking the creation of the Philippine Nuclear Regulatory Commission (PNRC), an independent nuclear-regulatory body focused on the control of peaceful uses and application of nuclear energy. House Bill (HB) 4369, titled Comprehensive Nuclear Regulation Act of 2016, is considered a vital piece of legislation, as the country embarks on a renewed effort to strengthen science and technology and boost industrial growth. Salceda said the PNRC will be attached to the Department of Science and Technology (DOST), and will work to harmonize with similar regulatory structures in other countries, especially in the Asia-Pacific region, such as China, South Korea, Japan, Australia and Singapore, among others. Most important, Salceda said the PNRC will “ensure consistency with the nation’s obligations under relevant international instruments.” It will also modernize the country’s nuclear civil liability and compensation regime, in line with internationally accepted standards. Salceda’s bill specifically aims to 1) harness the peaceful uses of nuclear energy that will benefit various fields, including health and medicine, energy production, scientific research, agriculture, industry and education; and 2) recognize, mitigate and protect individuals, society and the environment from the potentially harmful effects of ionizing radiation, including those that could result from improper use, accidents or malicious acts. The proposed PNRC will develop an “independent regulatory framework that will decide on and resolve issues affecting public health and safety, protection of the environment, and nuclear security and safeguards,

Christmas glitter

Craftsmen use their skills and creativity to make glittery Christmas balls from twigs and thin wires in their stall in Manila. The demand for Yuletide decoration is expected to peak as Christmas Day approaches. ALYSA SALEN

beyond the reach of entities with selfmotivated interests,” Salceda added. He said the resolution of these issues within an autonomous regulatory structure will generate in the public a higher level of trust and confidence in the application of nuclear technologies. He added that a positive public mind-set is “imperative for the continued and improved utilization of nuclear energy and radioactive materials in the country.” As conceived, the PNRC covers the areas of nuclear and radioactive material applications and requires a well-structured legal framework necessary to meet the technical and management standards designed to protect public health, safety, and security and the integrity of the environment. HB 4369 covers the 11 fundamental principles of nuclear law, according to current international standards. It addresses all gaps and omissions identified in the old Republic Act 5207, which are present in the areas of physical protection,

safeguards, nuclear security, nuclear/radiological emergency preparedness and response, radioactive waste management, transport of nuclear/ radioactive materials, and licensing of nuclear facilities, materials and radioactive sources owned and operated by the present Philippine Nuclear Research Institute (PNRI). The Albay lawmaker stressed that the country’s nuclear legislation should provide for all the key elements needed for an effective nuclear regulatory system, adding that the “setting up of a regulatory body alone, without ensuring that it possesses the ability to exercise the necessary regulatory functions, including its faithful commitment to international nuclear safety and security obligations, merely creates the illusion, not the reality, of such a system, and will not solve the problem that the proposed bill tries to address.” The bill points out that with such a vital responsibility of regulating complex nuclear technolo-

gies and practices, and natural radiation sources, the PNRC should be equipped with the necessary scientific, engineering, technical management, financial and legal expertise. Presently, the number of nuclear scientists and engineers in the Philippines is relatively small and are mostly under one roof, such that the expertise of one can be shared in undertaking several tasks. Any proposal to dissipate this mass of nuclear expertise to several agencies will be counterproductive, especially considering that it takes time to develop or build specialized capabilities and expertise. The bill recognizes that such expertise cannot be acquired in a short period of time. Thus, under the proposed legislation, a new Philippine Nuclear and Radiation Safety Commission (PNRSC) that will build on the extensive experience, competencies and capabilities of the previous Philippine Atomic Energy Commission and now the present PNRI, will be created. PNA

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46 countries fail to reach environmental goods deal

ENEVA—Forty-six countries, including the US, China and European Union nations, failed on Sunday to agree on a list of “environmental goods,” like solar-powered air conditioners or LED light bulbs, that could see lower tariffs.

$1T

The worth of annual trade of 200 environmentfriendly goods the tariffs of which is being eyed by the World Trade Organization to be reduced

In this October 13 file photo, supporters of the pro-democracy group Invoke Article 50 Now! hold a banner as pro-EU membership supporters hold EU flags on the first day of Gina Miller’s, a founder of investment management group SCM Private, the lawsuit of the High Court in London. AP

UK government’s Brexit plans in hands of Tribunal

ONDON—Prime Minister Theresa May wants to start Britain’s divorce from the European Union (EU). Eleven judges may stand in her way. On Monday May’s government will ask Supreme Court justices to overturn a ruling that Parliament must hold a vote before Britain’s exit negotiations can begin—a case that has raised a constitutional quandary and inf lamed the country’s heated debate about Brexit. May plans to trigger two years of divorce talks before the end of March by invoking Article 50 of the EU’s key treaty, using centuries-old government powers known as royal prerogative. The powers—traditionally held by the monarch but now used by politicians—enable decisions about joining or leaving international treaties to be made without a parliamentary vote. A hairdresser and a financial entrepreneur, Deir Dos Santos and Gina Miller, went to court to argue that leaving the EU will remove

some of their rights, including free movement within the bloc, and that shouldn’t be done without Parliament’s approval. Last month three High Court judges agreed. But the government says they have misinterpreted t he l aw. Gover nment lawyers, led by Attorney General Jeremy Wright, will argue this week that the British people have spoken by voting in a June 23 referendum to leave the EU. They say a parliamentary vote would mean getting lawmakers “to answer precisely the same question that was put by Parliament to the electorate and has been answered in the referendum.” In written arguments published before Monday’s hearing, government lawyers say the use of royal prerogative to start the talks is “constitutionally appropriate and lawful.” Many legal

experts say the government will likely lose its appeal and be forced to give Parliament a vote. “ T he arg uments t his time around are pretty much the same as in the last case—and I suspect the outcome will be the same,” said Nick Barber, associate professor of constitutional law at Oxford University. In a reflection of the constitutional importance of the case—which hinges on the balance of power between Parliament and the executive—all 11 Supreme Court judges will hear the appeal, the first time the full court has sat since it was founded in 2009. The case is scheduled to last four days, with a ruling likely in January. Brexit Secretary David Davis has insisted that “whatever the outcome of the Supreme Court appeal...we intend to stick to the existing timetable” for triggering talks. Complicating the picture are new participants including the Scottish government, which a rg ues t he Ed i nbu rg h- ba sed Scottish Parliament should get a vote too. Britons voted by 52 percent to 48 percent to leave the EU, but voters in Scotland strongly backed staying in, and the Scottish government says they shouldn’t be dragged out of

the EU against their will. Though the courtroom drama will unfold in cool legal language, it has set public passions simmering. November’s ruling infuriated pro-Brexit campaigners, who saw the lawsuit as an attempt to block or delay Britain’s EU exit. The anti-EU Daily Mail newspaper labeled the justices “enemies of the people.” Miller, the lead claimant, says she has received abuse and death threats. For me r U K I nde p e nde nce Party leader Nigel Farage vowed to lead a march on the Supreme Court to demand judges respect the will of the majority. It was canceled last week after organizers said there was a risk it could be hijacked by far-right extremists. The Supreme Court, facing the highest-profile case in its seven years of existence, noted on its website that the justices “are aware of the public interest in this case and the strong feelings associated with the wider political questions of the UK’s departure from the EU.” But, it stressed, this case isn’t about those wider issues. “The justices’ duty is to consider the legal questions impartially, and decide the case according to the law,” it said. AP

Get used to it: Economists see ‘new normal’ of slow growth

MERICANS should get used to a “new normal” of slow economic growth, business economists say. The median estimate from economists surveyed by the National Association for Business Economics calls for the American economy to grow 2.2 percent in 2017, up from a forecast 1.6 percent this year and unchanged from the previous survey in September. The improved number is still lackluster by historical standards. US economic growth averaged 3.1 percent a year from 1948 to 2015, according to the Congressional Research Service. But the business economists say Americans need

to get used to slow growth: 80 percent of those surveyed believe the potential growth rate of the American economy will remain at 2.5 percent or lower over the next five years. The economy has been hobbled by an aging work force and weak gains in productivity. Still, the economists see the risk of a recession as remote; 90 percent expect the current economic expansion to continue until at least 2018. They expect employers to add an average 168,000 jobs a month in 2017, down from 180,000 a month so far this year. Those surveyed also predict the

unemployment rate, which fell to a nine-year low 4.6 percent last month, will average 4.7 percent in 2017. A healthy job market means wage growth is likely to outpace inf lation this year and next, the economists say. They see consumer prices rising 2.3 percent next year, almost double the 1.2-percent increase they expect this year. Two-fifths of the economists say increased spending on roads, bridges and other infrastructure projects would be the best way to boost economic growth over the next four years; 36 percent chose tax reform, which usually

includes reducing the high official US corporate tax rate in exchange for closing tax loopholes. President-elect Donald J. Trump has said both infrastructure spending and tax reform will be priorities in his administration. The economists expect the Federal Reserve to raise interest rates at its meeting next week and to follow up with two more rate hikes next year. The association surveyed 52 professional economic forecasts from October 31 to November 16. Those who responded before the November 8 election were allowed to send in new estimates after Trump’s unexpected win. AP

The two-day meeting at World Trade Organization involved a bid to agree on reducing tariffs on over 200 environment-friendly goods worth around $1 trillion in trade annually, part of a process that EU Trade Commissioner Cecilia Malmstrom called important “to show that trade and the environment can go hand in hand.” She a nd ot her of f ic i a l s sa id C h i n a’s present at ion of a l ate l i st of good s to i nc lude t h re w a mon ke y w renc h i nto t he wee kend negot i at ion s. The talks amounted to just a step in a broader process on the Environmental Goods Agreement that was already facing uncertainty about how the incoming administration of US President-elect Donald J. Trump will approach it. “In the last seconds, China proposed a list that was not studied enough,” Turkish Economy Minister Nihat Zeybekci told The Associated Press on Sunday. “Many

countries, they have concerns about the list.” Zeybekci cited other concerns about sustainable-development lumber between Canada and New Zealand on one side and Japan and Taiwan on another. The United States and the European Union, which chaired the talks, said in a joint statement that envoys would return home to consider the next steps, but did not provide any timetable. “We tried really hard,” Malmstrom told reporters, adding that all negotiators were leaving “with clear determination to do this deal.... This is important for the environment, for the climate, for our moral obligation to show that trade can deliver after the Paris and Marrakech agreements” to help fight global warming. One senior negotiator said the last-ditch Chinese effort affected priority items for many other nations. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to provide details of the talks, said China’s new list—which was lopsided in favor of its own priorities—came in at 11 a.m. on Sunday, when others had already agreed upon many other points. “A l l delegat ions had some of their red lines moved in or moved out in a way that it was impossible to deal with in a couple of hours,” Malmstrom said, referring to China’s proposal. Jake Colvin, vice president for global trade issues at the National Foreign Trade Council, said the failure was a missed opportunity that was “disappointing to the American business community.” “To paraphrase Dickens, China’s offences carry their own punishment,” he added. “China missed a golden opportunity to address its environmental challenges and to claim a share of leadership on global trade.” AP

Beijing faces decision on how to respond to Trump’s tweets

E I J I N G — W it h D o n a l d J. Trump’s latest tweets touching on highly sensitive issues, China must decide how to handle an incoming American president who relishes confrontation and whose online statements appear to foreshadow shifts in foreign policy. China awoke on Monday to sharp criticism from Trump on Twitter, days after it responded to his telephone conversation with Taiwan’s president by accusing the Taiwanese of playing a “little trick” on Trump. Trump wrote, “Did China ask us if it was OK to devalue their currency, [making it hard for our companies to compete, heavily tax our products going into their country [the US doesn’t tax them] or to build a massive military complex in the middle of the South China Sea? I don’t think so!” That was apparently prompted by China’s response to Trump’s Friday talk with Tsai Ing-wen, the first time an American president or president-elect had spoken to Taiwan’s leader since the US broke off formal diplomatic relations in 1979. T he US and Taiwan retain strong unofficial ties, and the US sells weapons to the self-governing island. But American leaders have for decades avoided any official recognition in deference to China, which claims Taiwan as part of its territory—to be captured by force if necessary. Trump’s reference in another tweet to Tsai as “the President of Taiwan” was sure to inflame China, which considers any reference to Taiwan having a president as a grave insult. China’s reaction was relatively low-key and seemed to offer Trump a face-saving way out of an

apparent blunder by blaming the Taiwanese side. English-language commentaries then appeared in two state-run newspapers known to be used by China’s ruling Communist Party leadership to send messages abroad. “Trump might be looking for some opportunities by making waves,” said the Global Times in a Monday editorial headlined, “Talk to Trump, punish Tsai administration.” “However, he has zero diplomatic experience and is unaware of the repercussions of shaking up Sino-US relations,” the newspaper said. “It is certain that Trump doesn’t want a showdown with China, because it is not his ambition, and neither was it included in his promise to the electorate. He puts out feelers to sound China out and chalk up some petty benefits.” China’s response was characteristically coded. But it now faces an incoming president who deals in outspoken tweets, not communiques. Trump used a platform banned by censors in mainland China to renew several of his criticisms during the US presidential campaign. Some of his arguments aren’t true. Taiwan’s official Central News Agency, citing anonymous sources on Saturday, said that Edwin Feulner, founder of the Washingtonbased Heritage Foundation, was a “crucial figure” in setting up communication channels between the sides. Vice President-elect Mike Pence said on Sunday that the phone call shouldn’t necessarily be interpreted as a shift in US policy. He shrugged off the attention to the incident as media hype. “It was a courtesy call,” Pence told NBC’s Meet the Press. AP

www.businessmirror.com.ph • Editor: Lyn Resurreccion

The World

Chilean court rejects demand vs Israeli judges

ANTIAGO, Chile—A Chilean court rejected lawsuits filed in the South American country against three current or former Israeli Supreme Court justices for endorsing the construction of the West Bank separation barrier and the seizure of lands and the property on them from Palestinians.

350K The total number of immigrants and their descendants forming Chile’s Palestinian community

The Associated Press had access to the ruling on Sunday. Chile’s Palestinian Federation filed a war crimes lawsuit last week against current Justices Uzi Vogelman and Neal Hendel and retired justice Asher Grunis, who was president of the court in 2012-2015. In the lawsuit, the plaintiffs argued that the stretch of barrier is built on land the international community considers occupied and has separated Palestinians from properties and farmland. T he g roup contended that Chile’s international agreements

allow for suits involving crimes against humanity committed in other countries. But in their ruling, the judges said they did not have the authority to intervene in another country’s court decisions. A lawyer for the plaintiffs, Nicolas Pavez, said the group would appeal the ruling. A Chilean-Palestinian woman who owns land in the Cremisan Valley, which is near Bethlehem, had also filed a lawsuit. An Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman earlier said the federation’s lawsuit had no legal basis. Chile’s Palestinian community is among the world’s largest, with about 350,000 immigrants and their descendants. Israel says the barrier built beginning in 2002 is needed to keep out Palestinian attackers. Palestinians call the structure an illegal land grab because it frequently juts in and out of the West Bank, placing occupied territory claimed by the Palestinians on the “Israeli” side. The International Court of Justice, the UN’s highest judicial organ, in 2004 issued an advisory opinion saying the barrier was illegal. Palestinians seek the entire West Bank and east Jerusalem, territories captured by Israel in the 1967 Mideast war, as parts of a future independent state, a position that has wide international backing. AP

BusinessMirror

spearheaded the No camp on the constitutional reforms, a package aimed at updating Italy’s postwar Constitution that Renzi had depicted as vital to modernizing Italy and reviving its economy. Characteristically confident— detractors say arrogant—Renzi, 41, and Italy’s youngest premier, had bet his political future—or at least his current premiership—on a Yes vote win, and campaigned hard for a victory in recent weeks to confound opinion polls indicating that it would likely go down to defeat. W it h vote s cou nte d f rom nearly all the polling stations in Sund ay’s referendum, t he No’s were leading Yes votes by a 6-to-4 margin, Interior Ministry data indicated. The turnout of 67 percent was especially high for a referendum, and more in line for a vote for Parliament. Renzi had been hoping to beat off the rising populist forces that have gained traction across Europe, as well as with the US presidential victory last month by billionaire political outsider Donald Trump. Earlier on Sunday, in Austria’s presidential runoff, leftleaning cand id ate A le x ander Van der Bellen prevailed over a right-wing populist. Leaders of the populist 5-Star Movement, which is led by Grillo, joined the chorus among opposition forces for early elections. The 5-Stars are the chief rivals of Renzi’s Democrats and are anxious to achieve national power for the first time. “Today the caste in power lost,” said a 5-Star leader, Luigi Di Maio. It was a sharp retort to Renzi’s characterizing the reforms as an opportunity to shrink the “caste” of elite, perk-enjoying politicians by reducing the numbers and powers of Senators. “Arrogance lost, from which we’ll learn many things in forming our team for government and our platform,” Di Maio said. “Starting tomorrow we’ll be working on a government of the 5-Stars, we’ll involve the energies and the free persons who want to participate.” The 5-Stars’s constituency is largely Internet based, and bills itself as antiestablishment.

New Zealand Prime Minister John Key resigns after 8 years

ELLINGTON, New Zealand—New Zealand’s popular Prime Minister John Key stunned the nation on Monday when he announced, in a breaking voice, he was resigning after eight years as leader.

Key had been widely expected to contest his fourth general election next year. But he said he wanted to ensure he didn’t make the mistake that some other world leaders have done, and instead, wanted to leave while he was on top of his game. Speaking in a shaking voice, Key said he had made personal sacrifices for the job and the role had taken a toll on his family. Key said his National Party caucus would meet on December 12 to decide on a new party leader and prime minister, and that he expected to formally submit his resignation to the governor general that same day. He said he would back his Deputy Bill English to take over. English said he would likely decide in

the next day or two if he would seek the role. The New Zealand dollar fell by nearly 1 percent on the news and was trading at $0.71. Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said he’d sent Key a short message: “Say it ain’t so, bro.” “John Key is one of the most outstanding nationa l leaders in the world today,” Turnbull told reporters. “He has done an extraordinary job for New Zealand. He is somebody that all of us, right around the world, leaders in countries, large and small draw inspiration from.” New Zealand’s opposition leader Andrew Little said the decision had taken everybody by surprise. “He is entitled to be recognized

for what he has done for New Zealand,” Little said. “He’s been there through some pretty difficult times.” Key was a successful currency trader before turning to politics. He was elected to the nation’s parliament in 2002 and enjoyed a quick rise, becoming leader of his centerright opposition party in 2006. He won his first general election and became prime minister in 2008. He won subsequent elections in 2011 and 2014, and retained unusually high popularity ratings. His party was a clear favorite to win the most votes at next year’s election, at least until his announcement on Monday. Key said steering the country of 4.7 million through the economic crisis of 2008 and on to improved fortunes was a proud accomplishment. “Very few countries are in the financial position we are in,” Key said. “We’re strong, we’re in surplus, we’re growing, we’re creating jobs, we’re doing well.” New Zealand is enjoying relatively robust annual GDP growth of over 3 percent and the unemployment rate has fallen below 5 percent, thanks in part to growth in tourism and construction.

Renzi quits; Italian populists seek quick vote to win power OME—Italian voters dealt Premier Matteo Renzi a stinging defeat on his reforms referendum, triggering his resignation announcement and galvanizing the populist, opposition 5-Star Movement’s determination to gain national power soon. “I lost, and the post that gets eliminated is mine,” Renzi said early Monday, about an hour after the polls closed. “The government’s experience is over, and in the afternoon I’ll go to the Quirinal Hill to hand in my resignation” to President Sergio Mattarella. Besides the “antiestablishment” 5-Stars, the outcome energized another “anti” party, the anti-immigrant Northern League, an ally of French far-right leader Marine Le Pen, a candidate in France’s presidential race. In voting No, Italians also delivered a rebuke to Italy’s industrialists, banks and other establishment institutions, which had staunchly backed the referendum. The antireform victory, which could spook investors, comes just as the government had made some inroads in cutting the staggering rate of youth employment and while Italy’s banks have urgent need for recapitalization. During the campaign, the risk of political instability in Italy, Europe’s fourth-largest economy, triggered market reaction, with bank stocks sinking and borrowing costs on sovereign debt rising. But some analysts predicted the political crisis sparked by Renzi ’s ex it wou ld be shor tlived, as politicians focus on lining up support for a new electoral law they view as boosting their parties’ chances for whenever elections are called. Wolfango Piccoli, a Londonbased analyst and copresident at Teneo Intelligence, said the main risk of Renzi’s “devastating defeat” will lie in the medium term. That could see “a prolonged muddle-through period, the emergence of an ineffective patched-up coalition government in the postelection phase and continuously poor economic performance,” Piccoli said in an e-mailed comment. The 5-Star Movement, led by anti-euro comic Beppe Grillo,

Tuesday, December 6, 2016

Antireferendum militants gather in downtown Rome, after Italian Premier Matteo Renzi conceded defeat in a constitutional referendum and announced he will resign in Rome, on December 5. Banner in Italian reads, “You wanted to change the Constitution? Good-bye Bella.” AP

“The man alone at the command doesn’t exist anymore, but the citizens who govern the institutions do,” Di Maio told a news conference minutes after Renzi conceded. In Bologna, traditionally a left-leaning city, about 100 people rallied after the defeat to burn several Yes-vote flags and carried a banner saying “Renzi go home.” Mattarella, as head of state, would have to decide whether to accept Renzi’s resignation. Renzi is widely expected to be asked to stay on at least until a budget bill can be passed later this month. Then he or some other figure, perhaps from his Democrats, Parliament’s largest party, could be asked to lead a government focused electoral reform. The current electoral law would grant the biggest vote-getting

a generous bonus of seats in Parliament. Renzi ’s Democrats and the center-right opposition of former Premier Silvio Berlusconi want the law changed to avoid risking that the bonus would go to the 5-Stars should they lead the vote-getting. Elections are due in spring 2018, but Renzi’s resignation could prompt their being moved up a year. Another opposition leader, Matteo Salvini, of the anti-immigrant Northern League, hailed the referendum as a “victory of the people against the strong powers of three-quarters of the world.” He urged elections straightaway. Many had read the referendum as an outlet for growing antiestablishment, populist sentiment in Europe. When Renzi late last year promised to resign if the referendum was

defeated, it was months before Britain’s David Cameron had made his ill-fated bet that a referendum would cement the UK’s membership in the EU. Cameron was forced to resign when Britons, instead, voted to leave the EU fold. In Italy the referendum was required because the reforms were approved by less than two-thirds of Parliament. The reforms included steam-lining the Senate and giving the central government more powers at the cost of the regions. “We didn’t exit from Europe, but we didn’t ‘exit,’ from the Constitution either,” former Premier Massimo D’Alema said. A for me r C om mu n i s t , D’Alema opposed fellow Democrat Renzi on the referendum issue, aggravating tensions within their bickering party. AP

Key also talked about the importance of standing beside the people of Christchurch after an earthquake in 2011 killed 185 people. “Simply put, it has, for me, been the most remarkable, satisfying and exciting time of my life,” he said. “But despite the amazing career I have had in politics, I have never seen myself as a career politician.” He said the role came with costs. “For my wife Bronagh, there have been many nights and weekends spent alone,” he said. “My daughter Stephie and my son Max have transitioned from teenagers to young adults while coping with an extraordinary level of intrusion and pressure because of their father’s job.” He said he wasn’t sure what life after politics would bring, other than he would probably take up positions on a couple of company boards and accept international speaking engagements. He said he would remain on as a member of parliament long enough that he wouldn’t force a special election ahead of next year’s general election. “All I can say is that I gave it everything I had,” he said. “I left nothing in the tank.” AP

Tuesday, December 6, 2016

The World BusinessMirror

Democrats aim to rebuild political wall in Midwest

ES MOINES, Iowa—With the dust now settled from the election, Democrats are looking to rebuild the political “blue wall” of traditionally Democratic upper Midwest and Great Lakes states that Republican Donald Trump captured with an appeal to white, working-class voters.

Hillary Clinton’s failure to hold key blocs of these voters helped seal Trump’s stunning electoral victor y and leaves Democrats with a gaping, perhaps long-term, hole in the party’s national battle front. Trump boasted of his accomplishment at a postelection rally in Ohio. The president-elect crowed: “We didn’t break it, we shattered that sucker. We shattered it, man. That poor wall is busted up.” Trump carried Michigan and Pennsylvania, where Democratic nominees had won the previous six presidential elections. Trump also won Wisconsin, carried by Democrats in seven straight tries, and Iowa, carried just once by a Republican over the same period. In each, Trump vastly outperformed 2012 GOP nominee Mitt Romney in r ura l areas, while also seizing more typically Democratic-voting small cities and working-class suburbs. Should Democratic voting continue to lag behind Republicans in midterm elections, as it did in in 2014, the results could be devastating in two years when the party will defend Senate seats in Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, and try to retake governorships in Iowa, Michigan and Wisconsin.

“Democrats suffered the consequences of apathy and selective amnesia over the past midterms and arrogance over the presidential electorate,” said Haley Morris, a senior adviser to Democrat Gary Peters’s Michigan Senate campaign, among the Democrats’ few 2014 victories in the region. “We got walloped across the Midwest in 2010 and 2014. Democrats had a glimpse of what the results could look like without Barack Obama on the ticket and ignored it.” Mark Jefferson, the Republican National Committee’s Midwest regional political director, said the GOP consistently focused on “ blue-collar Reagan Democrats, who were heavily trending toward Trump.” County-specific, unofficial national voting data tabulated by The Associated Press shows Clinton received fewer votes than Trump in places Democrats had banked on for consecutive elections, and even decades, such as Dubuque County, Iowa. Trump edged Clinton by fewer than 1,000 votes in this northeast Iowa county known for its smallcity namesake on the Mississippi River and its once thriving manufacturing economy. Trump became the first Republican to carry

Dubuque County since Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1956. C l i nton’s 22,774 D ubuque County total fell roughly 6,000 fewer short of Obama’s 28,768 in 2012, and more than 1,000 behind his 23,791 in 2008. Dubuque’s Rebecca Thoeni, a lifelong Democrat until recently, said Clinton did not seem to reach out to her or her peers in 2016. “Then I saw Donald Trump, and he got out there and showed he was serious about keeping jobs,” said Thoeni, who attended a Dubuque Trump rally in January. “He explained things in layman’s terms. That’s what changed me.” T hoeni ’s is a scena r io t hat echoed loud ly around the cou nt r y, where si x in 10 wh ite women w ithout college degrees sa id t hey voted for Tr u mp, according to exit polls conducted for T he A ssoc i ated Press by Ed ison Resea rc h. T he rate was even higher among white, noncol lege educated men. And it played out in the thousands in Macomb County, Michigan, home to 10 percent of the state’s voters. A f t e r r a i l i n g for mo nt h s against the North American Free Trade Agreement, enacted under President Bill Clinton, Trump won Macomb by 48,000 votes. Clinton received 176,238 votes, compared with Obama’s 208,016 in 2012 and 223,754 in 2008. “In counties decimated by trade deals, decades of talking points don’t pay the bills,” said Robert Becker, who ran Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders’ winning campaign for the Michigan Democratic presidential 2016 primary. “For the party’s future, we have to be honest that the jobs being created in the country aren’t being created in this part of the country.” The pattern held

in Wisconsin too, where Trump won fewer votes than Romney did in suburban Milwaukee and where Trump’s criticism of Gov. Scott Wa lker worked against him. However, he carried the state in part by winning places like Racine County, part of a former union-heavy industrial cor r idor bet ween Mi lwau kee and Chicago. Trump received about 4,000 votes more than Clinton in Racine County. Clinton’s 42,506 w e re more t h a n 10,0 0 0 of f Obama’s 53,008 in 2012 and 53,405 in 2008. In Pennsylvania Trump similarly won Erie and Luzerne counties, smaller metropolitan areas than sprawling Philadelphia and its suburbs, but with a higher white working-class population and unemployment higher than the state average. Democratic presidential candidates had carried both counties in the past six consecutive elections. Trump beat Clinton in Luzerne County—childhood home of Vice President Joe Biden—78,303 to 52,092. In the final weeks, Clinton focused on emerging Democratic states such as Arizona and North Carolina. She lost both. Clinton did not have ties to working-class white voters as strong as those of her husband, who had been governor of Arkansas, said political historian Mary Frances Berry of the University of Pennsylvania. Berry, who has also worked for Democratic candidates, said before the election that Hillary Clinton was not contesting Trump in blue-collar country. The Democratic Party is seen by ordinary, working people as “caring about the cultural, managerial and professional elite,” she said, “not about them.” AP

Editor: Lyn Resurreccion • www.businessmirror.com.ph

Gun-rights backers vow to ‘go on offense’ during Trump years

OWA CITY, Iowa—Firearms enthusiasts who embraced Donald J. Trump’s campaign and his full-throated support of the Second Amendment are expecting a sweeping expansion of gun rights under his administration and a Congress firmly in Republican hands. Among their priorities: eliminating gun-free zones at schools, reducing requirements for background checks and ensuring that concealed carry handgun permits from one state are recognized everywhere in the US. “This is our historic moment to go on offense and to defeat the forces that have aligned against our freedom, once and for all,” Wayne LaPierre, chief executive of the National Rifle Association (NR A), said in a video after the November 8 election. “The individual right to carry a firearm in defense of our lives and our families does not and should not end at any state line.” In pursuing their agenda, the gun lobby and its GOP supporters could find themselves at odds with two other tenets of Republican orthodoxy: states’ rights and local control. “It would be ironic to see conservatives who long have professed a belief in states’ rights override states’ choices in this area,” said Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of the University of California Irvine School of Law. One of the NRA’s paramount goals is getting Congress to pass a law requiring all states to recognize concealed-carry handgun permits issued by any other state. Currently, many permit holders must leave their weapons at home when traveling or risk violating other states’ laws. NRA supporters say permits should be treated like driver’s licenses. Trump endorsed the idea during the campaign, but it is likely to face intense opposition from Democrats in states with tight gun restrictions, including California and the president-elect’s home state of New York.

States make their own judgments on who should be allowed to have a concealed carry permit, and their eligibility requirements vary based on an applicant’s criminal history, age and training. Many law enforcement organizations warn the change would mean encountering more guns during traffic stops and in tourist areas. They also say there is no way to easily check the validity of an out-of-state firearm permit because there is no nationwide database. The trend among states to expand the right to carry guns is already “creating enormous challenges on the streets for police officers who must figure out whether or not the people they encounter are legally entitled to have a firearm,” said Darrel Stephens, executive director of the Major Cities Chiefs Association. Chemerinsky and another expert who studies gun law, UCL A professor Eugene Volokh, said Congress probably doesn’t have the constitutional authority to order states to recognize concealed carr y permits from elsewhere. But they said Congress cou ld encou rage st ates to do so by t hreatening to w it h hold law enforcement and homeland sec u r it y f u nd ing. The NR A, which spent more than $30 mil lion supporting Tr ump and opposing Hi l lar y Clinton, also is calling for an end to gun-free zones around the country, including at schools. The organization has argued that such areas become targets for mass killers. Trump pledged during the campaign to eliminate gun-free zones. To do that, Congress would have to repeal the Gun-Free School Zones Act of 1996, which limits carrying and bans the discharge of guns within 1,000 feet of schools. Even then, Lindsay Nichols, senior attorney with the Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence in San Francisco, said she believes states and municipalities would be able to create gun-free areas locally. AP

Children who lived through Pearl Harbor attack remember H ONOLULU—In some ways, it could be any class photo from the 1940s. The sepia-toned image shows 30 fifthgraders—26 girls and four boys— at Thomas Jefferson Elementary School in Waikiki. Most are smiling, some look stern. A few have no shoes. Yet, this picture is different in one striking way: Each child is holding a bag containing a gas mask, a sign of how war had suddenly broke apart the routines of their adolescence on December 7, 1941. Three of the students, now in their mid-80s and all friends who have kept in touch over the years, reflected recently on the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor 75 years ago and the mark it left on their childhoods. Joan Martin Rodby remembered the carefree walks to school, and her family building an air raid shelter in their yard. Florence Seto, who is Japanese-American, recalled sharing ice cream with Rodby, and being worried that her family would be taken away. Emma Veary reminisced about her days singing, and her family covering the windows at night so Japanese pilots couldn’t use the light of homes to guide them.

War zone

ON the morning of December 7, a Sunday, Japanese bombers flew across Oahu and began their assault. Some children climbed onto the roofs of homes to see what was happening. The planes were so close to the ground in some cases that they could make out the Rising Sun insignia. Soon, smoke rose over the water,

about 10 miles from Veary’s home near Waikiki. Veary, then 11, climbed atop a neighbor’s house. Back then, Waikiki didn’t have any high-rise hotels and condominiums to block the view, so she could see all the way to the naval base. Her parents yelled at her to get down as soon as they heard about the attack. Seto, who lived a few blocks away near homes belonging to Navy families, remembered a neighbor rushing out of her home, screaming about how the Japanese, using an epithet common at the time, had attacked Pearl Harbor. The young Seto ran home, and, using the same word, told her parents, both immigrants from Japan. “That didn’t go over too well,” she said. The attack killed more than 2,300 people, nearly half of them on the battleship USS Arizona. More than 1,100 were injured. After the attack, President Franklin D. Roosevelt delivered a speech before Congress, calling December 7 a “date which will live in infamy.” The US declared war against Japan. Veary, Seto and Rodby suddenly found themselves living in a war zone, as an ever-present worry about a Japanese invasion permeated life in their island home.

Digging trenches

ABOUT a month or two after the attack, Rodby and her classmates were issued gas masks. Rodby, who was 10 at the time, remembers being tested on how quickly she could don the mask. If an air raid siren went off, they had to be able to put the masks on in seconds.

In this November 10 photo, Florence Seto (right) and her granddaughter, Michelle Kalehua Kukahiko, review a 1942 photo of Seto’s fifth-grade class taken in Honolulu, Hawaii shortly after the December 7, 1941, bombing of Pearl Harbor, in Medford, Oregon. Seto said the only scary part of the entire war was when military police, carrying guns with fixed bayonets, showed up at her house looking for her father. AP

The children put their gas masks around the backs of their chairs while in class. When playing outside, they kept them in a set spot so they could grab them right away. “It was like an extra arm we had to have all the time,” Rodby said. At home, her father, who worked at Honolulu Iron Works, built an air raid shelter in their yard. They didn’t know how long the war would last or how long they would need it, so they stocked it with pillows, blankets, dishes and a kerosene lamp to make it comfortable. “We would have food down there and artificial lighting and

the more we needed the air raid shelters, the fancier they got inside. I mean, people would have beds and they put flooring in,” she said. Her school had air raid trenches dug by parents and volunteers. They were covered with grass, tin or wood so any airplanes flying overhead wouldn’t be able to spot them. Many of Rodby’s war memories are happy ones, though. She recalls walking and skipping the four blocks or so from her home to the school, meeting friends along the way. They’d be a big group by the time they reached campus.

Pineapple fields

SETO said the only scary part of the entire war was when military police, carrying guns with fixed bayonets, showed up at her house looking for her father. Her neighbors, who served in the Navy, suspected he was hoarding food and reported him after he used his painting business truck to load up on Vienna sausage, Spam and rice for friends. Seto’s immigrant parents had trouble communicating with the police. Her brothers explained what their father was doing and gave the police the names of families they

were helping. The military police apologized and left, she said. The families who called the police were good friends of the Setos. Their children played with Seto and her siblings. “They were just afraid. It was a scary time,” she said. Government authorities detained 1,330 Japanese-Americ a n s a nd Jap a ne s e n at ion als from Hawaii, particularly community leaders like Shinto priests and teachers. Seto said her fat her was invest igated, but she believes he was spared because a business associate vouched for his trustworthiness. But a family friend, a restaurant owner, was deported. “We didn’t know any details except my mother and father would talk about it and then hush up when we would come close by,” she said. Many of Seto’s other memories were happy ones. She had the most fun helping out in the pineapple fields to fill in for men who left to serve in the military. “Everyone did their part,” she said.

Neighborhood patrol

SOON after the attack began, Veary’s father got a call to go to Pearl Harbor to help rescue sailors. He was a tug boat captain for a local shipping company. He didn’t come back for more than a day. Life under the threat of further Japanese attacks meant her family had to cover their windows to block any light from escaping at night. Wardens would patrol neighborhoods to make sure no light was visible through the windows. They would knock on the door of offending houses.

news@businessmirror.com.ph

AseanTuesday BusinessMirror

Editor: Max V. de Leon • Tuesday, December 6, 2016 A9

Vietnam seeks loans to expand refinery

ietnam is seeking about $1.2 billion in overseas loans for its only oil refinery before a share sale in 2017, to increase output and meet demand in one of Southeast Asia’s fastest growing economies. “The expansion will help our refinery operate more efficiently since it will boost the overall output by 30 percent and help cut production costs,” Nguyen Hoai Giang, chairman of Binh Son Refining & PetroChemical Co., the refinery’s operator, said in a telephone interview on Thursday. The company is in the process of selecting an adviser for the loans, he said. When completed in 2021, the expanded Dung Quat Refinery will be able to meet half of Vietnam’s fuel needs, rising from about onethird now with its current capacity of 148,000 barrels a day, Giang said. Vietnam’s demand for petroleum products is increasing and imports of such goods rose 18.7

percent in 2015, according to the General Customs. The operator expects to sign an engineering-procurement-construction contract with foreign companies for the expansion in 2018, Giang said, without identifying potential suppliers. The plan comes as oil is headed for its biggest weekly gain since August 2015 after Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries approved its first supply cut in eight years. The refinery is pushing ahead with its target to hold an initial public offering (IPO) as soon as the third quarter of next year and is in the process of getting a valuation, Giang said. Binh Son is in talks with international companies, including

briefs

G.I.C. to invest $260M in Indonesian movie theater chain

Bloomberg Photo

one from the Middle East and a few from Southeast Asia, to sell a 35 percent stake ahead of the IPO, the executive said, declining to identify potential strategic investors.

Vietnam’s VN Index has risen 15 percent this year, the bestperforming benchmark stock index in Southeast Asia after Thailand, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

“We are trying very hard to get ready for the IPO,” Giang said. “The exact timing and share sale volume will depend on the market situation next year.” Bloomberg News

Trump takes on China in tweets Malaysia central bank to ease onshore hedging rules as currency slides on currency, South China Sea

Bloomberg Photo

onald J. Trump took on the Chinese government via social media on Sunday, rejecting criticism of his decision to take a phone call from Taiwan’s president at the risk of triggering a backlash from Beijing. The US president-elect told his 16.6 million Twitter followers that he wouldn’t be told by China who he should or shouldn’t talk to, and reiterated some of the grievances about China used in his winning presidential campaign. The yuan reacted by declining for the first time in three days. “Did China ask us if it was OK to devalue their currency [making it hard for our companies to compete], heavily tax our products going into their country [the US doesn’t tax them] or to build a massive military complex in the middle of the South China Sea? I don’t think so!” Trump tweeted. The offshore yuan traded in Hong Kong fell 0.2 percent to 6.8835 per dollar, taking its decline since Trump’s surprise presidentialelection victory to 1.2 percent. The yuan traded in Shanghai, where moved are limited to 2 percent on either side of a daily central bank reference rate, was little changed. Trump has threatened to brand China a currency manipulator and slap 45-percent tariffs on the Asian nation’s exports. “We expect Trump to name China a manipulator very early in his new term,” said Cliff Tan, East Asian head of global markets research at Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ in Hong Kong. “Some might see the US drawing a line for the yuan at 7 against the dollar as the US begins what will likely be a protracted and multiyear negotiation process. But if the Chinese economy is still slowing, others will conclude the yuan has to weaken beyond 7 eventually. In the end, we think fundamentals will win.” Over the weekend China complained to the US after Trump flouted

almost four decades of diplomatic protocol by directly speaking with the leader of Taiwan, which Beijing considers a rogue province. China urged US authorities to adhere to the so-called one-China principle and “prudently” handle issues related to the self-governed island. The relatively measured response suggests China wants to keep the incident from escalating into a fullblown crisis. The US broke diplomatic ties with Taiwan and officially recognized the Communist government in Beijing in 1979. Still, it has maintained a close relationship with the democratically run island and is legally required to provide military support and protection. (See related story on page A6) If Trump challenges the basis of the One China policy “at the same time that he places pressure on China over trade, we could be heading for a very rough road,” said Malcolm Davis, a senior analyst at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute in Canberra. Trump’s retort was consistent with what one of his allies, former US House Speaker Newt Gingrich, signaled earlier on Sunday. Beijing does not dictate who the president of the United States speaks to, Gingrich said on Fox News Channel’s Sunday Morning Futures program, Trump’s comments may have a limited impact on the People’s Bank of China’s currency policy, according to Westpac Banking Corp. “In time, Trump may realize the limits of the powers of the White House in foreign-exchange markets,” said Sean Callow, a Sydney-based senior strategist at Westpac. “China’s currency policy is up to China, just as the US pursues its own interests. The debate is moving on from the formal label of currency manipulation to which unilateral trade sanctions will be imposed next year, and the reference to the South China Sea adds to the geopolitical risk premium.” Bloomberg News

alaysia said it would provide greater hedging flexibility in its onshore currency market after the central bank’s moves last month to discourage speculators saw the ringgit tumble toward its weakest since 1998. Overseas and domestic fund managers will be allowed to manage their foreign-exchange exposure of as much as 25 percent of invested assets, the central bank said in a statement on Friday. It said it would ensure there will be “continuous liquidity of foreign currency” in the onshore market. The central bank also said exporters can now hold only as much as 25 percent of export proceeds in foreign currency unless they get its approval for bigger amounts. That compares with 100 percent previously. Foreign currency arising from conversion of export proceeds will be used to ensure continuous liquidity in the onshore market, it said. The changes will take effect on Monday. “These measures are intended to promote a deeper, more transparent and well-functioning onshore FX market, where genuine investors and market participants can effectively manage their market risks with greater flexibility to hedge on the onshore market,” the committee said. “A deep and liquid onshore FX market will enable investors to better manage against volatile currency movements.” Malaysia is seeking to arrest a slump in investor confidence after a crackdown on trading in the offshore, nondeliverable forwards market last month hurt sentiment. The ringgit has lost 6 percent in the past month, one of the worst performances among emerging Asian currencies. It touched 4.4707 per dollar in Kuala Lumpur on Thursday, within 0.2 percent of the weakest level since the depths of the Asian financial crisis more than 18 years ago. The central bank is intervening in the onshore ringgit market, Assistant Governor Adnan Zaylani told reporters in Kuala Lumpur. “We are providing liquidity to the market and we will continue to do so even going forward if it’s necessary to maintain because we do need to sustain the market liquidity,” Adnan said. “And as this goes

into implementation, of course, it’s still a transition period. So if there’s a need, certainly Bank Negara will provide that liquidity.” Residents, including resident fund managers, may freely and actively hedge their US dollar and offshore yuan exposures up to a limit of 6 million ringgit per client per bank. Offshore nonresident financial institutions may participate in the Appointed Overseas Office framework, which will be accorded additional flexibilities on ringgit transactions. These flexibilities include foreign-exchange hedging of own accounts or on behalf of clients for current and financial accounts based on commitment, opening of ringgit account and extension of ringgit trade financing. Resident entities with domestic ringgit borrowings are free to invest in foreign-currency assets both onshore and abroad up to the prudential limit of 50 million ringgit. Bank Negara Malaysia warned foreign banks last month against using offshore forwards to bet against the ringgit and vowed to limit speculation. Governor Muhammad Ibrahim has blamed speculators in the “opaque” offshore nondeliverable forwards market for compounding the ringgit’s weakness, saying the currency’s pricing “should never be disconnected from real economic activities in the onshore market.” The move to clamp down on offshore forwards has raised the specter of capital controls which Malaysia employed in the late 1990s, even after the central bank called such fears ‘‘baseless”. Bank Negara’s efforts to curb speculation come as rising bets for higher US interest rates erode the appeal of developing-nation assets. The yield on 10-year ringgit notes recorded its biggest monthly increase since 2009 in November and reached an eight-year high last week. Bloomberg News

Malaysian investigator of missing plane visits Magadascar

NTANANARIVO, Magadagascar—A Malaysian investigator of the disappearance of a Malaysia Airlines plane in 2014 has traveled to Madagascar to pick up debris that possibly came from the missing plane and drifted across the Indian Ocean. Grace Nathan, whose mother was among 239 people on Flight MH370 when it vanished, said on Monday the investigator will collect possible plane pieces found on Madagascar’s shores by American wreckage hunter Blaine Gibson and others. Nathan and half a dozen other relatives of people lost on the Boeing 777 plane are currently in Madagascar to ask people to look for more debris. She believes the family visit prodded Malaysia into sending the investigator. The plane is believed to have crashed in the southern Indian Ocean after deviating from its flight path from Malaysia to Beijing. AP

GIC Pte., Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund, agreed to partner with an Indonesian cinema operator by investing 3.5 trillion rupiah ($260 million), to help expand the theater chain across the country. PT Nusantara Sejahtera Raya, which operates the Cinema 21, Cinema XXI and The Premiere brands in Indonesia, has entered into a strategic partnership with GIC, the companies said in a joint statement on Monday. The company operates 157 cinemas across 36 cities in Indonesia, Nusantara Sejahtera Raya said in the statement. This is GIC’s latest investment in the Southeast Asian nation, after it said in October that it would team with an Indonesian warehouse provider, PT Mega Manunggal Property Tbk, to invest in warehouses in the nation. GIC has been seeking to boost returns after warning that record-low interest rates and subdued global growth will weigh on investment performance in the coming decade. The fund in July said a key measure of returns fell to 4 percent in the 20-year period to March 31, from 4.9 percent in the period ended March 2015, as global stock markets posted lackluster performance and bond returns tumbled. Bloomberg News

Floods in southern Thailand kill at least 11 BANGKOK—More than 10 people have died as a result of rains and floods in southern Thailand, local media said on Monday. Almost a week of torrential rains has caused the deaths of at least 11 people in Thailand’s southern provinces, the Channel 3 broadcaster reported, citing the Interior Ministry. Over 2,000 towns and villages have been flooded since Tuesday, according to the channel. The depth of the floods has reached 3 meters (10 feet) in some places. The provinces of Nakhon Si Thammarat, Songkhla, Surat Thani, Chumphon, Krabi, Phatthalung, Yala, Narathiwat and Pattani are facing the most severe floods in terms of the affected area. Thailand’s government has started to evacuate local residents, as well as sending military engineer corps to the affected areas in an effort to mitigate the disaster and drain the floodwater with pumps. PNA/Sputnik

Ho Chi Minh City reports 94 Zika patients HO CHI MINH CITY—Vietnam’s Ho Chi Minh City on Sunday confirmed four more Zika cases, increasing the total to 94, including 12 pregnant women, said the municipal Preventive Medicine Center. To date, 19 out of 24 rural and urban districts of Ho Chi Minh City have detected Zika patients. Health workers of hospitals in the city have recently received intensive training courses on receiving and treating pregnant women infected with Zika virus. Vietnam has, so far, detected 103 Zika cases, including 94 from Ho Chi Minh City, two each in Dak Lak, Binh Duong and Ba Ria Vung Tau provinces, and one in Khanh Hoa, Phu Yen and Long An provinces, respectively. PNA/Xinhua

A10 Tuesday, December 6, 2016 • Editor: Angel R. Calso

Opinion BusinessMirror

editorial

Pay employees’ 13th month, or else what?

he Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) recently reminded employers to give workers their 13th-month pay not later than Christmas eve, as required by law.

The 13th-month pay is mandated under Presidential Decree (PD) 851. Employers may provide half of the 13th-month pay before the opening of the school year but the remaining half must be paid on or before December 24, or they would be liable for administrative sanctions from the DOLE. According to PD 851, any worker, whether regular, contractual or casual, is entitled to the 13th-month pay, or the equivalent of 1/12th of what they have earned for the entire year. This means those who worked for a company the whole year are entitled to a 13th-month bonus equivalent to a whole month’s pay. Those who worked for less than a year are accorded the total of what they earned during their time of service, divided by 12. These workers include those in the janitorial services, security agencies and contractual sales, who often complain their employers don’t pay them the 13th month because they are told they are not entitled to it. The law says they are, but how exactly does the labor department crack down on erring employers? The DOLE urges workers to report employers who fail to give them the government-mandated 13th-month pay by filing a complaint with the ministry’s regional offices. But really, how many workers would do that, knowing they would incur the ire of their bosses for telling on them, and perhaps, even lose their jobs for complaining? There must be a system that could keep the employees’/complainants’ identities anonymous so they would not face a backlash from their employers. The DOLE should also take the lead by sending inspection and monitoring teams to check on companies’ compliance with PD 851. There are several bills in the present Congress that seek to provide stiffer penalties against companies who don’t give their workers their 13th-month pay, and these must also be pursued. As per Section 9 of PD 851, nonpayment of the 13th-month pay is treated like money claims cases and processed in accordance with the Rules Implementing the Labor Code of the Philippines and the Rules of the National Labor Relations Commission. Erring companies are simply given notices to comply with the law. If the company fails to comply within 10 days, the company faces administrative sanctions. The process sounds tedious and the penalties not as persuasive or severe enough to ensure compliance for employers intent on flouting the law. Section 7 of PD 851 does provide an exemption to distressed employers or “those which are currently incurring substantial losses or [2] in the case of nonprofit institutions and organizations, where their income, whether from donations, contributions, grants and other earnings from any source, has consistently declined by more than 40 percent of their normal income for the last two years…” However, these distressed employers can only qualify for an exemption upon prior authorization by the secretary of labor. They also have to file a petition for exemption, which needs the labor secretary’s approval. We have seen in past years, though, that there have been a considerable number of employers who simply choose not to pay the 13th month, even if they could, intentionally flouting the law if they can get away with it, and perhaps, they have in the past, which makes them so brazen. This illegal practice the government must stop. The 13th-month pay is a way of showing appreciation to employees for their hard work and the contributions they have made to their respective companies and workplaces the last 12 months. If employers won’t pay it then the government must make them do so. This, after all, is the meaning of mandatory.

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THE Entrepreneur Continued from A1

rump’s election victory added fuel to apprehensions, which were based on his statements during the campaign period that American companies in the business-process outsourcing (BPO) industry in the Philippines would be compelled to go back to the US. On November 17, or nine days after the election, Moody’s released a report that said Trump’s plan to bring jobs back to the US would affect the Philippines’s BPO industry and remittances from overseas Filipino workers (OFWs). The report specifically mentioned India and the Philippines, which are the biggest BPO hubs in the world. I don’t think it’s that simple. BPO companies from the US will not just pack up and leave right after hearing their new president’s plans. First, I think the influence of a president in the US on his country’s businessmen is not as much as the

influence of Xi Jin Ping on Chinese businessmen. When President Xi tells his countrymen “this is where we go”, that’s where they will go. On the other hand, when Trump, who is not even that popular among Americans, says the same thing, US investors will proba bly say, “Wait a minute, we’ll think about it, we’re making money here.” Second, the BPO investors are putting a lot of capital and infrastructure in the Philippines. They already have a system in place here with their clients. The depreciation of the peso is also a boon to the BPO industry

because it lowers further their costs, which means they make more money. So, to me, the BPO companies are happy, and they will be inspired to put in more investments. The BusinessMirror carried a report about the Global Investment Forum early this month, during which a speaker said it would be hard for the US government to bring back BPOs to the US even if it offered tax incentives. Prime Philippines Managing Director Jettson Yu said during the forum: “When he [Trump] made his statement about bringing back BPOs to the United States, one question that we ask among ourselves is that how can the US beat the salary and the office space-rental rates in Manila or the Philippines?” Thus, I still feel the BPO business will be governed by economics, and investors, as in other industries, will be driven by the profit motive. And now, even the so-called weakening of the peso is making the BPO companies happy. In the past, they got worried when the peso strengthened and hovered in the P40 to $1 range, because it was cutting on their profits. The Information Technology and Business Process Association of the Philippines (Ibpap) estimates

More historical revisionism

Max V. de Leon Jennifer A. Ng Dionisio L. Pelayo Vittorio V. Vitug

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BPOs and peso rate: Underscoring the positive

John Mangun

OUTSIDE THE BOX

new phrase has recently entered the Filipino vocabulary: “historical revisionism”. Have you looked at pictures of yourself when you were a small child? There you are giving a high-five to Lolo. What a cute kid you were. Here is another one dressed just like Mom in matching Filipiniana. What you probably won’t find in your photo album is you taking apart several Betamax video tapes trying to find out how they work. Another missing picture is where you used the door of the brand-new refrigerator as a drawing board with permanent marker. Those are examples of historical revisionism. We choose to remember that which we want to remember and choose to ignore the rest. We remember events in a particular way to support a particular point of view or agenda. The recently deceased Cuban leader Fidel Castro carried the title

of “President” from 1976 to 2008. But most people think of a president as someone who was elected by the people with the following conditions: two or more candidates for office, political parties that campaign and a secret ballot. None of those circumstances have been part of choosing the president in Cuba. Circulating on social media is a checklist of all of Cuba’s social and economic accomplishments under Castro. While these may be true, they are not the whole truth. Yes, Cuba has made great enviable strides in childhood nutrition and infant mortality. But also is the fact that food

consumption in Cuba declined by 12 percent between the 1950s and the 1990s. In Chile it rose by 19 percent and in Mexico by 28 percent. Everyone knew that China was lying about its economic growth rate in the 1990s, because the economy was growing three times as fast as electricity production, which is impossible for an economy supposedly based on manufacturing that China said was the engine of said economic growth rate. Castro is lauded for having overthrown the Cuban Mafia-backed dictator Fulgencio Batista. However, there are at least 50 other dictators that have been overthrown in the last 100 years that did not lead to a ‘No Election-President-For-Life’ leader, the Philippines being one. A recent opinion column cites the fact that “Castro sent troops and materiel to support the revolutions in Namibia and Angola”. What is missing is that Cuba intervened twice in Angola’s war of independence, followed by a decades-long civil war marked by unspeakable atrocities against civilian by all factions, including the side Castro supported. Remember, Vladimir Putin “liberated” Crimea as did George Bush

that the information technologybusiness process management industry will generate $22 billion in revenues and employ 1.15 million workers this year. Another reason I see no reason to worry too much about the exchange rate is because remittances continue to grow. In September cash remittances sent by OFWs reached $2.4 billion, up 6.7 percent from the same month in 2015 and the highest monthly remittance for this year. This brought total remittances for the first nine months of 2016 at $20 billion, up 4.8 percent from a year ago. With the exchange rate hovering over P50 to a dollar, the OFWs and their families are happy because their salaries effectively increased, in peso terms. In sum, the BPO industry (which I expect to continue growing) and the resilience of remittances will continue to fuel consumption, which, in turn, will drive the economy forward and strengthen the Philippines’s attractiveness to investors, even those from the US under President-elect Trump. For comments, e-mail mbv.secretariat@gmail.

com or visit www.mannyvillar.com.ph.

in Iraq and Afghanistan. Then we are told, “Castro’s government survived the demise of the Soviet Union, as well as 10 US presidencies. That is a testament to the extent to which his people supported his revolution”. What is not mentioned are the 1.5 million Cubans that fled Cuba, including 2,460 since October 1, 2016 and the thousands that died trying. And why is it that all these “paradise” countries kill or imprison citizens who try to leave? Historical revisionism, in any form, is a sign of weak logic and the tool of those pushing an agenda. Two thoughts come to mind. In 1950 Bernard Baruch said: “Every man has a right to his own opinion, but no man has a right to be wrong in his facts”. Then there is sworn testimony in a court of law when a witness says, “I promise to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth”. That “whole truth” thing is an agenda killer and anything less defines historical revisionism. E-mail me at mangun@gmail.com. Visit my web site at www.mangunonmarkets.com. Follow me on Twitter @mangunonmarkets. PSE stockmarket information and technical analysis tools provided by the COL Financial Group Inc.

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Peace process should be inclusive

Restoring Manila to its old glory Edgardo J. Angara

Ernesto M. Hilario

ABOUT TOWN

hile in the thick of the political campaign for the May 2016 presidential elections, then-Davao City Mayor Rodrigo R. Duterte clearly laid down his intention to pursue political negotiations with all the major rebel groups so that peace would reign throughout the country.

For how can you encourage investors, both foreign and local, to put up businesses and create jobs if they have to dodge bullets whizzing in all directions? More than being caught in the crossfire between government troops and armed rebels, investors would not come in where there’s constant violence and bloodshed, and the resulting political unrest and uncertainty. Right after he assumed office as Chief Executive, Duterte hit the ground running and made it among his top priorities to resume the stalled peace talks with the communist movement. He called up his former college professor, Jose Ma. Sison, the founding chairman of the Communist Party of the Philippines, and relayed his readiness to restart the political negotiations that began in 1987 and proceeded in fits and starts until it was completely stopped during the Aquino administration. As a confidence-building measure, Duterte agreed to release a number of detained communist leaders that the National Democratic Front (NDF) claimed as their “peace consultants”. No less than 17 of these leaders have become part of the NDF team helping set the agenda of the talks and how to go about discussing the three remaining items in the agenda: socioeconomic reforms, political and constitutional reforms, and cessation of hostilities and demobilization. Another confidence-building measure ordered by Duterte was a declaration of a unilateral cease-fire with the New People’s Army (NPA) guerrillas. Since this was a unilateral declaration, the NPA continued attacks on government forces. Nevertheless, the government did not allow the talks to be derailed. Later, as the two sides began the second round of talks that started in Oslo under the aegis of the Norwegian government, the NPA also declared its own unilateral cease-fire. This cease-fire has been holding since then, so that the countryside has been quiet of late, with no sound of fierce exchange of gunfire reverberating in areas where the NPA operates. The temporary cease-fire now in place in the three major island groups—Luzon, the Visayas and Mindanao—is a welcome respite from nearly 50 years of fighting between the two sides. While the protagonists in the longdrawn war have traditionally declared a temporary cease-fire of limited duration during the Christmas and New Year holidays, the temporary cease-fire in effect while the peace talks are ongoing is significant as it underscores one lesson learned in previous episodes: talking across the negotiating table while going after each other’s throats in the battlefield just doesn’t work. Duterte deserves credit for ordering another temporary cease-fire so that the peace talks would continue. The third round of peace talks between the government and the NDF begins in January. As yet another confidence-building measure, the Duterte administration approved the release of four farmers jailed for rebellion. Chief government negotiator Silvestre H. Bello III has declared that the government is committed to releasing more than 500 political detainees in various jails in the country, including the sick and the elderly. The first batch of those

to be released, news reports say, would number around 130. It’s not only with the communists that Duterte is determined to forge peace. Apart from holding political negotiations with the NDF, Duterte has also met with leaders of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) to thresh out the kinks in the comprehensive peace agreement signed with the Aquino administration. You will recall that the agreement with the MILF led to the creation of a Bangsamoro Transition Council that drafted a Bangsamoro basic law (BBL) that would have established the Bangsamoro region enjoying autonomy within the bounds of the Constitution. But the BBL failed to pass the legislative mill as lawmakers said it violated the Constitution. It’s now up to Duterte to convince the MILF leadership that he really wants real autonomy for Muslims in Mindanao. The Mindanao situation, as we know, is very complicated. Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) founding chairman Nur Misuari led the bloody siege in Zamboanga City in 2013 that led to many fatalities and much property damage amounting to millions, not to mention the displacement of thousands of people. Even as Misuari faced rebellion and multiple murder charges, Duterte invoked his executive powers to ask the court to temporarily stay the arrest order for Misuari so he could bring him to Malacañang and even speak from the presidential rostrum in the Palace to express support for the administration’s peace initiative. You would think that with the Abu Sayyaf Group and the Maute Group in Mindanao having gained notoriety for terrorist activities, the government would exclude them from the peace process and give them instead the peace of the graveyard by running with hammer and tongs after them until they are annihilated to the last man. But Duterte has confounded everyone with his recent pronouncement that he is even willing to negotiate with the Abu Sayyaf and the Maute Group. What we’re seeing here is a determined bid by the Duterte administration to talk and forge peace with everyone who has legitimate grievances against the government. We see his recent pronouncement that he would not declare martial law as another welcome development amid his alleged take-no-prisoners war on illegal drugs. Duterte has said martial law declared in 1972 did not improve the well-being of Filipinos nor crush armed rebellion. What martial law did, from where we stand, was to divide the nation and to perpetuate poverty and underdevelopment that we need to really address in the years ahead. Duterte’s resolve to talk with all armed rebel groups, without exception, so that we can attain lasting peace, should be supported by all right-thinking Filipinos. Peace, to be achieved, requires the active participation of all stakeholders—the government, private sector, civil society, academe and the faithful, among others—in order to succeed. This is what we call inclusive peace, and it’s a goal worth fighting for.

E-mail: ernhil@yahoo.com.

Tuesday, December 6, 2016 A11

ast Sunday my Manila Bulletin column, “Erap, the Heritage Conservator”, was about recapturing Manila’s former glory because of the reported demolition of the Rizal Memorial Coliseum and the surrounding Sports Complex for a mall and several mixed-use sites. The column elicited several reactions from historians and heritage experts. Dr. Augusto de Viana, chairman of the Department of History at the University of Santo Tomas and former head of the Research and Publications Division of the National Historical Commission of the Philippines (NHCP), sent highly informative comments. Reprinted below is part of his reaction: “…The Manila of today is but a shadow of its glorious past. In the prewar period, the National Geographic [1935] once wrote Manila ‘was the place to be. It was America’s pearl of the orient.’ The year marked the arrival of the Pan American Clipper—the Philippines’s first direct link to the United States. Already the Philippines through Manila were served by prestigious shipping firms, like the United States Lines, the Nord Deutch Shipping, the Nippon Yusen Kaisha and the prestigious P&O, which owned the Queen Elizabeth. Tourists walked in the old Walled City, though it showed signs of decay, portrayed a period of the past century. The old houses and churches still stood there. Outside

of the Walled City would be Ermita and Malate districts, where the University Belt stood at the time. Institutions, such as the University of the Philippines, Ateneo de Manila, Philippine Christian University and various schools, helped mold the country’s youth. The district of Sampaloc still sported somewhat a rural condition with rice fields still existing at the time. Yet, the city was expanding toward this area with the start of the operations of the University of Santo Tomas in its new Sulucan campus. “The city at the time was the pride of the colonial administrators. The center of the arts was the Metropolitan Theater. Many buildings were built in the neoclassical style, such as the Post Office Building, the Agriculture Building and the Finance Building. There were also the buildings of the Philippine Normal School [now the PNU] and the Philippine College of Arts and Trades [PCAT, now the Technological University of the Philippines]. These buildings stand in contrast with those in Intramuros, which exemplified the Spanish period. “Across the Pasig River were the

districts of Binondo, Quiapo and Santa Cruz, which were the beehives of commerce. Binondo was still a mestizo zone though the Chinese were taking over. Quiapo and Santa Cruz had shops owned by foreigners, such as the Japanese, that the area of Rizal Avenue was called Little Tokyo. Quiapo had fishermen’s shops, bazaars and carpenter’s shops. The area of Tondo represented the places of the workers and the newly arrived migrants from the Visayas and Mindanao. “Life was very orderly at the time. There was no need for security guards unlike today. Squatting was not tolerated as anyone who tries to set up a post would be questioned by the police and asked for a permit. There were also very few beggars. It was very safe to walk the streets. “Every district has a park or two and the streets are lined up with trees, which made Manila a pleasant place even during the hot months of April, May and June. “Everything changed after the war as 70 percent of the city was destroyed. The streets became dirty, many old grand buildings were destroyed, abandoned or gone to seed. Squatting became rife. Along with it would be the rise of criminality. “Some mayors of the city did try to bring back the glory of Manila. There was Mayor Arsenio Lacson who cleared Intramuros of undesirable elements. The district became the haven of undesirables after its old residents moved out. There was also Mayor Antonio Villegas who replanted trees and some of his plant boxes are still here today along Quirino Avenue and Forbes [Lacson]. During the time of Villegas and Mayor

vailing themselves of the benefits of modern technology, public-school teachers are using the magic of the Internet to take their students anywhere on planet Earth, and even into the solar system. They do this through virtual field trips, which are becoming more and more popular among educators who want to expand

the knowledge of their students without leaving the safety of their classroom. Like regular field trips, virtual field trips are designed to be entertaining and educational. The experiences range from a simple trip to a zoo, a photo tour of a famous museum, to extremely detailed and high-tech field trips that offer video and audio segments to make the visit more interactive. What is a virtual field trip? A virtual

E-mail: angara.ed@gmail.com.

The crux of our national security problem Cecilio T. Arillo

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HE sobering fact is that this early, the Duterte administration is already locked in a cycle of peace talks and cease-fire agreements with the leftists and various separatist groups without a clearly defined policy on how to protect the state and its four elements: people, territory, sovereignty and government. This intractable cycle, now compounded by the upsurge of terrorism and the threat of mass destruction worldwide, has been moving in this country without a concrete solution since the revolutionary ferment in the 1960s, “taking off from the launching in 1959 of Fidel Castro’s communist revolution in Cuba against the profligate Batista regime. Thanks to Che Guevera’s marketing, the Cuban uprising captivated the world, and inspired a string of less successful revolutions in Latin America, Africa and Asia, including the Philippines. A very rare book, Lost in Time, published in 1999 by the Truth and Justice Foundation, Inc., authored by Dr. Galileo C. Kintanar and Pacifico Militante and edited by J. Augustus Y. De La Paz, has extensively recorded these national security problems, including the birth of the Communist Party of the Philippines and its military arm, the new People’s Army in the late 1960s. What is shocking is that, up to now the country is still using the archaic 81-year-old National Defense Act,

or Commonwealth Act 1, enacted around this month in 1935. Worse, the Ramos administration on September 22, 1992, only a few months after he took the presidency from Corazon C. Aquino, naïvely repealed the antisubversion law on Republic Act 1700, the only edict designed to check the expansion of insurgency and separatism in the country. Sen. Juan Ponce Enrile initially supported Fidel V. Ramos in the Senate but when he realized that the repeal created a national security vacuum, he subsequently crafted the Human Security Act, or the antiterrorism law, but leftists in both houses of Congress, supported by human-rights advocates, torpedoed it, brought it to the Supreme Court and when the High Court finally released it for implementation, what came out of it was a highly questionable law as some provisions protect more the violators rather than those tasked to implement it. As a result, no one among the law enforcers wanted to use the law.

In 2010 during the 15th Congress, Sen. Jinggoy E. Estrada, with the help of Enrile, Sen. Ramon Revilla Jr. and security and public-safety experts, introduced Senate Bill 675, known as the new comprehensive National Defense and Security Act to replace the obsolete Commonwealth law, bearing in mind that national security is all-embracing, dynamic, interactive, multidimensional and situational. Thus, assuming the Duterte administration succeeded in breaking insurgencies and organized crimes, but if there’s no comprehensive law to protect the republic and if plunder and corruption are rampant, that means we have not fully attained national security and public safety. “Also,” said the late Dr. Galileo C. Kintanar Sr., a distinguished national security expert, “we cannot fully enjoy national security and sustainable economic growth if we tolerate habits of indiscipline among our people, such as treating our creeks, rivers and seas as receptacles for solid and liquid wastes; crossing streets under footbridges constricting waterways by building on their banks; practicing illegal logging and destructive-fishing methods; and vending on sidewalks, as well as in the middle of streets and footbridges.” How about ethics in education and law making? Obviously, the education department and Congress (the House and the Senate) are locked in an impasse on how to apply ethics, particularly on what to do with Sen. Leila M. de Lima, Sen. Antonio Trillanes IV and other lawmakers, while some teachers in private and public schools and universities found more time to teach students how to hate the Marcoses

Virtual field trips: Safe and inexpensive way to explore our universe By Geraldine G. Cristal

Ramon Bagatsing, some establishments tried to bring back the glitz of Manila. The Plaza Miranda was a sort of our version of Times Square and there were new movie houses, like the Cinerama, the Globe and Times Theater. “However, since that time the historic beauty of the city was declining through neglect, decay and outright destruction. “Numerous landmarks were obliterated. “Harrison Park [a place for baseball and for promenades] is now Harrison Plaza. “The old Meisic [Spanish army cavalry headquarters] was demolished to give way to a mall. “The San Lazaro and Santa Ana Race courses are gone and are now condominium sites. “Historic houses, like the house of Teodora Alonzo, are gone and are now the site of a condominium. “Declared historical sites, such as the Katipunan founding site and the La Liga Founding Sites, are dirty and neglected. “What is more alarming is we are losing old heritage houses. Binondo has more antique houses than Intramuros. Since the ones at the latter were destroyed and the ones standing there are simply replicas. The sites of these old houses have been turned into condominium sites. “Even the historic Rizal Park is being invaded by commercial establishments, like hamburger restaurants and even a motorcycle dealership. Parks are supposed to be for the free promenade for the people to allow them to relax and to appreciate the historicity of the place. Now they are being commercialized…”

field trip is a guided exploration through the Internet that organizes a collection of prescreened, thematically based Web pages into a structured online learning experience. It can also be prepared by teachers through research and presented to a group of students depending on preferred topic or subject matter. Some virtual fieldtrip providers and links include The Nine Planets, Live from Antarctica 2, The Center for In-

teractive Learning and Collaboration (CILC), Explore the Estuary, 360 Cities, Arounder, Panaromas, Tours from Above, ViewAt or Vista Zoo. Apart from these, there are myriad of choices and teachers or even students can design their own virtual field trip by doing a simple search on the Internet. Virtual field trips also allow students to connect face to face with authors for a fraction of the cost of in-person visits.

Teachers say virtual visits deepen students’ understanding of what they are reading, and that the technology allows writers who might not otherwise go on a traditional book tour to reach readers anywhere as long as they have Internet connection. Virtual field trips offer rich learning experiences and are wonderful teaching tools. Virtual tours can also enhance or build upon what a child is about to experience or has just experienced.

rather than preach love, unity, good manners and right conduct. “But unless ethics education, like the moral-recovery programs of the recent past, is matched by the vigorous prosecution of the real plunderers or corruptors, these ethics classes will likely be seen as a lip service. Unless laws are vigorously and uniformly enforced, violators will continue with impunity,” Kintanar said. In the final analysis, the achievement of national security as a necessary partner of sustainable economic growth is a task that pertains not only to our military and the police, but also to the entire citizenry. For who else are obstructing the road to national security and economic growth but our fellow misguided citizens? Talking not only of misguided citizens but also of people in high places, especially those with conspiratorial hidden agenda, just look at what they did to Senators Estrada, Enrile and Revilla, then groomed to become the next president, who wanted to come up with a comprehensive national security and public-safety law? Instead of rewarding them, they ended up in jail while the real people involved in the plunder and corruption of public funds, particularly those authorized by law to release pork-barrel funds from the Office of the President, are free, oftentimes traveling abroad and strutting in self-importance in the lobbies of first class hotels and golf courses. Our laws are very clear that senators and congressmen have no authority to release pork-barrel funds.

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

While the real experience of going to a zoo or a historical place cannot be replaced by virtual field trips, parents and educators should always consider the pros and cons of traveling to far away places when students can learn and virtually experience almost the same thing in the comfort and safety of their classroom.

The author is principal at Dalaya Elementary School in Buguey, Cagayan.

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