Businessmirror may 01, 2016

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Sunday, May 1, 2016 Vol. 11 No. 204

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CASCADING LANDMARK

Waterfalls along the 22-kilometer access road to the OceanaGoldDidipio Mine site in Kasibu, Nueva Vizcaya, serve as a cascading welcome landmark to visitors.

Environmental protection is a strong advocacy in the mining village. LEONARDO PERANTE II

Farmers hit govt plan to expand Naga airport

By Manly M. Ugalde Correspondent

N

AGA City, Camarines Sur— Thousands of affected farmers have vowed not to sell their farms to the government to give way to the expansion of the Naga City airport located at the province’s capital town of Pili.

The Department of Transportation and Communications (DOTC) has allocated P3.5 billion for the expansion of the Naga airport.

The plan to expand the airport

Double-digit hike in PHL money supply continues

By Bianca Cuaresma

T

HE growth of the volume of cash circulating in the local economy continued at a double-digit pace at the end of this year’s first quarter, as banks continued to lend strongly during the period.

Dear Lord, knowing that when Simon Peter made his triple profession for his love for You, to which You replied with a triple act of trust and empowerment: “Feed my lambs...Tend my sheep...Feed my sheep.” (John 21:15-17). A firm faith and a deep, sincere love are the basic conditions required by You to choose a frail human being as Your representative or Your “Vicar” in taking care of Your flock, the new people of God. May we continue to be worthy, grace-filled and ever faithful as the new people of God. Amen!

Word & Life, Fr. Sal Putzu, SDB and Luisa M. Lacson, HFL

In a report late Friday, the central bank said domestic liquidity—broadly measured as M3— rose to P8.5 trillion at end-March this year, registering a growth of 11.7 percent.

March’s liquidity growth was faster compared to the 11.2-percent revised acceleration recorded in January this year.

A growing cash supply is beneficial for a growing economy, as it

U.S. puts China, Japan on new watch list for forex practices

Continued on A2

DOT shoulders certification fees to entice PHL firms to adapt halal

By Manuel T. Cayon @awimailbox Mindanao Bureau Chief

Continued on A2

THE NEW PEOPLE OF GOD

@BcuaresmaBM

D

AVAO CITY— The Department of Tourism (DOT) has assured food and accommodation establishments they do not have to pay certification fees if they adapt halal foodpreparation practices, promising a windfall of benefits to the untapped multibillion-dollar revenues from traveling Muslims.

Tourism Assistant Secretary Arturo P. Boncato Jr. said the fees were “significant” for these establishments, accrued mostly from bringing in consultants and certifying experts from Malaysia, Thailand or Indonesia, and services and professional fees.

“Minus these certification fees, these establishments would have additional budget for the needs of their kitchen, from the fixtures to utensils,” he said, as he clarified that “what we are certifying are the kitchens of these establishments, where halal food preparations take place.”

PESO exchange rates n US 46.7730

Boncato: “Minus these certification fees, these establishments would have additional budget for the needs of their kitchen, from the fixtures to utensils.”

There are now 60 establishments awaiting certification. Boncato said some of them are already among the big leagues in the accommodation and food industry, and include hotels, restaurants with a chain of stores nationwide, hospitals and entertainment joints.

Among them are the Marco

Polo Hotel, which belongs to the chain of Asian hotels; the Southern Philippine Medical Center, the largest government hospital​ outside of the Philippine General Hospital; the upscale Pearl Farm​ Resort on the Island Garden City of Samal; and Villa Margarita, a small but upscale inn.

The certification has taken them to the tourism destinations of Bohol, Boracay, Caraga, Cebu, Davao, Manila, Soccsksargen and Zamboanga City.

“Now, we are going to Palawan and Baguio,” he added.

DOT officials also recently visited the Middle Eastern destinations of Riyadh and Dubai to announce the readiness of the country to offer halal food preparations for Muslim businessmen and travelers.

“Right after my presentation, a group of big media companies with features on travel and tourism approached me to say how they appreciate the move of our government to provide halal establishments,” he said. Boncato also presented here the potential destinations in Mindanao to executives of foreign and See “Halal,” A2

Money traders monitor computer screens with the day’s exchange rate at a foreignexchange brokerage in Tokyo on April 11. China will remain the main driver of growth in Asia this year despite its prolonged slowdown, helped by sustained expansions in other developing countries in the region, the World Bank said. AP/Shizuo Kambayashi

T

HE US put economies, including China, Japan and Germany, on a new currency watch list, saying their foreign-exchange practices bear close monitoring to gauge whether they provide an unfair trade advantage over America.

The inaugural list also includes South Korea and Taiwan, the Treasury Department said on Friday in a revamped version of its semiannual report on the foreign-exchange policies of major US trading partners. The five economies met two of the three criteria used to judge unfair practices under a February law that seeks to enforce US trade interests. Meeting all three would trigger action by the president to enter discussions with the country and seek potential penalties.

The new scrutiny of some of the world’s biggest economies comes amid a bruising presidential campaign in which candidates from both the Democratic and Republican parties have questioned the merits of free trade. Republican front-runner Donald Trump has promised to declare China a currency manipulator, and the latest report may fail to appease critics in Congress who say China’s practices have cost American manufacturing jobs.

Continued on A2

n japan 0.4327 n UK 68.3447 n HK 6.0295 n CHINA 7.2204 n singapore 34.7754 n australia 35.6644 n EU 53.1107 n SAUDI arabia 12.4765

Source: BSP (29 April 2016 )

NewsSunday BusinessMirror

A2 Sunday, May 1, 2016

www.businessmirror.com.ph

Farmers hit govt plan to expand Naga airport Continued from a1

was hatched during the administration of then-President Joseph Estrada. It was shelved in deference to the strong opposition voiced by the farmers.

Expansion of the project is expected to start early in 2017.

The National Economic and Development Authority (Neda) identified four other less populated areas in the province as an alternate site for the airport project.

These alternate sites are the towns of Libmanan, Pasacao, Ocampo and San Jose, but local officials insisted to expand the Pili airport instead, said Arturo Bismonte, president of the Nabiga, Torac, Binasagan Irrigators Association.

Project oppositors are pointing at Gov. Luis Miguel Villafuerte, Pili Mayor Alexis San Luis and Rep. Leni G. Robredo of Camarines Sur as the parties behind the push for the airport’s expansion.

They said they were never consulted about the project and

Halal…

that the government is offering P500,000 per hectare for the farmers’ land through the DOTC. They said their farms are not for sale and this is nonnegotiable.

“What is insulting is the provincial government is offering us a price of P80,000 per hectare,” the farmers said.

Bismonte said plans to expand the airport runway by two more kilometers would already affect almost 135 hectares of prime, highly productive and fully irrigated agricultural lands, 20 hectares of which are allocated for palay-seed production to supply the entire Bicol region.

“We are not selling our farms and that’s nonnegotiable. The only option is for the government to look for other sites, as the Neda has recommended,” Bismonte added.

The farmers claimed that since the runway will be repositioned, it would certainly cut across the irrigation canals from Mount Isarog, the source of water to irrigate the farmlands and other areas. The plan is to elevate the runway by at least 3 me-

ters. This would surely cause severe flooding in Pili, Bismonte said.

Should the project push through, DOTC officials said the additional 2 kilometers in the runway can accommodate narrowbodied Airbus planes.

The Camarines Sur provincial board had initially fought for the construction of the Bicol International Airport, but it failed. It was instead put up in the upland barangay of Comon in Daraga, Albay, the construction of which is now on stage three. Named as main proponent of the P4-billion Bicol International Airport in Daraga town is Albay Gov. Joey S. Salceda.

Transportation Secretary Joseph Emilio A. Abaya has given the green light for the start of the airport expansion in 2017, saying the budget is already included for the year’s General Appropriation Act.

Despite strong opposition against the airport expansion project, the DOTC and local officials are adamant about pushing the project through.

Continued from a1

local airline companies.

He said Middle Eastern travelers are aware of the nice spots in the country, “but they were not keen on promoting them because of the lack of halal restaurants and food joints that cater to Muslim travelers.”

Next week the tourism promotion team of the Philippine Halal Tourism Program will go to Turkey to make another pitch for the Philippines during the annual halal international conference.

Turkey is the seat of the halalcertifying body recognized by the

57-nation Organisation of Islamic Cooperation.

“Our secretary expressed the hope that the recent gains of the Philippines being recognized as a desired Muslim destination would be continued by the next administration,” he said.

BORACAY BEACH CLEANUP With thousands of kilos of trash left behind by Friday night’s “LaBoracay” events and parties, the local government

of Boracay, Aklan, and Megaworld’s Global-Estate Resorts Inc. spearheaded a coast-wide cleanup movement to gather trash and to promote the proper way of disposing of garbage during the Labor Day weekend. Dubbed “Clean As You Party,” the movement is also highlighted by the distribution of 120 eco-friendly trash bins to the establishments along the white-beach coastline of the island.

Double-digit hike in PHL money supply continues Continued from a1

gives fuel to productive sectors in the economy to increase the nation’s capacity to grow.

However, an excessively slow cash-supply growth in the economy may be bad for a nation, especially if it does not provide enough financing to keep productive activities going.

Amid the continued acceleration in the pace of money-supply growth, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) gave the assurance that the level of cash-supply growth is still enough to finance the growing economy.

“The sustained expansion of M3 during the month indicates that money supply remains sufficient to support economic growth,” the central bank said in a statement.

“Going forward, the Bangko Sentral will continue to monitor domestic-liquidity dynamics to ensure that monetary conditions remain in line with price and financial stability,” it added.

The continued expansion of domestic-liquidity growth during the month was attributed by the central bank to the sustained demand for credit.

In a separate report, the BSP

said the growth of outstanding loans of banks went slower, contrasting to the money-supply growth for the period, registering at 14.8 percent in March this year. This is slower than the 16.9-percent growth in bank lending in January.

The expansion of loans was largely brought by loans for production activities. These comprise more then 80 percent of the banks’ aggregate loan portfolio.

Loans for production activities grew by 15 percent in February, slower than the 17.4 percent in the previous month.

US puts China, Japan on new watch list for forex practices Continued from a1

“We will continue to watch this process closely to ensure that the president squarely addresses currency manipulation and stands up for the American people,” House Ways and Means Chairman Kevin Brady, a Texas Republican, said in a statement on the Treasury report.

The Treasury had already been monitoring countries for evidence of currency manipulation under a 1988 law. In the latest report, the department concluded that no major trading partner qualified as a currency manipulator; the last country it labeled as such was China, in 1994.

Under the new law, Treasury officials developed three criteria to decide if countries are being unfair: an economy having a trade surplus with the US above $20 billion; having a current-account surplus amounting to more than 3 percent of its gross domestic product; and one that repeatedly depreciates its currency by buying foreign assets equivalent to 2 percent of output over the year.

China, Japan, Germany and South Korea were flagged as a result of their trade and current-account surpluses, the department said.

Taiwan made the list because of its current-account surplus and persistent intervention to weaken the currency, according to the Treasury.

If a country meets all three criteria, it could eventually be cut off from some US development financing and excluded from US government contracts.

“People in Congress who passed this law were very frustrated because they felt they’d never had an adequate explanation from Treasury why some countries weren’t found to be manipulating,” said Nicholas Lardy, a scholar at the Peterson Institute for International Economics who has studied China for more than three decades.

“Congress tried to be specific so the Treasury has less discretion.”

Lawmakers working on the trade bill originally sought to include tougher penalties, such as tariffs, for currency manipulators. But the Obama administration opposed that part and it was eventually dropped.

In its report, the Treasury said China’s yuan “should continue to experience real appreciation over the medium term.” In the department’s last report, last October, it said the yuan was “below its appropriate medium-term valuation.”

Before that, the department had said the yuan was “significantly undervalued,” a description it avoided again on Friday.

The Treasury said more clarity from China on its exchange-rate goals, including its commitment not to devalue its currency to boost growth, would help stabilize the market. The yuan has depreciated 4 percent against the dollar over the last year, even as the Treasury estimated China has sold $480 billion of foreign-exchange assets from August through March to support the currency.

The Treasury said it’s increasingly important that Japan use

all policy levers, including fiscal policy and structural reforms, to lift growth. Earlier in April, Treasury Secretary Jacob J. Lew urged Japan to focus on boosting domestic demand instead of exports as the yen rises. The yen has climbed almost 13 percent this year against the dollar.

Current conditions in the dollar-yen market are orderly, and it’s important for countries to keep their Group of Seven and Group of 20 currency commitments, the Treasury said, reiterating Lew comments that were seen as rebuffing Japan’s desire to potentially weaken the yen through intervention.

South Korea sold about $26 billion in foreign exchange from the second half of last year through March to prop up the won, the Treasury noted, saying the intervention represented a shift from efforts to depreciate the currency.

“Appreciation of the won over the medium term would help Korea orient its economy away from its current reliance on exports,” the department said.

Germany has the second-largest current-account surplus in the world, and the excess saving could be used to boost growth in the euro area, the Treasury added.

The Taiwanese government should limit currency interventions to the “exceptional circumstances of disorderly market conditions, as well as increase the transparency of reserve holdings and foreign-exchange market intervention,” the Treasury said.

Bloomberg News

NewsSunday BusinessMirror

www.businessmirror.com.ph • Editor: Dionisio L. Pelayo

IRC sees completion of deal with Ayala Land this year

P

ROPERTY developer IRC Properties Inc. expects to complete its deal with Ayala Land Inc., the country's second-largest real-estate company, to develop a portion of its landholdings in Binangonan, Rizal, this year.

IRC said in a report it hopes that the deal with Ayala Land will jump-start the development of a mixed-use community in the eastern part of Metro Manila.

IRC said it is still in talks with Wedgemore Property, a unit of Ayala Land, to sell a portion of the land out of the more than 2,000-hectare property. It said the company may complete the deal in six months.

“The entry of Ayala Land Inc. is seen to jump-start the development of a new mixeduse community south of Metro Manila. To date, a total of 142 hectares are ready for immediate development,” the company said.

It added that the project may run for the next seven years and will be divided into three phases.

The clearing of the company’s Binangonan property became the focus of its operations for the past years in order to completely free from thirdparty claims, it said. VG Cabuag

Sunday, May 1, 2016 A3

Catastrophe insurance pool proposal in limbo

T

By David Cagahastian

@davecaga

HE fast economic growth in Metro Manila, as may be seen particularly in the large volume of vehicle sales to middleclass families, also has a downside— the vulnerability of the metropolis to a near wipeout caused by natural or man-made disasters.

This is the reason the Insurance Commission (IC) and the Philippine Insurers and Reinsurers Association (Pira) are pushing for an executive order (EO), which will make it mandatory for all households and micro-, small- and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs) to have catastrophe insurance for disasters, such as earthquakes and floods.

However, the draft EO does not appear to be forthcoming during the last two months of the Aquino administration, putting a total of $101.09 billion in total GDP in Metro Manila alone at risk of being lost without any insurance cover should a “big one” come this way.

A research conducted by global reinsurer Guy Carpenter Singapore showed the danger being invited by both developed and developing countries in accumulating wealth without the appropriate insurance coverage for assets

which might be lost.

In 2011, when the so-called Great East Japan Earthquake brought the most powerful earthquake to hit that country and caused a big tsunami and when Thailand experienced the worst flooding, which inundated large portions of Bangkok, a total of 81 percent of the losses in the AsiaPacific region was uninsured.

Fourth in the world in potential damage

A RESEARCH conducted by worldwide insurance market services company Lloyd’s said Metro Manila is the fourth in the world in terms of total assets, which are at risk of being lost without insurance coverage.

In Lloyd’s City Risk Index, which assesses the amount of risk of loss in a particular city, Manila has an average annual GDP of $201.08 billion, and more than half of this

amount, or $101.09 billion, is at risk of being lost without any form of insurance coverage.

“Manila is No. 4 in the world because of its proneness to natural catastrophe and its fast-growing economy, which is growing at a fantastic rate but puts more assets at risk,” Lloyd’s Asia Managing Director Kent Chaplin said at the 13th Philippine General Insurance Summit last week.

The city risk index covers 301 cities throughout the world, which make $4.56 trillion of annual GDP, or half of the total global GDP. But a bulk of the GDP, which is at risk of being lost for lack of insurance coverage, comes from developing countries, with Manila being the top city in a developing country with the most to lose from a big catastrophe. In terms of total GDP at risk of being lost without insurance coverage, Manila is next only to Taipei (first), Tokyo (second) and Seoul (third).

A total of $3.26 trillion in GDP produced by cities in emerging economies is at risk of being lost to catastrophes, and 36 percent of this amount are in assets in the AsiaPacific region.

“This reflects the increase in the development in this area, but also ref lects the vulnerability because of the concentration of people and assets in these AsiaPacific cities,” Chaplin said.

Catastrophe insurance pool

ASEAN Insurance Council chair-

man Michael Rellosa, a past chairman of Pira, said the amount of assets at risk of being wiped out makes it imperative for the Philippines to come up with a catastrophe insurance pool, which will cover all households and MSMEs against big natural and man-made disasters not normally covered by fire insurance policies, such as earthquakes and floods.

Rel losa was chair man of P i r a w he n t he org a n i z at ion proposed the draft EO, which w il l require the mandator y insurance coverage under a catastrophe insurance pool.

“Since we’re No. 4 [in terms of the amount of assets at risk of being lost without insurance cover], it’s very important to establish it the soonest,” Rellosa told the BusinessMirror.

Under the proposed catastrophe insurance pool, the pool of insurers will underwrite the policies according to their corresponding subscriptions to the pool, which represent their exposures to the risks undertaken.

The proposed draft EO had already been recommended by the Department of Finance (DOF) to the Office of the President since Rellosa’s chairmanship at Pira last year but was returned with comments from the Office of President, particularly questioning the mandatory insurance coverage for households.

Pira, however, is of the position that the insurance coverage

has to be mandatory to be able to spread the risks over as many households and MSMEs as possible and achieve the critical mass to make such a catastrophe insurance sustainable to answer for huge amount of claims that will result from a big catastrophe.

IC chief support

INSURANCE Commissioner Emmanuel F. Dooc, who spearheaded along with Rellosa to propose the catastrophe insurance pool, reiterated his support for the establishment of such insurance pool.

“Natural calamities have disrupted our social, environmental and economic development. Mitigating or reducing the risks will be key to reversing chain effects of disasters. However, individual capabilities and resources are not readily available to massively implement viable strategy options,” Dooc said. “ De ve lopi ng a f i n a nc i a l ly sound and sustainable catastrophe insurance pool is just fitting and timely. Ultimately, this initiative reduces to a large extent the potential liabilities and risks on people and properties,” he added.

But the proposed EO does not appear to be forthcoming, with the Office of the President returning the draft to the DOF with comments, particularly on the mandatory premiums to be paid by households and MSMEs to be insured under the catastrophe pool insurance scheme.

SundayV

Busine

A4 Sunday, May 1, 2016 • Editor: Angel R. Calso

editorial

In condemnation of the terrorist Abu Sayyaf

A

T a time when the nation is preparing for the exercise of its sovereign prerogative—the election of the officials who will lead the nation in the next six years—a terrorist group in our society, the Abu Sayyaf, brutally kills an innocent foreigner for failure to meet its criminal demands. The foreigner, Canadian John Ridsdel, 65, was one of four persons kidnapped by the terrorist group late last year and held for ransom. The other three—consisting of another Canadian, a Norwegian and a Filipina— remain in the hands of the bandits to this day.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who apparently learned of the crime ahead of almost everybody else, immediately condemned the outrageous act. Similar denunciations came from high officials of the Philippines who called for the apprehension and punishment of the perpetrators.

Yet, even as we join our leaders and the officials of Canada in demanding that the perpetrators be brought to justice, we are skeptical that this will happen any time soon. We are afraid the Abu Sayyaf and other criminal groups will continue their merry way, kidnapping and killing innocent people, Filipinos and non-Filipinos alike, “till kingdom come.”

Till kingdom come? Yes, because the Philippine justice system just cannot be counted upon to speedily and successfully capture the criminals and mete out to them their just deserts. The system is so inefficient, when it is not so rotten, that the criminals are more likely to die from a lightning strike than from any punishment dished out to them by the law.

We have become familiar with the script. The President will give the order to go after the criminals and bring them to justice. Politicians will express repugnance at the brutal act.

The Philippine National Police and other law-enforcement agencies will dutifully vow to capture the terrorists. Citizens will remain revolted, awaiting results. But nothing happens until the next kidnapping takes place.

Are we doomed to have the Abu Sayyaf rampaging in our midst forever? Are we under sentence to endure criminal groups for the rest of our lives, given that the communist insurgency, for instance, has been with us in the last 60 years—the longest-running antigovernment movement in Asia, perhaps in the world?

The answer has to be an emphatic no. We protest against any insinuation that our justice system will remain broken forever. This piece has nothing to do with Rodrigo R. Duterte, or with politics at all. But is Duterte’s surge to leadership in the presidential contest an indication of the beginning of a national resolve to clear our country of criminals, from petty street-level thieves to plunderers in their barongs and western jackets, from isolated individuals to groups of well-coordinated operators? If it is, it is exactly what we need.

Let’s repair our justice system if not for the sake of innocent people like Ridsdel, but for the sake of our own self-respect as decent human beings.

Since 2005

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Candidates with three Ms will likely win the election I

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Database

By Cecilio T. Arillo

Popular candidates without the three Ms will only be eating the dust of those they follow in the campaign trail, and this will become clearer by the day up to election day on May 9 and two or three weeks thereafter.

This is so because a popular candidate, usually a product of surveys and selective perceptions, will have a serious problem converting his or her popularity into votes that can be officially counted and tallied without the three Ms. Let us limit our simple analysis to the five presidential candidates: Vice President Jejomar C. Binay, former Interior Secretary Manuel A. Roxas II, Davao City Mayor Rodrigo R. Duterte, Sen. Grace Poe and Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago.

Only two of these candidates, Binay and Roxas, are running under the two dominant parties—United Nationalist Alliance and Liberal Party—officially accredited by the Commission on Elections (Comelec) to have watchers inside the polling precincts.

Compared to Roxas, Binay has better-trained poll watchers backed by over a million guardians, both retired and those still in the active service of the military and police organizations, who are in the network of his running mate, Sen. Gregorio B. Honasan.

Honasan may not be as popular as Sen. Francis G. Escudero, Sen. Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. or Sen. Alan Peter Cayetano, but counting him out in the vice-presidential race might be imprudent, considering his own network, which also includes the Comelec-accredited party-list Rebolusyonaryong Alyansang Makabansa (R AM) and his ability to win. (Honasan has not lost an election ever since he entered politics.)

Con f ide nt i a l i n for m at ion relayed to Databank revealed 600,000 guardians will serve as

Confidential information relayed to Databank revealed 600,000 guardians will serve as special watchers in 10 regions for Binay, Honasan and retired Brig. Gen. Danilo Lim, who’s running as RAM party-list (No. 53 in the official ballot) No. 1 nominee for Congress, along with retired Navy Capt. Prospero Maligalig, retired Army Col. Alexander Noble and civilian member Jojo Cruz, as second, third and fourth nominees, in that order.

Seventeen teams of guardians, who are closely linked with one another via short message service and multimedia message service, have also been organized to protect Binay and other official opposition candidates against cheaters who might use preprogrammed data to alter the official election results, the information said.

special watchers in 10 regions for Binay, Honasan and retired Brig.

Gen. Danilo Lim, who’s running as RAM party-list (No. 53 in the official ballot) No. 1 nominee for Congress, along with retired Navy Capt. Prospero Maligalig, retired Army Col. Alexander Noble and civilian member Jojo Cruz, as second, third and fourth nominees, in that order.

Seventeen teams of guardians, who are closely linked with one another via short-message service and multimedia-message service, have also been organized to protect Binay and other official opposition candidates against cheaters who might use preprogrammed data to alter the official election results, the information said.

Hackers, who called themselves A nony mous, stole t he Comelec’s official biometric files as early as last year and systematically uploaded them early this

month on several occasions on various web sites, using cutouts they themselves had cleverly set up to avoid detection.

Pa r t o f t he i n for m at io n received by Databank showed that preprogrammed data in the form of memory cards and flash discs, which can be inserted into the vote-counting machines, are now being sold to moneyed candidates by unscrupulous people connected to some corrupt Comelec and Smartmatic officials.

The official Comelec data stolen by hackers included the huge biometric files of voters in 81 provinces, including the new province of Davao Occidental; 145 cities, including 35 highly urbanized; five independent component and 105 component cities; and 1,489 municipalities, spread in 17 regions throughout the country, including the National Capital Region (NCR).

The total number of biometric files of voters with complete names, fingerprints, pictures, cell phones and landline telephone numbers, individual addresses and the exact locations of the 87,000 clustered precincts they will be voting on election day is 54,363,329.

By regions, these are broken dow n to 6,253,249 voters in the NCR; 24,164,023 in Luzon; 11,316,792 in the Visayas; and 12,629,265 in Mindanao.

Demographically, 30 percent of the voters, or 16.3 million, are in the highly urbanized cities and provinces; the other 70 percent of the voters, or 38 million, better known as the masses, are in other smaller provinces, cities and municipalities.

This is where Binay and his supporters set up their network as early as two years ago, and that explains why he is very popular among the masses and the middle class in the countryside.

An 80-percent turnout of the 54.3 million voters would mean 43.5 million votes. The winning presidential candidate should get at least 10.8 million votes, or one fourth of the 43.5 million.

To contact this writer, e-mail at cecilio. arillo@gmail.com.

Voices

essMirror

opinion@businessmirror.com.ph • Sunday, May 1, 2016 A5

Democracy is a fight club I

N an ABS-CBN station ID, I said, “I don’t want a leader. I want a president, a president who will get the job of a president done.”

Free Fire

By Teddy Locsin Jr.

I don’t do leaders. Leaders are for followers or for people with no notion of self-worth. I have too much self-respect to follow anybody, too much pride to obey even the law.

If you don’t catch me breaking the law, that is not because I obey the law. That is because what I freely choose to do just happens not to break the law.

Businessmen break or obey the law all the time—by evading or paying the right taxes. Wage earners do not obey the law. The withholding tax on fixed wages takes that choice away from them.

They can’t cheat if they wanted to.

This is why I wanted to abolish the withholding tax and equalize the opportunity to be honest among the rich and the poor.

The idea of leadership is abhorrent to free men. Leadership is for nobodies and there are quite a few of those in our race. But leadership is really just for tribes; you know, the guys who don’t wear trousers.

Wolves attack in packs, lions in

prides, but only out of convenience.

No one leads the pack or the pride.

Wolves and lions attack each other all the time, not for leadership, but for the biggest slice of the pie—be the pie called Dolores or Mabel. So should it be in a democracy.

There is an ignorant notion that after the election, we must accept the winner, even if we did not vote for him, even if we hate what he stands for. Nowhere in democratic theor y (see Dahl, among others), at least not at Harvard (but perhaps in one of our native state universities) will you find the notion of a mandate.

If your candidate does not win, you continue the fight for the things he stood for in your eyes.

This is how it is in America, France and in all advanced countries. That is how François Mitterand became president of France after 6 elections—each time getting 10 percent more of the vote than the last time; until he woke up to discover he had totaled up a vic-

tory. His followers never deserted him after every defeat; they stuck to him and went on hating the guys who kept beating him. Indeed, the fight goes on; the dream never dies.

Victory never confers a mandate; all it does is give the job. And, as far as we are concerned, the job went to the wrong guy. So we must continue the fight. The ignorant says: Unity is essential to progress.

No, isn’t. That is a baduy notion— the sort of thing that poor provincial people say when they get a bit of education. Diversity is the spark of creativity, and competition the lifeblood of the economy. Unity is for slaves so they pull in the same direction under the lash.

In a free country and a free economy, unity leads to collective catastrophe and to cartels. The one in the lead will always take us in the wrong direction—which is to say into his pocket.

So in the coming elections, vote for the one who stands for the things you want for your country. Vote for

him or her whatever their chances of winning, because if you do—sure, your candidate may lose—but it will be with so big a vote that the winner will ignore your concerns only at grave risk to his political life. That is how it is in America.

The candidate who wins by the skin of his teeth—or even by a large majority but in the teeth of really deep animosity because he is perceived to be a bleeding-heart Negro liberal—that candidate veers totally to the right and the white and becomes all but a member of the Ku Klux Klan so he can govern.

Or else, he will be assassinated.

Democracy needs hate.

So keep up the attacks after the election. There is no such thing as a honeymoon in a democracy.

In a honeymoon, someone opens her legs and always gets screwed.

This is the public; and the one who opens her legs is the media. There can be no rest for the wicked as we see them, like none for the weary who lost a good fight.

We must unite vs govts cracking down on dissent

By Dhananjayan Sriskandarajah Inter Press Service

J

OHANNESBURG—Last month after receiving threats for opposing a hydroelectric project, Berta Caceres, a Honduran indigenous and environmental rights campaigner, was murdered. A former winner of the Goldman Environmental Prize for her opposition to one of Central America’s biggest hydropower projects, Berta was shot dead in her own home.

In the same month South African antimining activist Sikhosiphi Bazooka Radebe, leader of a fiercely fought campaign to protect a pristine stretch of the Pondoland Wild Coast, was also shot dead.

Across the world, civic activists are being detained, tortured and killed. The space for citizens to organize and mobilize is being shut down; dissenting voices are being shut up. In 2015 at least 156 human-rights activists were murdered—156 that we know of.

The scale of the threat cannot be underestimated. The most recent analysis by my Civicus colleagues shows that in 2015 significant violations of civic space were recorded in over 100 countries, up from 96 in 2014. People living in these countries account for roughly 86 percent of the world’s population. This means that sixout-of-seven people live in states

where their basic rights to freedom of association, peaceful assembly and expression are being curtailed or denied. No single region stands out; truly, this is a worldwide trend, a global clampdown.

Hostility toward civil society is becoming normalized, as threats emanate from an increasing range of state and nonstate actors: corrupt politicians and officials, unaccountable security forces, unscrupulous businesses and religious fundamentalists.

But perhaps more worrying is the demonization of civil society in mainstream political discourse. A recent bill in Israel, touted by its supporters as the “Transparency Bill,” places rigorous new disclosure demands on any Israeli nonprofit organization that receives more than 50 percent of its funding from “Foreign Political Entities,” in other words from foreign governments, the European Union or United Nation. Following an escalating global trend, the bill seeks to cast Israeli civil society organizations (CSOs), as disloyal “foreign agents,” demanding that their public communications state the source of their funding and calling for their employees to wear distinctive tags.

In the United Kingdom, recent government efforts to restrict

Illicit financial flows

By Jomo Kwame Sundaram | Inter Press Service

K

UALA LUMPUR, Malaysia—International capital flows are now more than 60 times the value of trade flows. The Bank of International Settlements (BIS) is now of the view that large international financial transactions do not facilitate trade, and that excessive financial “elasticity” was the cause of recent financial crises.

Illicit financial flows involve financial movements from one country to another, especially when funds are illegally earned, transferred and/or utilized. Some examples include: n A cartel using trade-based money-laundering techniques to mix legal money, say from the sale of used cars, with illegal money, e.g., from drug sales; n An importer using trade misinvoicing to evade customs duties, value-added tax (VAT), or income taxes; n A corrupt public official or family members using an anonymous shell company to transfer dirty money to bank accounts elsewhere; n An illegal trafficker carrying cash across the border and depositing it in a foreign bank; or

n A terrorist financier wiring money to an operative abroad.

Global Financial Integrity (GFI) estimated that in 2013, $1.1 trillion left developing countries in illicit financial outflows. Its methodology is considered to be quite conservative, as it does not pick up movements of bulk cash, mispricing of services, or most money laundering.

Beyond the direct economic impact of such massive haemorrhage, illicit financial flows hurt government revenues, and society at large.

They also facilitate transnational organized crime, foster corruption, undermine governance and decrease tax revenues.

Most illicit financial outflows from developing countries ultimately end up in banks in countries, like the United States and the United Kingdom, as well as in tax havens like Switzerland, the Cayman Islands or Singapore. GFI estimates that about 45 percent of illicit flows end up in offshore financial centers and 55 percent in developed countries. University of California, Berkeley Professor Gabriel Zucman has estimated that 6

the lobbying activities of CSOs prompted over 140 charities to express their concern. A proposed new grant agreement clause seeks to prevent UK charities from using their funds to enter into any dialogue with parliament, government or a political party.

In India Prime Minister Modi Narendra has cautioned his judiciary against being influenced by what he called “five-star activists.” Insinuating that the civilsociety sector is elitist and out of touch with realities on the ground, the comments lent renewed impetus to the country’s ongoing crackdown on critical civil-rights activists and nongovernmental organizations.

The recent proliferation of counterterrorism measures has also served to further stigmatize and stifle the sector. By suggesting that nonprofit organizations are particularly vulnerable to abuse or exploitation by terrorist groups, governments have justified new laws and regulatory restrictions on their legitimate activities and the political space they inhabit. Freedom of speech is being silenced, funding sources cut off; the effect has been debilitating.

State surveillance of online activities is also on the rise, as authorities note the power of the

Internet and social media as a tool for citizen mobilization. Governments have woken up to the power of civil society. The deepest fear of repressive regimes is no longer necessarily the rise of new political opposition parties; it is 100,000 of their citizens taking to the streets in the pursuit of change. And so a concerted push-back has begun, an effort to tame civil society, to smother its ability to catalyze social transformation.

We need to push back on these incursions on civic space, urgently and across the world. We need to be challenging our governments over rights violations, about the murder of activists, about their progress in fighting poverty, climate change and inequality.

There is much cause for hope.

Last year, a coalition of Tunisian CSOs won the Nobel Peace Prize for their work in bringing a country back from the brink of civil war and laying the foundations of a pluralistic democracy. The latest innovations in protest and movement building, in technologies that can liberate and mobilize citizens, in citizen-generated data that can empower campaigners and increase transparency around the monitoring of our global goals: All of these signal a new era of dynamic civic activism.

Over the last few days more than 500 leading activists and thinkers gathered at International Civil Society Week 2016 in Bogota, Colombia, to plot civil society’s global fight-back. It is fitting that this meeting took place against a backdrop of the peace negotiations that Colombian civil society has played such a key role in making possible.

Our gathering has the potential to be a defining moment for the future of democratic struggles.

There will be more setbacks, low points and sacrifices to come but the demands for change won’t go away. Nor will civil society’s ability to affect it. A new, radically different vision for the future of civic action is being formulated.

And those of us who believe in a healthy, independent civil society have more responsibility than ever before to keep on making our case.

Knowing the threats she faced, Berta Caceres said, “We must undertake the struggle in all parts of the world, wherever we may be, because we have no spare or replacement planet. We have only this one, and we have to take action.” She was right.

percent to 8 percent of global wealth is offshore, mostly not reported to tax authorities.

GFI’s December 2015 report found developing and emerging economies had lost $7.8 trillion in illicit financial flows over the 10year period of 2004 to 2013, with illicit outflows increasing by an average of 6.5 percent yearly. Over the decade, an average of 83.4 percent of illicit financial outflows were due to fraudulent trade misinvoicing, involving intentional misreporting by transnational companies of the value, quantity or composition of goods on customs declaration forms and invoices, usually for tax evasion.

Illicit capital outflows often involve tax evasion, crime, corruption and other illicit activities.

In the 1960s there was a popular dance called the “limbo rock,” with the winner leaning back as much as possible to get under the bar. Many of today’s financial centers are involved in a similar game to attract customers by offering low tax rates and banking secrecy. This has, in turn, forced many governments to lower direct taxes not only on

income, but also on wealth. From the early 1980s, this was dignified

by US President Ronald Reagan’s embrace of Professor Arthur Laffer’s curve which claimed higher savings, investments and growth with less taxes.

With the decline of government revenue from direct taxes, especially income tax, many governments were forced to cut spending, often by reducing public services, raising user-fees and privatizing state-owned enterprises. Beyond a point, there was little room left for further cuts, and governments had to raise revenue. This typically came from indirect taxes, especially on consumption, as trade taxes were discouraged to promote trade liberalization. Many countries have since adopted VAT, long promoted, in recent decades, by the International Monetary Fund and others as the superior form of taxation: after all, once the system is in place, raising rates is relatively easy.

A progressive tax system would seek to ensure that those with more ability to do so, pay proportionately more tax than those with less ability

to do so. Instead, tax systems have become increasingly regressive, with the growing middle class bearing the main burden of taxes. Meanwhile, tax competition among developing countries has not only reduced tax revenue, but also made direct taxation less progressive, while the growth of VAT has made the overall impact of taxation more regressive as the rich pay proportionately less tax with all the loopholes available to them, both nationally and abroad.

Overall tax incidence in many developing countries has not only long been regressive, but has also become more regressive over time, especially since the 1980s.

Although there are many reasons for income inequality, hidden untaxed wealth has undoubtedly also increased wealth and income inequality at the national and international level.

Dhananjayan Sriskandarajah is the secretary-general of Civicus, the global civil-society alliance.

Jomo Kwame Sundaram was United Nations assistant secretary-general for Economic Development, and received the Wassily Leontief Prize for Advancing the Frontiers of Economic Thought in 2007.

NewsSunday BusinessMirror

A6 Sunday, May 1, 2016

Bayan Muna slams killing of Samar leader

B

AYAN Muna party-list group on Saturday denounced the killing of Emil Go, its Northern Samar lead convenor, by unidentified assailants in Palapag town on Friday.

members of our society. We condemn in the strongest terms the killing of Emil Go, and demand prompt justice for his senseless slaying,” Colmenares added.

“President Aqu i no’s daang matuwid is now further heavily drenched by the blood of the innocents—from the massacre of farmers in Kidapawan just earlier this month to the slaying of Emil Go,” he said.

Me a nw h i l e , Z a r at e not e d that the killing could be election-related.

“A bloodless election has yet to happen in Philippine history. Gold, guns and goons have always been in the arsenal of the traditional politicians. It is truly unfortunate and disgraceful that Emil's life—spent as a long-time activist and human-rights defender—is senselessly snuffed just because of

COLMENARES: “The Aquino administration is now drawing to a close, yet, there is no let up still in the brutalities against the people and progressive members of our society. ”

Party-list Reps. Neri J. Colmenares and Carlos Isagani Zarate of Bayan Muna said in a statement that they condemned Go’s killing “in the strongest possible term.”

Go was shot just 10 days before the May 9 national elections, reports from a local human-rights organization said.

The victim was the lead convenor of Bayan Muna when it was established in Northern Samar

in 2001 and became a leader of the Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (Bayan) from 2001 to 2004.

He was also the convenor of the human-rights watchdog Katungod in 1999.

Go is a known supporter of the senatorial bid of Colmenares.

“The Aquino administration is now drawing to a close, yet, there is no let up still in the brutalities against the people and progressive

UP students’ wireless water quality-testing

Government workers get midyear bonus

device wins Smart health hackathon

A

GROUP of physics students from the University of the Philippines-Diliman bagged the gold prize in the #thinkOPENhealth: Hackathon for Health held recently at the Asian Institute of Management in Makati City.

Twenty-one teams composed of information-technology professionals and students, physicians and nurses competed in the 24-hour hackathon, organized by Philippine Long Distance Telephone (PLDT) wireless unit—Smart Communications (Smart)—the Department of Health (DOH) and the Department of Science and Technology—Philippine Council for Research and Development (DOST-PCHRD), in coordination with SmartDevNet, Smart’s developer community.

T he hackathon encourages developers to create plug-ins for the Shine OS+, an open-sourced electronic medical record (EMR) system developed by the Ateneo Java Wireless Competency Center in partnership with Smart.

Used mainly by local government-operated health-care facilities as an EMR, Shine OS+ has now opened its API to provide access to other systems enabling data sharing and interoperability that can improve the provision of healthcare services by local government and national health agencies, adhering to the goal on universal health-care program.

“At Smart, we have optimized mobile- and Web-based technologies to create solutions to realworld problems. In the case of Shine OS+, we want to help make health-care services accessible to more Filipinos,” said Ramon R. Isberto, Smart’s public affairs head.

“The hackathon helps our department think out of the box. If we want to have better outcomes, we should not be doing things again and again and expect different outcomes. We intend to adopt the innovative solutions that have been brought up by these young people,” Health Underscretary Kenneth Hartigan Go said.

Paul Pajo, senior developer evangelist of Smart, said: “Shine has a lot of features and they have interoperability with other systems. The developers are now tasked to see how to exploit these interoperabilities by creating a plug-in.”

UP Diliman’s Team Quantum Hackers won the gold award for their mobile wireless sensor-based water quality-testing device and app called Shine Herald. It tests the salinity (saltiness) and turbidity (cloudiness) of water samples to help prevent and monitor water-borne diseases. Team members Norman Mascarinas, a graduate student, and undergrads Kit Guial and Junelle Bacong, won P100,000.

By David Cagahastian @davecaga

G

OVERNMENT employees, including militar y and other uniformed personnel, will start receiving their 14th month pay for this year starting May 15, the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) said.

Budget Secretary Florencio B. Abad has issued the guidelines to determine the government employees who will be qualified to be given the 14th month pay as mandated by President Aquino’s Executive Order 201 issued in February.

“Eight in every 10 civilian personnel will receive their midyear bonus in full, or tax-free under Republic Act 10653, which provides that gross benefits, such as the 13th month pay and other benefits, not exceeding P82,000 shall be tax exempt,” Abad said. “ These means the majority of civilian personnel will take home their midyear bonus in full. They are the 970,943 civil-

ian employees belonging to Salary Grades 1 to 16,” he added.

EO 201 issued by Aquino provides qualified government employees with a midyear bonus equivalent to one month’s basic salary as of May 15. The grant of the midyear bonus also covers military and uniformed personnel.

Budget Circular 2016-3 issued

by Abad provides the qualifications for the grant of the midyear bonus for civilian positions, whether regular, casual or contractual, appointive or elective, or full-time or part-time in nature. The circular also provides the qualifications for the grant of the midyear bonus to military and uniformed personnel.

Under the circular, a government employee must have rendered at least a total or an aggregate of four months of service from July 1, 2015 to May 15, 2016, obtained, at least, a satisfactory performance rating in the immediately preceding period, and should still be in the service as of May 15.

T hose w ith less than four

election ambitions and interests,” Zarate said.

“The people has had enough of daang matuwid, and it should end with Aquino’s term. The people should reject this corrupt, brutal, and human-rights violating administration of Aquino, including his putative successor and his minions,” Zarate concluded.

Marvyn N. Benaning

months of service, or those that are no longer in the service as of May 15, shall not be entitled to the bonus.

The grant of midyear bonuses, which is expected to cost P31 billion this year, will be funded from the Miscellaneous Personnel Benefits Fund.

For government-owned and -controlled corporations (GOCCs), the governing board shall determine the grant of the bonus charged against approved corporate operating budgets. If funds are insufficient, they may grant at lower rates but at uniform percentage of the basic monthly salary as of May 15.

For local governments, the city or town council or provincial board shall determine the grant of the bonus charged against, subject to the personnel services limitation in the budgets of the local government concerned. They may also grant at lower rates but at uniform percentage of the basic monthly salary as of May 15, if funds are insufficient.

www.businessmirror.com.ph

RTC in QC grants TRO on bus GPS use; LTFRB to appeal court’s ruling

A

TRIAL court in Quezon City has issued a temporary restraining order (TRO) against the implementation of a Land Transportation Franchising and Regulator y Board (LTFRB) order to provincial bus companies to install global positioning system (GPS) devices that it sells in every provincial bus in the country.

T he LT F R B i m me d i ate ly said it will appeal the order either through a motion for reconsideration or an appeal to a higher court.

Judge Marilou Tamang of Branch 98 of the Regional Trial Court in Quezon City issued the TRO after the filing of a petition made by the Provincial Bus Operators Association of the Philippines (PBOAP), which has been renamed Nagkakaisang Samahan ng Nangangasiwa ng Panlalawigang Bus sa Pilipinas, asking the court relief from the order, which is supposed to be implemented on April 30. Inspite of a court notice, no LTFRB official attended the TRO hearing.

PBOAP Executive Director Alex Yague said the group is opposing the LTFRB order because there is a similar measure now pending in Congress. Yague says Congress needs time to further study the measure if it, indeed, would benefit the provincial bus sector in the long run.

Various transport groups are opposing the measure because of the absence of proof that the installation of GPS devices would improve traffic and enhance bus services.

“The order is unjust and it is not yet time to implement such a requirement. First, Congress needs to approve the proposed measure first. At this early, Congress is not too keen on requiring provincial bus companies to

install GPS devices because of its tremendous cost. Second, the use of GPS devices should be studied thoroughly first by Congress before LTFRB can even implement it. This proposal is still pending in Congress,” Yague said in an interview with reporters.

Yague clarified that the group wants the GPS program to succeed, that explains why such a move should undergo careful study, so that in the end, no one is to be blamed if it fails. “ Imagine, installing new GPS devices regardless of whether a bus unit right now already has its own GPS. Why would operators with old buses buy new GPS devices when these gadgets can actually be installed upon purchase of the bus? If the LTFRB order pushes through with this, it would surely costs a lot for operators who are burdened by extremely high costs of bus maintenance,” Yague added.

New bus units, Yague said, are now priced at P5 milalion each.

New GPS gadgets being sold by the LTFRB cost P12,000, with P700 to P900 per month additional payments. Under the new LTFRB memorandum circular, the agency will neither allow the issuance of new registration to public utility vehicles, such as buses, taxis, trucks, Asianutility vehicles and passenger jeepneys, nor grant renewal licenses to bus companies if no GPS gadget were installed in the unit.

The LTFRB is supposed to implement the memo circular on April 30.

Efforts made by Congress to implement a similar order was stalled shortly after various transport groups protested against it. Such a measure would just add to the additional financial burdens already being borned by bus companies.

INC sets 4 new Guinness World Records in one day

‘Y

OU are once again officially amazing!”

Four new Guinness World Records were set by the Iglesia Ni Cristo (INC), as four Guinness adjudicators declared that the religious organization was once again “officially amazing” on Friday, as it concluded its historic “Aid to Humanity” in Tondo, Manila.

Amid a chorus of claps and cheers, the four Guinness adjudicators declared that the INC had set four more Guinness world records that day—an amazing feat by itself. This means that the INC now has 18 Guinness world records in all.

The four new world records were for the largest collection of clothes for recycle-donation; the most shoes donated to charity in 24 hours; the most medical ultrasound examinations in eight hours; and the most number of medical risk- assessment tests in eight hours.

The announcements were made inside the INC house of worship in Tondo, Manila.

It was the record on the shoe donations that was the fastest to be set. The number of shoes donated was 17,000 pairs, which even exceeded the original target of 15,000 pairs. And it took the INC volunteers only less than two hours to distribute the shoes because of the large crowd.

This was a new record altogether. Another new record set by the INC was for the number of most medical risk-assessment tests in eight hours with a total number of 4,784.

The INC was also able to distribute more than 200,000 used clothes, thus breaking the previous record set by the Rescue Mission of Trenton, New Jersey, in the United States on November 15, 2015, for 179,550 clothes donated.

The Guinness adjudicators themselves were amazed with what happened, saying that no other organization in the world was able to achieve four new Guinness World records in a single day.

INC General Auditor Minister Glicerio B. Santos Jr. said this was made possible because of God’s help.

“Ang lahat ng ito ay gawa ng ating Panginoong Diyos. Siya ang dapat nating pasalamatan. Ibalik natin sa Kanya ang lahat ng kapurihan.

[All of these are the work of our Lord God. We should thank Him. We should give back all the praises to Him],” he said in an interview after the annoucement.

S antos als o thanke d INC E xe c u t i ve M i n i s te r B ro t he r Eduardo V. Manalo.

“Gayon din sinasamantala ko ang pagkakataong ito upang pasalamatan ang Kapatid na Eduardo V. Manalo na siyang nagpasya ng lahat ng ito,” Santos said.

Guinness World Records adjudicator Rishi Nath said the biggest challenge here was the strict conditions set by Guinness that the INC had to follow.

For the donation of the used clothes, all the items “would have to be clean, and in a condition which is wearable,” he said.

“That was the biggest challenge on the part of the Iglesia Ni Cristo. However, they have managed

Bridge of unity

Foreign Secretary Jose Rene D. Almendras (left) and Republic of Korea Ambassador Kim Jae-shin sign the agreement for a P4.859-billion loan for the Panguil Bay Bridge Project of the Department of Public Works and Highways at the Bureau of the Treasury, Intramuros, Manila. The bridge will connect Tangub, Misamis Occidental, and Tubod, Lanao del Norte. PNA photo courtesy of the Department of Foreign Affairs

it really well. All the clothes were washed. All the clothes were in good condition,” he added.

Another Guinness adjudicator inspected the distribution of shoes, which were all new, at the INC’s event in Tondo.

Swapnil Dangarikar said the shoes should all be in good condition, and should be wearable.

Lucia Sinigaglieu, another Guinness official adjudicator, who was present at the INC’s massive “Aid to Humanity” in Tondo, was assigned to check on the medical risk-assessment record attempt of the INC at the Isabelo delos Reyes Elementary School in Tondo, Manila.

Another Guinness adjudica-

tor Lena Kathmann inspected the medical ultrasound examinations of the INC. T he INC conducted more than 7,000 ultrasound examinations, beating the record set by the Chinese Taipei Rotary International Districts on December 15, 2015, of 2,434 ultrasound examinations.

Sports LA SALLE DETHRONES ATENEO BusinessMirror

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

championship series with a an epic comefrom-behind 18-25, 26-28, 25-17, 25-16, 15-11 five-set victory on Wednesday at the Mall of Asia Arena.

“Noong game namin sa Game Two, nakita namin kung ano ’yung problema, kaya sinabi ko kailangan natin matuto doon,” La Salle Head Coach Ramil de Jesus said.

Dy beat out her teammates Kim Fajardo, Ara Galang and Mika Reyes for the MVP trophy in the finals, but dedicated her award to the graduating players in the squad.

“Nag-enjoy kami. Iyon talaga ’yung winning formula, we enjoyed the game,” said Dy, who finished with 17 points on 16 kills and an ace. “This game dine-dedicate namin ‘to sa seniors. Thank you, seniors; we will miss you.”

Best Blocker Majoy Baron chipped in 11 markers on five blocks, three service aces and three attacks. Tournament Best Setter Fajardo paced the team with 51 excellent sets, including 11 digs and six points, while Best Digger and Best Receiver Dawn Macandili had 27 digs.

Reyes, Galang and Cyd Demecillo played their last UAAP game all with nine points

By Lance Agcaoili

D

E LA SALLE exacted its sweet revenge to Ateneo as it bucked a first-set loss in pulling off a 19-25, 25-21, 25-16, 25-16 in the deciding Game Three to bag its ninth crown in the University Athletic Association of the Philippines (UAAP) Season 78 women’s volleyball tournament on Saturday at the jam-packed Smart-Araneta Coliseum.

The Lady Spikers showed resilience after dropping the opening set and rode on the brilliance of finals Most Valuable Player (MVP) Kim Dy to give senior players a fitting ending in front of 22,848 screaming fans at the Big Dome.

It was La Salle’s ninth UAAP crown for third place overall behind University of Santo Tomas with 14 and Far Eastern University with 29.

The volleybelles from Taft Avenue never wavered when it mattered most as they displayed tremendous focus after blowing a 2-0 set lead in Game Two, as the Alyssa Valdez-led Lady Eagles tied the

Sunday, May 1, 2016 A7

Players and members of the coaching staff of De La Salle celebrate after reclaiming the crown of the University Athletic Association of the Philippines women’s volleyball over Ateneo. ROY DOMINGO

each. Carol Cerveza and Mika Esperanza also played their final game as Lady Spikers.

Coming off a frustrating Game Two, the Lady Spikers seemed to have yet bucked all disappointments as they succumbed the opening set to the Lady Eagles-led threetime MVP Valdez.

But they caught fire in the second set and took a 16-10 lead. Ateneo, however, stormed back tying it to 17-all and reached 19-all. The Taft-based squad scored six of the last eight points to level the match at 1-1.

The momentum swung to the green side, which dominated the third set, 20-12, and never looked back to take a 2-1 lead.

La Salle made it sure that there will be no meltdown, as the Lady Spikers exploded the most in the fourth set and built a 16-5 margin and continued to sizzle, stretching it to 21-9 lead to dethrone Ateneo.

Valdez ended her UAAP career with 31 points, highlighted by 30 kills. Jhoana Maraguinot delivered 10 markers, while Jia Morado had 49 excellent sets and six points.

Graduating Mae Tajima had two points, while Amy Ahomiro played her last game struggling with only a point.

AYO DEBUTS IN STYLE D

By Rick Olivares

E La Salle University (DSLU) won the war of attrition over the pesky Adamson University, 98-88, in the inaugural match of the 2016 Filoil Flying V Premier Cup on Saturday.

The Green Archers looked they were going to blow out Adamson when they spotted their foes a 15-point lead, 28-13, with 1:28 left in the first quarter with a power inside game behind Jeron Teng, Ben Mbala and Jayboy Gob. Matters looked bleak for Adamson with Papi Sarr on the bench with foul trouble, yet, the Falcons’ second unit of Dawn Ochea, Harold Ng, Khristian Bernardo, with new acquisitions Robby Manalang and Sean Maganti, rallied to take the lead, 34-32.

The Green Archers regained the lead heading into the half, 48-45. In the fourth period, DLSU took advantage of the absence of Manalang and Ng who both went down with cramps to lead by 14, 87-73, after a Kib Montalbo triple. Adamson attempted one last rally but a full-court press employed by the Archers squelched any thoughts of an upset.

“I think we’re at 60 percent to 70 percent in terms of playing the system that I want,” first year La Salle Head Coach Aldin Ayo said of his new wards’ effort. “If you look at all my players, none of them played for teams that did a lot of trapping. They know the concept but their bodies haven’t adjusted to playing it. But it was a good win.”

Teng led all scorers with 30 points. Gob added 20 points and seven rebounds, while Cameroonian center Mbala finished with a double-double of 13 points and 10 rebounds.

Adamson saw five players reach double digits, with FilipinoAmerican Sean Maganti leading the way with 13 points. Manalang

and Terrence Mustre, who played on La Salle’s University Athletic Association of the Philippines Season 76 champion team before transferring to the San Marcelino campus, finished with 11 points each. Ng and Ochea both had 10.

In the other seniors match, University of the East (UE) rallied to defeat Ateneo, 93-91, in overtime.

The Blue Eagles led by seven, 75-68, with two minutes left in regulation, but consecutive turnovers and two huge missed free throws by Mike Nieto allowed the Red Warriors to send the match in extension via a threepointer by Edson Batiller.

In overtime, Renz Palma proved to be a handful for Ateneo as he drove the lane and found the basket at will. He hit four straight free throws with power forward Clark Derige chipping in one point to spot Ateneo a five-point lead.

The Blue Eagles’ Adrian Wong sank a triple before the buzzer for the final scoreline. Palma led UE with 22 points while Team B call-up Alvin Pasaol added 15 while last year’s star, Battiler, scored 14.

Chibueze Ikeh led Ateneo with 28 points while rookie Tyler Tio finished with 19.

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Ateneo’s Thirdy Ravena drives past Ronnie de Leon of University of the East. NONOY LACZA

ADAMSON, U.P. DOWN RIVALS TO BOOST ASAPHIL G.S. BIDS

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BOWLING CHAMP Benshir Layoso (second from left) leads winners of the mixed open master’s division of the 27th Tenpin Bowling AffiliationBoysen Easter Open Bowling Championship held recently at the Superbowl Makati Cinema Square. Also in the photo was organizer Alex Lim (right).

DAMSON University and University of the Philippines (UP) dished out top form and defeated their respective rivals to bolster the title drive in the women’s Open division of the 10th Summer Grand Slam softball tournament presented by Cebuana Lhuillier at the Batangas Sports Complex on Saturday.

The defending champion Lady Falcons overpowered the University of the East (UE) Lady Warriors, 8-3, while the Lady Maroons pulled off a 1-0 win over the National University Lady Bulldogs in the premier side of women’s play in the annual event sanctioned by the Amateur Softball Association of the Philippines (Asaphil).

The chase for finals berths in the women’s club section also heated up with Adamson-B edging San Mateo-Rizal to complete a double win in the day for the San Marcelino-based squad.

But Tanauan-A stunned defending

champion UP, 6-3, heading to the final day of the weeklong tournament which featured the country’s top teams in the men’s and women’s Open and the men’s and women’s club.

“We’re one day away from determining the champions of this year’s Summer Grand Slam tournament and we’ve been witnessing nothing but a great display of softball skills and exciting competition every single day,” Asaphil President Jean Henri Lhuillier said.

“I am very glad that, aside from helping these athletes improve their sport and showcase their skills, we’re also providing them a platform to develop the essential values to be successful in life.”

Close to 50 squads are seeing action in the tournament, including softball teams from Indonesia and Malaysia, while Philippine Air Force is the defending men’s Open, and the San Antonio Bobcats are the team to beat in the men’s club division.

NIETES TO DEFEND CROWN AGAINST MEXICAN RIVAL IN PINOY PRIDE 36

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HE country’s longest-reigning world champion Donnie “Ahas” Nietes will defend his World Boxing Organization (WBO) light-flyweight title against Mexican Raul Garcia in ALA Promotion’s “Pinoy Pride 36: A Legend in the Making” on May 28 at the Saint La Salle Coliseum in Bacolod City.

Nietes, who holds a record 37 wins,

one loss, with 23 knockouts (KOs), braces for a tough stance from the challenge, whose twin brother, Ramon, lost to the Filipino boxer in 2011 to keep the 108-pound division belt.

The 33-year-old fighting pride of Murcia, Negros Occidental, can punch his way for a showdown with WBO and

World Boxing Association flyweight champion Juan Francisco Estrada if he wins convincingly in his assignment against Garcia (38-3-1, 23 KOs), which will be his ninth defense of his light-flyweight crown.

Also added to the stacked fight card are ALA’s Milan Melindo and King Arthur Villanueva.

Melindo (33-2, 12 KOs), who bowed to Estrada three years ago in his attempt to snatch the twin titles, will face Javier Mendoza (24-3-1,19 KOs) from Mexico for the second time after losing via technical decision for the International Boxing Federation light-flyweight belt in May 2015.

Villanueva (28-1, 14 KOs), on the other

hand, will slug it out with Juan Jimenez (229, 15 KOs) in their super-flyweight bout.

In their last outings in Cebu last November, Melindo beat the previously unbeaten Victor Emmanuel Olivo, while Villanueva, also a Negrense, escaped the rough challenge presented by Victor Mendez, scoring a split decision. Ramon Rafael Bonilla

Elasto Painters eye finals slot vs Beermen

AN Miguel Beer tries to stay alive again as it seeks the equalizer against Rain or Shine in Game Four of their best-of-five semifinal series of the Philippine Basketball Association (PBA) Commissioner’s Cup on Sunday at the Smart Araneta Coliseum.

The Beermen hope to send the series into a deciding Game Five with a win in their 5 p.m. encounter with balik-import Arizona Reid suiting up for the Philippine Cup champions.

Reid replaced Tyler Wilkerson, who was sacked by the San Miguel Beer management for his behavior after the team’s 96-98 loss in Game Two. Head Coach Leo Austria decided to play all Filipino in Game Three and behind Marcio Lassiter, Alex Cabagnot and Arwind Santos, the Beermen managed to prolong their campaign with a 104-98 win to stay alive in the series.

“I hope that win will be a rallying point for my players,” Austria said. “And we will treat it one game at a time.”

After a quiet first two games, Lassiter exploded for 30 points in Game Three, highlighted by five-of-eight shooting from the rainbow territory.

Cabagnot was also instrumental in that victory with 28 points, six assists and five rebounds, while Santos added 18 markers.

Rain or Shine Head Coach Yeng Guiao remains confident that his wards will reach the finals.

“We just postponed our trip to the finals,” Guiao said. “My feeling is we’ll get there only in a longer while. We still feel positive of our chances. Parang may twiceto-beat advantage pa rin kami.”

Guiao admitted that his players might be too eager to finish off the Beermen in Game Three that’s why they had some defensive lapses, especially guarding the three-point zone.

The temperamental mentor knows that they need to get the job done on Sunday, as a loss would give San Miguel added confidence going into the deciding Game Five.

“It becomes more difficult the more you postpone it. So we need to close it out as soon as possible,” Guiao said.

Meanwhile, solo leader Rain or Shine stormed to its third straight win on Saturday, even as similarly unbeaten Globalport kept pace with second-running Barangay Ginebra San Miguel in the 2016 Under Armour-Batang PBA 12-and-under tournament at the Philippine Science High School gym in Quezon City.

In other games, Star debuted with a hard-earned 52-43 overtime win over Alaska, with Jhazel Aerol Paguiligan firing 14 points for the Batang Hotshots.

Regulation ended with the scored tied, 33-all. Tropang TNT, meantime, rallied from a slim third-quarter deficit to edge Blackwater, 59-56, as Ariel Leandro Diloy tallied 16 points and Timothy Rich Cruz 13.

Joel Orellana

Sports BusinessMirror

GAME

Indiana, Miami force K.O. match

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NDIANAPOLIS—Paul George scored 21 points, Myles Turner added 15, and the Indiana Pacers beat the Toronto Raptors, 101-83, on Friday night to force a Game Seven of their series.

That will be played on Sunday in Toronto, and the winner will advance to the Eastern Conference semifinals.

Miami also forced a Game Seven in its series against Charlotte as Dwyane Wade led the Heat past the Hornets. Indiana scored 18 straight points in the second half to pull away from the second-seeded Raptors, who haven’t won a postseason series since the first round in 2001.

DeMarre Carroll and Cory Joseph each had 15 points for the Raptors.

Kyle Lowry (four-for-14) and DeMar DeRozan (three-for-13) struggled again and now the Raptors will head home and hear again about their troubled playoff problems: a Game-Seven loss at home to Brooklyn in 2014, Washington’s four-game sweep last season and no series wins in a seven-game series. And their 15-year victory drought is the longest active streak in the league.

Indiana trailed by as much as 12 early, never

led until early in the third quarter and had to fend off a late third-quarter charge from the Raptors before blowing it open in the fourth.

After Toronto cut the deficit to 65-64, Indiana responded by scoring the last six points of the third and the first 12 of the fourth to take an 83-64 lead.

The Raptors never recovered.

For Indiana, it was a dramatic turnabout.

Three days after blowing a 13-point, fourthquarter lead, they came out flat. The Pacers struggled to make baskets, struggled to defend and played catch-up the entire first half after Toronto took an 18-6 lead, just six-and-a-half minutes into the game.

But once the Pacers got righted, they took control and pulled away.

Indiana rebounded from a 44-40 halftime deficit with a 10-2 run to take its first lead, 49-48, on Ian Mahinmi’s tip-in, with 9:33 left.

They extended the lead to 63-55 before Toronto

Miami Heat’s Dwyane Wade points after making a big three-point basket against the Charlotte Hornets. AP

SEVEN

charged back to get within 65-64 in the final two minutes of the quarter.

Indiana scored the next 18 points to seal it.

Miami’s Wade scored 10 of his 23 points in the fourth quarter, making his first three-pointer of 2016, and the Heat beat Charlotte 97-90.

Luol Deng was nine-of-14 from the field and finished with 21 points, while Goran Dragic added 14 points and seven rebounds for the Heat, who will host Game Seven on Sunday.

The Heat overcame a playoff career-high 37 points from Kemba Walker to hand the Hornets only their 11th loss of the season at home. Al Jefferson had 18 points and nine rebounds, and Cody Zeller had 12 points off the bench for Charlotte.

With Miami leading by two, Wade hit his first three-pointer since December with 46 seconds left and added an 18-foot turnaround jump shot over Courtney Lee to help seal the win.

The Hornets missed a golden opportunity to advance to the second round of the playoffs for the first time in 14 years.

They trailed the entire second half, never quite able to get over the hump and the Heat made timely shots and grabbed crucial rebounds.

Miami outrebounded Charlotte 46-31.

Walker gave it all he had.

The 6-foot-1 point guard somehow got an up-and-under layup to fall amid the trees, then

hit a three-pointer from the left wing to beat the shot clock and cut the Miami lead to 85-81.

Hassan Whiteside returned to the game with 4:20 left and immediately made an impact, scoring on an offensive rebound. But Walker drove the lane and drew an and-one with three minutes to go, sending Whiteside to the bench with his sixth foul. Walker then added a razzledazzle step-back jumper to trim the Heat lead to 90-86 with 2:12 left in the game.

After a Miami miss, Walker drove the baseline after for a reverse to cut the lead to two, with 1:33 remaining.

After Deng shot an airball on a threepointer from the top of the key on Miami’s next possession and the Heat were called for a shot clock violation, the Hornets had a chance to tie.

But Walker, who was 14-of-30 from the field, missed a pull-up jumper. Wade answered with a three-pointer from the left wing to push Miami’s lead back to five with 46 seconds remaining. Jefferson scored off a dish from Walker, but Wade splashed a turnaround jumper from 18 feet over Lee’s outstretched hand to push the lead back to five with 19.5 seconds left.

Walker missed a driving layup and Joe Johnson added two free throws the seal the game. Portland Trailblazers advanced to the second round, finishing off the undermanned Los Angeles Clippers with a 106-103 win in Game Six and clinched the series, 4-2. AP

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unday, May 1, 2016 mirror_sports@yahoo.com.ph sports@businessmirror.com.ph Editor: Jun Lomibao

LAKERS, WALTON REACH AGREEMENT

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OS ANGELES—The Los Angeles Lakers reached an agreement on Friday with their former player and current Golden State assistant Luke Walton to become their head coach, choosing a leader for their new era after Kobe Bryant.

The Lakers grabbed Walton just five days after they fired Byron Scott, who led the 16-time National Basketball Association (NBA) champions to the two worst seasons in franchise history.

Walton spent nine seasons with the Lakers, winning two championship rings as a smart, steady contributor. Three years after his retirement, the 36-year-old is back to become the 26th head coach in franchise history.

“We’re excited to bring Luke back to Los Angeles, where we feel he’s going to start an outstanding coaching career,” Lakers General Manager Mitch Kupchak said. “He’s one of the brightest young coaching minds in the game and we feel fortunate that he’ll be leading the on-court future of our team.”

Walton seemed to be the ideal candidate for the Lakers from the start, given his equal fluency in the Lakers’ history and the Warriors’ cutting-edge brand of beautiful basketball. He’ll have the chance to mold the Lakers’ on-court approach in any way he chooses, with the franchise ripe for reinvention after the 20year career of Bryant.

“We are thrilled for Luke,” Warriors General Manager Bob Myers said. “This is a tremendous opportunity for him to return home and serve as head coach for one of the most storied franchises in sports. Luke has done an incredible job during his two-year stint with our team and has played a significant role in our success.”

Walton, who got a multiyear contract, will join the Lakers after the Warriors’ playoff run.

That could take several weeks, because Golden State is headed for the second round with designs on a second straight championship.

Walton became a top candidate for coaching jobs earlier this season when he led Golden State to a 39-4 record as the interim head coach, while Steve Kerr was sidelined by a back injury. Walton coolly stepped in and coaching the Warriors to an NBA-record 24-0 start before ceding the job back to Kerr.

Walton even finished eighth in the voting for NBA’s Coach of the Year award, which went to Kerr.

He won’t have nearly the same level of talent in Los Angeles, which is rebuilding after the retirement of Bryant, Walton’s longtime teammate.

The Lakers’ core consists of recent draft picks D’Angelo Russell, Julius Randle and Jordan Clarkson, alongside an unremarkable collection of veterans and young players.

Los Angeles went 21-61 and 17-65 under Scott. AP WALTON