THE MANILA TIMES | JULY 30, 2019

Customs collects P6.48-B taxes from rice imports »Story on B1 HH

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TUESDAY, JULY 30, 2019

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MA L AC A Ñ A N G:

PCSO closure temporary

BY CATHERINE S. VALENTE

For fraud, waste and abuse in government, inspector general system is the cure

T

HE closure of the lottery and other games operated by the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO) is only temporary, Malacañang said on Monday.

OBSERVER YEN MAKABENTA

First word EST the government embarks on a policy of rehiring all retired and pensioned military officers as a means to straighten out the public service and, secondly, lest civilians are demoted to junior status in our government system, I want to renew a recommendation I made in this column in November last year, wherein I argued that the Congress should enact a law to institutionalize the well-proven inspector general system as the primary tool for upgrading the quality of public management in our government system.

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äObserverA4

Why Digong scrapped all PCSO franchises

Y

IN MY LINE OF SIGHT

OU know why President Digong was so pissed off about the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO)?

RAMON T. TULFO

äIn my line of sightA5

Presidential spokesman Salvador Panelo said lotto, keno and other PCSO games would remain closed until the government concludes its investigation of the supposed “massive corruption” within the agency Panelo, in a radio interview, said President Duterte was “thoroughly” investigating the alleged corruption at the PCSO. He assured the public that the probe would be swift.

“Sabi nga ni Presidente, iniimbestigahan niyang maigi para malaman niya at matukoy niya kung sino ‘yung mga involved at i-a-identify niya lahat sa lalong madaling panahon (The

TOO LATE

Help came too late for Edwin Ponce, whose body was found by a rescue team on Monday in a cave in Sta. Maria village in Itbayat, Batanes. PHOTO BY DJ DIOSINA

»Story on A2

äTemporaryA2

‘Terrorists wiped out in 3 to 6 months’ DEFENSE Secretary Delfin Lorenzana has set an ambitious deadline to wipe out extremists in Sulu — three to six months.

Lorenzana came up with the timeframe

as he disclosed that the seven foreign terrorists, who linked up with the Abu Sayyaf Group and other local terrorist groups in

Mindanao, came from Syria.

The Defense chief, in an interview with CNN Philippines, said security experts believed that the foreign jihadists in Sulu

What’s inside STATE OF CALAMITY EYED FOR BATANES

NewsA2

Antonio ContrerasA4 n Manila Mayor Francis ‘Isko’ Moreno Domagoso raises the hand of Sen. Emmanuel ‘Pacman’ Pacquiao who visited him at City Hall.

PHOTO BY ENRIQUE AGCAOILI

Pacman visits Isko

SportsD1

CARLA JUST WAITING FOR TOM TO POP ‘MAGIC QUESTION’

EntertainmentE1

äWiped outA8

DoH chief’s brother named PCA chief

STATE OF CONFUSION

TNT GUNS FOR FIRST FINALS BERTH VS GINEBRA

were Indonesians and Malaysians, while a few came from Egypt and Singapore.

“We are really monitoring them [in

SEN. Emmanuel “Pacman” Pacquiao expressed his admiration for Manila Mayor Francisco “Isko” Moreno Domogoso when he called on the mayor

at the Manila City Hall on Monday.

Speaking after the flag-raising ceremony led by the mayor, the

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E-mail: newsdesk@ manilatimes.net Tel. Nos.: 5245664 to 67 Address: 2/F Sitio Grande, 409 A. Soriano Avenue, Intramuros, Manila 1002

äVisitsA2

PRESIDENT Rodrigo Duterte has appointed the brother of Health Secretary Francisco Duque 3rd as administrator of the Philippine Coconut Authority (PCA).

Palace spokesman Salvador Panelo said Gonzalo Duque took his oath as PCA chief before Executive Secretary Salvador Medialdea on Monday morning. äNamedA2

Earth’s 2019 resources ‘budget’ spent by July 29 PARIS: Mankind will have used up its allowance of natural resources such as water, soil and clean air for all of 2019 by July 29, a report said.

The so-called Earth Overshoot Day has moved up by two months over the past 20 years and this year’s date is the earliest ever, the study by the

ä’Budget’A2

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ASIAN STOCKS: t

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PSEi

8,188.52 UP 0.06%

P51.09 TO $1

Shanghai 0.12%

What’s inside TARIFF ROLLOUT HURTS PH RICE MILLERS

»BusinessB2

FARMGATE PRICE OF PALAY UP IN 2ND WEEK OF JULY

»BusinessB2

MERALCO INCOME HITS P12B IN JAN-JUNE

»Corporate NewsB3

US-CHINA TALKS REVIVED WITH LOW HOPES

»Foreign BusinessB4

BEYOND BUZZWORDS

www.manilatimes.net

S i n g a p o re 0 . 5 2 %

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Seoul 1.78%

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To k yo 0 . 1 9 %

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Jakarta 0.41%

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H o n g Ko n g 1 . 0 3 %

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BY MAYVELIN U. CARABALLO

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HE government has collected as of mid-July more than P6 billion in duties from rice imported by private traders since Republic Act 11203 or the Rice Tariffication Act took effect in March, the Department of Finance (DoF) reported on Monday.

In a statement, the Finance department quoted the Bureau of Customs

(BoC) as saying in a report to Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez 3rd that

preliminary data showed that it had collected P6.479 billion from importertraders as of July 15.

With the tax collected to date, the DoF is optmitistic that the Customs bureau “remains on course to collect the minimum of P10 billion needed for the RCEF per year,” referring to the Rice Competitiveness Enhancement Fund.

RA 11203 set up the RCEF to finance the modernization of the agriculture

B a n g ko k 0 . 7 5 %

New government mechanism needed “[The] global economy is in transition toward greater integration. A new gov-

äWar B4

ROUGH TRADE BEN KRITZ was some planning and a substantial objective involved in the PCSO shutdown, the whole thing really was an off-the-cuff decision untainted by neither forethought nor real goals.

Third, there is the undeniable fact that the PCSO is a legitimate target. The lottery operator has been a bog of corruption for a long time, as evidenced by the number of former PCSO officials and employees who have gone down behind corruption charges over the years, and the PCSO falls under the jurisdiction of the Office of the President, so there is no legal ambiguity about whether or not his drastic action was allowed.

äKritz B4

sector, and provide farmers with access to credit and training, as well as funds for mechanization, high-quality seeds and fertilizers, among others.

The Finance department said BoC collections from these imports since the enactment of the law would benefit palay (unhusked rice) growers, as such revenues were earmarked for the annual P10-billion RCEF.

äImports B2

PSEi flat, traders on wait-andsee mode

Shanghai on Tuesday and Wednesday, a month after US President Donald Trump and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping agreed during the Group of 20 meeting in Osaka, Japan to go back to the negotiating table after talks stalled in May. Tensions between the world’s two leading economies — which began last year after Trump accused China of engaging in unfair trade practices — saw them slapping tit-for-tat tariffs worth billions of dollars on each other’s goods. These put global markets on edge for months and resulted in reduced growth projections for this year.

Ad hoc governance

BSERVING the uproar that has erupted over the past couple of days as a result of President Rodrigo Durterte’s sudden clampdown on the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office’s (PCSO) gaming operations has been entertaining, for reasons that mostly do not put the government or the vast majority of the population that supports it in a good light.

First, there is the comical way in which the administration handled the decision, from the non-standard method of its announcement to the baduy show of police physically “closing” PCSO outlets, to the managed dribble of news in the aftermath to justify the move, including the traditional promise that the names of PCSO’s corrupt personnel would be provided for public shaming “in due time.”

Second, there are the clear signs that, no matter how much many people would like to give Duterte the benefit of the doubt that there

B2

Customs collects P6.48-B taxes from rice imports

‘Asean shouldn’t take sides in trade war’ BANGKOK: Members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) should not take sides in the ongoing trade war between the United States and China, according to a Thai central bank official.

At the 3rd Asean Media Forum here on Monday, Bank of Thailand board member Suthad Setboonsarng said countries in the region “should not be wasting…time worrying about those wars. We focus on what we need to do.”

“We must stop taking sides. We want to do it differently. We are in a win-win situation [when we are] not being dragged into one side,” he added.

According to him, the trade war should be “resolved quickly to prevent further global damage.”

Setboonsarng’s remarks come ahead of the resumption of trade talks between Washington and Beijing in

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TUESDAY JULY 30, 2019

Business Times

CURRENCY RATE

B1

ALL ABOARD

People board a train at the Sanam Chai MRT underground station during the station’s inauguration in Bangkok, Thailand, on July 29, 2019. AFP PHOTO

THE local stock market finished slightly higher on Monday as investors stayed on the sidelines ahead of the Federal Reserve’s two-day meeting.

The benchmark Philippine Stock Exchange index (PSEi) rose by 0.06 percent or 4.53 points to close at 8,188.52 while the wider All Shares grew by 0.15 percent or 7.44 points to end at 4,963.04.

AAA Southeast Equities Inc. research head Christopher Mangun said investors went on a last-minute buying while on a wait-and-see mode ahead of the Fed’s policy meetings on July 30 and 31, where a quarter-point rate

äTraders B4

SANTA MARIA NAMED NEW PAL PRESIDENT PHILIPPINE Airlines (PAL) on Monday welcomed Gilbert F. Santa Maria as its new president and chief operating officer, a month after his predecessor Jaime Bautista resigned.

In a statement, the flag carrier said its 15-man board of directors approved the appointment of 53-year-old Santa Maria — whom tycoon Dr. Lucio C. Tan had handpicked — during a meeting in Manila.

Tan, also the airline’s chairman and chief executive officer, urged PAL officials and employees to back Santa Maria.

“I call on all PAL executives and staff to support Gilbert Santa Maria.

Let’s work together and help him face PAL’s many challenges,” he was quoted as saying in the statement.

For his part, Santa Maria expressed confidence on PAL attaining its goal to be the leading airline in the country and bring it back to profitability.

“PAL is the airline that meets the needs of local and global travelers by showcasing our brand’s main strength — the passion for safety and service.

Maintaining the current level of service is important and of course, profitability.

Let us do our share to make PAL reach greater heights,” Santa Maria said.

“It is important for my father’s vision to be translated into PAL providing consistent quality service to our customers and also, the flag carrier serving as a means to contribute to nationbuilding. With this new leadership, we will accomplish this further,” PAL Executive Vice President and Chief Administrative Officer Vivienne K. Tan said.

Santa Maria has 30 years of executive management experience in various industries here and overseas.

For the last 15 years, he was a key leader in and contributor to the Philippines’ business

äPAL B4

n Philippine Airlines (PAL) Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Lucio C. Tan (left) shakes hands with new PAL President and Chief Operating Officer Gilbert F. Santa Maria. PHOTO FROM PAL SPOKESMAN CIELO VILLALUNA

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