Manila Standard - 2019 September 1 - Sunday

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VOL. XXXIII • NO. 199 • 4 SECTIONS 16 PAGES • P18 • SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 1, 2019 • www.manilastandard.net • mst.daydesk@gmail.com

Japeth Aguilar of the Philippines defies a blocking attempt by an Italian player during the Basketball World Cup Group D game between Italy and the Philippines in Foshan on Aug. 31, 2019. Italy won 108-62.

AFP

GILAS PILIPINAS GETS RUDE WELCOME VS. ITALY

By Peter Atencio

CAGEFEST. Performers entertain the attendees during the opening ceremony of the FIBA Basketball World Cup 2019 at the National Aquatics Center in Beijing on Aug. 30, 2019. President Rodrigo Roa Duterte was among the guests during the opening of the prestigious international cagefest. Presidential Photo

FOSHAN, China—Connecting with a total of 15 of 31 three-point attempts, Italy gave Gilas Pilipinas a rude welcome to the international stage and cruised to an easy 108-62 victory in the 2019 FIBA World Cup late Saturday night at the Foshan International Sports and Cultural Arena.

Not even the presence of President Rodrigo Duterte, who watched at the VIP section, could boost the overall play of the Filipinos in the humiliating 48-point loss—an outcome that the Philippine President predicted weeks ago.

Bannered by NBA players Danilo Gallinari and Marco Belinelli, the taller Italians proved their case early and stormed

to a ridiculous 37-8 first-quarter lead, which they ballooned further to 62-24 at the half.

The Italians just couldn’t be stopped.

The Filipinos were hoping to use their quickness to offset the Italians’ heft, but even their running game came to a halt with sloppy plays and cold touch from the outside in the face of their foes’ dominant inside plays coupled with torrid shooting.

Italy started strong and caught Gilas Pilipinas flatfooted with its impeccable outside shooting in the first period, setting the pace with six triples.

Luigi Datome had 17 points, including three big treys, and Amadeo dela Valle also made 17 for the Italians. Turn to A2

GCTA: FAELDON'S FAILURE? EXEC 'RELEASED' 3 CONVICTS IN CHIONGS' SLAY—LACSON

RODY PRESSED FOR BUCOR SHAKEUP, CHIEF'S OUSTER

By Joyce Pangco Pañares

By Rey Requejo and Joel Zurbano

A TECHNICAL superintendent at the Bureau of Corrections allegedly signed the release orders of at least three convicts in the killing of sisters Marijoy and Jacqueline Chiong in 1997, Senator Panfilo Lacson said.

“Maria Fe Marquez signed their release order. That is the information that was relayed to me,” Lacson told Manila Standard in an interview.

BuCor chief Nicanor Faeldon earlier denied signing any release order for any of the six suspects who were convicted and detained at the maximum security prison in Muntinlupa City. The seventh suspect, Paco Larrañaga, is currently detained in Spain.

“If Marquez was authorized, then she and Faeldon should be held equally accountable. If she signed it without his knowledge, then that is tantamount to usurpation of authority,” Lacson said.

Asked if Faeldon may be held accountable for command responsibility even if he may have been hoodwinked by a subordinate, the senator said: “I don’t really understand why the President still trusts Faeldon.”

Turn to A2

GOV'T TARGETS 2020 BUILDUP PRESIDENT Rodrigo Duterte has ordered government agencies to ensure that the massive infrastructure projects under his administration’s ambitious Build, Build, Build program are finished before his term ends in June 2022.

The President likewise assured Chinese investors that their businesses will be protected in a competitive environment that is free of corruption in the Philippines.

“Whatever your plans [are], do it fast,” he said, noting that the Sangley Point International Airport, in particular, must be completed in two years.

The project involves Cavite Holdings, China Communication Construction Co. and China Airport Construction Group Co. Ltd. Turn to A2

P

RESIDENT Rodrigo Duterte will hold accountable officials of the Bureau of Corrections who were involved in the release of 1,914 prisoners convicted of heinous crimes due to Good Conduct Time Allowance as calls for BuCor chief Nicanor Faeldon’s firing continued to snowball.

BuCor Chief Nicanor Faeldon

“Those release orders did not go through the President. He will hold accountable the officials who handled those,” Senator Christopher Go said.

Thelma Chiong, mother of rape-slay victims Marijoy and Jacqueline, on Saturday challenged Faeldon to resign amid reports that three of the seven suspects have been released after benefiting from the GCTA.

“To Faeldon, I hope you get your karma.

Is he making money out of criminals? [It’s like you ca] pay for your freedom and not the good moral conduct issue. Faeldon should resign. He has also already committed several mistakes. Imagine—releasing criminals who must not be freed. What will happen to our country?” the Chiong matriarch told CNN Philippines.

Senate President Vicente Sotto III also urged Duterte to fire Faeldon and reorganize the entire bureau.

“The President must revamp the entire officialdom of BuCor. This travesty of justice is condemnable,” Sotto said on his Twitter account.

Turn to A2

EX-DFA CHIEF SLAMS DUTERTE 'BETRAYAL' PRESIDENT Rodrigo Duterte's acceptance of Beijing’s continued rejection of Manila’s 2016 arbitral victory on the former’s nine-dash-line claim over almost the entire South China Sea may constitute a betrayal of public trust, former Foreign Affairs chief Albert del Rosario said on Saturday.

“For the Philippines to have been asked to agree that it will not bring up the issue again is to effectively accept without equivocation that China is above the rule of law. This would be so wrong. It would be a betrayal of the trust we have placed in our governance,” Del Rosario said.

It was during Del Rosario’s term that Manila lodged a complaint against China’s sweeping maritime claims.

The ruling favoring the Philippines, however, was awarded in July 2016 when Duterte had already assumed

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the presidency.

Chinese President Xi Jinping told Duterte on Thursday that Beijing will not acknowledge the arbitral ruling.

Duterte did not challenge Xi’s statement, according to Presidential Spokesman Salvador Panelo. “[The President raised the arbitral ruling] in a friendly, assertive, and unequivocal manner,” Panelo said.

Asked if the President questioned Xi’s position, Panelo said: “No...I think he [Duterte] expected that because from the very start as that was their position even prior to the visit. But nevertheless, as he committed himself to the Filipino people and to Mr. Xi himself, he raised the issue.”

“He [Duterte] already said that our position is also the same. We are not changing ours. And they both agreed after that the conflict should not be the

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sum total of the relationship between the two countries and that they should move forward but at the same time continue with the dialog peacefully on that issue,” the Palace official added.

Del Rosario, however, said Filipinos must continue to exert pressure on the administration to convince it to be more assertive on the maritime claim issue.

“The arbitral tribunal outcome is now an integral part of international law. This should have been the setting between the two presidents in Beijing,” he said.

“We must convince our leadership that we need to strengthen our resolve, and not have it weakened. We need to prepare a strategy for taking our case to the United Nations. It will take time and hard work, but we must do this for the sake of our many generations to come,” Del Rosario added.

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BATOCABE MURDER SUSPECTS GRANTED BAIL; SOLON FUMES

By Maricel V. Cruz

A

FORMER mayor of Bicol who’s the principal accused in the murder of Rep. Rodel Batocabe in December was granted bail by the Regional Trial Court, a move that was criticized on Saturday by Rep. Alfredo Garbin of AKO Bicol Party-list.

Former Mayor Carlwyn Baldo of Daraga, Albay, and his co-accused, have been allowed to post bail by Branch 10 of the Regional Trial Court in Legazpi City on Friday.

Baldo, who is facing two counts of murder and six counts of attempted murder was required to post a bail of P3 million per count of murder.

The court’s order partly reads: “Evidence presented is not enough to convince the Court that evidence of accused’ guilt is strong enough to deny his motion for bail” as it enumerated “inconsistencies in the testimonies of the witnesses, among other facts such as Baldo’s absence in the crime scene at the time of the murder and a witness saying Baldo did not give specific instructions to the hitmen he supposedly hired to follow Baldo.”

Garbin, however, claimed that “the evidence against Baldo was overwhelming.”

“The witnesses have spontaneously and separately pointed out to him [Baldo] as the mastermind, the evidence gathered by the police point to him as the mastermind, and he has a clear motive to mastermind the commission of crime,” Garbin said in a statement.

“There is enough evidence to convict and definitely more than enough to deny bail,” he added.

The Batocabe family and AKO Bicol Party-list group will file a motion for reconsideration for the court to reverse its decision, Garbin added.

Under the Rules of Court, those charged with heinous crimes like murder may be granted bail by the court after an evaluation of the evi-

dence submitted by the prosecution.

The lawyer-son of Batocabe denounced the grant of bail to Baldo.

In a statement written in Pilipino sent to media outlets by a certain Chester Lobramont, Justin Batocabe said: “Pinaghalu-halong galit, panlulumo, at pagkagimbal ang nararamdaman ngayon ng aming pamilya sa kautusan ng Legazpi City RTC Branch 10 na palayain si Carl “Awin” Baldo.

(Feelings of anger, frustration and surprise are being felt by out family due to the order of Branch 10 of the Regional Trial Court in Legazpi City to release Carl “Awin” Baldo.”)

Justin Batocabe said the murder charge filed against Baldo is nonbailable, thus it rendered a serious blow to the family, to the memory of the victim and to the people who have faith in the Philippines’ justice system.

“Ang murder charges laban kay Baldo ay non-bailable kaya’t matinding dagok ang kautusang ito sa aming pamilya, sa alaala ng aking ama, at sa mga taong nananalig sa sistema ng hustisya sa Pilipinas.”

“Ang aking ama, si Cong. Rodel, ay

walang awang pinaslang nitong Disyembre habang nagbibigay regalo at saya sa mga Senior Citizens at PWDs. (My father was mercilessly killed last December while distributing gift and happiness to senior citizens and the disabled. Thanks to the speedy action by the authorities, President Duterte, SAP Bong Go, Ako Bicol Party-list, PNP and NBI all of the assailants were arrested, and the weapons and motorcycle used in the treacherous attack were seized. These were shown to the media and court.”)

“Salamat sa mabilis na aksyon ng mga awtoridad—kay Pangulong Rodrigo Roa Duterte, SAP Bong Go, Ako Bicol Party-list, PNP, at NBI sapagkat nahuli lahat ng mga salarin at nakumpiska rin ang mga baril at motorsiklong ginamit sa pataksil sa pamamaslang. Ipinakita at ihinarap ito sa madla at hukuman” “Malinaw po ang tinutumbok ng mga ebidensiya. Walang dudang si Awin Baldo ang nagpapatay sa aking ama.

(The evidence clearly points to Awin Baldo as the mastermind in my father’s killing).

NO KIDDING. Children of Tondo hold a protest march to denounce the use of illegal drugs, calling on residents of Baseco Compound in Tondo, Manila to join the campaign on Saturday, Aug. 31.

Norman Cruz

GOV’T EARMARKS P100-B INVESTMENT IN RAILWAYS THE Department of Transportation is set to multiply by five times its expenditures in railways next year, a congressman said on Saturday.

“The DOTr is spending P100.6 billion next year to build, renew and upgrade railways. This is five times the P19.9-billion allocation this year for the same purpose,” said Makati City Rep. Luis Campos Jr., House appropriations committee vice chairman.

“The bulk of the spending, or P84.8 billion, is meant for North-South Commuter Railway System,” he said.

Campos was referring to the 147-kilometer, 36-station elevated railway project that will run from Calamba,

RIVER CLEANUP.

Environment and Natural Resources Secretary Roy Cimatu (left) and Manila Water president Ferdinand dela Cruz lead the kickoff ceremony for the ‘Toka Toka Para sa Taguig River’ cleanup campaign held at the Taguig Baseball Stadium on Saturday.

Manny Palmero

Laguna to New Clark City in Capas, Tarlac.

The railway will also provide a direct link to Clark International Airport in the cities of Angeles and Mabalacat in Pampanga.

Campos said the DOTr’s allocation for the Railway Construction, Rehabilitation and Improvement Program in the proposed P4.1-trillion national budget for 2020 also includes: • P9.8 billion for the Metro Manila Subway Project Phase 1; • P5 billion for the Metro Rail Transit Line 3 Rehabilitation Project; • P878 million for the South Long-Haul Project that

will link up Metro Manila, Calabarzon and Bicol and cut travel time between Manila and Legazpi City to just six hours, from 13 hours; • P97 million for the Mindanao Railway Project; and • P74 million for the LRT Line 1 Cavite Extension Project.

Of the P9.8 billion for the Metro Manila subway, Campos said P4.6 billion will be covered by loan proceeds, while the P5.2-billion balance represents the Philippine government’s counterpart funding for the project.

The initial phase of the subway is being financed in part by a P51.2-billion (104.6 billion yen) loan from the Japanese government. Maricel V. Cruz

TOURISM SITE PRIDES ITSELF IN TOILETS FOR ALL GENDERS A FARM tourism destination in Palawan is raising the concept of gender sensitivity a stripe higher.

For nearly two years now, Yamang Bukid Farm in Puerto Princesa City’s Barangay Bacungan has introduced a novel way of giving people the facility where they can answer nature’s call regardless of their sexual orientation.

Manned and maintained by elderly women, Yamang Bukid Farm’s comfort room has separate spacious cubicles for girls, boys, gays and lesbians.

The round-shaped building is made of concrete and roofed with indigenous materials. Outside it has two porcelain tubs and faucets for washing hands. Inside each cubicle has a flush toilet and bidet hose for cleaning.

Outside, one can easily see the markings on the top of each of the four white wooden doors. Emblazoned in white against a black background each of the doors are

the words: GIRL, BOY, BAKLA and TOMBOY. One may argue that bakla and tomboy (Filipino slang for gays and lesbians, respectively) are in fact derogatory but for Bobby Arzaga, a Palawan-based vlogger and receptionist for the Farm, the terms are mainly names that describe their sexual label and nothing else.

“I’m not offended because that’s how I want people to see me. I don’t know with other gays if they’re offended, though,”Arzaga said, adding he uses the cubicle labeled for the gays more often than that of the boys.’

A learning site for sustainable and organic-based agriculture, the Farm which is a subsidiary of health and wellness productsmaker Yamang Bukid Healthy Products Inc. , is advocating equality for all, embracing and respecting all guests of whatever gender stripes, according to the toilets’ designer Benjie Monegasque.

Jack Dorsey

TWITTER CEO FALLS VICTIM TO HACKING TWITTER said Friday the account of chief executive Jack Dorsey had been “compromised” after a series of erratic and offensive messages were posted.

The tweets containing racial slurs and suggestions about a bomb showed up around 2000 GMT on the @jack account of the founder of the short messaging service before being deleted.

Some of the tweets contained the hashtag #ChucklingSquad, which was believed to indicate the identity of the hacker group. The same calling card was left behind during recent hacks of other highprofile social media personalities.

The messages contained racial epithets, and included a retweet of a message supporting Nazi Germany.

Twitter said that the phone number associated with Dorsey’s account was “compromised due to a security oversight by the mobile provider,” allowing a hacker to posts tweets to @jack by sending text messages.

Dorsey’s account has been secured and there was “no indication that Twitter’s systems have been compromised,” according to the San Francisco-based Internet firm.

It appeared that tweets posted on Dorsey’s account by the hacker were up for about a half-hour before they were removed.

Pinned atop Dorsey’s account was a tweet from early last year saying: “We’re committing Twitter to help increase the collective health, openness, and civility of public conversation, and to hold ourselves publicly accountable towards progress.”

A barrage of comments fired off on the platform questioned why the Twitter co-founder didn’t secure his account better, and how disturbing a sign it was that the service couldn’t keep its own chief safe on the platform.

“If you can’t protect Jack, you can’t protect... jack,” one Twitter user quipped. AFP

BOLS0NARO HATES BIC

President Jair Bolsonaro

BRAZIL’S President Jair Bolsonaro said Friday he will stop using disposable pens made by France’s Bic to sign official documents, while a diplomatic spat continues over fires in the Amazon basin.

“A pen [of the Brazilian brand] Compactor and no more Bic, will work,” Bolsonaro said, confirming remarks he made during a live broadcast on Facebook a day earlier.

Bolsonaro said Thursday he would stop using Bic “because it is French.”

When asked by AFP if Bolsonaro was serious or joking, Brazil’s presidential office declined to comment.

Most of the Bic ballpoint pens sold in Brazil are made in the French company’s factory in the Brazilian city of Manaus in the Amazon, a Bic spokesperson told AFP. Bolsonaro has previously cited Bic pens, which are cheap and commonly used in Brazil, as a sign of austerity after the expenses of his predecessors.

Bic said it felt “flattered” to be recognized as a “democratic brand,” but would not comment on the president’s decision. AFP

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'ONE-WAY EDSA NO-WIN OPTION'

By Joel E. Zurbano A SENATOR has rejected a proposal to convert EDSA into a one-way road to ease traffic, saying this will only disrupt businesses and inconvenience commuters.

Senator Sherwin Gatchalian expressed his opposition after an engineering consultancy broached the idea of transforming EDSA into a northbound highway while the parallel C-5 Road will be turned into a southbound road.

“EDSA and C-5 are not designed for one-way vehicular flow. Instead of helping the commuting public, converting these major highways into one-way roads will only disrupt businesses and commuters. This scheme only redirects vehicular traffic but does nothing to reduce vehicular volume,” Gatchalian said.

He said in order for the one-way traffic scheme to work, bus routes across Metro Manila have to be rationalized first.

“The way I see it, if we focus on improving our mass public transportation system, including our buses and railways, and decongesting our side streets from illegally parked vehicles, we would automatically decongest EDSA as well,” Gatchalian said.

“In the long term, moving the seat of government to Clark would significantly reduce traffic congestion in Metro Manila. But for now, the government must hasten the construction of Skyway 3 and the North-South Connector road to decongest EDSA,” he added.

The Philippine National Police has already deployed anew its Highway Patrol Group to assist in managing traffic on EDSA. The Metropolitan Manila Development Authority blamed the worsening traffic to the increasing number of public and private vehicles as well as undisciplined drivers.

The agency admitted the present volume of vehicles on the road can no longer be accommodated by the limited road network in Metro Manila.

MMDA spokesperson Pircelyn Pialago said vehicles passing through EDSA have increased by 5.75 percent, or an average of 405,882 for the first eight months this year.

This is an additional 22,054 vehicles compared to the 2018 data for the same period, which posted an average of 383,828 vehicles, she said.

As the “ber months’ starts today (Sept.

1), MMDA is expecting the volume of vehicles to swell on EDSA. Shopping malls and other commercial establishments located along EDSA are traffic generators during these months, MMDA said. At least 16 malls and shopping centers are located along EDSA. MMDA study showed that delivery trucks and container vans loaded with goods, imported items and other salable merchandise, piled up the streets of Metro Manila, adding to the traffic as the holiday season draws near.

The MMDA is supporting Gatchalian’s proposed measure requiring new car buyers to prove they have parking space before they can complete a purchase.

GOV'T...

From A1

During the Philippines-China Business Forum in Beijing, the President bannered the country’s growth for 82 consecutive quarters, recorded above 6 percent annual growth rate since 2012.

“Let me thank our Chinese friends for their interest to be part of the Philippines’ growth story. We are encouraged by your vote of confidence in our economy,” the President said.

“In return, [we] can offer you the benefits of our preferential trading arrangements with various economies, especially the US and European Union.

We therefore have a win-win situation here. And I invite you all to take advantage of it fully,” he added.

He said Chinese investors are welcome to participate in the Build, Build, Build program.

Duterte assured Chinese businessmen that he will personally take to task Philippine government officials or personnel who will ask for bribes or grease money in exchange for faster facilitation of their investment contracts.

“Part of your hesitancy before was that because the Philippines was a corrupt country and not a peaceful one. I’d like to reassure you that during my term, I will not allow corruption. If you go to the Philippines, or with any agent there, come to me for any of your problems,” he said.

“If you encounter, or your agents, or your lawyer will tell you ‘This official is asking for something like this’ – you just tell me and I will call that official, whoever he is, in my office and in your presence. I will tell the official to eat the money and swallow the coins. I have done it several times. Perhaps I will do more until the bureaucracy of the Philippines behaves,” Duterte added. Vito Barcelo

T

HK PROTESTERS DEFY BAN

ENS of thousands of pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong on Saturday defied a ban on rallying, the arrests of leading activists and rising threats from China, to take to the streets for a 13th straight weekend.

Hong Kong police fired tear gas at protesters gathered outside government headquarters.

Protesters threw rocks and pointed lasers at riot police separated from the crowds by barriers.

Police had banned the demonstration on security grounds and organizers initially canceled the mass up after last weekend saw some of the most violent clashes in months of political turmoil.

But large crowds, many in their signature black T-shirts and under a colorful canopy of umbrellas, snaked through Hong Kong island anyway, blocking roads in the financial heart and chanting “Reclaim Hong Kong.

Revolution of our times.”

One group passed the official residence of Hong Kong’s embattled Beijing-backed leader Carrie Lam, who is the focal point of anger after trying to pass a bill which would have allowed extradition to China.

Another big group massed in the busy shopping district of Causeway Bay, occupying the road and chanting anti-government slogans.

“I’m prepared for the consequences of coming out,”said one protestor, who gave his name as Jay, adding “Hong Kongers have the right to assembly.”

“I’m not afraid to come out here today,” said another 25-year-old protester who gave his surname as Ng. “We don’t know when we will violate their laws... I can be arrested by even taking transport.”

A helicopter buzzed above marchers as police appealed to the public to “leave immediately.”

Opposition to the extradition bill—now suspended but not permanently withdrawn—has brought much of Hong Kong to the streets.

The protests have expanded into a wider pro-democracy call and a rejection of attempts by Beijing to curtail the freedoms of the semiautonomous territory.

“It’s ‘now or never’ for Hong Kong, “ said a 33-year-old accountant who gave her surname as Wong.

“I’m a mother of two. They didn’t come today but their grandmother did. We’re defending the right of assembly for the next generation in

Hong Kong.”

Police erected barricades near the Liaison Office, the department that represents China’s central government, while water-cannon trucks were driven onto the streets in anticipation of renewed clashes with a hardcore minority of the mainly student protesters.

Saturday marks the fifth anniversary of Beijing’s rejection of a call for universal suffrage for Hong Kong, which sparked the 79-day “Umbrella Movement” in 2014.

Many protesters are determined not to let the new movement fizzle out as the Umbrella protests did.

At least five high-profile activists and three lawmakers were arrested on Friday in a sweep aimed at defanging Saturday’s rally.

Rights groups say the tactics are cribbed directly from Beijing’s protest playbook.

Two of the Umbrella Movement’s leaders, Joshua Wong and Agnes Chow were among those arrested, charged and bailed for“inciting others to take part in unauthorized assembly.”

The European Union’s diplomatic chief Federica Mogherini said the developments were “extremely worrying,” while US President Donald Trump said his economic pressure on China was forcing Beijing to take a more moderate line in Hong Kong.

Protesters sidestep ban

In an attempt to sidestep Saturday’s protest ban, crowds earlier carried Christian crosses and sang “Hallelujah” in religious gatherings—which do not require the same stringent permission from authorities.

The demonstrators, who have earned a reputation for their creativity and unpredictability, also called for “mass shopping trips”in the city center.

“The mass arrests yesterday were an obvious tactic to scare us off. Instead, [the government] lures us to come out today and then they can start their second round of mass arrest,” said a protester online.

On Saturday morning, LIHKG, the Reddit-like forum used by protesters to communicate, reported via Twitter that its app had suffered the “largest attack it has ever seen.”

Police on Friday confirmed three lawmakers—and a district councilor— had been arrested over their alleged actions in previous protests, but denied the sweep was timed specifically to weaken the weekend’s protests.

More than 900 people have been arrested since June in connection to protests.

Hong Kong’s crisis-hit government has refused to back down over the protests, which have seen millions march peacefully through the streets but also hardcore groups of radical protesters hurl bricks and petrol bombs at police armed with tear gas and rubber bullets.

The violence has damaged Hong Kong’s reputation for stability and prosperity.

China has responded with a campaign of intimidation. State media on Friday reported that fresh military anti-riot drills were held across the border in Shenzhen. AFP

EXEC...

From A1

CNN Philippines earlier disclosed copies of the release orders of Josman Aznar, Alberto Caño, and Ariel Balansag dated Aug. 16.

The orders noted that the three convicted criminals have already served 40 years upon the retroactive application of the GCTA law.

Last week, the parents of the Chiong sisters described the release order as an “injustice.”

“It’s like we lost our children again,” said Dionesio Chiong, father of the victims.

GCTA:...

GILAS...

From A1

“Why is it that wherever this official [Faeldon] is appointed, a scandal happens? Where will he be recycled next?” added Sotto, referring to the P6.4 billion illegal shabu shipment that was released when Faeldon was still the Bureau of Customs head.

For Senator Panfilo Lacson, a former police chief, Duterte must take action against Faeldon as his presence in government is a black eye on the administration’s campaign against drugs and criminality.

“It is the biggest irony that while the government has spent so much time, energy and resources to build up intelligence, gather evidence leading to the arrest of big-time drug traffickers, here is Faeldon and whoever else was responsible, by the stroke of their pens would release at least 48 drug convicts out of the 1,914 heinous crime convicts under questionable circumstances,” Lacson said in a statement.

“If the President does not take drastic action on this latest caper of an official who was recycled in spite of questionable actions committed in his previous assignments, we should start thinking if there is seriousness in this administration’s much touted war against drugs and corruption,” he added.

Senator Sherwin Gatchalian said he does not understand why the President continues to place his trust on Faeldon.

“In my anger, I don’t know what to say. Faeldon allowed the release of P6.4 billion worth of illegal drugs in the BOC. Now, he allowed the release of (heinous crime convicts) in BuCor. Why is this person still in government?” Gatchalian said.

Data from the Bureau of Corrections showed that of the 1,914 heinous crime convicts released, 797 were sentenced for murder, 758 for rape, 274 for robbery with violence or intimidation, 48 for drug-related offenses, 29 for parricide, five for kidnapping with illegal detention, and three for destructive arson.

Malacañang earlier said that heinous crime convicts released early should be taken back to jail.

“The law is very clear. Republic Act No. 10592 is very clear that those charged and convicted of heinous crimes, escapees, habitual delinquents and recidivists

From A1

are not covered by the law. Obviously, they should be put back in prison until they serve the full term of their sentence,” Presidential Spokesman Salvador Panelo said.

Justice Undersecretary Markk Perete said while the GCTA law was clear in excluding heinous crime convicts, “someone committed a mistake in the crafting of the Implementing Rules and Regulations and on that basis, these prisoners were favored.”

“We can review their case. But as to whether we can haul them back to jail on the theory that they have not yet fully served their sentence as they are not deserving of GCTA, that is a bit tricky because they were released based on the current IRR, which was crafted in 2013.”

The Department of Justice, however, ordered a halt in the deportation process of four Chinese drug lords—earlier identified by Lacson as Chan Chit Yue, Kin San Ho, Ching Che, Wu Hing Sum—who have been released based on their GCTA computation.

“Justice Secretary Menardo Guevarra has already ordered the holding of their deportation,” Perete said. , for his part, said the DOJ will determine on Monday whether it has jurisdiction to undertake a review and investigation into the questionable actions of Faeldon.

“The DOJ will take up this matter on Monday. First and foremost, we need to determine jurisdiction, the reason being that Faeldon is a presidential appointee, and primary jurisdiction may vest with the Office of the President/PACC [Presidential Anti-Corruption Commission],” he said in a text message.

The PACC said it may investigate BuCor officials behind the release of the inmates even as the law on GCTA excludes those convicted of heinous crimes.

“The PACC may investigate prison authorities in connection with the release of thousands of convicts...

Whether or not corruption marred the process of crediting good conduct leading to the release of convicts, even disqualified ones, is inconsequential. The focus would be possible criminal violations by prison authorities,” PACC Commissioner Manuelito Luna said.

A floater followed by a trey from Datome in the last 8:01 of the opening quarter started a 26-2 blast that broke a 2-all deadlock.

When it was over, two triples from Marco Gallineri, followed by another pair from Daniel Hackett, and a second one from Datome did great damage to the Team Pilipinas’ defense before the quarter ended.

The Italians, who also crushed the Philippine team, 106-70, in a tune-up game in June 2016 ahead of the FIBA Olympic Qualifying Tournament, never let up the third to lead by as much as 85-39.

Only Gilas newcomer CJ Perez came to play with 15 points and 3 assists, while Andray Blatche had 15 points and 10 rebounds.

The Filipinos have a chance to bounce back Sunday at 7:30 p.m., but it will be against pre-tournament favorite Serbia, which is touted to be the team that can dethrone the US team reinforced by NBA stars.

The Serbians showed that they are the team to watch out for as they thrashed Angola 105-59 in the opening match of the tournament.

In another early match, Russia edged Nigeria—touted as a possible surprisepackage—in a thriller in Group B. Russia led at half-time, only for Nigeria to surge level at the end of the third quarter.

The Africans were in the ascendancy and led early in the fourth, but the Russians stormed back and they were tied 75-75 with less than a minute left.

But it was the Russians who held their nerve, grabbing victory 82-77 after a tense final few seconds.

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BI CHIEF REVAMPS TCEU UNITS AT NAIA TERMINALS ing Unit and no longer TCEU-NAIA 3 terminal head and Ma. Lourdes G. Quidangen IO3, as deputy head for Administration, Foreign Travel Monitoring Unit.

Assigned at the TCEU Central Office as overall deputy head for Operations is Ma. Carelyn S. Taberna; while overall deputy head for Administration is Mary Jane D. Hizon.

New TCEU officers are as follows: NAIA 1 Terminal Head—Maria Rosalia Concessa V. Acuna; Deputy Terminal Head—Syranrus E. Ebdane-Tizon; NAIA 2 Terminal Head—Ma. Ruby C. Fontejon; Deputy Terminal Head— Leni A. Maminta; NAIA 3 Terminal Head—Ma.

By Vito Barcelo

I

MMIGRATION Commissioner Jaime Morente reshuffled the bureau’s Travel Control Enforcement Unit officers holding key positions at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport Terminals 1, 2 and 3 as part of management’s thrust to revitalize operations.

Morente signed an order, Letter Directive No. JHM 2019-381, designating and transferring all TCEU personnel to their new positions effective immediately.

Morente also signed personnel order JHM No. 2019-884 and 885, reassigning Immigration officer III Anthony Lopez as deputy head for Operations, Foreign Travel Monitor-

Bernadette N. Catipay; Deputy Terminal Head—Ma. Angelica B. Timtiman.

Among their duties is to conduct a secondary inspection of passengers arriving and departing in the different international ports.

“This is just the initial wave of a thorough revamp that we shall implement in our airports in the coming days,” Morente said.

Morente observed that many of the officers who were relieved or replaced as a result of the reshuffle have been in their posts for more than two years.

“It is time to give others a chance to assume the responsibility of overseeing our operations at the airports,” he said.

INC MUSEUM. Iglesia ni Cristo General Auditor Glicerio ‘Jun‘ Santos (left), with his son Chief Legal Counsel of INC GP Santos (center), warmly welcomed House Majority Leader and Leyte Rep. Martin Romualdez (right) during the Iglesia Ni Cristo Museum opening for the public at Central Avenue in Barangay Culiat, Quezon City. The museum offers to the public specially students the 105 years history of Iglesia ni Cristo. Ver Noveno

PIA CHIEF RESIGNS POST; SLAMS DETRACTORS DESCRIBING his stint in government as a “roller-coaster,” Philippine Information Agency Director General Harold Clavite has said that he was officially resigning from his post.

Clavite posted his resignation in a social media on Friday, and thanked all those who have been part of his ‘‘journey.’’

“It’s official. I’ve separated from the Philippine Information Agency effective today. Many thanks to all who have been part of my journey.

I appreciate all the support given by our partners in government, the private sector, and the general public,” he said.

He added that ‘it “It has been a roller-coaster ride the past three years and I look forward to a less stressful private life now. I have contributed a lot and have completed my purpose of giving up my career and life in the United States to serve my home country, the #Philippines. I will be back to my family and take care of my

own now.”

Only last June, Clavite faced an investigation by the Presidential Communications Operations Office over allegations of splitting contracts, misusing funds for hotel accommodations, and irregularities in the production of information materials.

Clavite, however, has denied the allegations which he said were the handiwork of some people in the agency to discredit him after he initiated a probe on

supposed irregularities in the PIA, the government’s development communications arm.

“Rest assured,” Clavite continued, “I will continue to be an advocate for peace, good governance, and a more responsible citizenry. I will continue to promote and foster a freer world through information and communication by advocating #responsiblesocialmedia and responsible sharing of information.

I will continue to support the work in #Marawi.”

‘ALLIANCE’ IN BRANDING, ARTS, MUSIC BUILT

BUS MISHAP. Six people were injured after a passenger bus slammed into a concrete post of the LRT near Manila City Hall on Saturday, Aug. 31, 2019.

Norman Cruz

A GROUP of creative-oriented professionals and thought leaders have formed the Philippine Branding Alliance for the Belt and Road, dubbed ‘The Alliance’, which held its first Assembly at Makati City. The Alliance encompasses the broad field of branding, advertising, arts, design, music, culinary, and architecture; and aims to forge partnerships with China and the countries of the Belt and Road to propel the creative industries underlying cultural understanding as well as people-to-people relations.

“The economic rise of China and the Belt and Road countries is a growing reality…Our relationship and public discourse on China has always been political. We feel it’s an important issue to continue resolving; but in areas where we can already cooperate, we feel that working together is best for everybody,” said JC Valenzuela, chief executive officer of Propel Manila and

a founding member of The Alliance.

He pointed out that the Philippines and all Filipinos can benefit from the massive economic opportunities arising from the continuing drive to spur economic integration and people-to-people connectivity across Europe, Russia, South, Southeast, and Central Asia by land (the “Road”); and connecting China’s coastal regions with South and Southeast Asia, the South Pacific, the Middle East, Eastern Africa, and Europe, by sea (the “Belt”).

Earlier in May this year, Valenzuela held exploratory talks with the president of the China Council for Brand Development, Liu Pingjun, in Beijing where the latter expressed his support for the PBABR to pursue partnerships among the 70 belt and road countries that account for about 65 percent of the world’s population and around a third of the world’s Gross Domestic Product.

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SEPT. 3, 1945, YAMASHITA’S SURRENDER, NOW A HOLIDAY

By Maricel V. Cruz STARTING Sept. 3, and on the same in the next years, the country will mark the surrender of the Japanese general who was tasked to defend the Philippines at the closing days of the Second World War. Sept. 3 has been declared be Republic Act 11216 as Surrender of Yamashita Day, a working public holiday, to commemorate the surrender of Japanese General Tomoyuki Yamashita and his army in Baguio City weeks after the surrender of Japan to the allied forces.

President Rodrigo Duterte signed RA 11216 into law on Feb. 14.

RA 11216 provides that Sept. 3 “shall be known annually as a special working public holiday throughout the country, in commemoration of the surrender of the Japanese military forces led by General Yamashita at the American High Commissioner’s Residence in Camp John Hay, Baguio City. The surrender signaled the end of World War II in the Pacific.”

Baguio City Rep. Mark Go, principal author of the measure at the Lower Chamber, expressed the significance of emphasizing Baguio as the location where World War II in the Philippines started and ended.

Historical documents indicate that the Second World War reached the Philippines when Camp John Hay was bombed by units of the Imperial Japanese Army Air Forces on Dec. 8, 1941, hours after Pearl Harbor in Hawaii was attacked in December by the Japanese Navy.

The Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor at 7:53 a.m. on Dec. 7 Hawaii time or at 1:53 am Dec. 8 in the Philippines.

Philippine time is 18 hours ahead of Hawaii time.

Go said that the historical event was also especially important to the Cordilleras, as it was in the town of Kiangan, Ifugao, where Yamashita and his forces were captured by Ifugao guerrillas on Sept. 2, 1945 before the general was flown to Camp John Hay to sign surrender documents on Sept. 3.

TESDA HONORS SALCEDA AS ‘KABALIKAT’ AWARDEE THE Technical Education and Skills Development Authority has recently conferred its 2019 National Kabalikat Award to Albay Rep. Joey Sarte Salceda. The honor is the agency’s highest institutional recognition for one’s continuous, significant contributions to its technical education and skills development program.

The annual Kabalikat Awards, which coincided with TESDA’s 25th Anniversary in August, is given to the institution’s most active and outstanding partners who have meaningfully contributed in developing, enhancing and implementing its multi-faceted skills training programs that have resulted in better employability of Filipino skilled workers.

Salceda also bagged the regional honors for Region V. He was recognized for his sustained and active contribution to TESDA dating back to his earlier three terms as congressman of Albay’s third district, then as Albay governor for nine years, and now as representative of his province’s second district.

His most recent contribution to TESDA was brought by the enactment of the Free Tuition or the Universal Access to Quality Tertiary Education Act, which he also authored, that secured the release of P7 billion in 2018 and another P7 billion in the 2019 budgets for its technical-vocational programs. He said another P7 billion or possibly more is anticipated in 2020 which would translate to a three-year additional budget of P21 billion for the agency.

In 2018, Salceda initiated the inclusion of TESDA in UAQTEA that helped assure continuous funding for the agency’s training institutes, providing a platform to expand its short-term courses like Training for Work Scholarship Program and Special Training for Employment Program to two years as associate degree courses.

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BATOCABE MURDER SUSPECTS GRANTED BAIL; SOLON FUMES

By Maricel V. Cruz

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FORMER mayor of Bicol who’s the principal accused in the murder of Rep. Rodel Batocabe in December was granted bail by the Regional Trial Court, a move that was criticized on Saturday by Rep. Alfredo Garbin of AKO Bicol Party-list.

Former Mayor Carlwyn Baldo of Daraga, Albay, and his co-accused, have been allowed to post bail by Branch 10 of the Regional Trial Court in Legazpi City on Friday.

Baldo, who is facing two counts of murder and six counts of attempted murder was required to post a bail of P3 million per count of murder.

The court’s order partly reads: “Evidence presented is not enough to convince the Court that evidence of accused’ guilt is strong enough to deny his motion for bail” as it enumerated “inconsistencies in the testimonies of the witnesses, among other facts such as Baldo’s absence in the crime scene at the time of the murder and a witness saying Baldo did not give specific instructions to the hitmen he supposedly hired to follow Baldo.”

Garbin, however, claimed that “the evidence against Baldo was overwhelming.”

“The witnesses have spontaneously and separately pointed out to him [Baldo] as the mastermind, the evidence gathered by the police point to him as the mastermind, and he has a clear motive to mastermind the commission of crime,” Garbin said in a statement.

“There is enough evidence to convict and definitely more than enough to deny bail,” he added.

The Batocabe family and AKO Bicol Party-list group will file a motion for reconsideration for the court to reverse its decision, Garbin added.

Under the Rules of Court, those charged with heinous crimes like murder may be granted bail by the court after an evaluation of the evi-

dence submitted by the prosecution.

The lawyer-son of Batocabe denounced the grant of bail to Baldo.

In a statement written in Pilipino sent to media outlets by a certain Chester Lobramont, Justin Batocabe said: “Pinaghalu-halong galit, panlulumo, at pagkagimbal ang nararamdaman ngayon ng aming pamilya sa kautusan ng Legazpi City RTC Branch 10 na palayain si Carl “Awin” Baldo.

(Feelings of anger, frustration and surprise are being felt by out family due to the order of Branch 10 of the Regional Trial Court in Legazpi City to release Carl “Awin” Baldo.”)

Justin Batocabe said the murder charge filed against Baldo is nonbailable, thus it rendered a serious blow to the family, to the memory of the victim and to the people who have faith in the Philippines’ justice system.

“Ang murder charges laban kay Baldo ay non-bailable kaya’t matinding dagok ang kautusang ito sa aming pamilya, sa alaala ng aking ama, at sa mga taong nananalig sa sistema ng hustisya sa Pilipinas.”

“Ang aking ama, si Cong. Rodel, ay

walang awang pinaslang nitong Disyembre habang nagbibigay regalo at saya sa mga Senior Citizens at PWDs. (My father was mercilessly killed last December while distributing gift and happiness to senior citizens and the disabled. Thanks to the speedy action by the authorities, President Duterte, SAP Bong Go, Ako Bicol Party-list, PNP and NBI all of the assailants were arrested, and the weapons and motorcycle used in the treacherous attack were seized. These were shown to the media and court.”)

“Salamat sa mabilis na aksyon ng mga awtoridad—kay Pangulong Rodrigo Roa Duterte, SAP Bong Go, Ako Bicol Party-list, PNP, at NBI sapagkat nahuli lahat ng mga salarin at nakumpiska rin ang mga baril at motorsiklong ginamit sa pataksil sa pamamaslang. Ipinakita at ihinarap ito sa madla at hukuman” “Malinaw po ang tinutumbok ng mga ebidensiya. Walang dudang si Awin Baldo ang nagpapatay sa aking ama.

(The evidence clearly points to Awin Baldo as the mastermind in my father’s killing).

NO KIDDING. Children of Tondo hold a protest march to denounce the use of illegal drugs, calling on residents of Baseco Compound in Tondo, Manila to join the campaign on Saturday, Aug. 31.

Norman Cruz

GOV’T EARMARKS P100-B INVESTMENT IN RAILWAYS THE Department of Transportation is set to multiply by five times its expenditures in railways next year, a congressman said on Saturday.

“The DOTr is spending P100.6 billion next year to build, renew and upgrade railways. This is five times the P19.9-billion allocation this year for the same purpose,” said Makati City Rep. Luis Campos Jr., House appropriations committee vice chairman.

“The bulk of the spending, or P84.8 billion, is meant for North-South Commuter Railway System,” he said.

Campos was referring to the 147-kilometer, 36-station elevated railway project that will run from Calamba,

RIVER CLEANUP.

Environment and Natural Resources Secretary Roy Cimatu (left) and Manila Water president Ferdinand dela Cruz lead the kickoff ceremony for the ‘Toka Toka Para sa Taguig River’ cleanup campaign held at the Taguig Baseball Stadium on Saturday.

Manny Palmero

Laguna to New Clark City in Capas, Tarlac.

The railway will also provide a direct link to Clark International Airport in the cities of Angeles and Mabalacat in Pampanga.

Campos said the DOTr’s allocation for the Railway Construction, Rehabilitation and Improvement Program in the proposed P4.1-trillion national budget for 2020 also includes: • P9.8 billion for the Metro Manila Subway Project Phase 1; • P5 billion for the Metro Rail Transit Line 3 Rehabilitation Project; • P878 million for the South Long-Haul Project that

will link up Metro Manila, Calabarzon and Bicol and cut travel time between Manila and Legazpi City to just six hours, from 13 hours; • P97 million for the Mindanao Railway Project; and • P74 million for the LRT Line 1 Cavite Extension Project.

Of the P9.8 billion for the Metro Manila subway, Campos said P4.6 billion will be covered by loan proceeds, while the P5.2-billion balance represents the Philippine government’s counterpart funding for the project.

The initial phase of the subway is being financed in part by a P51.2-billion (104.6 billion yen) loan from the Japanese government. Maricel V. Cruz

TOURISM SITE PRIDES ITSELF IN TOILETS FOR ALL GENDERS A FARM tourism destination in Palawan is raising the concept of gender sensitivity a stripe higher.

For nearly two years now, Yamang Bukid Farm in Puerto Princesa City’s Barangay Bacungan has introduced a novel way of giving people the facility where they can answer nature’s call regardless of their sexual orientation.

Manned and maintained by elderly women, Yamang Bukid Farm’s comfort room has separate spacious cubicles for girls, boys, gays and lesbians.

The round-shaped building is made of concrete and roofed with indigenous materials. Outside it has two porcelain tubs and faucets for washing hands. Inside each cubicle has a flush toilet and bidet hose for cleaning.

Outside, one can easily see the markings on the top of each of the four white wooden doors. Emblazoned in white against a black background each of the doors are

the words: GIRL, BOY, BAKLA and TOMBOY. One may argue that bakla and tomboy (Filipino slang for gays and lesbians, respectively) are in fact derogatory but for Bobby Arzaga, a Palawan-based vlogger and receptionist for the Farm, the terms are mainly names that describe their sexual label and nothing else.

“I’m not offended because that’s how I want people to see me. I don’t know with other gays if they’re offended, though,”Arzaga said, adding he uses the cubicle labeled for the gays more often than that of the boys.’

A learning site for sustainable and organic-based agriculture, the Farm which is a subsidiary of health and wellness productsmaker Yamang Bukid Healthy Products Inc. , is advocating equality for all, embracing and respecting all guests of whatever gender stripes, according to the toilets’ designer Benjie Monegasque.

Jack Dorsey

TWITTER CEO FALLS VICTIM TO HACKING TWITTER said Friday the account of chief executive Jack Dorsey had been “compromised” after a series of erratic and offensive messages were posted.

The tweets containing racial slurs and suggestions about a bomb showed up around 2000 GMT on the @jack account of the founder of the short messaging service before being deleted.

Some of the tweets contained the hashtag #ChucklingSquad, which was believed to indicate the identity of the hacker group. The same calling card was left behind during recent hacks of other highprofile social media personalities.

The messages contained racial epithets, and included a retweet of a message supporting Nazi Germany.

Twitter said that the phone number associated with Dorsey’s account was “compromised due to a security oversight by the mobile provider,” allowing a hacker to posts tweets to @jack by sending text messages.

Dorsey’s account has been secured and there was “no indication that Twitter’s systems have been compromised,” according to the San Francisco-based Internet firm.

It appeared that tweets posted on Dorsey’s account by the hacker were up for about a half-hour before they were removed.

Pinned atop Dorsey’s account was a tweet from early last year saying: “We’re committing Twitter to help increase the collective health, openness, and civility of public conversation, and to hold ourselves publicly accountable towards progress.”

A barrage of comments fired off on the platform questioned why the Twitter co-founder didn’t secure his account better, and how disturbing a sign it was that the service couldn’t keep its own chief safe on the platform.

“If you can’t protect Jack, you can’t protect... jack,” one Twitter user quipped. AFP

BOLS0NARO HATES BIC

President Jair Bolsonaro

BRAZIL’S President Jair Bolsonaro said Friday he will stop using disposable pens made by France’s Bic to sign official documents, while a diplomatic spat continues over fires in the Amazon basin.

“A pen [of the Brazilian brand] Compactor and no more Bic, will work,” Bolsonaro said, confirming remarks he made during a live broadcast on Facebook a day earlier.

Bolsonaro said Thursday he would stop using Bic “because it is French.”

When asked by AFP if Bolsonaro was serious or joking, Brazil’s presidential office declined to comment.

Most of the Bic ballpoint pens sold in Brazil are made in the French company’s factory in the Brazilian city of Manaus in the Amazon, a Bic spokesperson told AFP. Bolsonaro has previously cited Bic pens, which are cheap and commonly used in Brazil, as a sign of austerity after the expenses of his predecessors.

Bic said it felt “flattered” to be recognized as a “democratic brand,” but would not comment on the president’s decision. AFP

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Adelle Chua, Editor mst.daydesk@gmail.com

Opinion SEARCH GOES ON FOR MOTHERS OF COLOMBIA’S MISSING

EDITORIAL

THE NO-HOMEWORK POLICY

T

HERE is need to be circumspect and judicious, with the no-homework policy bills proposed by lawmakers in both the House of Representatives and the Senate, welcomed by the Department of Education but slammed by teachers’ groups.

Definitely, those bills will be examined closely and thoroughly during public hearings to be conducted by the committees involved in both chambers, appreciating forwarded arguments and bones of contention from the proponents and those who oppose it.

The bill filed by House Deputy Speaker Evelina Escudero seeks to remove homework as a requirement and have Kinder to Grade 12 students do academic activities

entirely within school premises, with the bill’s explanatory note stressing homework assignments “can deprive students and parents (of) precious quality time for rest, relaxation, and interaction after school hours and even on weekend.”

Quezon City Rep. Alfred Vargas, in a separate bill, wants to eliminate homework on weekends for all elementary and high school students. He goes further by citing a 2018 study that featured discussions on a similar policy in a public school

in Western Cape province of South Africa where scholars argued “that homework is a burden for children and parents” which had contributed to the decline of family time and compromised learning interest.

In the Senate, Senator Grace Poe filed a bill titled “No Homework Law” banning teachers to give homework or assignments on weekends, the policy to be applicable to both public and private schools.

Poe also cited a study from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development’s Program for International Student Assessment, and noted that additional time spent on homework had a negligible impact on performance of students.

Some senators like Senator Joel Villanueva have also expressed support for the no-homework policy.

Villanueva, who currently chairs the Senate Committee on Higher,

Technical and Vocational Education, who said school children “should be able to spend more time with their families and explore things outside the regular class curricula. This will encourage our kids to enhance their creativity and deep thinking.”

We note of the knockdowns raised by the Alliance of Concerned Teachers, the Teachers Dignity Coalition and the Federation of Associations of Private Schools and Administrators as well as the support extended by the Department of Education.

It is axiomatic that we need to make strategies where students can be responsive to the challenges and demands of a very competitive market.

Let’s have the arguments scrutinized properly during the public hearings. But let’s not slam the door shut at this point on what might be the merits of the proposals.

PAINTER JOY ROJAS’ 4TH SOLO SHOW; MEDIAWISE BAGS PH QUILL AWARD ABSTRACTIONIST Joy Rojas returns with a new, innovative collection of works in his fourth solo show “Rising Sun,” organized

by Galerie Anna and opening on Sept. 2, Monday. he prolific painter was trained as a lawyer and still pursues a private practice.

He has also served in government, notably as Philippine Racing Commission chairman from 2008 to 2011 and Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office vice chairman and general manager from 2010 to 2016. As such he is better known under his full professional name, Jose Ferdinand M. Rojas II. A well-traveled bon vivant, Rojas draws upon his journeys abroad for inspiration.

His recent travels to Australia, the United States, Cuba, Japan, and other countries provided some of the artistic stimulus that burgeoned into his latest collection.

Sunsets, landscapes, human activity— nothing escapes his eye.

His strong religious faith and devotion also find expression in his art.

Yet it is Rojas’ interest in the gentlemanly sport of horseracing that continues to inform his work and provide inspiration, particularly in the naming of his paintings.

“Majestic Ruler”, “Silver Story,” and “Sun God” are among the works he has named after Philippine racehorses. The title of his fourth exhibition, “Rising Sun,” was the name of one of his favorite racehorses, and is also the title of his weekly opinion in

Business Mirror.

Rojas’ art language is primarily composed of color and texture. Using swathes of iridescent pigment and brightly colored paint, applied thickly and expressively to portray spatial dimension, he conveys narrative, experiences, and message.

Essentially, Rojas, combines creative insights in a natural, spontaneous manner with an intuitive grasp of harmony and form.

Art critic Cid Reyes is all praise for the paintings in Rojas’ fourth solo exhibition.

He says: “In these robust and solid works, Rojas once again transforms a surface into an encounter with the infinite varieties of sensation, tension, and languorous mood, dominated by a low-key, greyed-out, monochrome palette and a lavish feast of textures.

“Rojas as an artist is categorized among the minimalists. It is true that his works are spare, reductive, free of clutter and distraction, rejecting the gestural brushstroke, depth, and visual illusion, but they are lean without being arid, austere, or anorexic.

“As if in recompense, Rojas gratifies the viewer with ample energy of execution, conveyed and felt by the viewer as a vitality of expression and the sheer appetite for the palette knife’s application of pigment.”

Reyes also noted Rojas’ experimentation with a different shape for some of his

recent works. “Veering away from the square and rectangular format, Rojas seizes the cruciform and converts it into a shaped vessel for spiritual exhortation. He has christened the works “ushpizin,” meaning ‘guests’ in Aramaic…. For Rojas, the choice of the cruciform is an emotive advance to the symbol of Christianity.”

Rojas’ past solo shows have always sold out, and judging by the mastery embodied in his latest works, this occasion will be no exception.

Joy Rojas’ fourth solo show “Rising Sun” opens 6:00 p.m., Sept. 2, 2019, at the A.R.T. Center, 4/F The Artwalk, Bldg. A, SM Megamall, EDSA, Mandaluyong City. For artwork inquiries, text or Viber 0915-1976955 or 0921-506-0078. *** “On the March,” a coffeetable book on Jesuit ministry in the Philippines, scored its fourth major award this year—a Philippine Quill under the publications category—adding to its Gold Anvil Award and Platinum Anvil Award from the Public Relations Society of the Philippines (PRSP) and its Gold Quill (Award of Merit) from the prestigious International Association of Business Communicators (IABC).

The book’s principal author is Father Jose Arcilla, SJ; its editor, journalist John Nery. It was published by Media Wise Communications, with Manuel Paras Engwa and Ramoncito Ocampo Cruz as copublishers.

By Luis Robayo THEY clamber onto buses and stand among the jostling commuters, portraits of missing loved ones hanging from their necks, their presence a reminder that despite a 2016 peace agreement, for some, Colombia’s conflict has never really ended.

The women are on the bus to beg, not for money, just for a moment of their fellow passengers’ attention: “Have you seen my daughter?” or “Have you seen my son?”

These are the self-styled “Searchers” of Cali, a city that has known more than its share of violence during Colombia’s halfcentury of civil strife.

Their faces lined with worry, they haunt its public transport stations, brandishing giant portrait photos of their children, missing victims of the country’s many-sided conflict.

“It’s like a cry that we are launching, so that the world will know, so that it becomes aware,” said Maria Elena Gallego, who has spent the last eight years looking for her missing daughter.

Gallego is one of a group of 35 women seeking to draw attention to the victims of forced disappearances, which were a feature of Colombian life during a halfcentury of conflict.

Every day, they board buses carrying their children’s portraits, distributing handwritten letters recounting their poignant, unceasing searches.

“Mothers of missing people carry eternal pain,” says one missive.

Official figures put the “disappeared” at nearly 83,000—almost three times the number missing under the dictatorships of Argentina, Brazil and Chile combined.

“Where is She?”, “Where is He?”—the questions are written in bold lettering over the ageless portraits of the long lost: civilians and soldiers, men and women, but mostly the young.

Therapy for absence Gallego says she knows little about what happened to her daughter Sandra Viviana Cuellar, an environmental activist. She left her home on Feb. 17, 2011, heading to Palmira, a town around 30 kilometers (19 miles) from Cali, and never returned. She was 26.

“I got down to the task of investigating her disappearance, going from here to there, even attending workshops to learn how to look for my daughter, because what I want most is for her to reappear,” she says in her letter.

Gallego says telling strangers about her experience is a kind of balm against uncertainty.

“At least we go out, we shout, we talk, we cry! It’s an outlet! It’s therapy! But the pain, we take it with us everywhere,” she tells AFP. A campaign called #ReconocemosSuBusqueda (We recognize your search) was launched this year to highlight the work of these women, who have taken on the weary task of investigating the disappearances alone.

The initiative is supported by Colombia’s Missing Persons Research Unit and the Truth Commission, created as part of the 2016 peace agreement that ended the armed conflict between the government and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC).

Though Colombian officials have never given her any leads in the search for her daughter, Gallego believes Sandra disappeared because of her environmental work. She still believes that her daughter is alive.

Met with indifference Luz Edilia Florez, 57, paid a heavy price for wanting to know what happened to her son, Jose Ernesto Moran, kidnapped by a far-right militia in the southwestern area of Jamundi.

When paramilitaries found out she was investigating his 2002 disappearance, she says they seized her, raped her, tortured her, and left her for dead.

These days, she rides the buses of Cali, distributing her message and brandishing her son’s portrait. In her letter, she lambasts the “indifference” of society towards the women’s stories.

Hanging onto a bar overhead, the picture of her son hung around her neck, she sings a lament to the other passengers gazing at the image. Hope propels her forward, though she admits: “My son could be in a grave.”

Part of the difficulty she and other mothers face is the many-sided aspect of Colombia’s conflict, in which around 30 armed groups were involved, both pro- and anti-government.

According to the National Center for Historical Memory, at least 82,998 people were forcibly disappeared between 1958 and 2017.

Only in 52 percent of cases do authorities know who was responsible.

Florez’s wish on the International Day of the Victims of Enforced Disappearances, held on Aug. 30 each year, is that “there will be no more missing,” and that she’ll find her son. AFP

POP GOES THE WORLD JENNY ORTUOSTE “On the March” chronicles the Jesuits’ ministry of education and the many aspects of their apostolate in the Philippines.

In January this year, Cruz, who is also Media Wise president and CEO, received a Platinum Anvil Award for “On the March.”

The award is given to an outstanding entry chosen from among the Anvil Gold winners.

The Anvil is the symbol of excellence in public relations, awarded to outstanding PR programs, tools and practitioners.

In June, Cruz received a Gold Quill from San Francisco-based IABC at the 2019 IABC World Conference in a ceremony held in Vancouver. Only four other Filipino organizations have received the coveted international recognition.

The IABC awards committee cited “On the March” for “exhibiting high-quality writing and superior production values.”

“The book is well-organized, consistent... from the beginning to end. It flows well. It’s clear that [Mediawise] brought together the right mix of interviewers, writers, designers and publishers to produce a high-quality communication vehicle,” said the committee.

Media Wise Communications publishes coffee table books under its imprint Muse Books. For inquiries, send an email to: mediawise02@yahoo.com. FB and Twitter: @DrJennyO

Rolando G. Estabillo Publisher ManilaStandard

Published Monday to Sunday by Philippine Manila Standard Publishing Inc. at 6/F Universal Re Building, 106 Paseo de Roxas, corner Perea St., Legaspi Village, Makati City. Telephone numbers 832-5554, 832-5556, 832-5558 (connecting all departments), (Editorial) 832-5554, (Advertising) 832-5550. P.O. Box 2933, Manila Central Post Office, Manila. Website: www.thestandard. com.ph; e-mail: contact@thestandard.com.ph

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TRUMP: LATEST CHINA TARIFFS SET SUNDAY ‘ON’

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ASHINGTON—US President Donald Trump confirmed Friday that steep new tariffs on Chinese goods will kick in on Sunday and said that his economic pressure is forcing Beijing to take a more moderate line in Hong Kong.

“They’re on,”Trump told reporters, two days before the levies on billions of dollars’ worth of Chinese imports are set to rise in the latest escalation of the trade war between the world’s two biggest economies.

Trump also said that US economic pressure on China was responsible for preventing the authorities from carrying out a harsher crackdown against pro-democracy demonstrators

in Hong Kong.

“Because of what I’m doing with trade that’s really keeping down the temperature,” he said at the White House.

Trump’s tough line—and his claim that events in Hong Kong are linked to the trade war—follows his insistence over the last week that Chinese negotiators are keener than ever to strike a deal.

However, despite repeated hints that highlevel communications have been reopened on the standoff, White House officials have sparked skepticism by failing to provide details of those reported talks.

His confirmation that the new tariffs will go ahead underlines the reality that the two sides remain at loggerheads.

Trump earlier this month had called for 10 percent tariffs on $300 billion in goods to take effect September 1 and December 15. Then Beijing retaliated by targeting $75 billion in US exports and Trump announced that the new tariffs would instead hit 15 percent.

In addition, existing 25 percent duties on $250 billion worth of Chinese products will rise to 30 percent starting October 1.

Trump initiated the trade war last year because of complaints over unfair Chinese trade practices.

His comments on Hong Kong could touch political nerves in China, which bristles at anything it sees as outside interference in the restive city.

Asked if he saw a connection between the way the Chinese respond to the unrest and the difficulties their economy faces under US pressure, Trump said: “I do, I do.”

“If it weren’t for the trade talks Hong Kong would be in much more trouble,” he said, reiterating a call for Beijing to “handle it in a humane fashion.”

Trump’s call fell on the same day prominent Hong Kong democracy activists including three lawmakers were arrested in a protest crackdown —a move described by rights groups as a wellworn tactic deployed by China to suffocate dissent ahead of major political events. AFP

Cesar Barrioquinto, Editor / Jimbo Gulle, Issue Editor

BAHAMAS, FLORIDA IN PATH OF ‘DANGEROUS’ DORIAN MIAMI—Hurricane Dorian strengthened into an “extremely dangerous” storm on Friday as it bore down on the Bahamas and the east coast of the US state of Florida.

Bahamas Prime Minister Hubert Minnis urged residents of the Atlantic Ocean archipelago in the path of the “very powerful and potentially lifethreatening hurricane” to seek safety.

The Miami-based National Hurricane Center (NHC) said Dorian, which is expected to make landfall in the Bahamas on Sunday and in Florida late Monday or Tuesday, “has strengthened to an extremely dangerous Category 4 hurricane” on a five-level scale.

The storm has winds near 140 miles per hour (220 kilometers per hour), according to the NHC. “A prolonged period of life-threatening storm surge and devastating hurricaneforce winds are likely in portions of the northwestern Bahamas, where a hurricane warning is in effect,” the NHC said.

Minnis, the Bahamas prime minister, told a press conference that the storm was life-threatening. AFP

BOLSONARO FUELS SPAT WITH EUROPE; AMAZON FIRES SOAR ARIQUEMES, Brazil—President Jair Bolsonaro said Friday that Europe has “nothing to teach” Brazil about preserving the environment, as the country aligns itself with the United States over fires raging in the Amazon rainforest.

The far-right leader’s comments come as the latest official data show thousands of new fires were ignited across Brazil on Thursday—the first day of a ban on burning—with most of them in the Amazon basin.

Offers of international help to combat the worst fires in the Amazon in years have been made, but the issue has provoked accusations in Brazil that foreign countries—particularly in Europe—were trying to meddle in its affairs.

Brazil has found an ally in the United States where President Donald Trump praised Bolsonaro’s handling of the crisis and offered US assistance. AFP

RELAXING TREAT. Spectators in bathtubs listen Czech opera singers Adam Plachetka (left) and Eva Kyvalova performing parts of Mozart’s Don Giovanni, at the rooftop of Lucerna Palace building on Thursday in Prague. AFP

BRITONS SET TO PROTEST JOHNSON’S BREXIT MOVE LONDON—Demonstrations are expected across Britain on Saturday against Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s move to suspend parliament in the final weeks before Brexit.

The protests come ahead of an intense political week in which Johnson’s opponents will seek to block the move in court and legislate against a nodeal departure from the European Union.

Organizers said they were hoping hundreds of thousands of people would take part in the demonstrations, organized under the slogan #StopTheCoup.

“Disruption is the only form of leverage protesters can rely on,” said Michael Chessum, national organizer for the campaign group Another Europe is Possible.

“This process needs to force the government to change its course,” he said.

The left-wing group Momentum, closely allied with the main opposition Labour Party, is calling on its supporters to “occupy bridges and blockade roads”.

Saturday’s main demonstration is expected outside Johnson’s Downing Street office in London from around 1100 GMT and there will be more in around 30 other towns and cities.

Johnson warns MPs Johnson, who only came to power a month ago following a Conservative Party leadership election, has promised to lead Britain out of the EU on October 31 with or without an agreement with Brussels.

He has said he is ready to strike a deal if provisions for Britain to stay in the customs union even after Brexit are cut from an existing deal struck by his predecessor Theresa May.

But EU leaders have said they are still awaiting concrete proposals from London.

Johnson’s Brexit adviser David Frost is expected back in Brussels for talks next week.

Opposition MPs and some lawmakers from Johnson’s own Conservatives want him to delay Brexit beyond October 31 if he fails to strike an agreement with the EU. The government meanwhile is ramping up preparations in case of no-deal.

Johnson on Friday cautioned MPs against trying to hamper his plans, saying a decision to delay Brexit again would do “lasting damage” to public trust in politics.

He said the opposition’s efforts could in fact help lead to a no-deal Brexit as EU counterparts would be less likely to offer a compromise if they believed Brexit could be stopped. AFP

US BLACKLISTS IRAN OIL TANKER IN MEDITERRANEAN BEIRUT, Lebanon—The United States on Friday blacklisted the Iranian oil tanker Adrian Darya following repeated warnings over its valuable oil cargo.

Previously known as Grace 1, the ship has been bouncing around the Mediterranean after being held for six weeks by Gibraltar on suspicion its cargo was bound for Syria.

Despite Washington’s efforts to keep it detained, it was released by the British territory and its every move is being followed with intense speculation.

The US Department of Treasury on Friday said the vessel is “blocked property” under an anti-terrorist order, and “anyone providing support to the Adrian Darya 1 risks being sanctioned”.

The ship’s captain, Akhilesh Kumar, was also blacklisted under the order, which generally prohibits dealings with blocked property by US persons.

Lebanon had earlier dismissed Turkish claims that it would receive the ship, which has a cargo of 2.1 million barrels worth around $140 million. AFP

‘ENSLAVED’ GERMAN TEEN CASE SHAKES NORTHERN ROMANIA BUCHAREST, Romania—German teens treated “like slaves”, tied with ropes and forced to pull carts alongside animals: these are the allegations facing a Germany-funded social programme in remote northern Romania.

On Tuesday, riot police backed by a helicopter stormed a farm in Viseu de Sus village where a German couple set up the programme some 15 years ago to help dozens of troubled minors.

But now the German man and four Romanians stand accused of keeping children in “slavery-like conditions”, using “barbaric methods amounting to torture” and treating them in “humiliating and degrading” ways, prosecutors say.

They say the children were forced to “do exhausting physical labor”, deprived of food and beaten repeatedly under “Projekt Maramures” named after the county where

it is based.

Twenty children, aged 12 to 18, were in the programme’s care—several of them at host families—when authorities raided the farm and seven other houses.

Berlin has said it had not been aware of any problems with the programme in the past 20 years. Some of the children have also dismissed the abuse allegations.

“What slavery? We fed the cattle and the sheep. It’s not so tough to feed them.

And we could eat as much as we wanted. I gained 11 kilos (24 pounds) in three months,” Jonelle Kooi, who lived in a host family, told Romanian news channel Digi24.

But at least four of them, who are with child protection services now, have denounced the alleged brutality of the center employees, punishments and in the case of a young girl the forced use of a contraceptive coil, according to investigators. AFP

BIG BUSTS. A couple poses for a selfie with giant salvaged busts of former US Presidents Sunday in Williamsburg, Virginia. Howard Hankins rescued the busts from the closed Presidents Park in Colonial Williamsburg, when he was commissioned to destroy them. AFP

Images

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SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 1, 2019 mst.daydesk@gmail.com

PHOTOS OF THE WEEK

BORIS BURIED. A demonstrator, wearing a mask depicting Britain’s Prime Minister Boris Johnson and using a mock gravestone inscribed with the words ‘RIP British Democracy’, protests outside the gates to Downing Street in central London on Wednesday. Johnson announced that the suspension of parliament would be extended until Oct. 14—just two weeks before the UK is set to leave the European Union, enraging anti-Brexit members of Parliament. AFP

ACTION STARS. President Rodrigo Duterte meets Chinese actor and martial artist Jackie Chan during his visit to China on Thursday. Duterte received an autographed book, a jacket, and stuffed panda toys from the action star, as shown in this photo released by Malacañang. Presidential Photo

MOST WANTED. Calabarzon police, led by Regional Director Police Brig. Gen. Edward Carranza, present to the media the No. 2 Most Wanted Person in the region, Marvin Dupal-Ag, who was arrested at Barangay Cantabaco in Toledo City, Cebu on Thursday afternoon. Dupal-Ag is charged with killing a man in 2003 and the frustrated murder of another man in 2007, both in Dasmariñas, Cavite. Roy Tomandao

TILT-A-WHIRL. Stuntmen and acrobatic dancers perform during the official

‘FACEKINI’. This photo taken on Thursday shows a woman clad in facekini cooling off in the surf in Qingdao, in eastern China’s

ASEAN GARB. Muntinlupa Mayor Jaime Fresnedi looks at the display of the ASEAN Costume Exhibition on Thursday. In celebration of ASEAN Month, the Museo ng Muntinlupa and the National Commission for Culture and the Arts launched ‘Woven Identities: Clothing Traditions of ASEAN’ at the Grand Lobby of Museo ng Muntinlupa.

A traveling exhibition, this is the first time the exhibition will be displayed in a museum setting.

MUSIC EDUCATION. Some girls of the Adat B’laan, an indigenous group in South Cotabato play their traditional music

launch of the Isuzu D-Max at the Glorietta Activity Center in Makati on Friday.

Sonny Espiritu

Shandong province. AFP

using the ‘klubing’, a bamboo mouth harp, during the Indigenous People’s Day in Tupi, South Cotabato. TELUS International Philippines helped educate the youth and restore the cultural pride of the tribe through a grant of the BPO firm’s Community Board worth P455,000 to GeoChris Foundation and the Adat B’laan.

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SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 1, 2019

Riera U. Mallari, Editor sports_mstandard@yahoo.com

Sports

PH SPORTS OFFICIALS UNITE FOR SEA GAMES

HILIPPINE Sports Commission Chairman William “Butch” Ramirez yesterday hailed the recent tripartite agreement that involved the PSC, Philippine Olympic Committee and the Philippine Southeast Asian Games Organizing Committee (Phisgoc) as the move that put forward the country’s preparations for the hosting of the Games.

“Now we can move on,” said Ramirez, also the Chief of Mission of Team Philippines.

Ramirez said President Rodrigo Duterte has placed a special concern on the country’s preparations on the Philippine hosting of the SEA Games after special elections were once again called by the POC following the resignation of its former president Ricky Vargas.

“Now that the internal issues of the POC

have been settled and with all of its officials now moving in the same page, government, through the PSC, and all the other agencies with stakes in the Games, can now also move forward with the preparations,” Ramirez said.

The PSC chief said newly-elected POC President Abraham “Bambol” Tolentino, who is also the Cavite 7th District Representative in the House of Representative, is ably steering the national sports associations in their roles for the hosting.

“The success of the SEA Games will rest on the now very pronounced cooperation among our sports leaders. Rep. Tolentino is able to galvanize the once contenting sports leaders into a cohesive group that yes, we can now say the SEA Games is definitely a go,” Ramirez said.

For its part, Ramirez said the PSC will support the technical needs of the NSAs aside from its continuing program to boost their athletes’ chances by funding their training

both home and overseas.

“Time, however, is of the essence. We’re no longer counting the days towards the SEA Games but the hours and minutes leading to them,” Ramirez said.

The SEA Games will be held from November 30 to December 11 in different venues in Luzon.

Main venues for the Games are being built at the Clark and Subic.

Ramirez and Tolentino met with the POC Board and several other NSA officials on Thursday and defined their respective roles in the Games.

“I saw their cooperation as a very positive sign that points to the success of the Games’ hosting.

Rep. Tolentino and the POC Board are also upbeat on the SEA Games, especially now that we have a little than four months before the first matches are played,” Ramirez said.

“The SEA Games are a go, that is for sure,” he added.

Shown here after the tripartite signing among the Philippine Sports Commission, Philippine Olympic Committee and the Philippine Southeast Asian Games Organizing Commitee are (from left, seated) POC Chairman Steve Hontiveros, Team Philippines Chef de Mission and PSC Chairman William Ramirez, POC President Cong.

Bambol Tolentino and PHISGOC President and COO Ramon Suzara, (from left, standing) POC legal counsel Atty. Al Agra, POC Treasurer Julian Camacho, Board Member Cynthia Carrion, PSC Commissioner Charles Maxey, POC Auditor Jonne Go, PSC Commissioner Arnold Agustin, PHISGOC Director for legal Atty.

Jarie Osias, PSC Commissioner Ramon Fernandez and PHISGOC Director for Protocol and IR Porfirio Mayo stand as witness for the signing.

ENRIQUEZ, TANGUB DOMINATE PPS COTABATO SYDNEY Enriquez and Eric Jay Tangub primed up for the tough ITF meet in Malaysia next month by ruling their respective sides in big fashions in the PPS-PEPP Cotabato City national age group tennis tournament at the Cotabato City Tennis Society courts recently.

Enriquez, 16, yielded just two games in topping her age bracket, highlighted by a 6-0, 6-1 romp over unranked Alyssa Dino in the finals.

The Salug, Zambo del Norte ace proved tougher in 18-and-under play, crushing Althea Lu, 6-0, 6-0, to cap a rare unbeaten run to the crown in the Group 2 event presented by Dunlop.

Tangub, from Tukuran, Zambo

del Sur, held off Heinz Carbonilla, 6-2, 6-3, to capture the boys’ 16-U diadem in a victory that augured well for his and Enriquez’s buildup for the ITF Grade 5 tournament in Selangor on Oct. 1-6 as representatives of the Unified Tennis Philippines.

“With a series of tournaments lined up in the next two months or so, we expect Enriquez and Tangub to further hone up and reach top form in time for the Selangor meet,” said Palawan Pawnshop president/ CEO Bobby Castro.

Sharing top honors were local bets Arpha Sarip (10-unisex) and Dyan Natano (girls’ 12-U), Lanao’s Kale Villamar (boys’ 12-U) and Carbonilla (boys’ 14-U), Pagadian’s Nilo Ledama (boys’ 18-U) and

Dapitan’s Christine Gulagula (girls’ 14-U).

Sarip stunned top seed Pete Bandala, 4-1, 4-0; Natano upended No. 1 Marilyn Mesiona, 6-3, 4-6, 10-3; No. 6 Villamar repulsed unranked Reuben Nagret, 6-3, 6-1; Carbonilla routed Oxter Sarip, 6-0, 6-0; Ledama stopped doubles partner Tangub, 6-2, 6-2; and Gulagula foiled Natano, 6-2, 6-3.

Tangub and Ledama later teamed up to clinch the 18-U doubles title with an 8-6 triumph over Aslan Carbonilla and Ren Lagamon with Ezra Enriquez and Mae Torrecarion beating Ayessa Dino and Lu, 8-2, in the girls’ finals.

Vinz Bering and Kale Villamar took the boys’ 14-U plum with an

8-2 rout of Nagret and Klayton Dino with Gulagula and Mesiona bagging the girls’ crown with an 8-3 win over Natano and Yna Francisco.

Bandala and Inigo Barrios toppled the top-seeded pair of Johnel Maldo and Cian Ramirez, 8-4, to snare the 10-unisex title in the event sanctioned by the UTP made up of PPS-PEPP, Cebuana Lhuillier, Wilson, Toby’s, Dunlop, Slazenger and B-Meg. For details, call PPS-PEPP Sports Program Development director Bobby Mangunay at 0915-4046464.

Meanwhile, next up is the PPSPEPP Actifit All Students Open presented by MCF Global on Sept. 1315, 20-22 and 27-28 at the Actifit Sports Center in Valenzuela City.

ABOITIZ INVITATIONAL RETURNS TO WACK WACK THE Aboitiz Invitational marks its ninth edition back at Wack Wack’s fabled East course in September with another strong international field gearing up for four days of battle of shotmaking and mental toughness in one of the country’s toughest courses.

The event has become one of the most sought-out championships this side of the region for its prestige and prize fund, luring some of the leading campaigners and rising stars from other regional tours and featuring the cream of Philippine golf.

Organized by Aboitiz Equity Ventures, Inc. in its home base in Cebu in 2011 in collaboration with Pilipinas Golf Tournaments, Inc., the Aboitiz Invitational has not only boosted the local golf calendar but also helped raise the level of play here with the composition of the competing field getting deeper and deeper year-in and year-out.

In fact, the $100,000 event slated Sept. 4-7 expects to draw another power-packed cast led by the regular campaigners on the Philippine Golf Tour Asia, this being a regular leg of the region’s emerging circuit since it was launched in 2017 as a fivestage tour, and those aiming to toughen up for their respective buildup for other bigger circuits outside of the region.

“We are greatly privileged to be instrumental in bringing together Philippine golf’s rising stars and living legends along with players from overseas to hone their game towards a spot in the world ranking,” said AEV

president and CEO Erramon Aboitiz.

Meanwhile, PGTI chairman and president Ricky Razon, the man behind PGT Asia, has expressed enthusiasm over the circuit’s role in helping produce more local players to join the likes of Miguel Tabuena, Angelo Que and Juvic Pagunsan in the international stage.

“In its first three seasons, the PGTA has served and will continue to serve as a great platform for Filipino players to develop their talent and skills and advance their respective careers. And we are happy to do our part in helping these players,” said Razon.

The Wack Wack East, which used to be the home of the Philippine Open, is being spruced up and is expected to reach championship form in time for the event for a true test of golf.

Jay Bayron beat Gavin Green of Malaysia by two strokes when the Mandaluyong layout hosted the Aboitiz Invitational in 2016. The championship moved to Manila Southwoods the following year where Tabuena nipped Que by one in a thrilling finish then Australian Damien Jordan became the first foreign player to win the event with a four-shot romp over Thai Namchok Tantipokhakul at Orchard last year.

Bayron also topped the inaugural event in Cebu in 2011 then fellow Davaoeño Elmer Salvador scored backto-back victories, also in Cebu, before Tony Lascuña beat Que by three at Riviera in 2014.

Jay Bayron

COCOLIFE TIGERS EDGE SHARKS DEADSHOT Joseph Terso buried a couple of killer treys in the dying seconds to bring life back to Davao Occidental COCOLIFE Tigers as they snatched a hard-earned 65-61 victory over the Cebu Sharks in the elimination round of the Maharlika Pilipinas Basketball League Lakan Cup recently at the Cuneta Astrodome in Pasay City.

The Sharks were on the verge of pulling off a giant-sized upset win after Jason Viloria and Raffy Oktubre joined hands in a 7-0 run to secure a 4-point lead, 61-57, with over a minute left in the game.

The Sharks’ premature celebration was snapped by Terso’s scoring show in the endgame as he scored a basket with 1:13 left, to go with a back-to-back triples to carry Davao from imminent defeat and into its eighth straight win in the season.

Both teams started slow, posting a low 13-11 first-quarter score in favor of the Tigers.

The Mindanao team of Dumper Party List Congresswoman Claudine Bautista of Davao Occidental backed

by COCOLIFE president Atty. Jose Martin Loon, FVP Joseph Ronquillo, AVP Rowena Asnan and SVP Franz Joie Araque unleashed a tight defense and an 11-0 blast for a 24-11 lead, ignited by veterans Billy Robles,Mark Yee and Bogs Raymundo .

Cebuano frontliners Al Mc Aloney, Oktubre and Lee Yu gallantly fought back to end the half, 30-34.

It was tooth and nail in the final half until it was decided in a close victory for the Tigers, who stayed on top of the team standings with a 10-1 record in the south division of the 31team league organized by Senator Manny Pacquiao.

“Nagbunga din ang shooting practice ko sa training. Na-maintain namin ang aming composure lalo na sa endgame. Matagal na kaming magkakasama kaya saulado na ang galawan,” said Terso, who earned his first Best Player of the Game award as a Tiger with 16 points and 5 rebounds.

NOVAK MAKES 4TH ROUND NEW YORK—Top-ranked defending champion Novak Djokovic rolled into the US Open fourth round on Friday while Serena Williams and Roger Federer cruised into the last 16 and Kei Nishikori was eliminated.

Djokovic, champion in four of the past five Slams and 16 overall, was less bothered by left shoulder pain that nagged him in the second round in defeating 111th-ranked American Denis Kudla 6-3, 6-4, 6-2.

“That I managed to play almost pain-free, that’s a big improvement from last match obviously,” Djokovic said. “I didn’t know how my body would react. That was nice.”

Djokovic, who needed treatment throughout his second-round triumph, skipped practice Thursday in favor of shoulder treatment.

“I’m not going to go into the medical details,” he said. “But it definitely was bothering me in the past couple weeks.”

The 32-year-old Serbian, a threetime US Open winner, booked a Sunday showdown with three-time Slam winner Stan Wawrinka, the Swiss 23rd seed who eliminated Italian lucky loser Paolo Lorenzi 6-4, 7-6 (11/9), 7-6 (7/4).

“There’s something with him that when I get into my best game, I know that it’s going to have some big rallies and I’m going to play good tennis,” Wawrinka said.

Djokovic, no worse than a US Open semi-finalist since a thirdround exit in 2006, leads Wawrinka 19-5 in their all-time rivalry, but they haven’t met since Wawrinka beat Djokovic in the 2016 US Open final.

“We’ve had some great battles over the years, but especially here,” Djokovic said. “Let the better player win.”

Federer routed Britain’s 58thranked Dan Evans 6-2, 6-2, 6-1 in only 80 minutes, blasting 48 winners to just seven for Evans. After dropping the first set in his first two matches, the 20-time Grand Slam champion was solid from start to finish. AFP

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SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 1, 2019

Business

Ray S. Eñano, Editor / Roderick dela Cruz, Issue Editor business@manilastandard.net

AFNI VOLUNTEERS HELP CHILDREN WITH CLEFT LIP

Lester Codog (right) with world boxing champion Floyd Mayweather

Captain Lester Tancioco Codog

STREET-SMART ENTREPRENEUR NOW SOARS ABOVE THE CLOUDS

F

ROM having adventurous adolescence in Metro Manila’s streets in the 1990s, Lester Tancioco Codog now runs several businesses and owns two aircraft that often take him above the clouds. His journey to the top, however, was full of challenges and opportunities.

Still young at age 39, the father of four admits he had a colorful past. Although he grew up in a middle-class family, his mingling with the poor gave him the tenacity to survive challenges and his partying days with the rich opened business opportunities.

Codog is a “rock star” in the motoring world, being the founder and CEO of Foilacar Industries—a pioneer in foil car wrapping that offers an alternative to car paint protection.

Foilacar develops and provides revolutionary design and aesthetic automotive wrapping services.

When US boxing champion Floyd Mayweather visited Manila in 2018, it was upon Codog’s invitation. He personally drove the champ for a tour of Manila.

Codog is also the CEO of Foilafly Inc. —a private charter plane company that also provides medium-sized aircraft restoration in the Philippines. A reservist at the Philippine Air Force and a member of Class Charlie Mabalasik (1998-2000), Codog regularly flies his own aircraft across the country to promote general aviation as a hobby and to discover and introduce different tourist destinations through his popular vlog. He owns two air assets: Cessna 182T Skylane RG2 and Cessna 340 multi-engine aircraft.

COLORFUL YOUTH Codog recalls that in his teenage years, he was an aggressive salesman who sold cars. Being inventive and full of devices, he was not afraid to take risks. “At a young age, I wanted to be mature.

At Grade 4, I smoked cigarettes. But when I got home, I still had values because we are a religious Catholic family,” he says.

He joined a fraternity group and engaged in street brawls at Grade 4 and Grade 5. He began courting girls in Grade 6. “I matured at a very young age. I started driving using my father’s car to go to bars,” he says.

“Crazy activities and cars were the best things for me. I started to love cars. Then I started using drugs. I was being adventurous. Then I was kicked

out of a Catholic school in Parañaque,” he says.

He enrolled in Malate Catholic School but had to quit after a week. He transferred to a school in Makati which is known for drop-outs and spoiled brats. At 16, he met a girl whom he got pregnant.

He was kicked out of school for the third time.

He then took and passed the Philippine Educational Placement Test to obtain a high school diploma, after which he studied BS in Aircraft Maintenance Technology at Airlink International Aviation College and a flight training course at Masters Flying School in Pasay.

In 1998, he joined the Philippine Air Force as a reservist and completed the grueling eightmonth training to become a technical sergeant.

All this time, Codog was living with the family of his girlfriend where he was exposed to a circle of rich individuals. “My life started changing because this is a completely different kind of people,” he says, referring to the wealthy families who lived around the area. “My connection became different,” he says.

Hesitant to ask for money from his parents, Codog entered the underground buy-and-sell business involving cars and ammunition. At 19, he was wanted by the government and was forced out of the country by the Department of Justice for the illegal transactions that he entered into.

He was charged with 11 high-profile cases. “I entered a plea bargain. Then Justice Secretary Hernando Perez ordered me out of the country.

For five years, I was not allowed to enter the Philippine soil, or else I would go to prison,” he says.

“It was a very difficult moment for me and my family. But that’s when my life started to change,” says Codog.

He became a janitor and construction worker in the United Kingdom, a pothead in Switzerland and a driver in the United Arab Emirates. In the year 2000, he joined his father in Dubai to become his assistant and all-around office boy. His father had a small business engaged in theme park construction and artificial landscaping.

CORPORATE WORLD When his father left for Saudi Arabia to attend to a project, Codog took charge of the business in Dubai. Being resourceful and imaginative, he started innovating. “My mind was playful.

With high-profile friends including sheiks, I got contracts for the interior design and refurbishing of yachts. I hired more carpenters from the Philippines and our team grew from 10 to 50,” he says.

Being aggressive and young, he was able to complete only one of the three projects. “That’s

the first lesson in the corporate world I learned. If it is not your expertise, don’t enter it. You should also hire the best people. The problem is I did not hire the best people. So I learned a lot of things,” he says.

He went back to indoor landscaping and got the biggest break when they were offered a contract by Grand Hyatt of Dubai to do interior landscaping. “The bamboos inside Grand Hyatt that they imported in Southeast Asia were dying and the grand opening was within a few days.

We replaced them with artificial bamboos. The business recovered,” he says.

At age 23, his father’s company, Shifa Decoration, became known for landscaping, rockworks and riverworks in Dubai. When his father returned, their ideas clashed. He quit as marketing manager to prove to his father that he could make it on his own.

An Arab neighbor hired Codog as a partner to put up Floramex Agriculture, a horticulture company that imports ornamental plants from Holland. From a two-man and one-truck company, Codog transformed Floramex into the largest firm of its kind in the Middle East with 36 trucks and 96 employees.

“I became corporate because I dealt with the biggest banks, biggest chains of hotels, with the sheiks and princes, with the palace itself. At age 24, I bought myself a brand-new Porsche Boxster S. I also bought a boat. I had motocross. I had a jet ski. I had friends in the palace. I had everything a boy wanted. I had all the toys. I became a legend as a party boy. At 24, I was a rock star there,” says Codog.

From being a minority partner, Codog dreamt of establishing his own company. “I wanted to grow even more because I was exposed to the corporate world and learned the intricacies of quotations and contracts. I was talking to consultants, architectural firms, accounting departments. I was managing employees from Pakistan, India, South Africa and the Philippines,” he says.

“I put up my own company called Design Unlimited. I got a business partner from the Philippines and we traded furniture and vases.

I imported them from Vietnam where I had a vase factory. We supplied vases to the Middle East—Qatar, Bahrain, Saudi. We became known for ornamental plants and vases. One of our competitors asked me to become a partner in Qatar. So I had two apartments, one in Dubai and another in Qatar,” he says.

Design Unlimited became one of the leading Filipino-owned companies in the United Arab Turn to C2

DASMARIÑAS, Cavite—At age 14, Jarenz Lantayan Hernandez is no stranger to surgeries. Born with cleft lip and cleft palate, Jarenz had surgery for the first time when she was only two.

Jarenz’s mother Merly said, “There is still a small opening on her palate …

This is going to be her fourth operation if she passes the screening.”

Jarenz is among thousands of Filipino children born with cleft palate and/or cleft lip problems, and she is not alone in dealing with all the challenges that come with it.

At the Pagamutan ng Dasmarinas on Aug. 17, more than 100 parents queued for hours for a chance to help their children with cleft palate and/ or cleft lip problems get free surgery thanks to Operation Smile Philippines and its partner donors.

A volunteer from Afni PH talks to children at the mission.

Operation Smile PH executive director Angel Mojica said one in 500 Filipino children suffer from cleft palate and/or cleft lip problems at the time of birth. Many of those affected come from poor communities, where proper nutrition and an ideal healthy environment for pregnant mothers are lacking.

Since its establishment in 1982, Operation Smile PH has helped repair more than 40,000 cleft palate and/or cleft lip problems.

“Aside from children who are born with this condition yearly, we have the backlogs [in surgery],” said Mojica. “The backlog is probably around 18,000 to 20,000.”

“Around 60 out of 100 patients are given the ‘green light’ for surgery,” Mojica said. “There are several reasons why some don’t pass the screening.

Some are too young, some are not in good health condition.”

Several studies show children with cleft palate and/or lip problem tend to have low self-esteem due to bullying and social isolation. Operation Smile PH’s mission tried to ease that as partner donor Afni Philippines held a fun-filled program for parents and children alike.

Afni Inc.’s charity arm, AfniCARES, regularly holds activities that allow employees to “listen to the challenges its neighbors face” and “make an impact.”

For this quarter, AfniCARES in the Philippines, through Afni Gives Back, chose to help children in need and to collaborate with Operation Smile PH. Together, they worked on a weekend mission to provide a fun time for children and parents while they waited for screening. The Afni PH program was complete with games, the distribution of gift bags and refreshments being served to children and volunteers.

Afni PH human resources director Joyce Caseñas said it’s the company’s core value to provide an avenue for employees that help the most vulnerable populations.

“About 78 percent of our employees in Afni Philippines are millennials and as millennials, they have the drive and passion to feel relevant in the society,” Caseñas said. “They want to contribute.”

There were 65 Afni Gives Back volunteers who joined the initiative—the most since 2017, with monetary pledges reaching nearly P45,000—enough to sponsor the surgery and post-surgery medication of one patient.

YANSON MATRIARCH APPEALS FOR RESPECT FROM SQUABBLING CHILDREN OLIVIA Yanson, the 85-year-old matriarch of the Yanson Group of Bus Companies, appealed to her children to honor and respect her as their mother and co-founder of the bus conglomerate as she has only a few years to live.

In a statement sent to journalists, Olivia called on her children to pay her a visit and work for family reconciliation to ensure the smooth operations of the country’s largest bus transport organization.

“If you go out of your way and spend hours to be with your friends, why cannot you spare just 30 minutes a week and spend it with me? If I call your phones, you would not answer. When I visit you, you would give all reasons not to see me,” she said.

“Am I asking too much from each one of you? Many of you have not even visited

me at my house since your father died.

My pillow is full of tears every morning because of all the pain you are giving me. I think I don’t deserve this after I have sacrificed my life for each one of you. My only wish in the twilight of my life is to see all of you as a family and not fighting one another,” Olivia said.

“Your father and I made sure that each one of you would live more than comfortably but instead of counting your blessings, you turned against each other. If you continue to fight each other, there would be nothing left for the next generation,” she said.

“Each one of you has already more than enough... so work on forgiving each other so that the next generation and the generations to come can also enjoy the blessings we have left behind,” the Yanson matriarch said.

Yanson Group of Bus Companies co-founder Olivia Yanson

Olivia, together with her late husband Ricardo Yanson Sr., established the Yanson Group in 1968 and oversaw its growth to become a bus conglomerate that now employs 18,000 individuals who provide transport services to 700,000 passengers across the country daily.

A nurse by profession, Olivia helped her husband manage the business from the ground up. “I remember before Ceres became a successful enterprise, we could even hardly buy food and feed all our children,” she recalled.

Ceres Liner is one of the bus brands of Vallacar Transit Inc., the largest company under the Yanson Group.

Olivia reminded her children about the hardship that they went through as a family before the success of their business divided them, instead of bringing them together.

“We could hardly afford to buy medicines when our children became sick, or ensure their milk supply. I often stayed up all night so no mosquitos would bite them. Yet today, after more than five decades of tirelessly working for the success of the business, I got into this stage of seeing some of my children going against me and leaving me with nothing after all my hard work alongside their father,” she claimed.

“Precisely, I worked so hard so they did not have to endure what we have endured and that I would not beg money from them,” Olivia said.

“Now that our business has flourished, it is very painful on my part as a parent, painful to a mother like me that I have to go through all these. I have sacrificed so much Turn to C2

Business

C2

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 1, 2019 business@manilastandard.net

BRIA CONTINUES TO BUILD HOMES IN THE VISAYAS AND MINDANAO

A M I D t h e o n g o i n g i n f ra s t r u c t u re projects in the Visayas and Mindanao, a br ighter future is unfolding for longtime residents of these areas.

Visayans and M indanaoans are becoming increasingly confident about sticking close to home to pursue their dreams or to raise their families. In fact, those who had earlier sought opportunities in Manila and its environs are seriously considering moving back home.

With the prospect of legions going back to their roots to further boost regional progress, Bria Homes has recognized the need for decent housing to accommodate them.

The fastest-growing mass housing developer in the Philippines has, in fact, bolstered its presence in the Visayas and Mindanao regions, building more communities to meet the need for safe, secure and affordable dwellings for prospective residents.

Bria Homes has more than 50 masshousing projects across the country, with a large number in the south. It has built residential communities in Samar, Leyte and Negros Oriental. In Mindanao, it has built homes in Cagayan de Oro, Misamis Oriental, Bukidnon, Davao del Norte, Davao del Sur, South Cotabato and North Cotabato and more developments are in the works.

TECHNOLUX HOLDS ANOTHER BUSINESS SERIES TECHNOLUX Business Series will feature Pizza Master and Italmill Pizza on Sept. 5 at 2 p.m. at Mall of Kitchens along Kamagong St. in Makati City. Admission is free.

TBS is aimed at introducing world-class kitchen equipment and quality ingredients to foodpreneurs, chefs and enterprises engaged in the F&B industry and helping them discover what will work best for their businesses through product demos and engagements with guest speakers from different countries.

Italmill S.p.A. is one of the biggest family-run businesses in the flour and semi-finished baking product industry in Italy. Its products include pastry, bakery and pizza preferred by Michelin-starred restaurants, cafés and pizzerias because they guarantee the best Italian pizzas and artisan bread.

Pizza Master Oven, meanwhile, is the largest electric deck oven ranges in the world with 80 different sizes and over 1,000 combinations. It boasts of high performance, durability and space-saving functions.

YANSON...

From C1

and done things beyond the capabilities of a nurse, performing functions outside my core skills like being assigned to manage the warehouse, handle finances as well as ticketing,” she said.

Olivia handled the administrative operations of the company, including the management of the group’s thousands of employees.

“I willingly served the company and when I have learned the functions, I put in place systems to professionalize the operations until my husband moved me to handle personnel services where I excelled the most in motivating and drawing out the best among our workers and made them vital partners in the growth of the company,” she said.

“Because of my effective handling of personnel, many of them who are now past the retirement age, decided to still stay and help the company,” Olivia said.

The family feud started on July 7, 2019 when four Yanson siblings—Roy, Ricardo Jr., Emily and Celina—in a purported special board meeting, unseated Leo Rey Yanson as the president of VTI. Leo Rey was subsequently replaced by his eldest brother Roy Yanson but Leo Rey with the support of his mother, Olivia and sister Ginnette Yanson Dumancas, refused to step down.

The four siblings claimed that their parents and all the children signed the family constitution and shareholder’s agreement in 2010 and 2013 when their father was still alive. The patriarch died in 2015. They said that in exchange for having zero shares in the company, her mother “owns vast lands.”

On Aug. 19, the stockholders of VTI, including the Yanson matriarch, elected a new set of board of directors who subsequently re-elected Leo Rey Yanson as the president of the company.

The special stockholders meeting effectively re-affirmed Leo Rey Yanson as the rightful president of VTI, the largest subsidiary of the Yanson Group of Bus Companies and is the company behind Ceres Liner and Sugbo Transit.

Leo Rey asked his siblings to respect the rights of their mother. “VTI was started and honed to what it is now by our parents as a conjugal venture,” Leo Rey said.

He said that claiming that her mother Olivia no longer owns VTI is plainly wrong.

“It is but fitting and proper that our mother be accorded respect and control over what she built over the years,” Leo Rey said.

Leo Rey said his parents built Ceres from scratch. “Allow her to enjoy the fruits of her hard-earned labor,” he said. “Legally and morally, OVY owns VTI, OVY owns Ceres,” Leo Rey said.

INNOVATORS HOLD THE KEY TO ENDING SMOKING EPIDEMIC I

NNOVATIVE individuals in the Asia-Pacific region, home to the largest population of smokers, have an opportunity to end the smoking epidemic by improving the technologies to deliver nicotine in a much less hazardous and more affordable way, according to experts who convened during the 3rd Asia Harm Reduction Forum held in Seoul, South Korea on August 29.

“We have the ability to use business and create regulatory incentives to change the [tobacco] market.

We have tremendous opportunity to do really amazing things,” David Sweanor, an adjunct professor of law at the University of Ottawa, says during the 3rd Asia Harm Reduction Forum in Seoul, South Korea.

The forum was jointly organized by the Korea Harm Reduction Association and Yayasan Pemerhati Kesehatan Publik (YPKP) Indonesia. Sweanor, who has worked on tobacco and health policy issues since the early 1980s and played a key role in setting a wide range of Canadian and global precedents, is among the 100 experts from 18 countries who gathered at GLAD Hotel Yeouido to discuss the topic of harm reduction.

Sweanor says Asian innovators have the chance to improve the electronic nicotine delivery systems and make them less expensive and more accessible to the public in the same way that Japanese electronics manufacturers and Korean automotive makers became dominant in the global arena.

Sweanor says innovators can further improve the technologies behind non-combustible tobacco products. “Over time, the technology gets better and gets cheaper. That’s what we can do through innovation and technology. If we want to make them available to more smokers, if we want to make them less expensive than smoking, if we want to make them safer, if we want to make it easier for people to quit smoking, we have the ability to do that,” he says.

“It starts at whatever technology we have now and we use regulation to try to speed up the change.

Mobile phones are really a good example. You look around Asia and everybody has mobile phones today and they are better than 20 years ago,” he says.

Sweanor says such innovations will have a tremendous impact on public health as they will dramatically reduce the rate of smoking which is responsible for 20,000 deaths globally each day. He describes smoking as a public health catastrophe which causes a human death for every 4.5 seconds.

Sweanor says it is smoking, and not the nicotine in tobacco, that was found to be hazardous to human health. “The problem is not the nicotine, but the delivery system,” he says, adding that electronic cigarettes, heat-not-burn tobacco and Swedish snus that also contain nicotine were found to be much less harmful to human health.

“Cigarettes are really hazardous way for people to get nicotine. There are over a billion people in the world who are seeking nicotine by smoking cigarettes.

It kills people because they have to breathe in smoke.

We have the ability to get rid of the smoke. If we get rid of the smoke, we get rid of the disease,” says Sweanor.

“As you replace old products, you get better at it, you create a new business that could be very, very powerful and very wealthy because the cigarette market globally is so huge. Any company that takes 10 percent of that [$850-billion tobacco] market is gonna be probably worth as much as Amazon or Apple,” says Sweanor.

An expert independent evidence review by Public

STREET-SMART...

From C1

Emirates. The business, however, was hit by the 2008 economic crisis in Dubai, forcing Codog to consider other business ventures.

BACK TO THE PHILIPPINES He thought about putting up tea and cacao shops in other Asian countries.

He also considered bringing the foil wrapping technology from Dubai to Singapore. On the way to Singapore, he decided to visit Manila first, with the five-year travel ban against him already expired at that time, to see his mother. On the airplane, he sketched his business plan on a tissue paper.

In Manila, it was timely that a Filipino with expertise in the foil wrapping installer also went home. A good friend of Codog asked him if they could wrap his Porsche. “It was not a business project. It was just a test. I ordered stickers and we wrapped it,” he says.

His friend liked the way his supercar looked. Other supercar owners also got interested and asked for Codog’s services. He then decided to establish Foilacar Industries, not in Singapore, but in Manila. “My life went upside down in 2008. I was supposed to take a short vacation in Manila, but when I woke up, two years had passed. It took me two years to finish the line of supercars lining up for our services,” he says.

“That’s how Foilacar started. That’s also how I discovered that the Philippine economy is very good. I closed my company in Dubai and turned over the operations to my partner. Now, I am fully based here and it is now Foilacar’s 11th year,” says Codog.

Professor Tikki Pangestu

Health England concluded that e-cigarettes are around 95 percent less harmful than smoking and that e-cigarettes may be contributing to falling smoking rates among adults and young people in the UK. Sweanor says non-combustible products were also found effective in making people quit smoking in several countries. He says the introduction of heatnot-burn devices in Japan has dramatically reduced smoking incidence in the country. “Look at what Japan has now achieved. Roughly a third of Japanese cigarette market has disappeared, replaced by noncombustible tobacco products,” he says.

He says in Iceland, smoking prevalence went down by 40 percent in just three years by substitution of electronic cigarettes and Swedish snus.

Sweanor says the challenge is how to speed up the adoption of technology to save more lives as soon as possible. “We could cause a revolution in these products,” says Sweanor. “The history of innovation usually comes from new players. There will be some bright young people, somewhere who will say I have an idea. Juul is a company nobody heard of three years ago. Then it became worth $40 billion,” he says, referring to American e-cigarette manufacturer Juul Labs Inc.

Prof. David Sweanor

“People who are willing to take risks, who see the world differently, people who don’t have vested interests in the old technologies or old ideas, they can cause a big change. Asia is fascinating because many innovative companies, new technologies, new ideas are coming out of Asia. Many governments understand and support that,” says Sweanor.

“And if they did that on issues of alternative nicotine, we could have a revolution very quickly as new technology came forward. It would make the technology that we have now, heat-not-burn and the vaping and snus and products like that look like the early mobile phones that we used to have. People could look at the technology and say I can do that better,” he says.

Sweanor says Indonesia, for one, has enormous potential like many other Asian countries because it has a very large domestic market. “You have the ability to create domestic industrial champions the way many Asian countries have in ship manufacturing, car building or semi-conductor or consumer electronics.

Indonesia is in a good position to do that because they have such a big domestic market,” he says.

Codog is considered one of the godfathers of the global foiling industry.

He developed foiling technology standards that he also brought to the US, Hong Kong, Pakistan, Japan, Indonesia and Malaysia.

He also expanded his network of friends because Foilacar became a hub for supercar owners including a president, senators, congressmen, governors, mayors, economists, billionaires, businessmen and even wealthy individuals with underground ventures.

Codog ventured into other businesses such as aviation, mining ser vices, restaurants and public relations. “In between the 11 years that I am in the Philippines now, I established different businesses already. From there, I went back to flying because that is the love of my life. So I opened a company that distributes a brand of aircraft.

We offer char tering and aircraft restoration. I also have contracts with mining companies. I am a partner in various restaurants. The latest is an advertising agency and consulting firm that I put up,” he says.

In 2017, he established Quintessential Communications Network, a public relations, branding, marketing and out-of-the-box strategist that executes effective and high-impact media campaigns for political organizations and companies.

Quintessential has arranged highprofile deals with celebrities like world boxing champion Floyd Mayweather and Miss Universe 2015, 2016 and 2017 as some of his brand ambassadors for the different companies he held.

Beyond his corporate responsibilities,

Professor Tikki Pangestu, a professor at Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy (Public Health) in the National University of Singapore, says smoking rate among Asian males is very high. “In Indonesia where I come from, 76 percent of males are smokers but you can also see that in many other Asian countries, the rates are also very high. Six out of nine countries with the highest number of deaths from smoking are in Asia,” he says.

He says among the countries with the highest number of deaths from smoking are China (1.8 million); India (743,000); Indonesia (180,000); Japan (166,000); Bangladesh (153,000); and Pakistan (124,000).

Within the region, smoking incidence among males is highest in Indonesia at 76 percent; Laos, 57 percent; South Korea, 50 percent; China, 48 percent; Vietnam, 47 percent; Cambodia, 44 percent; Malaysia, 43 percent; the Philippines, 43 percent; Pakistan, 42 percent; Thailand, 41 percent; Bangladesh, 40 percent; Nepal, 37 percent; Japan, 34 percent; Myanmar, 32 percent; Sri Lanka, 28 percent; Singapore, 28 percent; and India, 20 percent.

Data also show that half of the largest tobaccoproducing countries in the world are in Asia, including China, India, Indonesia, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Korea, Thailand, Vietnam, the Philippines and Laos.

Pangestu says while there are safer alternatives to smoking, Asian countries such as Singapore, Thailand, Brunei and Cambodia ban the use of electronic cigarettes and there are ongoing debates about e-cigarettes in Indonesia, Malaysia, Vietnam and the Philippines He says promoting harm reduction in Asia is quite a challenge because of misinformed and misguided policymakers, the position of the World Health Organization on harm reduction, political and economic drivers, “fear factor” among smokers, affordability of e-cigarettes and HNB devices and the lack of quality local research.

Professor Okryun Moon of the Korea Harm Reduction Association says smokers in Asia deserve access to better alternative tobacco products.

Dr. Konstantinos Farsalinos, a cardiologist and researcher at Onassis Cardiac Surgery Center in Greece, says countries and governments should realize that harm reduction is a human right.

“In my opinion, tobacco harm reduction is an absolute necessity. There are mainly two reasons. One is that millions die of smoking every year. There are more than 1 billion smokers in the world today. Eight million of them die prematurely every year because of smoking-related diseases. It is a huge burden for the whole world,” says Farsalinos.

“The second reason is that quitting smoking is extremely difficult and approved methods to quit failed in the majority of smokers,” he says.

Farsalinos says harm reduction products such as e-cigarettes, heated tobacco and snus are found to be less harmful than combustible cigarettes. “They have far lower risks for smokers. We have seen a large reduction in cigarette sales when heated tobacco products are becoming more available. We have seen that in Japan and Korea,” he says.

Data show that in 2005, 49 percent of men and 14 percent of women in Japan were smokers. In 2018, the country’s smoking rate decreased to around 18 percent of the total population.

A new study by University College London says that smokers are three times more likely to succeed in quitting smoking with the use of electronic nicotine delivery systems or e-cigarettes, compared to those prescribed with nicotine replacement therapy based on research covering nearly 19,000 smokers in England over a 12-year period from 2006 to 2018.

“Due to the difficulty in quitting smoking, tobacco harm reduction represents a historical opportunity to eliminate smoking globally,” says Farsalinos.

“Harm reduction is a strategy that everyone knows, everyone understands because we all practice this every day in our lives. We need to emphasize that harm reduction is a human right,” says Farsalinos.

Codog uses his flying skills with the Fourth Air Force Wing Reserve, where he is ranked as a captain and wing commander (WesCom) to engage in rescue missions, charity works in times of natural disasters emergencies and highly-classified missions.

As an innovator and designer, he is a member of the Inventors’ Society of the Philippines. He received an automotive/ color change patent in 2009. As an avid golfer, he became the Sta. Elena Golf Cup Champion in Laguna in 2013.

For his outstanding achievements in business, innovation and design, Codog has received various awards such as Outstanding Young Businessman Awardee (2012-2014) and Automotive Innovative Awardee (2011-2015).

Asked about the lessons in business that he learned through the years, Codog says branding and marketing play important roles behind the success of a company.

LESSONS IN BUSINESS “The first thing I learned in business is marketing and branding. Second is how to operate. I may not be a master of operations, but I learned a lot in operations by eating with people, meeting with them, sleeping with them and leading them. Lastly, I learned that you don’t have to be rich to become happy. If you are not happy with what you are doing, then quit. Even though you will take a big loss, you should never be scared because that is going to be temporary. Your happiness is the greatest motivation that you should have. You have to be happy,” says Codog.

“You have to be enthusiastic about what you are doing. If you are not having fun, it is not gonna work. If

you are having fun, it is not work.

Sometimes when you get tired, you just have to take a time off before you come back,” he says.

Codog says while he had a colorful past, he remains adventurous to this day. “I am still adventurous. I never stopped but I am more careful right now,” he says.

He now finds joy in simple things.

“Think of it as your last day. You will start appreciating more,” says Codog who was involved in a plane crash two and a half years ago in Plaridel, Bulacan.

“I am now a strong believer and promoter of general aviation in the Philippines. The general aviation is dying because the patrons of general aviation are mostly in their senior years. I want to fly to our more than 7,000 islands. I am promoting to all businessmen how flying can change their lives,” he says.

Codog usually takes breakfast in one island and eats lunch in another.

“I can go home and back to my office on the same day. That’s my advantage of having my own plane and flying. General aviation should be alive because we have so many islands. Once our general aviation becomes big again, it will be cheaper for everybody,” he says.

Codog says another passion that keeps him excited every day is the branding services that his advertising agency provides to clients. “One of my goals is to help mediumscale companies to be on par with international companies. It makes my adrenaline high in helping companies.

When I see companies and people growing, it makes me feel more alive,” he says. Roderick T. dela Cruz

Tech & Gadgets

INTELLIGENT PARKING SYSTEM UNVEILED AT SM MEGAMALL

S

M INTELLIGENT Car Park, the first automated parking system in Philippines, was officially unveiled on Thursday at the SM Mega Mall Building A by Park Solutions Inc., which expects to revolutionize the parking industry in many ways.

Park Solutions Inc. and SM Megamall formally opened the first two towers, which are part of a cluster of 23 towers it expects to complete by the first quarter of 2020.

Attending the ribbon-cutting ceremonies which ushered in the first Japanese automated multi-level parking system in the country were Ferdinand P. Oroza, President/Chief Executive Officer of Park Solutions Inc.; Hans T. Sy, Director of SM Prime Holdings; Steven Tan, SM Supermalls’ COO; Fernando Khalil Oroza, Vice President of Park Solutions; Kenji Kawakami, Director/Manager Hokoku Parking System Japan and PC SUPT. Valeriano De Leon, Chief of the Firearms and Explosives Office.

Park Solutions Inc. is part of the Oroza Group of Companies, a diversified enterprise committed to providing the Filipino people with quality, value added products and services.

The company enumerated the various benefits that an intelligent parking system brings to the table, such as low environmental impact (no massive digging, minimal disruption of landscape etc.), quick construction, lower cost, higher parking capacity per square meter of land compared to all other parking systems,

Park Solutions Inc. personnel demonstrate how the SM Intelligent Car Park works.

Park Solutions/Oroza Group of Companies is durable/high quality (100% Japanese designed and made) and transferable, should the need bringing to the Philippines the first Intelligent come to re-develop the land/property where it Parking System, in cooperation with the Houkoku Parking Systems Co. of Japan. is situated.

The IPS is a mechanical system that automatically moves cars from the car park entry to an available parking space, using multiple levels and stacking cars vertically to use the least square footage possible in order to park as many cars as possible.

Oroza Group of Companies is involved in the distribution of retail and consumer goods, industrial equipment leasing as well as real estate and property development, while Houkoku is under Houkoku Holdings, which is part of Wathahan Co Ltd., a 16th generation business in Japan that is involved in various industries.

Sy entered into a contract with the Oroza Group, making SM Megamall as the first-ever site of the APS in the country.

In addition to the space saving, many IPS designs provide a number of secondary benefits such as: parked cars and their contents are more secure since there is no public access to parked cars; minor parking lot damage such as scrapes and dents are eliminated; drivers and passengers are safer not having to walk through parking lots or garages; driving around in search of a parking space is eliminated, thereby reducSM Intelligent Car Park, the first automated parking system in Philippines, was officially unveiled on ing engine emissions; only minimal ventilaThursday via a ribbon-cutting ceremony attended by (from left) Steven Tan, SM Supermalls’ COO; PC tion and lighting systems are needed; handiSUPT. Valeriano De Leon, Chief of Firearms and Explosives Office; Ferdinand P. Oroza, President/CEO of cap access is improved; the volume and visual Park Solutions Inc.; Hans T. Sy, Director of SM Prime Holdings; Fernando Khalil Oroza, Vice President of impact of the parking structure is minimized Park Solutions and Kenji Kawakami, Director/ Manager of Hokoku Parking System, Japan. and shorter construction time.

HONOR PH CELEBRATES 1ST YEAR HONOR Mobile, a leading mobile device ebrand and part of the HUAWEI Consumer Business Group, ranked as the number 1 smartphone with 16% online market share globally based from the second quarter report of IDC Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker.

In line with its slogan, “HONOR my World”, the brand, which promises to expand its presence nationwide both online and offline channels, was created to meet the needs of millennials through internet-optimised products that offer superior user experiences, inspire action, foster creativity and empower the young to achieve their dreams.

In doing this, HONOR has set itself apart by showcasing its own bravery to do things differently and take the steps needed to usher in the latest technologies and innovations

for its customers.

HONOR promises to bring in more technologies specifically the Harmony OS, a world’s microkernel-based distributed Operating System for all scenarios.

Honor vision is the first Harmony OS TV that will be available soon in the Philippines.

Towards end of the year, HONOR will release from midrange to top end 5G smartphones with enhanced software, upgraded GPU Turbo Technology and improved camera hardware for optimal market experience which caters the different interests of the younger market-world of photography, videography, gaming, music and lifestyle.

HONOR is currently present in key cities with numerous concept stores, kiosks and multi-brand stores. Watch out as HONOR will aggressively builds more stores nationwide. Paula Reynoso

RV Cuarto, Honor PH's Product and Training Manager

CASHALO GM ENUMERATES COST OF FINANCIAL IGNORANCE THREE in four Filipino adults are financially illiterate, and that financial ignorance costs us millions of dollars, the economy billions and for the country —the opportunity to alleviate poverty.

Consumer spending contributes about 70% to the overall economic growth in the Philippines—the world’s 26th largest consumer market with a population of nearly 107 million. For the past decade, the economy has been one of the fastest-growing in the world, and yet, wealth largely remains within the upper echelons of society.

With the economy expected to grow at least 6% this year and next, the influx of investments and wealth generation opportunities are a boon for the country’s emerging middle class— if they know how to access them to their advantage.

Not knowing, unfortunately, is the problem.

One in 10 Filipinos have no basic financial knowledge, according to a World Bank survey. The study showed 10% of respondents had zero correct answers to seven financial literacy questions that covered basic numeracy, compounding interest, price comparison, inflation, and investment diversification. Only 2% got all seven correct.

Meanwhile, a survey by the Standard & Poor’s Ratings Services put the Philippines’ financial literacy rate at 25%, lower than the global average of 33%, making it one of the 30 least financially literate countries in the world. In comparison, Scandinavian countries topped at 71%, Singapore had 59%, and the United States had 57%. Even neighbor Thailand edged out the Philippines with 27%.

Like most developing countries with large populations, having access to public services like education and health is critical to financial inclusion. The average Filipino is focused on covering basic needs like food and shelter, and they overlook long-term financial well-being and get stuck in a cycle of debt and spending. Any extra income is seen as a treat, and more often than not, is spent on dinner at the mall or a family outing.

That’s where financial education comes in. Filipinos grow up mindful of socioeconomic class divisions, and money management is a sensitive topic that is not taught in local schools. Filipino families don’t talk about finances either, because culturally, showing any sign of ignorance or inability to take care of the household is seen as shameful.

To “save face,” the head of a household will budget based on trial and error, vulnerable to making poor financial decisions that cost more in the long run. Studies show that not understanding compounding interest causes a consumer to pay higher interest rates, spend more on transaction fees, borrow more and run up bigger debts.

To combat this culture of financial silence and ignorance, the Philippine government, banking institutions and financial technology (or “fintech”) firms are building an ecosystem of information sharing and resources to promote financial inclusion and responsibility.

The Philippine government designated the second week of November as Economic and Financial Literacy Week. Meanwhile the private sector, universities, NGOs and community organizations are collaborating to reach target audiences, including young people entering the workforce, educators, OFWs, MSME entrepreneurs, and female heads of households who manage money. The Fintech Alliance and the wider fintech industry, too, are developing an industry-wide code of conduct and a collective voice to promote financial literacy and build trust in the burgeoning but still nascent sector.

C3

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 1, 2019 rumallari@thestandard.com.ph

GOOGLE TOLD TO PAY OUT $150-200M OVER YOUTUBE PRIVACY CLAIMS WASHINGTON—Google will pay $150200 million to settle allegations YouTube violated a children’s privacy law while gathering data to better target its adverts, US media reports said Friday.

The US Federal Trade Commission agreed the amount of the settlement against YouTube parent Google, which if approved by the Justice Department would be the largest settlement in a case involving children’s privacy, the New York Times reported.

The allegations against YouTube were made by privacy groups who said the platform had violated laws protecting children’s privacy by gathering data on users under the age of 13 without obtaining permission from parents, Politico reported.

The FTC is expected to announce its decision on the settlement in September, the New York Times said.

US regulators have long argued Google fails to protect children from harmful content and data collection on its YouTube platform.

Advocacy group The Center for Digital Democracy said in a statement that the proposed settlement would be “woefully low” given Google’s size and revenue, and called on the FTC to “enjoin Google from committing further violations” of children’s privacy law.

Google remains the money-making engine for parent company Alphabet, with most of its revenue coming from digital ads, which accounted for $116 billion of the $136 billion the Silicon Valleybased company took in last year.

In January, France’s CNIL data watchdog slapped Google with a record 50-million-euro fine for failing to meet the EU’s tough General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), which came into force early last year.

Google is appealing the fine.

Fellow US tech giant Facebook recently settled a record $5 billion fine with the US Federal Trade Commission for misusing users’ private data. AFP

TECH-DRIVEN..

From C4

Both rounds of funding were managed by Asia Partners, a Singaporebased growth equity firm founded by senior executives. It is now one of the largest funded startups in Singapore and is the best funded company in its category of online affordable accommodations in Southeast Asia. It is also Asia Partners’ first portfolio company which focuses on growth-stage investments in technology and technology-enabled companies in Southeast Asia.

MASSIVELY EXPANDING CONSUMER FOOTPRINT DRIVES PH TOURISM Majority of travelers do not have big budgets for five-star or four-star accommodations. But what they need are clean rooms, clean sheets and basic amenities that will give them a pleasant travel experience. From small and medium entrepreneurs to millennial backpackers, the availability of highly affordable lodging for short- or long-term stays is an attractive proposition. Boosted by the travel app to make bookings fast and convenient, the number of budget travelers is growing exponentially across the country.

This has resulted in a travel boom that has in turn revved up local businesses, opened up jobs, created support industries and benefited local governments.

Most of all, little known travel destinations are being identified and given focus, making these revolutionary Virtual Hotel Operators (VHOs) enablers in the government’s campaign to promote Philippine tourism.

Hamilton Angluben Cashalo, General Manager

C4

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TECH & Gadgets SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 1, 2019 Riera U. Mallari, Editor rumallari@thestandard.com.ph

TECH-DRIVEN SAVVY FUELS REDDOORZ

NEW LEARNING EXPERIENCE THRU HP PRINTERS

EDDOORZ is Southeast Asia’s largest and fastest-growing, technology-driven hotel management company offering affordable accommodations for everyone. With a vision to enable people to travel more and provide an affordable reliable stay in all major cities and destinations across the region, RedDoorz is disrupting the hospitality industry by transforming the fragmented supply inventory into branded, standardised accommodations and leveraging its mobile app and digital channels to drive strong consumer demand.

The company was founded in 2015 by a team of senior executives with deep experience in the online travel and hospitality industry and has grown into a regional powerhouse with operations in Indonesia, Singapore, the Philippines and Vietnam. The firm has been growing by five times year-on-year.

RedDoorz was introduced in the Philippines in July 2018 and has, within just a year, become a leading affordable hotel chain in the country. All hotels offer free Wi-Fi, clean rooms and bed sheets as well as basic amenities to ensure that anyone staying at a RedDoorz hotel receives a pleasant experience.

TAKING A TECH-FIRST APPROACH One of the key drivers to the company’s rapid growth is RedDoorz’s internet booking platform that greatly facilitates short-term transient rentals and hotel bookings. The RedDoorz mobile app— which has climbed to the number one position as mobile travel app of choice—has drastically improved the speed and convenience factors that were once considered points of friction for travellers.

This in turn has helped shift the balance of power between the slow-moving and inefficient luxury hotel brands and affordable hotels that appeal to smart, tech-savvy travelers.

The availability of multiple payment options— from credit cards, DragonPay (via bank transfer and 7-Eleven outlets) and ‘pay-at-hotel without credit card guarantee’—has made RedDoorz the primary destination for hotel guests. The convenience factors which have been developed around customer insights and data also invites repeat bookings. In addition, the RedCash rewards system, exclusive discounts and partner deals through RedClub membership raises the bar on consumer perks and incentives.

SUPPORTING THE LOCAL ECONOMY In the Philippines, RedDoorz has established over 150 hotels across 10 cities since the first quarter of

By Angelica Villanueva

A sample of RedDoorz’ accomodation

2019. It has directly supported the creation of over 1,000 jobs across those 10 cities where its hotels are located.

Locations include: Metro Manila, Baguio, Pampanga, Tagaytay, Palawan, Cebu, Iloilo, Bacolod and Davao with Bohol, General Santos City, Roxas City and Caticlan as new destinations.

By year end, new RedDoorz outlets will open in tourist-heavy Boracay Island, Antique, Capiz, Negros Occidental, Dumaguete, and Tacloban City. An even aggressive nationwide expansion is eyed in 2020.

INVESTORS’ CHOICE AND HOTEL OWNERS’ TRUSTED PARTNER As part of the RedDoorz brand network, hotel owners are able to grow their businesses and increase revenues while streamlining their operations.

RedDoorz’s solutions help partners manage distribution, pricing, marketing, customer experience and technology solutions—offering an end-to-end platform powered by an advanced technology infrastructure.

RedDoorz secured a fresh investment of USD 70m at the start of Q3 2019, as part of its first close of series C funding. This was announced less than

Liviu Nedef (center), RedDoorz’ SVP, Marketing and Communications explains why RedDoorz’s is disrupting the hotel industry with its techdriven savvy. He is joined by RedDoorz Country Head Stefanie Irma (left) and Marketing Manager Raenald Renz de Jesus.

two months after the company closed its series B funding with $45 million in Q2 2019; bringing the total funds raised to approximately $140 million since the company launched.

Turn to C3

GET FREE JBL GO 2 SPEAKER WITH VIVO S1 PRE-ORDER VIVO fans can take their style up a notch when they pre-order the Vivo S1.

Until Sept. 6, online pre-orders of the S1 for just P14,999, will not only get their hands on a fashionable handset that captures their style, they can also score an equally chic JBL GO 2 Bluetooth speakers.

Possessing fashion and functionality, the portable and waterproof JBL GO 2 is the perfect companion to go with the stylish Vivo S1. It can provide hours of continuous quality sound in an ultra-compact and colorful case, much like the S1.

The Vivo S1 boasts of a 6.38” Full HD SuperAMOLED screen that features an indisplay fingerprint sensor while its 6GB RAM and 128GB ROM is powered by a fastcharging 4500mAh battery.

The first handset in the new S Series also has a 32MP AI selfie camera and an AI triple lens set-up (16MP main, 8MP secondary, and 2MP wide-angle) at the back.

But what makes the S1 stylishly sophisticated is its gradient glossy finish on the Skyline Blue variant and a diamond cut design on the Diamond Black variant.

With exciting features and designs, plus an in-trend and quality freebie, the S1 is definitely one smartphone that will capture your style.

Be among the lucky owners of these two fashionable pieces when you preorder the Vivo S1 on Shopee bit.ly/ShopeeVivoS1 and Lazada bit.ly/LazadaVivoS1 today, while stocks last.

IN A recent study entitled “HP New Asian Learning Experience,” conducted by HP Inc., parents’ greatest priority when it comes to their children is for their kids to become a futureproof.

This means that parents want their children to become prepared when obstacles and challenges come their way.

Study also shows that 70% Filipino parents prefer and are willing to add and spend extra money for the extracurricular activities for their children.

“The study gives us insights on how learning is evolving and where our innovation can ensure these young learners thrive,” said Pallasena V. Viswanath, Managing Director of HP Philippines.

Filipino parents want their kids to be exposed to the world and develop skills that they can use beyond the class room and in real life.

“At HP, we are aligned with the parental focus on reinventing learning to create a positive impact on their children,” Viswanath added.

However, parents, of course, want their children to be happy and fulfilled, that is why most of them use teaching as their way of bonding with them.

It has also been revealed that most parents still believe in print materials than digital learning.

But parents are also receptive to the idea of mixing traditional with digital learning.

Such is the promise of HP. Learning and developing skills can now be easier and accessible for children through HP’s innovative printers and personal computers like HP DeskJet Ink Advantage 3775 and the HP Pavilion x360.

Make learning easier and more fun with the right tools to develop children’s skills and help their practical, creative, critical, and inventive learning.

SALARIUM LAUNCHES PAYROLL SOFTWARE FOR BIG BUSINESSES SALARIUM, one of the country’s leading providers of intelligent technological business solutions, launches the latest version of its payroll processing software this September.

While Salarium already serves numerous small to medium enterprises, the update is a complete overhaul that will bring a new level of enterprisegrade payroll to address the requirements of bigger businesses in the Philippines.

“We wanted to provide large Philippine enterprises with a highly customizable payroll solution that is ideal for solutions integrators,” said Salarium founder and Chief Executive Officer Judah Hirsch.

“Company’s needs vary on a case-to-case basis, so we decided to shift to a modular microservices-based architecture. This makes Salarium ideal for integrating into an existing structure or system, and it allows us to create highly customizable technological solutions for our clients,” Hirsch revealed.

A HIGHLY ADAPTABLE AND BUSINESS-CENTRIC SOFTWARE The biggest change from previous iterations is that instead of distributing the software as

a single bundle of services, Salarium now offers each service as an individual module so that large businesses need not be concerned about the difficulty of integrating the software because they can choose the specific solutions that meet their needs.

BIG BUSINESSES NEED BIG SOLUTIONS Version 3.0’s modular setup is a response to the demand for scalable technological solutions to process-heavy administrative tasks. As a company grows, scalability becomes essential to maintaining the quality and reliability of its services.

Salarium’s new modules introduce independent scalability. Since services are assigned specific teams to develop them individually, deployment is much quicker, and improvements are made with greater attention to detail.

A SEAMLESS USER EXPERIENCE Additionally, the new update has transformed Salarium into a powerful and highly customizable asset that guarantees a scalable management system, versatile timekeeping, sophisticated payroll disbursement and convenient handling of government reports.

Salarium has also completely redesigned its

user interface to make it easier to access and navigate for both administrators and employees.

TAKE MORE CONTROL OVER SECURITY AND DATA PRIVACY Potential risk is always directly proportional to company size, especially when it comes to maintaining a secure hold over sensitive information.

In the case of larger businesses, the need to tighten security around the personal data of employees only increases the more people they employ.

The update takes a state-of-the-art approach that not only covers monitoring user activity and setting advanced permission controls, it also provides an extra measure of security that is inherent to its new structure.

CUSTOMER SUPPORT THAT CONTINUES 24/7 The largest businesses in the Philippines are heavily tied-in with the global market, rendering services and providing goods to consumers all over the world. Continuous and specialized customer support that never sleeps is one of Salarium’s competitive edges. Clients can reach Salarium at any time, through various channels and with any query so that any potential disruption of service is avoided.

Shown here are (from left) Marc de Juan, Salarium Head of Fintech Operations, Judah Hirsch, Salarium Founder and CEO and Arianne Gonzaga, Salarium Support Manager.

Destinations D1

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 1, 2019

Bernadette Lunas, Issue Editor

manilastandardlife@gmail.com

THE TUSCANY OF MY DREAMS

@manilastandardlife

@MStandardLIFE

A replica of the statue of the She-Wolf in the Piazza del Duomo.

Banca Monte Dei Paschi di Siena, the oldest functioning bank in the world.

An image of the She-Wolf is the focal point of this ceramic masterpiece on the floor at the main entrance of the cathedral.

The Palazzo Pubblico in the center of town, with the sun crowning the 88-meter-tall Torre del Mangia.

A

MERCURY RISING

BY BOB ZOZOBRADO

S I mentioned in a previous column, I have always dreamed of celebrating my birthday in picture-perfect Tuscany, as I’ve seen it in the movies. And then, in a flash, thanks to my younger sister, Esperanza, who painstakingly put together our Italian holiday I found myself in my dream destination

Discounts and more at Klook Travel Fest

Exciting discounts and exclusive deals on tourist destinations around the world, plus tips from travel icons await attendees to the upcoming Klook Travel Fest on Sept. 7-8 at the World Trade Center in Pasay City.

Leading telco Smart teams up with Klook to bring more travel deals and data roaming perks. Smart subscribers can also get exclusive vouchers from the travel booking app.

Smart teams up with Klook to offer travel deals and data roaming perks.

Picturesque Siena is right at the center of Italy’s Tuscany Region. It is known for its medieval buildings made of bricks, and it has a very interesting story to tell.

Local legend says that the brothers Romulus and Remus, founders of Rome, were born of a She-Wolf.

When Romulus later killed Remus, the latter’s two sons made their quick getaway from Rome and settled in Siena, bringing with them the statue of the She-Wolf which they got from the Temple of Adonis.

A replica of the statue is displayed

on top of a concrete column in the city’s Piazza del Duomo and is one of the many attractions that can leave any seasoned tourist spellbound. We had time to visit a few of them.

The oldest bank in the world is in Siena. Banca Monte Dei Paschi di Siena continues to operate to this day and is located in Piazza Salimbeni, where the statue of Sallustio Bandini is also found. If the name doesn’t ring a bell, finance researchers will tell you that he was a great economist who paved the way for an effective banking system. He also introduced the

TRAVEL FOR LESS PH Travel Mart 2019 boosts domestic tourism

The Tourism Promotions Board-supported Philippine Travel Mart 2019, happening until today at SMX Convention Center, features over 250 exhibitors offering the best deals from all over the country.

TPB’s support of the event aims to bolster the tourism industry through the promotion of the country’s rich culture, natural attractions, and products, while supporting a sustainable business environment socially equitable for local communities.

The country’s longest running travel trade exhibition, now in its 30th year, also promotes intra-regional travel, with exciting offers from China, Japan, and Korea.

The 30th Philippine Travel Mart offers the best deals from all over the country.

use of checks as a form of payment A few blocks away is the Piazza del Campo, the city’s main plaza, where all its 17 districts spread out from.

Here is where the iconic Palazzo Pubblico stands. This magnificent Gothic structure is now the town hall, and it looks even more spectacular with the 88-meter-tall Torre del Mangia, where tourists can go up to its crown and enjoy breathtaking views of the beautiful city.

I was lucky to have been able to take a dramatic shot of this historic Turn to D2

Online platform offers deals on travel and other lifestyle ‘xperiences’

Travel and lifestyle online booking platform Traveloka launched in the Philippines its new product that lets users discover and book travel and lifestyle activities in and out of the country.

Traveloka Xperience allows domestic and international travelers to enjoy diverse ranges of services.

Product categories under the platform include Attractions; Events; Beauty & Spa; Entertainment; Sports; Classes & Workshops; Tours; Transports; and Travel Essentials. Currently, there are more than 15,000 inventories available across more than 300 destinations globally.

Traveloka Xperience can be accessed via desktop, mobile, and app. It offers a variety of payment methods that facilitate instant booking confirmation, as well as 24/7 local customer support.

Traveloka Xperience market and partnership manager Milani Franco and head of revenue growth Sylvia Gunawan.

Destinations

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SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 1, 2019 manilastandardlife@gmail.com

LET’S GO

5 VACATION SPOTS TO TRY NEW SPORTS A

STUDY commissioned by online travel booking platform Agoda reveals "trying a new sport" is among the top three things on this year’s bucket list of Filipinos aged 18 to 29.

Young Pinoy travelers are looking for a place that will satisfy their wanderlust while getting their endorphins up. Agoda lists down five vacation spots for a truly sporty holiday.

Snowkiting in Switzerland

Take a break from the usual skiing and snowboarding, and try something new. Snowkiting allows one to explore the mountains while being powered by the wind from a large kite—a relatively easy sport to pick up.

This outdoor sport is similar to water-based kiteboarding using footwear for snowboarding or skiing. And what better place to do that than in the wintry Swiss Alps. Enroll in a snowkiting school close to the town of Brig and enjoy action-packed days.

Where to stay: For award-winning French and Swiss cuisine and a cozy stay, check-in at Hotel Ambassador.

Watch one of the world’s biggest rugby events in Japan

Mountain bike ride through New Zealand ‘ghost towns’

Veer away from the typical Kiwi trip itinerary and swap a visit to the Hobbiton movie set for a ride on the wild side. The Old Ghost Road is an 85-kilometer mountain biking and tramping trail on the West Coast of New Zealand that runs through four “ghost towns,” so it’s a true test of one’s adventurous spirit.

Where to stay: Book a room at the Murchison Lodge for a restful night before taking on the 30-minute drive (or warm-up ride) to the starting point at Lyell Historic Reserve.

Witness world-class rugby in Japan this autumn. Fly out to the Kanagawa prefecture to catch the final match of the tournament at the Yokohama Stadium. While there, thrill-seekers can try their hand at some traditional Japanese sports like kendo (bamboo swordsmanship), kyudo (Japanese archery), or even learn the art of stealth practiced by ninjas known as ninjutsu.

Where to stay: Book a capsule at Atsugi Capsule Hotel for no-fuss, affordable accommodation—and a cool capsule experience.

Head over to the home of Muay Thai

Phuket in Thailand offers more than just amazing beaches and great surf spots, it’s also home to the world-renowned Tiger Muay Thai and MMA Training Camp. Get a chance to learn Muay Thai or “The Art of the Eight Limbs,” Thailand’s national sport and cultural martial art, from the masters themselves. They’ve got week-long and month-long training packages for the serious practitioner, but those who can only a spare a few hours or a few days, may avail of single-class, day pass, and 1-on-1 private training sessions.

Where to stay: Casa Bella Phuket will be a great home base as it’s less than a 30-minute drive away from Tiger Muay Thai and is also very accessible to other attractions, like Big Buddha and various popular beaches.

dral, which churchgoers can visit any time, and its ceiling is filled with awesome frescoes showing the battles the sons of Remus had to fight. And, right inside the main structure, with the noontime sun crowning the tower, as entrance, on the floor is the beautiful mosaic masterpiece showing the legendary She-Wolf surrounded by shown on this page.

Our tour guide egged us on to see what she described as the emblems of the cities around Siena.

Another interesting highlight of our tour to Siena was “a most beautiful church.” A short walk from the piazza is the Cattedrale Metropolitana di Santa Maria Assunta. Sure the lunch we had. We drove all the way outside the city and had real, honest-toenough, we were awed by its goodness Tuscan cuisine façade. But if the exterior is imserved in a private residence pressive, the interiors are even YOUR WEEKEND CHUCKLE in one of the many vinemore stunning! yards in the countryside.

A good wife always forgives her husband What made the interiNot only was the menu dewhen SHE’s wrong. ors strikingly unique are lectable, I also enjoyed the the black-and-white stripes captivating scenery that unpainted on the tall columns folded before us. and the walls. Our tour guide My mental picture of Tuscany was right there, in front explained to us that black and white were the official colors of Siena because “when the two sons of Remus fled of me—a panorama of vineyards on breezy, rolling hills, to Siena, they rode in a black horse and a white horse.” dotted with peach-colored houses and accentuated by This interesting local legend has certainly added more rows of majestic cypress trees. The splendid scenery oomph to the visual treat that tourists enjoy in this city. confirmed to me once again that I was right there where The cathedral’s interiors banner many other wonder- I wanted to be for my birthday, enjoying the blessings of ful sections that tourists like me gush over. The ornate life, at the center of Tuscany. pulpit is fully covered with carvings of scenes depicting For feedback, I’m at bobzozobrado@gmail.com. the history of the city. There is a library inside the cathe-

Try dragon boat racing in Dumaguete

Aside from being a home to warm, gentle people, Dumaguete is gearing up to become the Philippines’ next sports tourism hub. It has played host to a number of sporting events, from the annual Dumaguete Dragon Boat Challenge, to the Little League Philippines Series, the National Frisbee Ultimate Championship, and Beach Volleyball Republic on Tour.

Where to stay: Stay at a dive resort like Atlantis Dive Resort Dumaguete, which offers custom dive packages and courses to get certified.

THE TUSCANY...

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The impressive Cattedrale Metropolitana di Santa Maria Assunta is a main attraction in the city.

The unique black-and-white striped interiors of the cathedral.

Bank of China Manila country head Deng Jun (left), Bank of China Manila managing director Celeste Diokno (right) and Metropolitan Museum of Manila president Tina Colayco (second from right) with Filipino artists (from second from left) Rico Lascano, Phyllis Zaballero, Norberto Carating, and Manuel Baldemor.

ARTS AND CULTURAL EXCHANGE PROGRAM BETWEEN PH, CHINA

THE Bank of China, in partnership with the Metropolitan Museum of Manila, Chinese Culture and Art Association, and China Daily Mail launches an arts and cultural exchange program between the Philippines and China.

The project, dubbed “In Harmony with Nature,” brings together five Filipino artists and five Chinese artists to participate in a brief residency in historically and culturally significant locations that would juxtapose similarities and nuances of people, place, and nature.

It seeks to present the issue of climate change and mankind’s stewardship of the natural environment from an artist’s perspective.

“We care deeply about the environment, and that extends to our business as well. We implement a strict Green Financing policy where we only finance projects that do not damage the environment,” said Deng Jun, country head of Bank of China Manila.

The participants will first undergo a brief residency in Palawan before returning to Manila to exhibit their work at the MET. The initial leg will be punctuated with a collaborative/interactive painting that will be held during the exhibit’s opening day.

After the art exhibition in the Philippines, a counterpart art exhibition will be held in China. It will then be the Filipino artists’ turn to visit China for a similar residency and collaborative painting activity.

Participating artists from the Philippines are Manuel Baldemor, Rico Lascano, Phyllis Zaballero, Norberto Carating, and Jonahmar Salvosa. Their Chinese counterparts are Kuku Chai Bukuk, Cai Zhixin, Ding Jie, Hao Ping, and Liu She.

Entertainment

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 1, 2019

NETFLIX

ALDEN

AND CHILL WITH LOCAL TITLES

RICHARDS

STREAMING giant Netflix continues to expand its library with more of your favorite Filipino movies starring some of the most loved Pinoy stars, including Anne Curtis, James Reid, Nadine Lustre, Jericho Rosales, Bela Padilla, and more.

Get ready to stream your favorite Pinoy rom-coms and “hugot” dramas about love and heartbreak this September.

Here are the local titles subscribers can binge-watch this month: Die Beautiful — Sept. 1 This film centers on Trisha (Paolo Ballesteros), a transgender woman who dreams of becoming a beauty queen.

The heart-wrenching story follows her colorful life, from her troubled childhood as a young boy living under the roof of a homophobic father (Joel Torre) to her wacky adventures as an aspiring pageant queen alongside her loyal best friend, Barbs (Christian Bables).

WINS ASIAN STAR PRIZE AT DRAMA AWARDS IN SEOUL

This Time — Sept. 23 Real-life couple James Reid and Nadine Lustre play childhood friends Coby and Ava, respectively.

Although they only meet during the summer, their friendship spans years, eventually blossoming into a complicated romance that they struggle to properly label. Things change when Ava goes off to college and meets someone new, and Coby starts to question their real relationship status.

Camp Sawi (Camp for the Brokenhearted) — Sept. 23 What if there was a boot camp that promised to help you get over your heartbreak? You get Camp Sawi, where five women (Arci Munoz, Bela Padilla, Yassi Pressman, Andi Eigenmann,and Kim Molina) all dealing with their respective sawi dating histories, who sign up to help each other cope with pain, loss, and unresolved feelings.

K

APUSO actor Alden Richards marks another milestone in his career as he receives the Asian Star Prize in the Seoul International Drama Awards 2019 last Wednesday, Aug. 28 at the Grand Peace Hall in Kyung Hee University.

The Kapuso prime actor proves to be unstoppable in expanding the standards of acting and strengthening his depth as an artist.

Alden flew to Seoul to personally accept the prestigious accolade and expressed his heartfelt gratitude to the award-giving body during his acceptance speech.

“It is such an honor to receive this award. As a Filipino, I am very humbled and grateful to be recognized in the international scene along with so many amazing and talented artists here tonight. This award is also extra special to me because it comes at a time when we are celebrating 70 years of friendship between the Philippines and Korea. Thank you to the Seoul Drama Awards Committee and the Korean Broadcasters Association,” he said.

Meanwhile, Alden will once again showcase his acting chops in the upcoming primetime series The Gift, where he takes on the role of Joseph—a man who grows up in Divisoria and becomes one of its hard-working vendors. Despite the trials that come his way upon losing his eyesight, Joseph continues to be a good person and becomes an inspiration to the people around him.

Alden underwent an immersion with Resources for the Blind Inc., a nongovernment office that helps visually-impaired people to prepare for his character.

A recognition of his remarkable talent, the award also symbolizes Alden’s dedication and love for his craft. He noted, “As actors, it is always our hope to make more people happy and inspire them with our passion.”

Organized by Seoul Drama Awards Organizing Committee and Korean Broadcasters Association, Seoul International Drama Awards is a festival that brings together all professionals in the field of TV drama production and media industry and global audiences who enjoy television dramas.

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Nickie Wang, Issue Editor nickie.standard@gmail.com

ON THE RED CARPET.

Pambansang Bae Alden Richards graces the 2019 edition of Seoul International Drama Awards.

Sid & Aya: Not a Love Story — Sept. 23 This movie follows two strangers, Sid (Dingdong Dantes), a successful stockbroker who suffers from chronic insomnia, and Aya (Anne Curtis), a waitress whom he hires to keep him company during his sleepless nights.

Diary ng Panget (Diary of an Ugly Person) — Sept. 23 JaDine makes a reappearance on this list with the first film that brought this popular tandem together. Nadine Lustre plays Eya, a young girl so desperate to make ends meet that she decides to work as the personal assistant of Cross (James Reid), the egoistic and popular boy in school.

MAYWARD REACHES NEW HEIGHTS WITH FIRST SOLO CONCERT Maymay Entrata and Edward Barber team up for a major concert entitled ‘M.E. & U,’ which celebrates their love team and the support they get from their legion of fans.

THERE’S really no stopping Maymay Entrata and Edward Barber Barber as they hold their first major concert together dubbed M.E. and U U happening on Sept.

27 at the New Frontier Theater in Quezon City.

The adorable and unbreakable tandem collectively known as MayWard promises to bring enjoyment in the much-awaited event produced by Star Events, Star Music, and Star POP. “We want to make our supporters feel that we’re doing this because of them and that they’re part not only of the concert, but also of our lives. That’s why it’s M.E. it’s & U, because they’re the U,” Maymay said of the story behind the concert’s title.

Fans can look forward to their performances of their collaborations “Baliw,” “Mahal Kita Kasi,” “Magdamag,” and more.

A lot of the suggestions, ideas and

memories and history that we had with the MayWard family will be there, as in you can see the journey that we’ve had during the prods of the concert,” Edward added.

Maymay and Edward are fresh from starring in the recently-concluded fantasy series Hiwaga ng Kambat. Earlier this year, they also released new music under Star Pop titled “Kakayanin Kaya” and “No One Else,” respectively.

The M.E. and U Concert is one of the many exciting events under Star Events, which brings OPM to the next level with thrilling Kapamilya experiences and outstanding performances during live events.

Get ready for a romance-filled and talent-loaded night in M.E. & U: MayWard Live in Concert, and grab your tickets at Ticketnet Online for only P3,500 (SVIP), P2,999 (VIP), P2,600 (Orchestra A), P1,999 (Orchestra B), P990 (Loge), and P530 (Balcony).

100 Tula Para Kay Stella (100 Poems for Stella) — Sept. 23 During his freshman year, Fidel (JC Santos) is a shy honor student with a speech impediment, befriends Stella (Bela Padilla), a confident and rebellious student who dreams of musical stardom.

Despite their differences, they become best friends all throughout their four years of college, and along the way, Fidel secretly writes poems to express his true feelings for Stella.

Luck at First Sight — Sept. 23 Director Dan Villegas weaves a romcom with fantasy elements in this film.

Joma (Jericho Rosales) is a gambler with a pile of debt threatening to take away his family’s home. When he’s advised to look for a “lucky charm” that will turn his life around, he finds it in Diane (Bela Padilla), who needs money to save her ailing father’s life.

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By Maricel Mondejar

H

E WAS shaking uncontrollably on the street in Manila. He had distemper, a fatal disease that hits the nerves before the dog dies. It is a painful illness, and a painful way to die. His name is Jasper.

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 1, 2019

Desiree Carlos, Editor

Pets

daycarlos28@yahoo.com

ADOPT LOVE, ADOPT A RESCUED DOG OR CAT

Her owner died of cancer a few months ago. The siblings of her owner put her up for adoption and Peachy, 1.2 years old, is a sweet kitten. breeders lined up to get her. A pure Belgian Malinois, breeders wanted her because she can produce many puppies who will be sold for a lot of money. Her name is Macky.

Save ALL Inc. - Save Animals of Love and Light decided to save them.

Save ALL Inc., an animal welfare group registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), could not leave Jasper alone on the street to die of a painful disease, or allow Macky to be bred for life.

The group rescued both dogs and spent tens of thousands of pesos to have Jasper treated for distemper and later for erlichia, and Macky for a slight bacterial infection and tick infestation. Both dogs were dewormed, vaccinated, and have been on a heart worm preventive medicine.

Macky has been spayed, while The two dogs are now ready for who are waiting to be loved and Jasper is due for neutering in Sep- a lifetime, loving home. welcomed into a loving family. tember when the vet returns from Jasper and Macky are just two To date, Save ALL has rescued the province. of the many rescues of Save ALL more than 400 dogs and cats from the pounds, and animals who were hurt, very sick, and abandoned in their owner’s house and on the streets. Most have been adopted but there are still rescues waiting to be adopted.

Can you adopt LOVE? Can you adopt a rescued dog or cat?

Save ALL has had them treated for different illnesses, had them vaccinated, spayed or neutered.

If you are an animal lover with a lot of love in your heart, do consider adopting LOVE, a rescued dog.

Please contact the author or Save ALL Inc. through the Facebook community page Save AniJasper, 3-4 years old, mals of Love and Light - Save ALL. is a very friendly dog Loving and always grateful, who loves to play with both dogs and a rescued dog or cat can be humans. your best friend, your companion for life.

THIS corner features pets of animal lovers every week. We hope new owners and those thinking of getting a pet will be encouraged to be responsible “furparents” through these features. We also hope more people will be moved to be kind to animals when they read about the great relationship that can be created between humans and animals.

For contributions, please email to daycarlos28@yahoo.com and put My Furry Bestie as subject.

Macky, 3 years old, is a very playful dog who can accompany you during your morning walk to keep you healthy.

RAPPER was only a month old when he rescued.

“He was abandoned in a house in the neighborhood. He was tied, soaking in his own pee while crying out loud for help in the garage,” says rescuer-adopter Nikolai Cristol.

“The gate was locked and I had to jump over the fence to free him. Rapper cried the moment I freed him from his chain.

Since then, we became the best buddies, “ Nikolai says.

“He loves chasing balls and eats pandesal like crazy. I named him Rapper because of how he got my attention by crying like rapping. He now lives in a home where he is the baby i have never had,” Nikolai adds.

Author Maricel Mondejar with Mags, a 3-4 year-old mixed rescued dog who is also up for adoption.

About the author: Maricel Mondejar, furmommy of 18 rescues, is the head of the adoption committee of Save ALL Inc., and a Vegan animal rights activist.

A HEALTHY FUR = A HEALTHY DOG PET TALES

BY DESIREE CARLOS DOG owners know that while all dogs are beautiful no matter the color or thickness of the fur, a shiny coat means the dog is healthy.

“One of the best things about having a doggie in your life is petting them. Cuddling up to your doggo and playing with their super soft coat is bliss. If you’ve noticed that your dog’s coat doesn’t seem like a healthy, shiny coat, don’t worry. There are …ways to turn a dull, dog coat into a sleek, shiny, healthy coat, “ Emily Wang said in “How Do I Maintain My Dog’s Coat?” in BarkPost,com Wang added, “Sometimes a dull dog coat, can be the signs of skin issues. If your dog seems to be scratching a lot, or losing more hair than normal, speak with your vet to see if they need special treatment. Your dog may have allergies or something else.”

Georgine, is a Yorkshire Terrier who is brought to the In “Tips To Keep Your Dog’s Fur Healthy & groomer regularly by owner Gina Pacheco Evangelista.

Shiny” in Madpaws.com, author Melanie said She is turning four years old in January. diet, fish oils, oatmeal, eggs and grooming can well with pups and can also cause skin issues.” contribute to a healthy coat.

Wang added that owners must make sure the dog food stays fresh. “The essential fatty acids 1. Diet A dull coat is a good indicator that your dog that are often included in complete and balanced is not getting the nutrients he/she needs, said kibble are prone to oxidation when exposed to air. To ensure your dog’s food stays fresh, store Melanie.

“Whether you’re feeding dry, wet or raw food, it in an airtight container. Don’t forget to check the should be perfectly balanced to give your dog ex- sell-by date on the package, “ Wang said. actly what it needs. Avoid any foods with grains 2. Fish oils like corn, wheat and soy which can cause allerFish oils (particularly Omega 3) in the form of gies and provide very little nutrition to your dog, a supplement can be added to the dog food to “ Melanie said.

Wang, on the hand, said “Low-fat diets may also keep the coat looking good, said Melanie.

“Alternatively, you can add some oily fish to cause an omega-6 deficit. That deficit can turn a healthy coat into coarse, dry hair. Check the label your dog’s diet such as salmon, tuna or sardines. of your dog food to see what’s in it, and how Whichever method you choose, start off with much omega-6 is included. Grains, especially ge- small amounts as too much oil can cause digesnetically modified grains, sometimes don’t bode tive issues,“ said Melanie

MY FURRY BESTIE

SKIPPER, a one-year-old mixed breed, was given to Sandra Aguda by her aunt when Skipper was about two months old.

“I have been a dog lover since then. I treat Skip like a baby. I give her a shower twice a week and take her for a walk every morning, “ Sandra says.

“She loves to be cuddled while sleeping beside me in bed. She eats almost everything and enjoys playtime with her sister cat, Evie! The two are inseparable!!

I love them both so much!!” Sandra adds.

Editor's note: These stories were compiled by admin Miks Lim of Save Animals of Love and Light (Save ALL), a SEC-registered animal welfare group that helps animals in need, and encourages and promotes responsible pet ownership, adoption of rescued dogs and cats from fosters, shelters and pounds, and spaying and neutering of pets to control animal population in the country, among others.

Nugget, a three-year-old Yorkshire Terrier, always gets his hair brushed by owner Teresa Tan.

3. Eggs A raw egg can be added to the dog’s dinner once a week, Melanie said. You can also grind the egg shell and sprinkle on the dog food regularly, she added.

4. Grooming Grooming is very important, even for dogs who do not shed.

“Aim to brush them a couple of times a week. Regular brushing removes dead skin and hair and brightens up their coat, “ Melanie said.

Wang said it is also important to follow a proper bathing routine.

“Based on your dog’s breed and personal needs, he may need a different bathing schedule than other dogs. Some dogs have skin that

can only be shampooed and bathed once every few months. Other dogs need weekly baths, “ Wang said.

Shampoos with aloe vera or oatmeal, or a hypoallergenic option is good for dry skin, Wang added.

“A DIY colloidal oatmeal bath for your dog can help significantly with skin and coat health in an easy and cheap way. Oatmeal soothes and moisturizes skin (humans can also enjoy the benefits of a colloidal oatmeal bath). If your dog has allergies, this can soothe them,” Wang said.

Lastly, Wang recommended herbal remedies but she stressed the owner must first consult a vet.

“Horsetail and spirulina are two options that you could give a go for your pup, “ Wang said.

“Horsetail contains silica, which helps with the maintenance of healthy skin, bones, and fur. Spirulina contains B vitamins and carotenoids that support healthy skin as well, “ Wang added.