Domingo: Lapses, not anomalies, in P6.4b shabu raid

THE former director of the police Drug Enforcement Group on Tuesday admitted lapses in the October 2022 drug bust in which P6.4 billion worth of shabu was seized but denied there was any cover-up.

Testifying before the Senate committee on public order and dangerous drugs, the former director of the Philippine National Police Drug Enforcement Group (PDEG), Police Brig. Gen. Narciso Domingo admitted he had not told the panel the whole truth about the drug raid.

“I admit that there are lapses in our entire operation, but such judgment calls and procedural lapses were done by me in good faith based on the reports of my men,” Domingo said.

“We are waiting for the Senate [version of the bill]...but we are very much eager, [to have it adopted once approved there],” Dalipe said at a news conference Tuesday.

Both chambers will skip the bicameral conference meeting to reconcile their versions of a bill once the House agrees with the Senate’s version of such. The measure will then be considered an enrolled bill awaiting the President’s signature.

The Senate is expected to have the MIF bill approved by June 2.

The purpose of the amendment, Tulfo said, is to ensure ownership of the Maharlika Investment Corp. to be created by the bill “shall be exclusively with the government including its GOCCs (government owned and controlled corporations).” place in August 2023.

“This way, we can allow investment from private sectors,” said Tulfo, to which Sen. Mark Villar, the bill’s sponsor, agreed.

This developed as Amnerican, Japanese, Australian, and Philippine defense ministers are planning to hold their first-ever quadrilateral talks in Singapore next month, a diplomatic source said Tuesday, amid China’s growing maritime assertiveness in the Indo-Pacific region.

The meeting by the United States and its three security allies in the Pacific would take place on the sidelines of the annual Asia Security Conference,

In related developments:

* The Department of Finance (DOF) on Tuesday allayed fears the proposed Maharlika Investment Fund would bankrupt banking institutions, including Landbank, should it fail.

* Finance Secretary Benjamin Diokno also said board members of state pension institutions should not be “precluded” from deciding on possible investments in the proposed sovereign wealth fund.

* Senate Minority Leader Aquilino “Koko” Pimentel III said there should be an iron-clad provision that will guarantee that pension funds will not be touched or compromised in the MIF bill.

“If the Senate can finish it today.... maybe, if there is a need for a bicam [conference committee to reconcile different versions], we can do it tomorrow and pass it, ratify it before we go on sine die adjournment,” Dalipe said.

“We are waiting, we are keeping a close watch, and we hope it will turn out fine tonight and we can have it done by tomorrow,” he added.

The House approved on third and final reading its version of the MIF bill known as Shangri-La Dialogue, scheduled for three days through June 4 in the Southeast Asian city-state.

The gathering would be held as Japan, the United States and Australia have been each bolstering their defense cooperation with the Philippines, while trying to showcase their collaboration as a group of four nations surrounding the Pacific.

“This year’s Indo-Pacific Endeavor is going to be, probably one of the biggest we’ve ever done, with the Philippines right at the center of it,” said Yu. Charles Dantes last December.

It provides that “under no circumstance that the GOCCs providing for the social security of government employees, private sectors, workers and employees, and other sectors and subsectors, such as but not limited to the Government Service Insurance System (GSIS), Social Security System (SSS), and Home Development Mutual Fund, be requested or required to contribute to the MIF.”

The House version also states that no part of the funds of said GOCCs shall go to the MIF.

In the Senate, Pimentel said: “Our workers’ hard-earned pension should be shielded from any adverse implications that could arise from the establishment of MIF.”

“Unfortunately, the threat that MIF would dip its hands into retirees’ pension funds is still very much alive,” he added.

The earlier versions of the measure wanted to tap into the funds being managed by the country’s top social insurance institutions, namely the GSIS and the SSS as the source for the initial capital of Maharlika.

For example, there was a lapse when the operating team did not conduct an inventory on the scene after confiscating two kilos of shabu from then Police Master Sgt. Rodolfo Mayo.

However, Domingo said that if they had followed the rule, they might not have discovered the 990 kilos of shabu.

When the 990 kilograms of shabu was later seized, policemen committed a violation when they pilfered about 42 kilos of the contraband, Domingo said.

Domingo said there was also a procedural lapse when he submitted a sketchy report by PDEG Special Operations Unit Region 4A chief Police Col. Julian Olonan to then-PNP chief Rodolfo Azurin Jr. on Oct. 8.

That report did not implicate Mayo, Domingo was told, because they believed Mayo could point them to a bigger stash of shabu. Charles Dantes

NDRRMC:...

From A1 said in Filipino.

In the latest situational report released early Tuesday, the NDRRMC said 2,859 families or 11,264 individuals from Batanes, Cagayan, Isabela, Aurora, Antique, Negros Occidental, and Apayao were evacuated.

Of these, 3,484 or 877 families were staying in evacuation centers.

NDRRMC said that a total of P1.8 million worth of assistance was prov ided across Region 2, Region 3, MIMAROPA, Region 6, and CAR. These consisted of bottled water, family food packs, hygiene kits, meals, cash, and relief goods. NDRRMC added that they are monitoring power interruptions in Abra, Mountain Province, and Ifugao.

Citing a World Bank study, he said the policy gap or the supposed tax to be collected and what is actually collected could reach as high as P539 billion.

“Meaning, maybe we find areas where we can recover those too many exemptions. For example: one exemption is really the cooperatives - that’s right, there are a lot of people who don’t pay VAT because of the cooperatives. So, the IMF study will tell us how do we recover because 0.4, that’s really poor … poor performance,” he said.

With VAT being the best tax in the world, with 90 percent of the countries around the world imposing such tax, Diokno said, “it is in our interest to improve on the efficiency of the VAT.” holding a joint special hiring program was raised due to Saudi Arabia’s push to develop its tourism sector.

Meanwhile, Diokno said the approval of the estate tax amnesty extension until 2025 by the Senate would mean stronger compliance by taxpayers and additional revenue collections for the government.

“The Department of Finance welcomes the renewed extension of the estate tax amnesty period. This will allow errant taxpayers to settle their estate tax liabilities affordably, enable the government to collect additional revenues, and strengthen tax compliance,” he said in a statement.

“The timely enactment of this measure is crucial, as it will provide much-needed relief to individuals and families facing extraordinary circumstances while supporting the national government’s efforts to spur development by incentivizing the regularization of assets,” he said.

“They mentioned their hotel and restaurant sector, they are booming in terms of building cities,” the DMW chief said in a TV Patrol report.

European countries are also interested in hiring skilled Filipino workers, with Ople mentioning Austria, Portugal, Romania, Hungary, and the Czech Republic.

Demand for overseas Filipino workers was likewise high in Guam and Canada, she added.

Ople also called for a “bold discussion” to ensure the protection of all migrant workers through better migration governance.

During her speech, she encouraged stakeholders to have a bold discussion and collectively work together to be able to achieve Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) and Global Contact on Migration (GCM) objectives.

Among the topics to be discussed include SDG Target 8.8 that “protect labor rights and promote safe and secure working environments for all workers, including migrant workers, in particular women migrants, and those in precarious employment.” Also to be tackled is SDG Target 10.7 which refers to the facilitation of “orderly, safe, regular and responsible migration and mobility of people, including through the implementation of planned and well-managed migration policies.”

Included in the pipeline for discussion are GCM Objectives 8 and 23 which refer by CTG-linked groups among students and even the out-of-school youth. to the shared responsibility to “facilitate fair and ethical recruitment and safeguard conditions that ensure decent work.”

They said this practice promotes armed violence and a bloody overthrow of the government.

According to Ople, Objective 23 seeks to “Strengthen international cooperation and global partnerships for safe, orderly, and regular migration.”

“In shorthand, what all these means is how do we keep our workers safe as they cross borders, as they look for better opportunities for their families and how to balance the situation, with also the need to meet the needs of our foreign employers for skilled, responsible, and reliable foreign workers,” Ople explains.

With the Philippines hosting the discussions, she expressed hope that actual experiences by senior labor migration officials and resource persons from countries of origin in Asia and countries of destination in the GCC would help in achieving its goals.

Jimbo Gulle

bear arms, you are criminally liable. We will do anything to file charges against you,” Gonzales said.

Meanwhile, an island in Batanes has been suffering a total blackout according to the Provincial Administrator and Emergency Operations Center.

A report on ANC said Sabtang Island suffered a blackout when a tanker that was supposed to deliver fuel was stranded in Pangasinan due to heavy seas.

Elsewhere, a warehouse in Cagayan Economic Zone Authority collapsed due to strong rain and wind. Cagayan Gov. Manuel Mamba said the collapsed warehouse was the only reported damage in CEZA.

At least two houses in Central Luzon were reported damaged.

A total of 104 domestic flights and 17 international flights were canceled in the National Capital Region.

Cebu Pacific Air and its sister airline CebGo on Tuesday suspended 40 flights due to bad weather conditions brought on by typhoon Betty.

The officials did not say how they would verify a link between an election candidate and a would-be communist supporter.

Both Gonzales and NYC chair Undersecretary Ronald Cardema, who was also present at the event, said they were dismayed at what the former called “from books to armalite” brand of recruitment

They appealed to school administrators and teachers not to aid recruitment activities by groups like the Anakbayan, the Kabataang Makabayan (KM), Gabriela, and Anakpawis, among others, as” they too are not immune from legal suit.”

“To teachers, especially school administrators, who teach our students to where net gainers fell from +10 to +6. It also decreased from “fair” to “mediocre” in Visayas from -4 to -14.

Cardema supported this and underscored the need to prevent these fronts from conducting recruitment activities among students to support SK candidates that will be bankrolled by the CTGs.

“All areas are being monitored through our regional NYC offices. Even the teachers’ ranks, they should be monitored. Teachers serve as advisers to these students. If we can stop all among elementary graduates from net zero to +1, but fell from “very high” to “high” among junior high school graduates from +13 to +7. these recruitment activities, the NPA will die down naturally. Why? Because they can’t recruit senior citizens to become terrorists,” the NYC chair said. Gonzales said the role of the Vice President is crucial to barring NPA recruitment in schools. in the past three months. This means they were hungry and had nothing to eat at all. of very high +18 in December 2019,” SWS said of the survey conducted from March 26 to 29.

“They (fronts) will not succeed in our schools through the help of the Vice President and Education Secretary Sara Duterte,” he said, adding that “critical thinking” should not be used as an excuse in allowing students to associate with CTG fronts.

Compared to December 2022, net gainers declined from “very high” to “high” in Metro Manila from +18 to +2. The same happened in Mindanao,

On the other hand, it remained “very high” in Balance Luzon, up by 2 points from +10 to +12. Net gainers also rose from “very high” to “excellent” among college graduates from +18 in December 2022, to +20 in March 2023. It improved from “fair” to “high”

It stayed “fair” among non-elementary graduates, although down by 3 points from -2 to -5.

The March 2023 survey further revealed that 9.8% of Filipino families, or an estimated 2.7 million, experienced involuntary hunger at least once

Compared to December 2022, the net gainers score went down from “very high” to “high” among the non-hungry families from +10 to +5.

But it rose from “fair” to “high” among overall hungry families from -7 to +1; and among moderately hungry families from -4 to +4. Vito Barcelo