The Standard - 2016 January 05 - Tuesday

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VOL. XXIX NO. 327 3 Sections 32 Pages P18 TUESday : JaNUaRy 5, 2016 www.thestandard.com.ph editorial@thestandard.com.ph

DFA hits China for escalating tensions

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SOLGEN bACkS POE Govt lawyer asks court to junk case on citizenship By Rey E. Requejo

THE government’s top lawyer asked the Supreme Court Monday to uphold the Senate Electoral Tribunal decision that Senator Grace Poe is a natural-born Filipino citizen and was therefore qualified to run for senator in the 2013 elections. In a comment filed Monday, Solicitor General Florin Hilbay, acting as counsel for the SET, also asked the Supreme Court to dismiss the petition filed by Rizalito David seeking to reverse the decision, saying the SET was correct in ruling that Poe, a foundling, is a natural-born citizen based on evidence—including her physical features and circumstances surrounding her abandonment and discovery. “The SET did not commit grave abuse of discretion in ruling that private respondent is a natural-born citizen,” Hilbay said. “The SET reasonably and correctly ruled that proof of private respondent’s status as a foundling did not necessarily equate to the lack of proof of Filipino parentage. Neither did it translate to an inability to prove Filipino parentage.” Next page

Abaya: No experience, no problem By Christine F. Herrera

Broken promise. Members of the group Riles Laan sa Sambayanan Network stage a protest action at the PNR España slamming President

Benigno Aquino III and Transport Secretary Emilio Abaya who promised they would get themselves run over by a train if the extension to Cavite of LRT 1 was not finished by the end of 2015. Work on the extension has not even started. Danny Pata

TRANSPORTATION Secretary Joseph Emilio Abaya said Sunday it didn’t matter that none of the Filipino partners in the consortium that was awarded the P4.25billion maintenance contract for the Metro Rail Transit had any experience in railway maintenance or operations. Reacting to criticism from senatorial candidate Leyte Rep. Martin Romualdez, Abaya also denied that the negotiated contract was a “sweetheart deal.” Romualdez had earlier challenged the government to be transparent about the P4.25-billion deal that was awarded without public bidding, and expressed concerns that not a single local partner of the Korean company Busan Transportation Corp. was involved in Next page


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