BusinessMirror November 6, 2014

BusinessMirror

three-time rotary club of manila journalism awardee 2006, 2010, 2012

U.N. Media Award 2008

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Sports BusinessMirror

C | T, N ,  mirror_sports@yahoo.com.ph sports@businessmirror.com.ph Editor: Jun Lomibao

HOUSTON MOVES TO 5-0, TOP MIAMI BY 17 POINTS

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HOUSTON Rockets center Dwight Howard (12) uses his left hand to shoot over Miami Heat forward Chris Bosh. AP

IAMI—James Harden had 25 points, 10 assists and nine rebounds; and Dwight Howard added 26 points and 10 boards, as the Houston Rockets remained unbeaten with a 108-91 win over the Miami Heat, 108-91, on Tuesday.

Trevor Ariza added 19 points for the Rockets (5-0), who used a 13-0 run late in the fourth quarter to pull away.

Chris Bosh scored 21 points for Miami (3-1). Dwyane Wade added 19; and Shawne Williams and Mario Chalmers each scored 12.

Portland’s Damian Lillard snapped out of a shooting slump with 27 points as the Trail Blazers held Cleveland star LeBron James to just 11 in a 101-82 win over the Cavaliers. Lillard was nursing an abdominal strain but had 15 points by halftime. He averaged just 13.7 points on 11-for-41 shooting in the first three games.

Wesley Matthews finished with 21 points as the Blazers (2-2) snapped a twogame losing streak.

At Los Angeles, Gerald Green scored 26 points off the bench and Markieff Morris had 23 points and 10 rebounds, as Phoenix overcame Kobe Bryant’s 39-point performance to beat the Lakers, 112-106, and keep Los Angeles winless.

Isaiah Thomas scored 22 points in a reserve role for the Suns, who survived a fourth-quarter surge led by Bryant to beat the Lakers for the second time in seven days.

Bryant went 14-for-37 for the Lakers, who are off to their first 0-5 start since the 1957-and-1958 Minneapolis Lakers lost their first seven games. The Toronto Raptors defeated the Oklahoma City Thunder, 100-88, after DeMar DeRozan scored 16 points and Patrick Patterson had 14.

Lou Williams scored nine of his 12 points in the fourth quarter and Tyler Hansbrough got eight of his 12 at the free-throw line as the Raptors improved to 3-1.

Serge Ibaka had 25 points and 11 rebounds for a short-handed Oklahoma City. In other games, Pau Gasol had 16 points and 13 rebounds as the Chicago Bulls beat the winless Orlando Magic, 98-90; the Milwaukee Bucks beat the Indiana Pacers, 8781; the Washington Wizards downed the New York Knicks, 98-83; and the New Orleans Pelicans were 100-91 winners over the Charlotte. AP

FIFA RACISM ADVISER FEARS BOYCOTT OF 2018 WCUP AGENT: GRINER CUT BUT OK IN KNIFE ATTACK IN CHINA B D F The Associated Press

WOMEN’S National Basketball Association (WNBA) star Brittney Griner was cut on the elbow by a man in a knife attack in China but didn’t need to go to the hospital, her agent told the Associated Press on Tuesday. Agent Lindsay Kagawa Colas said Griner sustained a small cut as her team was boarding a bus after practice on Monday in what she called a random attack. Colas said the 6-foot-8 (2.03-meter) player was wearing a winter coat and that the knife barely cut her skin. Griner didn’t require stitches.

The agent said the man also stabbed one of Griner’s teammates, but that she was wearing two jackets and the knife didn’t go through.

Colas said the man was yelling as he chased the players onto the bus. She said he left the scene, then returned covered in blood and was apprehended by Chinese authorities. It was not immediately clear in which city this happened.

Griner plays in the WNBA with the Phoenix Mercury. This is her second season in China and first with the Beijing Great Wall. The team was preparing for a road game against Liaoning Hengye.

DOHA, Qatar—International Football Federation (Fifa) antiracism adviser Tokyo Sexwale believes black players could boycott the 2018 World Cup and urged Russian President Vladimir Putin to demand tougher action against racism in football.

Sexwale, who was an antiapartheid campaigner and former political prisoner on Robben Island, is against a boycott, but expressed concern in an interview with the Associated Press about the growing number of racist incidents in the Russian league.

“There is a threat black players will say they are not going to Russia [for the World Cup]—we can’t have that,” Sexwale said on Tuesday on the sidelines of the Doha Goals conference.

“I am talking as a Fifa person and a citizen of the world—it can’t go that far.... Once these things start and you don’t act as leaders, these things snowball.” Although Union of European Football Association (UEFA) has punished Russian clubs for racism at Champions League matches in recent years, the national federation has appeared less willing to tackle abuse.

Sexwale is urging his “personal friend” Putin to intervene.

“Show that leadership, be the Putin the world knows, be tough,” said Sexwale, a former South African government minister who is an adviser to Fifa’s antiracism task force. “Failure to do so, we could be talking something different about the 2018 World Cup...

RUSSIAN President Vladimir Putin (left) and International Football Federation President Sepp Blatter have to deal with the racism issue in the 2018 World Cup in Moscow. AP

you will have people saying they will not go to Russia.”

The Russian Football Union has been criticized for taking no action against FC Rostov Coach Igor Gamula for saying last week he wouldn’t sign a defender from Cameroon because the club has “enough dark-skinned players, we’ve got six of the things.” Gamula apologized after the agent of Rostov defender Siyanda Xulu, a South Africa international, said that five African players on the team threatened to sit out Monday’s training.

Sexwale said an apology alone wasn’t enough, pointing to how the National Basketball Association forced Donald Sterling to sell the Los Angeles Clippers and banned him for life over racism.

South African Football Association

President Danny Jordaan wrote to Fifa President Sepp Blatter on Monday “expressing concerns,” according to Sexwale. “For the Russian federation to be seen to be serious, we need them to take stern action. The world took stern action against South Africa [over apartheid], it was expelled from Fifa,” Sexwale said, stopping short of calling for Russia to face the same sanction.

CSKA Moscow has been forced to play Champions League games without fans this season because of fan abuse toward black players, although Sports Minister Vitaly Mutko maintained last month that Russia has no major racism problem, saying: “I don’t know what there is to be frightened.”

But Sexwale said of Moscow: “There

are certain parts if you are my color it’s unsafe....people are scared of going to Moscow.” Sexwale wrote to South Africa’s ambassador to Moscow on Monday to “caution that this is very dangerous.”

“If these ultra-ring elements have their way they are threatening the World Cup,” Sexwale said. “The authorities have got to come down on the perpetrators, otherwise the authority is now going to be boycotted by the victim because people will lose confidence in the Russian federation.”

Claudio Sulser, the head of Fifa’s disciplinary committee, said in Doha that the organization would deal with any racism at the World Cup. “It’s very critical,” Sulser said. “This is a problem of the society.”

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anne rice revives vampire creations in ‘prince lestat’ Pages BusinessMirror

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By Carolyn Kellogg Los Angeles Times

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block her.” The Anne Rice of today does seem different from the one a fan might have met years ago. She sold her grand new Orleans mansion, the three-story, 47,000-square-foot former orphanage she’d restored, and lives in relative quiet in Palm Desert. Rice is petite, more than 100 pounds lighter than she was at her heaviest (she was an undiagnosed diabetic and has since had gastric bypass surgery). She’s surrounded herself with paintings by her late husband, Stan, forsaking many of the gothic antiques and religious artifacts she once owned. Rice was raised Catholic in a workingclass family in new Orleans and has had an intense, on-again-off-again relationship with the Church. She’s a

believer and admires the Church’s centuries of history, the sense of social justice and its art, architecture and music. But, she says, she “suffered agonies” as a teenager over her priests’ declaration that kissing and necking were a mortal sin. “I’ll never entirely get over the damage done to me by the Catholic attitude toward sex. The hatred of sex, the loathing of it and the denial of the loathing of it,” she says.

That seems unusual, perhaps, for someone who writes erotica. “That’s protest,” she says, laughing. “I’m very proud of my erotica.”

Initially published under the pen name A.n.

Roquelaure, her Sleeping Beauty trilogy is an explicit

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sadomasochism fantasy. “What I write is out-andout pornography,” she says. “I think it’s a fine word.

The only reason I don’t use it more often is it gets all misunderstood, and people want to call it erotica.”

The success of Fifty Shades of Grey has brought renewed attention to Rice’s Sleeping Beauty books.

“They went mainstream because of it. The publishers reissued them for Wal-Mart and Target,” Rice says. “It was a riot, really.”

Rice, of course, has thought a great deal about the erotic element of her vampire myth. “The vampire is hyper-romantic, a Byronic hero—a larger-than-life, extremely strong, mysterious, tragic personality,” she says. “It’s Mr. Rochester and Jane [eyre] over and over again.... Basically the vampire is untamed mystery, and that’s what men seem to women. It’s a deep, deep metaphor for sexual difference. every man’s a vampire to us, in a way.”

Which makes the reader not the victim but the chosen partner. “I’m sure every boy and girl out there reading a vampire novel is convinced that the vampire would never bite them,” Rice says, rapping at her table on the last three words: never. Bite. Them.

In her new novel, vampires live in the modern world, listening to Internet radio and ducking cell-phone paparazzi. Most of them have figured out how to use immortality to their financial advantage, and live in luxurious surroundings. And yet there is a threat that seems to be converging on them from all sides—crowds of young vampires keep getting torched, a terrifying and complete death. “I agonize over some of the dark and cruel things that I write. I want them, for me, to be effective and authentic and dramatic and moral, I guess,” she says.

When she lived in Berkeley in the 1960s and 1970s, Rice says, she used to debate with her friends about the demands of art. “If great art is really great art, it shouldn’t depress you. We would argue about, like, the movie The Blue Angel: Is it depressing or is it uplifting?

If it’s great art, it should be so uplifting that you come out of it feeling joy.”

She explains that she gave up on Breaking Bad because it was too depressing. So is she in the uplifting camp? “not necessarily. I can’t resolve it,” she says. That kind of tension—between tragedy and transcendence— is what it takes to spend half a lifetime writing stories of the glamorous undead. n

By Michael Schaub Los Angeles Times

Pegasus, which had planned to release an anthology called In the Company of Sherlock Holmes, edited by Laurie R. King and Leslie S. Klinger. The book, which features holmes-inspired stories by contemporary writers, is now for sale.

Klinger sued the estate and won. The Supreme Court’s decision not to hear the appeal means Doyle’s estate is out of options in the US. The decision does preserve copyright on 10 late Sherlock holmes stories by Doyle but leaves most of the author’s work and characters in the public domain.

It also means that holmes fans can occupy themselves by writing their own stories while they’re waiting for the fourth season of the BBC hit Sherlock, which likely won’t debut for more than a year.

Tom Hanks to publish short story collection with Knopf TOM hAnKS—yes, Oscarwinning movie star Tom hanks— will publish a short story collection with Knopf, the publisher announced on Monday. The book of short fiction is still untitled, and its release date has not yet been set.

One thing is known about the book: Its stories will be inspired by hanks’s collection of typewriters.

In a release, hanks said, “I’ve been collecting typewriters for no particular reason since 1978—both manual and portable machines dating from the 1930s to the 1990s.

The stories are not about the typewriters themselves, but rather, the stories are something

that might have been written on one of them.” Last month hanks published his first short story ever in no less than the new Yorker.

“Alan Bean Plus Four” was said to be inspired by hanks’s film and television work around the space program—Apollo 13 and From the Earth to the Moon—and not a typewriter. (Maybe a typewriter too. We will see).

Asked by new Yorker Fiction editor Deborah Treisman about why he decided to write a short story, hanks replied, “I’ve been around great storytellers all my life and, like an enthusiastic student, I want to tell some of my own. And

I read so much nonfiction that the details stack up in my head and need a rearranging sometimes.” hanks’s long hollywood career includes blockbusters and critically acclaimed films, spanning humor and drama, performing television roles and voicing animated film characters. his movies include Captain Phillips, Saving Private Ryan, Splash, Forrest Gump, Toy Story, Sleepless in Seattle, Philadelphia, and the literary adaptations Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, Cloud Atlas and The Da Vinci Code.

CARoLyn KeLLogg, Los AngeLes Times

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expat living & extended travel abroad Make beautiful of Your church

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EAR Lord, we believe in You as the work of art created by God to show the greatness of a Savior who makes something beautiful out of the broken pieces of our lives. The Church’s one foundation is You, oh Lord and she is Your new creation. By water and the Word. You gave everything to make something beautiful of Your church. Amen.

OUR DAILY BREAD AND LOUIE M. LACSON Word&Life Publications • teacherlouie1965@yahoo.com

Editor: Gerard S. Ramos • lifestylebusinessmirror@gmail.com

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B C H Los Angeles Times

UESTION: A reader writes that she plans to give up her apartment, store her belongings and live and travel outside the US for a year. “Can you recommend resources on this subject?” she asked. “Might be a topic of interest for a column.”

Answer: There’s enough information on this to fill a book, and a quick search using such terms as “expat” and “extended travel” will turn up several of them.

The biggest issue is where to start. Here’s what Karen McCann says: “I often tell people that a journey of a thousand steps begins with an online search.”

She knows well some of the complications of being abroad. For the last 10 years, McCann, a California native who called Cleveland home, has lived in Seville, Spain.

She details her transitions in the books Dancing in the Fountain: How to Enjoy Living Abroad and 101 Ways to Enjoy Living Abroad: Essential Tips for Easing the Transition to Expat Life, as well as on her web site, EnjoyLivingAbroad.com.

She notes that traveling abroad for extended periods and living abroad—she has done both—raise slightly different problems, but there is common ground as well.

Indeed, traveling abroad may well lead to living abroad, as it did in her case. She and her husband, Rich, were visiting friends in Marbella in southern Spain, when they stopped in Seville and fell in love with it.

With a lot of research, the nuts-and-bolts issues such as health insurance and mail delivery will fall into place, she said.

It’s the mental adjustments in making the leap that are the larger hurdle. And for that, you’ll need help.

Although many people decide that they’re going to hang out only with locals—an “authentic experience” being one of the buzz phrases of travel these days—consider seeking out expats, who can be enormously helpful, McCann said, “in fitting into a new society” if only for a few months.

InterNations.org, which has been around since April 2007, sprang from the experiences of its founders, who had lived abroad. Besides the forums, it offers “activity groups” that can be as diverse as “a group for

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art lovers...business networking, for parents and children and many more.” There’s also a volunteer group component that gives travelers an opportunity to give back.

McCann also recommends Expatica.com and InternationalLiving.com. And to read about her recent three-month, nearly 5,000mile trip through Eastern Europe, go to her blog at www.bit.ly/1tac9ki.

Brittney Strange, who writes the blog LifeofanExpatParent.com, agrees that support from people who are like you can be helpful but notes that being with others who were also doing an internship in Britain in 2004 may have made her less likely to dig deeper for information, which was more limited a decade ago. “We didn’t understand universal health care; we never registered with a doctor,” she said. “We didn’t know about banking.”

That wouldn’t be an issue today, partly because her knowledge base has grown with time but also because there are many more sources of information that are easier to find and access because “somebody always knows somebody.” Using those connections, however tenuous, should yield specifics.

John Henderson, formerly a sportswriter with the Denver Post who decided he would retire in Rome, details some of his challenges in moving from the Rocky Mountain State to Rome in a GoNomad.com post: www.bit. ly/12TSxZ6.

Henderson, like McCann, had previous extended travel experience; he had spent time in the Eternal City more than a decade earlier before returning to live la dolce vita, which, he notes, isn’t always dolce.

Whether it’s to live abroad or to travel for a period of time, here’s his advice: “If you think you can, do it. It’s better to try and fail than spend your days looking over your shoulder thinking you could have something better than you have.”

Yes, it is about logistics when you plan to be away for a period of time. But it’s more about having the mind-set and the heartset (OK, I made up that word but I think it works) to make it happen, and you won’t find that online.

Travel requires you to be braver than you think you are, whether it’s for a week or a year, and involves the joy of finding a better, smarter, stronger self that lasts well past the day you put away your suitcase if, indeed, that day ever comes. ■

Work hard, surf harder TWENTY-FIVE-YEAR-OLD Royce Opinion works all week long. From Monday to Friday, he is a senior project development specialist for a real-estate firm. On weekends, he’s swamped with work as well—except it is the kind many of us would only be too happy to have.

Opinion moonlights as a weekend operator for a travel company where he gets to do the work he likes best, which is surfing. For many, being tied up with work every day of the week may seem daunting, even frustrating. But if it’s on a leash, Opinion says he embraces working on a weekend with open arms.

“I surf whenever my schedule permits. When things get busy, I try to surf at least once a month,” Opinion shares. For him, surfing has gone beyond being a hobby. It’s no longer just the hunt for waves that makes him go back, he says, but the culture and the strong surfing community. “The overall atmosphere is very laidback, people are kind and friendly, and there is an air of serenity and calm about them,” he says.

He finds inspiration in Baler, Aurora, natives Rommel “Okoy” Rojo and Wilson “Saddam” Faraon who went on to make a name for themselves in the local surfing scene. He says watching professional surfers on video and in the flesh has helped him learn surfing techniques and improve on his own. Though he says he is not hard-pressed on becoming a pro surfer, he admits, “I wouldn’t mind doing a hang ten in the

coming years.” Looking for the best drop, Opinion has been to a lot of surf spots all over the country. But one surf destination stands out from the rest and remains a favorite: Zambales.

“I’ve surfed in Liwliwa in San Felipe, Zambales, for three times and it was an awesome experience every time. Zambales makes for a great surfing destination because it’s the closest to Metro Manila,” he explains.

For his Zambales getaways, Opinion chooses to ride Victory Liner buses. The buses are clean and well-maintained, and drivers and conductors are professionally trained, he observes.

“Since I have regular work on weekdays, it is important for me to get enough rest when traveling during weekends. A bus that has enough leg room and spacious seats is the ticket to a comfortable sleep,” Opinion says. He also notes that Victory Liner has plenty of trip schedules to many other interesting destinations in Northern Luzon.

For travelers who prefer to stay awake during trips and keep busy, Victory Liner offers free onboard Internet access. Victory Liner has also set up an online booking and payment system (www.victoryline.ercom/ reservations) to make trip arrangements easier and more convenient for busy individuals such as Opinion.

Now, what inveterate traveler doesn’t appreciate such convenience?

life

By Bianca Cuaresma & Cai Ordinario

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Is expat living on your horizon?

Read up on extended travel abroad

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BSP to keep rates as inflation slowed to 4.3% in October

HOW LUPITA NYONG’O GOT OVER.... »D2

Thursday, November 6, 2014

aking the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) to court is still an option that stakeholders may take, according to local and foreign business groups, which hit the agency anew on Wednesday for its new policy that is seen to make the process of claiming value-added tax (VAT) refunds more difficult.

See “BIR,” A4

Sherlock Holmes belongs to us all: Supreme Court declines to hear case IT’S official: Sherlock holmes, Arthur Conan Doyle’s famous detective (and Benedict Cumberbatch’s famous alter ego), is in the public domain.

The Supreme Court on Monday refused to hear a case brought by Doyle’s estate, which claimed that authors who wanted to publish stories about holmes needed to pay the estate a licensing fee.

This leaves intact a June decision by 7th Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Richard Posner, which held that most of Doyle’s Sherlock holmes stories are no longer protected by copyright.

The case started last year after Doyle’s estate demanded a licensing fee from the publisher

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By Catherine N. Pillas

In a news conference held on Wednesday morning, 20 business organizations aired their sentiments on BIR Revenue Memorandum Circular (RMC) 54-2014, which prescribes new rules for VAT-refund claims.

The circular mandated a “120+30-day rule” on processing VAT refunds and credits of investors, wherein if a claim for refund is not acted upon by the commissioner in 120 days, it is deemed denied, and the claimant has 30 days within receipt of the denial notification to take the case to the Court of Tax Appeals (CTA).

Rina Reyes Manuel, president of the Tax Management Association of the Philippines, said their legal option needs to get the backing of all the concerned stakeholders and must undergo review by all the business groups.

Anne Rice talks about reviving vampire creations in ‘Prince Lestat’ hen Anne Rice published Interview With the Vampire in 1976, she didn’t just launch her own vampire series—her sexy tragic vampire antiheroes launched an entirely new genre.

The phrase paranormal romance “didn’t exist when I wrote the vampire novels in the beginning,” Rice says.

But the genre, she adds, “is here to stay.” Indeed, after an 11-year break, the grande dame of vampire fiction has revived her famous vampire clan with Prince Lestat (Alfred A. Knopf: 458 pages).

That supernatural romance has become a flourishing part of pop culture has been a blessing and a curse. The field is crowded with hits like Twilight and True Blood, and countless other television shows, movies, graphic novels and books, and for a long time, Rice avoided it all.

“I was always frightened of being too influenced, and I would get blocked,” she admits.

Serving up lunch on formal china in her house, she explains that she thought she had closed the book on her Vampire Chronicles with 2003’s Blood Canticle. After that, she allowed herself to enjoy other people’s vampire stories. “I got less scared in my 60s.... I came to realize we all make our own cosmology, and there are certain traits that are common to all of the fiction in this area. I just grew up.” emotional maturity aside, the 73-year-old author has some of the habits of a teenager. A poster-sized picture of actor Matt Bomer hangs on her bedroom wall— “because I think he’s gorgeous, and I like to look at him,” she trills—and she spends hours a day on Facebook.

Unlike most teenagers, her Facebook page has 1.1 million fans. Rice is so engaged—linking to news stories, asking provocative questions and responding to comments—that some don’t believe it’s actually the author. Other writers who have sold more than 100 million books worldwide may have assistants taking care of their social-media presence.

“It’s totally me,” she confirms. “I’ve had some pretty nasty exchanges on the page with people who didn’t believe it. I remember one woman came on, she said, ‘I know Anne Rice, I’ve been in her house in new Orleans and you are not she.’ ...I finally got angry enough to

Thursday, November 6, 2014 Vol. 10 No. 29

BIR stirs business uproar yet again

perfect rockets

B R H The Associated Press

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20 LOCAL, FOREIGN TRADE GROUPS PROTEST REVENUE CIRCULAR ON V.A.T. CLAIMS

INSIDE

PERFECT ROCKETS M

A broader look at today’s business

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he Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) assured markets of an unchanged monetary policy in its last policy-setting meeting this year, after the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) reported that the commodityprice growth in the country hit a six-month low in October.

BSP Governor Amando M. Tetangco Jr. told reporters early Monday that the recent developments—including the continuous deceleration of inflation to 4.3 percent in October, as reported by the PSA—give room for the central bank to maintain its policy stance for the remainder of the year.

“The October inflation print should help keep inflation expectations in check, especially in light of more favorable money-supply conditions as M3 has continued on its deceleration path. These developments give us room to pause,” Tetangco said, in his reaction statement following the PSA’s announcement of inflation in October.

Inflation in October has settled to 4.3 percent, slowing down from September ’s 4.4 percent. Against inflation last year, however, October’s print was still an acceleration from the 2.9-percent consumer-price growth in the same month last year.

The October’s print of 4.3 percent is the second consecutive month of slowdown for the country’s inflation.

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PESO exchange rates n US 44.9570 n japan 0.3955

‘Belenismo sa Tarlac’ The Armed Forces of the Philippines’s belen, made from recycled aluminum and plastic materials collected from junkshops and framed in

bamboo, gets the attention of passersby in Tarlac City. Derived from the Spanish name for Bethlehem, a belen is a tableau depicting the birth of Christ. It is only one of the many Nativity scenes displayed in Tarlac province. Judging of the best belen takes place in the next few days. NONIE REYES

OIL PRICES TUMBLE ANEW ON SAUDI DISCOUNT MOVE

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il prices slumped to multiyear lows on Tuesday, after Saudi Arabia cut the price of oil sold to the US, a move that is shaking an already volatile market but will likely give the world economy an unexpected stimulus.

The 25-percent-or-so slide in oil prices since the summer could boost consumer spending and business investment in many economies around the world as fuel bills fall.

But not everyone’s a winner. Oil-producing countries like Russia and Venezuela, which have high extraction costs and whose budgets rely on assumptions of relatively high energy prices, stand to lose out. And lower prices could eventually slow down booming production in the US, offsetting the benefit of lower energy costs for consumers and businesses.

US oil dropped another 2 percent on Tuesday to $77.19, at one point falling to $75.84, the lowest level since October 2011. It was trading at $100 a barrel as recently as July.

Brent, the international benchmark, declined 2.3 percent, to $82.82, having earlier fallen to $82.08, its lowest level in just over four years.Adam Slater, senior economist at Oxford Economics, reckons the recent fall in oil prices, if sustained, could add around 0.4 percent to gross domestic product (GDP) in the US in two years, and a little less in Europe. China, which is the second-largest oil consumer and on track to become the largest net importer of oil, could see GDP 0.8 percent higher than it otherwise would have been.

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Palace still reviewing next move on Calax

By Butch Fernandez

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alacañang on Wednesday remained undecided on whether to green light a rebidding of the P35.42-billion CaviteLaguna Expressway (Calax) project, even as a major business group backed President Aquino’s “inclination” to rebid, while other foreign and local trade groups are resisting the move to void the initial bidding won by the Ayala-Aboitiz consortium.

Asked if the government is now ready to proceed and rebid the tollroad project with the Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry (PCCI), the biggest group of Filipino businessmen backing the plan, Communications Secretary Herminio B. Coloma Jr. admitted the Palace has not yet reached a final decision to go ahead or not.

Coloma, in a text message to the BusinesssMirror, said the Office of the President is “still reviewing the matter.”

The secretary added that any decision the Palace will take on the

COLOMA said that any decision the Palace will take on the Calax project “will be based on legal principles, and will be in consonance with the national interest.”

Calax project “will be based on legal principles, and will be in consonance with the national interest.”

The PCCI, in a statement, had affirmed support for the government to rebid the Calax project, saying this would “maximize [the] economic benefits” the state would reap from the toll-road project, given the estimated P8.45 billion it would gain from fresh tender which, PCCI President Alfredo Yao said, could be tapped to bankroll rehabilitation of areas ravaged

by Supertyphoon Yolanda (international code name Haiyan).But other Continued on A8

n UK 71.9222 n HK 5.7992 n CHINA 7.3517 n singapore 34.8801 n australia 39.2569 n EU 56.3986 n SAUDI arabia 11.9854 Source: BSP (5 November 2014)

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Thursday, November 6, 2014

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BSP to keep rates as inflation slowed to 4.3% in October Continued from A1

It also slightly above the Business Mirror’s median forecast of private economists for the month, which came in at 4.2 percent.

October’s inflation brought the average inflation for the first 10 months of the year to 4.3 percent, still within the government’s 3percent to 5-percent target range for this year.

The slower inflation for the year was attributed to lower annual increments in the prices of food and nonalcoholic beverages. Lower prices of petroleum products were also noted during the period.

This prompted the local monetary authority chief to maintain the dovish monetary-policy stance, after its most aggressive twin move of increasing policy and special deposits account rates in September.

Tetangco said the 4.3-percent inflation average for January to October this year gave the BSP “comfort that the inflation target for the year is safe.” Tetangco also noted that the core inflation of the country has mellowed for the month.

Core inflation is the measure of growth of the prices of consumer goods in the country, which excludes the more volatile movements. This measures the broad overall long-run trend of the movement of consumer prices in an economy. In its previous statement earlier this year, Tetangco expressed worry on the rising core inflation around the third quarter of 2014.

“Nevertheless, we will continue to monitor how our previous policy actions are filtering through to the economy, and see if there would be need for adjustments in our policy levers,” the central bank chief said.

Economists welcome Tetangco’s comment, and reiterated their view of a pause in the tightening measure up until the second quarter of 2015.

“Given falling inflation and stabilization in money-supply growth, Tetangco today [Wednesday] gave the clearest indication to date that the BSP has room to pause. We expect Bangko Sentral to keep rates unchanged for the next few months and, in our view, it will look to raise rates only in the second quarter of 2015,” Barclays Regional Economist

Rahul Bajoria said.

Likewise, ING Bank economist for Manila Joey Cuyegkeng said the gradual easing of headline inflation, instead of a more significant drop in the inflation rate, is evidence of a downtrend in inflation environment for the next few months.

“Food inflation is on the downtrend, and is likely to remain on that path as week-on-week prices continues to ease further. Oil prices are likely to remain low, with crude oil prices on a peso value is 15 percent lower year on year in October and around 19 percent lower early this month. Power rates are likely to remain elevated, with another power- rate upward pressure for January 2015,” Cuyegkeng said.

Socioeconomic Planning Secretary and National Economic and Development Authority (Neda) Director General Arsenio M. Balisacan said the lower inflation in October could also be due to the lifting of the truck ban in the City of Manila.

The lifting of the truck ban somehow eased the congestion in key seaports in the country, allowing improved flow of goods to and

from Metro Manila and other major hubs nationwide. “In part, the easing of logistics bottleneck in the port of Manila starting September 2014 may have also contributed to the abatement of price pressures in October 2014,” Balisacan said.

He added that the easing of prices of commodities in the international market amid improved supply was reflected in the domestic markets.

However, this favorable impact was negated by the year-on-year upward adjustments in electricity charges during the period.

Price indices of electricity, gas and other fuels went up to 3.2 percent in October 2014, from 2.4 percent. Electricity price increased as a result of the P0.67-per-kilowatt-hour generation charge of the Manila Electric Co. “Overall, the tempered inflation outturn is expected to provide the BSP room to possibly keep its key policy rates steady,” he said.

The Monetary Board on October 23 kept the BSP key policy rates unchanged at 4 percent for the overnight borrowing, or reverse repurchase facility; and 6 percent for the overnight lending, or repurchase facility.

This, the Neda said, was done due to easing pressures for commodity prices, robust domestic demand, adequate domestic liquidity and strong bank-lending growth.

Balisacan said moving forward, the government intends to remain vigilant against inflation risks and will continue efforts to ensure ample supply of goods nationwide.

“The government also continues to explore more lasting solutions to the port-congestion problem to avoid disruptions in the domestic supply chain that could result in higher transportation costs,” the Neda said.

Year-on-year increases in the heavily weighted food and nonalcoholic beverages index at the national level slowed to 7 percent in October. The country’s food-alone index slowed to 7.2 percent in October. Its annual growth last month was at 7.8 percent and in October 2013, 3.4 percent. The slowdown in food prices was due to reductions in the price of meat; fish; oils and fats; vegetables; sugar, jam, honey, chocolate and confectionery; and food products not elsewhere classified. On a monthly basis, the country’s inflation rate remained at

Oil prices tumble anew on Saudi discount move Continued from A1

“This is similar to a surprise stimulus,” Slater said.

Though a drop in demand is a factor in the current slump amid concerns over global growth, Slater says supply-side factors are having a much bigger impact than back in 2008, when demand plummeted as the global economy tanked.

The rise of fracking in the US, the return of oil output from Iraq and Libya, and Saudi Arabia’s willingness to resist production cuts have combined to weigh on prices.

On Monday Saudi Arabia, Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries’ (Opec) largest oil producer, cut prices for customers in the US. The move has been interpreted as an attempt by the country to maintain its market share in the world’s largest economy against supplies from the likes of Canada, Mexico and Venezuela, and US shale-oil producers.

Phil Flynn, senior market analyst for the Price Futures Group, said Saudi Arabia’s move was directly aimed at those US producers, who have boosted US oil output to the

highest level in decades. As a result, US imports of crude oil from Saudi Arabia dropped to 894,000 barrels per day in August, down from 1.3 million bpd in the same month a year ago. Saudi Arabia is “threatened by US oil production and they are acting to try to break the US producers back,” Flynn wrote in a daily newsletter to clients.

The drop in oil reverberated in the US stock market on Tuesday. The Dow Jones transportation average touched a high of 8,870.90. Airline stocks, such as American Airlines and United Continental, gained close to 2 percent.

3-DAY EXTENDED FORECAST

TODAY’S WEATHER

NOVEMBER 6, 2014 | THURSDAY

Intertropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ) is the result of the Northern and Southern Hemisphere tradewind convergence; widespread cloudiness, occasional thunderstorms, precipitation and moderate to strong surface winds are associated weather conditions.

NOV 7

NOV 8

SATURDAY

METRO MANILA

23 – 30°C

23 – 31°C

NORTHEAST MONSOON AFFECTING NORTHERN LUZON.

TUGUEGARAO

22 – 31°C

21 – 30°C

NOV 9

SUNDAY

LAOAG CITY 20 – 30°C

NOV 8 NOV 9 SATURDAY SUNDAY

23 – 31°C

24 – 32°C

23 – 31°C

23 – 31°C

21 – 30°C

TACLOBAN

24 – 32°C

23 – 31°C

23 – 31°C

22 – 31°C

CAGAYAN DE ORO

TAGAYTAY CITY 19 – 28°C

21 – 31°C

24 – 31°C

23 – 30°C

23 – 32°C

23 – 30°C

23 – 31°C

24 – 32°C

24 – 31°C

24 – 30°C

24 – 31- °C

BAGUIO

15 – 22°C

14 – 21°C

14 – 21°C

SBMA/ CLARK

23 – 31°C

23 – 30°C

23 – 30°C

ZAMBOANGA

TUGUEGARAO CITY 22 – 31°C BAGUIO CITY 15 – 22°C

20 – 30°C

METRO DAVAO

TAGAYTAY

LEGAZPI

PHILIPPINE AREA OF RESPONSIBILITY (PAR)

NOV 7

FRIDAY

METRO CEBU

20 – 28°C

21 – 29°C

ILOILO/ BACOLOD 24 – 31°C

TACLOBAN CITY 24 – 32°C

METRO CEBU 24 – 32°C CAGAYAN DE ORO CITY 24 – 31°C ZAMBOANGA CITY 23 – 30°C

PUERTO PRINCESA

ILOILO/ BACOLOD

23 – 31°C

23 – 30°C

SUNRISE

SUNSET

MOONSET

MOONRISE

5:53 AM

5:26 PM

4:58 AM

5:01 PM

21 – 28°C

LEGAZPI CITY 24 – 31°C

PUERTO PRINCESA CITY 25 – 30°C

3-DAY EXTENDED FORECAST

(AS OF NOVEMBER 5, 5:00 PM)

LAOAG

METRO MANILA 23 – 30°C

public finances, potentially prompting government spending cuts or tax increases that can hurt growth.

Opec members are due to meet on November 27 in Vienna, Austria, but investors doubt the cartel will be able to agree to any reduction in production quotas given Saudi Arabia’s actions. That is another reason oil prices have remained under pressure, and why many analysts think this oil-price retreat may be longer lasting than a previous bout of weakness seen in 2012. “This time, the fall should stick a little bit more,” Slater said. AP

INTERTROPICAL CONVERGENCE ZONE (ITCZ) AFFECTING MINDANAO.

Northeast Monsoon locally known as “Amihan”. It affects the eastern portions of the country. It is cold and dry; characterized by widespread cloudiness with rains and showers.

SBMA/CLARK 24 – 31°C

NOV 7

FRIDAY

Meanwhile, major oil companies, such as Exxon Mobil and Chevron, fell about 1 percent, while Continental Resources, which primarily operates in the US, fell 7.5 percent.

Russia and Venezuela are two countries that are considered particularly vulnerable to a sustained fall in prices as their economies are highly dependent on oil. And because their costs of production are high and baseline budget plans are considered optimistic, analysts say they stand to lose more than, say, the Gulf states.

Lower tax revenue from the fall in prices could derail

0.1 percent in October, the same rate in September.

Meanwhile, the annual inflation in Metro Manila, however, went up to 3.6 percent in October. Last month it was 3.5 percent and in October 2013, 1.1 percent.

This was largely due to increases in the indices of clothing and footwear; housing, water, electricity, gas and other fuels; furnishing, household equipment and routine maintenance of the house; and health.

However, annual inflation in Areas Outside NCR eased to 4.5 percent in October. Inflation was 4.7 percent in September and 3.4 percent in October 2013.

This was due to the slower increases in the indices of food and nonalcoholic beverages; alcoholic, beverages and tobacco; clothing and footwear; housing, water, electricity, gas and other fuels; and restaurant and miscellaneous goods and services.

Excluding selected food and energy items, core inflation further decelerated to 3.2 percent in October. It was 3.4 percent last month and 2.5 percent during the same period last year.

22 – 30°C

HALF MOON FULL MOON

SOUTH HARBOR

OCT 30

10:48 PM

24 – 30°C

23 – 31°C

22 – 30°C

NOV 7

6:06 AM

CELEBES SEA

9:26 PM

0.97 METER

Cloudy skies with rain showers and/or thunderstorms.

24 – 32°C

23 – 31°C

23 – 31°C

Partly cloudy to at times cloudy with rain showers.

Weekday hourly updates: 6:00 AM on Balitaan, 7:00 AM & 8:00 AM on Good Morning Boss!, 9:00 AM, 10:00 AM, 11:00 AM, 12:00 PM, 1:00 PM on News@1, 3:00 PM, 4:30 PM, and 6:00 PM on News@6

www.panahon.tv

SABAH

3:43 AM

0.05 METER

Partly cloudy to cloudy skies with isolated rain showers and/or thunderstorms

Watch PANAHON.TV everyday at 5:00 AM on PTV (Channel 4).

METRO DAVAO 24 – 31°C

LOW TIDE MANILA HIGH TIDE

@PanahonTV

news@businessmirror.com.ph

The Nation BusinessMirror

Asean jurists tackle human-rights situation

By Recto Mercene

M

EM BER S of t he I nter national Commission of Jurists (ICJ) from Asean members will gather on November 6 and 7, in Manila to promote and protect human rights in the Asean region. They will discuss recent developments in international humanrights law on questions relating to the right to life.

Among the areas of consideration will be custodial deaths and other extrajudicial k illings and enforced disappearances.

The two-day event, dubbed “Judicial Dialogue on Deciding Cases Involving Human Rights Violations in the Asean,” is organized by ICJ, in collaboration with the Working Group for an Asean Human Rights Mechanism.

This initiative is also part of ICJ’s continuous efforts to support Southeast Asian judiciaries through the facilitation of colloquia and dialogues.

Among the event’s participants

are Dato Seri Paduka Hj Kifrawi bin Dato Paduka Hj Kifli, chief justice of Brunei Darussalam; ICJ Commissioners Justice Adolfo S. Azcuna and Prof. Vitit Muntarbhorn; and Dato’ Param Cumaraswamy, co-chairman of the Working Group for an Asean Human Rights Mechanism and Former United Nations Special Rapporteur on the independence of Judges and Lawyers.

The judicial dialogue is aimed to be a platform for peer-to-peer sharing of experiences among judges, representatives from judicial-training institutions, and lawyers and other jurists in the Asean.

Some of the discussions expected to take place include the international legal framework on the right to life, including custodial deaths and other extrajudicial executions; landmark cases that have previously found state authorities accountable for serious violations of human rights; and challenges faced by judges in cases involving serious violations of human rights and practical solutions to overcome them.

Villar cites lessons from Yolanda

VILLAR: “We saw firsthand the destruction and death brought about

by Yolanda. The scenario was really bleak. Many were then asking where will they start and how will they begin to rebuild their lives.”

T

ACLOBAN CITY—Sen. Cynthia A. Villar underscored the “lessons” Filipinos learned from the aftermath of Supertyphoon Yolanda that pummelled the Eastern Visayas region in November last year.

“There were realizations we obtained from our experiences after Typhoon Yolanda,” Villar said during the “Uma-ahon Initiative: One Year After Yolanda” event, with the theme “Building Back Better Farming and Fishing Communities” in Region 8.

The celebration was sponsored by the Department of Agriculture (DA) Region 8 to commemorate the first anniversary of the super tyhoon, which claimed the lives of more than 6,000 people.

Agriculture Secretary Proceso J. Alcala delivered a message in the opening program held at the Eastern Visayas State University.

Alcala and Villar also led the distribution of certificates and simple tokens to local and international non-governmental organizations and public offices, which helped in the government’s relief and rehabilitation efforts.

In her keynote address, Villar noted that coconut farmers resorted to intercropping after 33 million coconut trees were damaged by the tragedy of this magnitude.

Coconut was the most affected crop, robbing over a million farmers of their livelihood and income.

“But, while waiting for the harvest period of coconut trees, they planted other crops,” Villar said, as she related it will take six years before a coconut tree becomes productive.

In continuing to rise above the challenges, the coconut farmers and farmers engaged in the production of other crops opted to engage in other means of livelihood, such as livestock or poultry-raising.

She said postdisaster recovery comes in stages or phases— immediate, short term, medium term and long term.

“But a year after, the focus is more on the medium to long term, and what I cited about the intercropping of coconut farmers is just one of them. And this also includes livelihood diversification, disaster risk reduction, environmental resilience and tapping alternative

agricultural procedures and processes,” she said.

“That is among the so-called silver lining behind the dark clouds brought about by the devastation,” added Villar, chairman of the Senate Committee on Agriculture and Food.

Villar said the agriculture sector is the worst battered when the strong winds and storm surges as high as a two-story building ravaged the poor farming and fishing communities.

“There are various estimates that were reported, but it easily reached more than P31 billion [in damage to agriculture in the Visayas alone]…the losses are really staggering. For an agricultural country as ours, and for a region that is highly dependent on agriculture, the losses are really staggering,” Villar added.

She said there is no question farmers and fishermen need to be prioritized, since the majority of the disaster-hit communities heavily rely on agriculture. It was really important for them to get back to their farms and to the sea. “ The sooner that happen, the sooner their lives and that of their families will have a semblance of normalcy. Thus, we distributed motorized fishing boats and farm implements, like vegetable seeds, coconut seedlings and organic fertilizer, on top of food packs and roofing materials they urgently needed that time,” Villar said.

She thanked the DA for affording her the chance to partner with them in their rehabilitation efforts to areas affected by Yolanda and other typhoons.

“We make a good partnership,” said Villar, adding that the agriculture department and its attached agencies provided agriculture-related assistance, like farm implements and inputs to farmers and motor boats to fishermen.

On August 31 the senator and her husband, former Senate President Manny Villar, went to Guiuan, Quinapondan, General MacArthur, Llorente, Hernani, Mercedes, Balangiga, Giporlos, Lawaan in Eastern Samar and Marabut and Basey in Western Samar.

In his capacity as CEO of Vista Land, the former Senate President also visited some areas in Eastern Visayas.

“We saw firsthand the destruction and death brought about by Yolanda. The scenario was really bleak. Many were then asking where will they start and how will they begin to rebuild their lives,” the senator said.

Editor: Dionisio L. Pelayo • Thursday, November 6, 2014 A3

Journalists’ protection prime responsibility of govt–de Lima ­ J

By Joel R. San Juan

USTICE Secretary Leila de Lima has acknowledged that it is the government that has the primary responsibility for ensuring the protection and safety of journalists in the country.

De Lima made the statement during the plenary session of delegates of the Third United Nations Inter-Agency Meeting on the Safety of Journalists and the Issue of Impunity that took place at the Council of Europe in Strasbourg, France.

In a statement, the Department of Justice (DOJ) said de Lima stressed during the session that “the viciousness of these crimes committed against journalists demands a coordinated response from the government and the private sector.”

The meeting brought together stakeholders, United Nations member-states, its agencies, international and regional or-

ganizations, academe and media practioners to discuss and find ways to address the threats against the safety of journalists, media workers and social-media producers, and of the culture of impunity surrounding the crimes against them.

The discussion, according to the DOJ, centered on the necessity of transforming UN resolutions and papers, including the UN Plan of Action, into prompt, effective and responsive national-level strategies by the UN member-states.

De Lima, during the sesssion, stressed on the urgency of educating the public on the protection of journalists.

The justice secretary revealed to the member-states the composite team approach that was adopted by the Inter-Agency Committee under Administrative Order 35 that she currently chairs.

The interagency committee is the primordial body tasked to investigate all cases of extrajudicial killings, enforced disapperances, torture and other grave violations of the right to life, liberty and security, including media killings, both by state and nonstate forces; and to ensure a cofused case buildup and speedy resolution of all unsolved and new cases.

Under the composite team approach, prosecutors and investigators collaborate, cooperate and coodinate in the investigation and buildup of validated cases of extrajudicial killings, enforced disappearances, torture and other grave violations of the right to life, liberty and property.

Based on the records of the Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility, a total of 145 Filipino journalists have been killed for their work since democracy was restored in 1986.

However, only 14 cases were successfully prosecuted and resulted in convictions.

Economy

A4 Thursday, November 6, 2014 • Editors: Vittorio V. Vitug and Max V. de Leon

BusinessMirror

Lower power-generation charge seen in October

T

By Lenie Lectura

he Manila Electric Co. (Meralco) on Monday said it is expecting a lower generation charge to power users for the supply month of October.

“There are strong indications that generation costs are lower for October, which could lead to a generationcharge reduction this November,” Meralco Utility Economics Head Larry Fernandez said.

Generation charge last month stood at P5.35 per kilowatt-hour (kWh). It is the largest component of an electric bill.

“Generation supply conditions normalized in October: much less forced plant outages occurred and no Malampaya gas restriction was experienced” as against the five-day cumulative gas restriction in September, the Meralco official said.

Meralco will announce the final rate changes for November on Tuesday.

Last month Meralco power rates slightly went up by P0.10 per kWh as against a reduction of P0.58 per kWh in the previous month.

The increase was mainly due to the P0.159-per-kWh upward adjustment in generation charge, the biggest component of a Meralco bill, from P5.19 per kWh to P5.35 per kWh. Meralco said generation charge for the supply month of September and reflected in October bills went up because of the five-day Malampaya restriction, from September 8 to 11 and from September 21 to 23, which forced the Santa Rita and San Lorenzo power plants to use more expensive liquid fuel in lieu of natural gas.

This resulted in higher generation costs from these plants. Also, the Malampaya restriction reduced dispatch of the Ilijan power plant during the September supply month.

The deterioration of the peso against the dollar from 43.590 to 44.875 this month contributed further to the increase in generation charge.

Meralco sources its power requirements from power-supply agreements (PSAs), independent power producers (IPPs) and the Wholesale Electricity Spot Market (WESM).

Meralco reiterated that it does not earn from the pass-through charges, such as the generation and transmission charges. Payment for the generation charge goes to the power suppliers such as the plants selling to Meralco through the WESM and under the PSAs, as well as the IPPs. Payment for the transmission charge, meanwhile, goes to the National Grid Corp. of the Philippines. Of the total bill, only the distribution, supply and metering charges accrue to Meralco.

news@businessmirror.com.ph

Group issues call for MRT 3 ‘commuter uprising’ this month

By Marvyn N. Benaning Correspondent

T

HE Train Riders Network (TREN) has called for a “commuter uprising” this month over the mismanagement of the Metro Rail Transit Line 3 (MRT 3), which has figured in a series of dangerous accidents and systems breakdowns.

Worse, howled TREN Spokesman James Relativo, MRT has been assessed

by Mass Transit Railway Hong Kong (MTR Hong Kong), which found its overall performance as “unsatisfactory.”

“If anything, the news only reaffirmed what every MRT 3 commuter have known for years now—that the private Metro Rail Transit Corp.

[MRTC] really is not doing its end of the bargain of facilitating the train’s maintenance,” Relativo said.

He also assailed the Department of Transportation and Communications (DOTC) and President Aquino for their commitment to privatization.

This, Relativo argued, has “paved the way for the ‘hellish’ conditions in MRT 3.”

“It is believed that the unsatisfactory asset performance was very likely related to the inappropriate maintenance interval and maintenance content,” MTR Hong Kong said in its assessment report.

The audit team expects the condition of MRT 3 to worsen in the future should there be no improvement in the train’s maintenance.

“When their criminal neglect exposes the riding public to a clear and present danger, do we not bleed? We are commuters—humans capable of feeling pain once cramped into a speeding tin can. We are angry taxpayers ripped off their good money every day,” Relativo said.

Tren called on the Aquino administration to immediately junk the MRT 3’s “onerous” and “questionable” concession agreement and demanded the government takeover of the facility.

“When business interests supersede public welfare, things like this are bound to happen, coupled with unabated calls for a fare increase,” the group’s spokesman added.

Ombudsman indicts NEA official CA exempts Aboitiz property linked to P1.5-million bribery case in Davao from CARP coverage

T

HE Office of the Ombudsman on Wednesday ordered the filing of criminal charges against a National Electrification Agency (NEA) official for allegedly receiving P1.5 million from the Cotabato Electric Cooperative Inc. (Cotelco) in May 2010.

Ombudsman Conchita CarpioMorales, in a joint resolution, said that NEA Acting Department Manager for Legal Services Omar Mayo will face charges for alleged violation of Section 7(d) of Republic Act (RA) 6713, or Code of Conduct and Ethical Standards for Public Officials and Employees.

Morales said her office found that Mayo solicited and accepted money from Cotelco, an entity under the regulatory and supervisory author-

ity of NEA. The money was then deposited to Mayo’s personal bank account in Unionbank. It was also uncovered that Mayo also availed of cash advance from Cotelco amounting to P28,200. ​In approving the indictment for violation of RA 6713, Morales gave no credence to Mayo’s allegation that the money represented the litigation costs he advanced to another counsel in connection with the case involving Cotelco’s franchise.

She said that the bare assertion “cannot prevail over the contents of the undisputed liquidation report, check voucher, deposit slip, audit report and the anonymous letter stating that Mayo had been paid by and accepted from Cotelco the amount of P1.5 million as litigation fee.”

​Aside from the criminal indictment, Mayo was found administratively liable for grave misconduct and was meted out the penalty of dismissal from the service with the accessory penalties of cancellation of eligibility, forfeiture of retirement benefits and perpetual disqualification for reemployment in the government service, she said.

Meantime, the complaints against NEA Administrator Edita Bueno, Deputy Administrator for Legal Service John Joseph Magtulay, Deputy Administrator for Electric Distribution Utilities Service Edgardo Piamonte and Department Manager Veronica Cruz were dismissed for lack of merit.

Jovee Marie N. dela Cruz

BIR stirs business uproar anew. . . continued from a1

She maintained that it is still an option for the groups, especially with the impact of the retroactive application of the 120+30 rule under the RMC. The groups are contesting the fact that the said rule was applied retroactively to all pending VAT refund-claim applications—essentially an automatic denial for the said applications, the groups said.

They said the input VAT-refund claims have already run into the billions of pesos, including those that are still not acted upon by the BIR, or are pending with the CTA. “At the very least, we estimate it to be about P15 billion because that’s what the government actually provided in the national budget for issuance of refund. But the figure could be much higher given it has accumulated for all these years; so that’s not the exact figure but that’s the least estimation,” Manuel said.

The retroactive application of the strict 120+30 rule on all pending VAT applications is confiscatory since it will result in a large-scale automatic denial of all pending applications, the business groups said in their statement.

Manuel added in a text message

that the amount represents pending claims to be processed by the government, which include those affected by the new rule. “Actual value of total pending claims to date would be higher.”

Through the RMC, the BIR is removing the taxpayer’s right to an administrative appeal process, said the groups, as the BIR’s inaction after 120 days would lead to a denial that is “deemed final unless appealed before the CTA.” The groups also said the BIR’s decision to forfeit jurisdiction and halt processing of an administrative claim after it has been appealed to the CTA runs contrary to a Supreme Court ruling.

Previously taxpayers may elevate the claim to the CTA after the 120+30-day period, or continue to wait for the BIR’s final decision before elevating the claim to the CTA. The groups want the finance department to revert to this system, which, the groups said, has been upheld by previous administrations.

The groups are also against retroactive application of any new rule on pending claims.

The groups also asked the BIR to expedite the processing of all pending VAT-refund applications

Aerospace. . . continued from a8 of trainings that can be done; the question now is which one would benefit the whole industry. Gifas can also be tapped to train companies how to service aircrafts; there are new A380s that are being bought. So there are

programs for capability and also competency- building for very specific knowledge, for example, surface treatment and heat treatment,” Lee said.

The local aerospace industry is targeting to achieve a conservative revenue goal of $2.5 billion by

within a definite time frame for affected zero-rated ta xpayers and investors.

The said letter was signed by the Japanese Chamber of Commerce and Industry of the Philippines, European Chamber of Commerce of the Philippines, American Chamber of Commerce of the Philippines, Philippine Association of Multinational Companies Regional Headquarters, Inc., Canadian Chamber of Commerce of the Philippines, Korean Chamber of Commerce of the Philippines, Australian-New Zealand Chamber of Commerce of the Philippines, Philippine Exporters Confederation Inc., Pilipino Banana Growers and Exporters Association, Philippine Coconut Oil Producers Association, United Coconut Associations of the Philippines, Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry, IT and Business Process Association of the Philippines, Philippine Independent Power Producers Association, Employers Confederation of the Philippines, Chamber of Mines of the Philippines, Tax Management Association of the Philippines, Management Association of the Philippines, Financial Executives of the Philippines and the Association of Certified Public Accountants in Public Practice. Catherine N. Pillas

2022 and is in consultation with the government to attract more players in the Philippines. The group may revise its road map next year to include the MRO road map for the aerospace industry, as well as include the airlines’ input.

Catherine N. Pillas

T

By Joel R. San Juan

he Court of Appeals (CA) has reversed the decision issued by the Office of the President (OP) in 2012 allowing the Department of Agriculture to place more than 59 hectares of property owned by the Aboitiz clan under the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP) coverage.

In a 14-page decision penned by Associate Justice Victoria Isabel Paredes, the CA’s Special Eleventh Division, found merit to the petition filed by the Aboitiz family, led by Jaime Jose Aboitiz, executive vice president and COO of Aboitiz Power Corp., seeking to stop the government from seizing its property in Barangay New Carmen, Tugbok, Davao City.

The appellate court noted that the petitioners main business is cattle-raising and not agricultural business.

“Petitioners have sufficiently shown that the subject lot had been devoted to livestock raising even before the passage of the CARL [Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Law] and that one of the main consideration for the lease of Lapanday Agricultural and Development Corp. [Lapanday], way back in 1975, was to gain access to bananas which replaced the cumbersome method of milling rice and corn to produce bran mixed with molasses and pasture grass, and then used as feed for its cattle herd,” the CA pointed out.

The CA explained that it was not uncommon for enormous landholding to be intermittently

planted with trees.

“Thus, the presence of banana trees on the subject lot at the time it was leased to Lapanday must be placed within the context of how it figured on the totality of the running of the cattle ranching business which, in the case at bar, was an integral and necessary component in the cattle and livestockraising business of petititoners,” the CA said.

The CA also gave weight to the supervening event that the petitioners initially raised in its motion for reconsideration before the OP. The Aboitiz clan claimed in their petition that while the subject lot was leased to Lapanday to address the need of their cattle for bananas, the same was abandoned by Lapanday on October 31, 2011, due to caso fortuito or fortuitous events.

“As necessary consequence of Lapanday’s abandonment of the subject lot, the same reverted back to a grazing land,” the CA said.

“It could not have been the intention of the framers of the Constitution that lands exclusively devoted to livestock which, in the interim, were planted to bananas, to address a cattle raisers’ need for food for their cattle and which finally became new grazing land for their cattle, would be covered by CARP,” the CA added.

Based on the records, the Aboitiz family bought the cattle ranch from Enrique Zobel back in 1970.

To avoid the trouble of planting, cutting and hauling homegrown supplement or grass for its feedlots, it leased a portion of the land to

Obama. . . continued from a8

But if he’s unpopular, so are congressional Republicans. And Vice President Joe Biden argued, perhaps hopefully, that congressional Republicans will need to compromise with Obama if they want something to tout in 2016.

“We know what we have to get done the last two years,” Biden said.

The White House is “ready to compromise,” he said on CNN. “And I think [Republicans will] be inclined because the message from the people, and I’m getting it all over the country, is they’re tired of Washington not being able to do anything.”

Though he’ll feel lonely, Obama isn’t alone in what he faces. The last three presidents to serve two terms—Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton and George W. Bush—spent their last two years in office with the opposition controlling both chambers of Congress. Reagan never had a Republican-led House, and in his sixth-year midterm election Republicans lost control of the Senate. In Bush’s sixth-year midterm, Republicans lost control of both chambers.

Aides who worked for those former presidents say a lame-duck president can still accomplish things. Obama and congressional Republicans share a desire to show voters they can gov-

ern, said William Galston, a former policy adviser to Clinton who’s a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, a center-left policy research center.

“President Obama, like any president, wants to finish strong and leave as much of a legacy as he can,” Galston said. And Republicans “are struggling with a badly degraded brand,” he said.

“The Republican leadership has some pretty powerful incentives to show they can do business.”

Reagan found a way to pass trade agreements, rewrite welfare laws, ratify an arms treaty, secure a Supreme Court justice confirmation and pass 13 appropriations bills while coping with the Iran-Contra scandal, said Ken Duberstein, who served as Reagan’s chief of staff in his second term. “There is incentive for Obama, if he wants those last two years to be of consequence, to figure out ways to work with Congress,” Duberstein said. “He needs to build trusting relationships.”

It will take a commitment to work with Congress, and, probably, an infusion of newly invigorated staff, he said. The White House has signaled that some personnel changes are likely, with Obama’s appointment of former Biden Chief of Staff Ron Klain as Ebola czar widely seen as a

Lapanday, to ensure its cattle herd a steady and dependable cattle food in the form of nonexportable bananas.

On April 20, 1998, the Aboitiz family filed an application with the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) for the exclusion of Lot 467-A, covered by TCT T-25916 from the CARP on the ground that the land holding is devoted to the raising of livestock.

The land covered by TCT T-25916 appears to have been divided into three sections: Lot 467A-1 or the lot subject of the case; Lot 467-A-2 consisting of 61.73 hectares, which was utilized as an airstip and road; and Lot 467-A-3 consisting of about 12.12 hectares.

On May 2, 2000, the DAR granted in part the application with respect to Lot 467-A-2 but increasing the coverage over the subject lot from 51 hectares to 59.09 hectares.

It denied the motion for reconsideration filed by the Aboitiz family, prompting it to appeal the matter before the OP, but the latter denied the same in a decision on September 7, 2012.

“In the instant case, we find that, contrary to the findings of the OP and its subalterns, the subject lot had always been actually devoted exclusively to livestock farming, with an interim agricultural activity for livestock feeds, even before the enactment of the CARP and thus, exempt from its coverage,” the CA said in reversing the OP’s decision.

Concurring with the ruling were Associate Justices Vicente S.E. Veloso and Pedro Corales.

move to get Klain on staff. But Press Secretary Josh Earnest dismissed suggestions of a major shakeup, at least not right away. “There have been some presidents who have felt compelled in the aftermath of midterm elections to publicly fire high-profile members of the administration,” he said. “At this point, I don’t anticipate that that will happen later this week.”

Obama and the Republicans could compromise on a variety of issues, including trade, corporate tax restructuring, immigration policy changes and investing in the nation’s highways and railroads. “There are ways to bridge the differences,” Duberstein said. “I think there is a fork in the road. If he wants to stay insular, he doesn’t get anything done.”

The Alliance for Justice, a liberal advocacy group, found optimism in the records of Obama’s predecessors for judicial nominations. The group found that Reagan, Clinton and Bush saw about 20 percent of their total number of judicial appointments confirmed during their final two years, despite their lame-duck status. The results suggest “neither the White House nor Senate Democrats should yield to the narrative of an inevitable confirmation shutdown,” the group said. MCT

Economy BusinessMirror

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Meralco’s BCG expansion plan gets ERC nod

By Lenie Lectura

T

HE Manila Electric Co. (Meralco) has secured the green light to proceed with its P253.53-million expansion project of its substation in Bonifacio Global City (BGC) in Taguig City.

In its 18-page order, the Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) said the expansion of Meralco’s FBGC-4 115-kilovolt (kV) -34.5 kV substation is the most beneficial and the best immediate option that would address the capacity deficiency in the highdensity urban area of BGC. “The project will provide increased reliability and operational efficiency that will benefit various existing residential and commercial customers, multinational corporations, international schools, BPOs [business-process outsourcing office’s] and other vital customers in the area,” the ERC said.

Currently, the residential and commercial customers in BGC are being served by 34.5-kV distribution feeders from Meralco’s FBGC-4 substation. However, due to the rapid development and large load applications in BGC, the said substation is expected to be overloaded at 101 percent in 2015.

Meralco, in its application, said that without the additional capacity, it would not be able to accommodate additional service or load in the said area. Assuming that these additional loads will be connected to the said substation without additional capacity, these loads would result in the overloading of the substation at 118-percent usage, explained the utility firm.

Further, several transformers in the said area already reached the 70percent loading limit of power transformers to necessitate augmentation.

“Moreover, as the substation’s demand approach critical overloading, many residential, commercial and BPO customers in BGC will be affected,” the utility firm added.

The ERC agreed, saying “the project will not only relieve the expected overloading of FBGC-4 Bank No.1 at 101 percent in 2015 but will also prevent prolonged power interruptions during contingencies.”

In approving its application, the ERC directed Meralco to conduct a competitive bidding for the purchase of materials in the implementation of the project, submit a progress report, and remit P1.90 million in permit fees.

Aquino administration’s post-Yolanda response ‘slow, glaringly inadequate’

A

By Cai Ordinario

lmost a year after Supertyphoon Yolanda wreaked havoc in Central Philippines, farmers, fishermen and other residents who were affected by the super typhoon have experienced significant reductions in their income.

Local research group IBON Foundation Inc. said agricultural income in the affected areas, for instance, has been estimated to have dropped by 50 percent to 70 percent after Yolanda.

IBON added that a survey of 1,094 respondents in six Eastern Visayas provinces showed eight out of 10

families earn less than P5,000 on the average every month, or live on less than P34 a day.

“The government’s response to the urgent needs of the Yolanda survivors is not only slow and glaringly inadequate [but] also fails to address the most important reasons for the vulnerability to calamities of Eastern

T

he co-chairman of the Joint Congressional Power Commission (JCPC) on Wednesday said that disparity of figures presented by the Department of Energy (DOE), the House and energy stakeholders on the projected power deficit for summer of 2015 slows down the crafting of the joint resolution granting President Aquino emergency powers.

Liberal Party Rep. Reynaldo Umali of Oriental Mindoro, chairman of the House Committee on Energy, at a hearing on Luzon power situation, told DOE officials and stakeholders to reconcile their figures.

“We just have to be clear on these [numbers] kasi magre-report kayo kay Presidente, after this hearig magre-report ako kay Speaker, and we’ll have different figures. Parang hindi tayo nag-usap. This is the reason for this meeting so we’ll understand each other clearly. Hindi ’yung iba ’yung sinasabi niyo, iba ’yung sinasabi namin tapos pag pinatawag kami ni President, nagkakagulo’yungnumeronatin,” he said.

The DOE data shows that the committed power supply from the Interruptible Load Program (ILP) from participants is only 120 megawatts (MW) but the Lower Chamber data showed that there are already 891 MW of committed ILP with a de-rated or usable capacity of 623 MW. The figures show a wide difference from the 348 MW already tallied by the Retail Electricity Suppliers Association, an umbrella organization of electricity retailers.

Visayas communities,” IBON said.

IBON estimated that about 5.6 million to 6 million workers engaged in agriculture, fishing, trade and transport were affected

by Yolanda.

The reduction in their incomes because of the disaster and the slow progress in the reconstruction and rehabilitation works, IBON said, only compound existing problems in typhoon-affected areas.

IBON said provinces affected by Yolanda, like Eastern Visayas, were already among the poorest in the country prior to the disaster.

Poverty incidence in Eastern Visayas, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) said on Monday, was already at 41 percent prior to the typhoon. The ADB expects poverty incidence in the province to worsen to 55 percent.

“This [reduction in income] is an additional blow for hardest-hit

Eastern Visayas, which is among the poorest in the country and heavily relies on agriculture,” IBON said.

IBON added that apart from lower incomes, as much as 250,000 families, or 1.3 million individuals, are still living in uncertain or inadequate homes.

This means that these families are still living in evacuation centers, tent cities, bunkhouses and in government-declared “no-build” areas.

Further, IBON said data from the Office of the Presidential Assistant for Rehabilitation and Recovery revealed that rebuilding infrastructure has also been very slow.

IBON added this includes public buildings that can be used to extend basic services to those affected by the disaster. There is limited progress in the repair or construction of municipal halls, civic centers, flood-control structures and ports.

With Jonathan L. Mayuga

Soft sell

Aling Yeye, a sidewalk vendor of rugs, doormats, pillows and bed comforters, displays and sells her products at her stall in Laong Laan, Manila, at affordable prices to motorists and commuters alike. The household materials, she said, were made at a factory in Hagonoy, Bulacan, and distributed to her stall on consignment basis. ROY DOMINGO

Disparity of figures on summer electricity shortage slows down grant of emergency powers to Aquino

By Jovee Marie N. dela Cruz

Thursday, November 6, 2014 A5

The ILP is a voluntary program whereby businesses such as malls and factories that have their own generators can be disconnected from the power grid in times of short supply, and can sell any excess power they generate to distributors.

According to the draft resolution on emergency powers, the House of Representatives wants the government to use the committed ILP in addressing the looming power shortage next year.

Based on the latest draft of the House resolution, authorizing the President to establish additional generating capacity to effectively address the projected electricity shortage in the summer months of 2015, the DOE projects a critical power shortage estimated at 700 MW to occur in March to July 2015 consisting of 14 weeks yellow alert and two weeks of red alert, for a total of 16 weeks of approximately one hour of brownouts for one day per week.

It said that provision and procurement of additional generation capacity shall be available on or before March 1, 2015, and the additional generating capacity shall be preferentially sourced from the ILP. The resolution added that the adoption and execution of energy and conservation measures shall pursued as a further fallback mechanism.

It said that to stimulate additional generation capacities, private entities with self-generating facilities (SGFs) are hereby encouraged to participate voluntarily in the ILP on or before December 1, 2014.

“Provided, that the government shall reimburse the owners of SGFs or backup generators for fuel expenses and reasonable recovery for their use in accordance with ERC [Energy Regulatory Commission] rules and validated by the distribution utilities,” it said.

Based on established protocols, ILP is implemented during a red-alert status (minimal power reserve) upon the notice of the National Grid Corp. of the Philippines and the distribution utilities informing ILP participants to deload from the grid.

Through the ILP, the aggregate demand for power from the system will be reduced to a more manageable level, helping ensure the availability of supply. The lawmaker said the government will encourage more businesses to sign up for the ILP to increase the power reserves available next summer.

Umali also vowed to approve the committee report for emergency powers when Congress resumes session on November 17.

Last month, President Aquino has asked Congress to grant him an emergency power that will allow him to contract additional power capacity to avert the looming power crisis in summer next year.

The President cited the Section 71 of the Electric Power Industry Reform Act which states that, “Upon determination by the President of the Philippines of an imminent shortage of the supply of electricity, Congress may authorize, through a joint resolution, the establishment of additional generating capacity.”

It’s important to get energy policies right, prize-winning expert tells PHL

By Lenie Lectura

P

ULITZER prize-winning author and energy global expert Daniel Yergin underscored the importance of crafting correct energy policies suitable to the environment of the country, and have these implemented efficiently and swiftly.

Yergin, author of the bestseller The Quest: Energy, Security, and the Remaking of the Modern World, said during his visit to the Philippines that “it is important to get energy policies right,” in a bid to entice investors and encourage them to do business in the Philippines for a long period of time.

At t he sa me t i me, Yerg i n stressed that one way to encourage investments is consistency in government policies.

“The lesson from around the world, again and again, to assure that you have adequate electricity to support economic growth, is consistency in energy policy. You just can’t change back and forth. What you want to do is encourage investments,” he said.

“In this environment we’re in now, you have to be realistic of how

the markets have changed. The attitudes of investors have changed.

They have more choices. They are more careful, and have more capital discipline. Consistency and realism, I think, make up a wise investment regime,” Yergin said.

Yergin, likewise, believes that the Philippines should be part of the Asean LNG (liquefied natural-gas) market.

“You have 3,000 megawatts of natural gas-fired plants, and the main field is expected to go down.

Gas should be part of your energy mix. In fact, the Philippines should be part of the Asean LNG market,” Yergin said.

Energy Secretary Carlos Jericho L. Petilla has said the agency is currently crafting a fuel-mix policy, one that will increase the share of the LNG to encourage energy diversification in the country.

“We are trying to look at ways how to actually give incentives to balance other energy resources. Perhaps, give tax perks, like in renewable-energy sources. I have recommended this to the BOI [Board of Investments],” Petilla said.

briefs sss to open 16 more offices before year-end to boost collection

The Social Security System (SSS) is eyeing to open 16 more offices before the end of the year to boost its collections from its members, particularly voluntary and selfemployed individuals, an official of the state-pension fund said.

SSS Vice President for Luzon Operations Group Josie Magana said they expect improved earners from collections, particularly in the Ilocos region with the additional office it inaugurated on October 31 at Stern Mall, San Nicolas, Candon City in the province of Ilocos Sur. The new branch could potentially increase the total collection by about P60 million this year, she said.

“The SSS is increasing its presence all over the country to make SSS transactions easier and more convenient to our members. This also affords more segments of society immediate access to social security,” Magana said.

The SSS now has 17 foreign and 241 local offices, including the other seven new branches it recently opened in Molo, Iloilo; MalandayMarikina; Batasan Hills, Quezon City; Bocaue, Bulacan; Santa Rosa, Laguna; Eastwood, Quezon City; and San Jose, Nueva Ecija.

Total contributions collected by the state agency for the first eight months of the fiscal year showed a 17.9-percent growth, or P12.09 billion higher than the same period in 2013.

Contributions, which represent 77.7 percent of the SSS’s total revenues, were largely from the employed sector, at P68.98 billion, followed by voluntary paying members, at P6.86 billion; and selfemployed, at P3.62 billion.

SSS offices in Northern Luzon have collected a total of P2.02 billion in contributions during the period.

The SSS Candon branch sees 100,000 potential members, of whom 85 percent are voluntary and self-employed individuals primarily engaged in cottage and farming industries.

The new SSS office covers the city of Candon and 17 municipalities of Ilocos Sur, namely, Alilem, Gregorio del Pilar, Lidlidda, San Emilio, Sigay, Sugpon, Suyo, Banayoyo, Burgos, Galimuyod, Salcedo, San Esteban, Santa Cruz, Santa Lucia, Santa Maria, Santiago and Tagudin.

The branch used to be a service office at the Candon Municipal Hall before it moved to a larger space and turned into a fully operational branch in 2014, Magana said. Jonathan L. Mayuga

house bill seeks to regulate parking-fee rates A measure seeking to regulate the collection of parking fees and imposition of exorbitant rates in malls, hospitals and schools has been filed at the House of Representatives.

House Bill 5099, authored by Nationalist People’s Coalition Rep. Sherwin Gatchalian of Valenzuela City, seeks to protect consumers who avail themselves of parking facilities offered by business operators from unreasonable parking fees and rates.

The bill covers parking facilities for all kinds of motor vehicles, including parking spaces in shopping malls, hospitals, schools or other similar establishments, including vacant lots and buildings, dedicated to parking for vehicles. Under the bill, business establishments will impose parking fees for the use of their parking spaces subject to rates.

The standard parking fee shall be P40 per vehicle for a maximum of eight hours and an additional P10 per succeeding hour.

For overnight parking, a customer shall be charged a onetime fee of P100 per vehicle.

On the other hand, a customer shall be given a grace period of 30 minutes, wherein he or she shall not be charged the standard parking fee if his or her motor vehicle shall have entered and exited the premises within the grace period.

Opinion BusinessMirror

A6 Thursday, November 6, 2014

Editor: Alvin I. Dacanay

editorial

Should we quarantine free trade?

A

S the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) Integration 2015 looms on the horizon, many fear that small- and medium-scale industries in the Philippines might suffer setbacks as foreign companies battle it out for supremacy in the region.

One such industry is the vegetable industry. Benguet province, the so-called Salad Bowl of the Philippines, is gearing up for the competition ahead of Asean integration to secure its place as the country’s primary vegetable source.

This mountainous province in the country’s north—which has a population of about half a million people, with a little over 10 percent of them dependent on agriculture—is home to a wide variety of vegetables, and supplies nearly 70 percent to 80 percent of the demand for vegetables in Luzon and some parts of the Visayas.

Benguet produces, on average, 500,000 metric tons (MT) of vegetables, which decrease and increase slightly every year. Last year the province produced 444,593 MT. Fears of unfair competition are not unfounded. Everyone is aware that China is a major competitor in the area of carrot distribution. Experts feel that China could flood the Philippine market with its carrots and push aside local ones.

This already happened in 2001, when a typhoon damaged much of the country’s crops, forcing the government to import vegetables from China.

Concern is being raised on the potential threat posed by China’s produce, which are allegedly laced with too many pesticides. Also, the influx of foreign vegetables could put our vegetable industry in a bind, as it compels market forces to bring down prices. Farmers should now even brace themselves for the possible impact of dwindling market prices.

Safety nets, as a solution, must now be put in place, should the imports come in free of tariff. Experts suggest quarantine procedures for vegetables of questionable origins and growth process.

The use of pesticides is a growing menace among local and foreign vegetable producers, which costs millions of pesos in farmers’ health, labor productivity and other disastrous effects in consumers.

One research paper says the most prevalent symptoms of pesticide misuse were “headache [64 percent], muscle pain [61 percent], cough [46 percent], weakness [43 percent], eye pain [40 percent], chest pain [38 percent] and eye redness [34 percent].”

The good news, however, points to the advancement in agricultural studies, as well as laws that help in the strict enforcement of quarantine policies and other guidelines needed for an effective course of action.

Apparently, not all are benefited by free trade, especially when unfair competition tips the scales in favor of foreign producers than local ones. The country’s priority should stem from the need to assist local producers and not simply benefit from importation.

Pesticides have wreaked havoc on our agricultural industry for decades, and no amount of profit can replace the lives lost and endangered in exchange for the legal tender.

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John Mangun

OUTSIDE THE BOX

J

APAN is a strange country. That is not necessarily a criticism, but simply a fact. While all societies and cultures are unique and have their own peculiarities, Japan takes these to a new level.

The Japanese pride themselves on having a culture with a nearly unbroken history that spans thousands of years and, yet, based on birth and marriage records, they have no desire to build for the future. Demographically speaking, their nation is dying.

While the Japanese are traditionally pictured as conservative worker bees who are laboring within narrow environments, their culture and government are often extreme. Other countries use vending machines as a convenience. In Japan they are almost an obsession, selling items from apples to umbrellas and everything in between, including pornography.

Japan’s ambitions during World War II were self-defeating. Creating an empire in East Asia that stretches from the Land of the Rising Sun to as far as Australia was completely unrealistic, given Japan’s population size and industrial

capacity. Attacking Pearl Harbor in Hawaii without an immediate, followon invasion guaranteed its defeat in the first battle of the war.

The postwar period saw the United States giving Japan advantages and economic assistance that the former’s allies, including the Philippines, did not receive.

In the 1960s and 1970s, the Japanese economy was unstoppable, growing at an average annual rate of 7.5 percent.

Japan took over US manufacturing in everything from television sets to automobiles. Japan had the strongest economy and was on track to becoming the most powerful and influential one in the world.

While Japan’s two-decade growth was fueled by genuine economic activity, toward the end of this growth run the government began artificially reducing interest rates and expanding the money supply to achieve further growth. This

Poor in a rich country

Romeo M. del Castillo

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Ariel Nepomuceno

DECISION TIME

T

HE Philippines is blessed with extraordinary natural and human resources. We basically have what we need to end the hunger and deprivation that plague our nation, but we are trapped in a cycle of failures and mistakes that aggravates an already difficult situation.

We have many brilliant leaders who were schooled and trained in the best institutions in the world. Their actions are cloaked with the most noble of intentions to alleviate poverty. Their advocacies are on a par with the most serious programs of other global leaders. Throughout our history, we have proudly proved our patriotism and willingness to sacrifice for the welfare of our country. In fact, President Aquino has committed to squarely confront this worsening problem with the belief that if there’s no corruption, there would be no poverty.

Nation of achievers

WE have a long list of exemplary achievers in the fields of business, the arts, sports and literature, and even in the military. The entrepreneurial milestones reached by one of Asia’s richest persons, Henry Sy Sr., are acknowledged globally.

He revolutionized the Philippine retailing sector with his giant malls. Now, he owns the country’s largest bank and has started to build his property business.

We also have Lucio Tan’s business

empire, which covers banking, manufacturing, property development, aviation and food processing, among others. His wealth and fame are already the envy of other conglomerate owners.

Ramon Ang’s aggressive expansion of his business continues to be in motion.

San Miguel Corp. is now an accepted brand worldwide, and its overseas manufacturing and distribution operations have already penetrated even China.

Petron Corp., the country’s largest oil refinery and distributor, is expanding its oil-refinery business in Malaysia. His group is now a major player in infrastructure development, energy and mining.

We have many other local taipans.

Enrique Razon Jr.’s port operations now enjoy the upper hand in the international arena after winning huge contracts in Mexico, Indonesia and Europe. Now he’s also into gaming and entertainment.

In other areas, like sports and the arts, we have iconic personalities, like Manny Pacquiao, who holds an unmatched record of winning in eight boxing divisions; Paeng Nepomuceno, who

created an asset-price bubble that saw companies using the value of higher stock prices to buy office buildings and borrowing money against the increased value of these buildings to buy more stock.

It all eventually collapsed, and the government ramped up money-printing to counter the collapse. Fighting a fire with gasoline is not a sensible policy.

For the last two years, after 20 years of virtually no economic growth and a flat standard of living, the government, under Japanese Prime Minister Shinzō Abe, decided that the problem of the failed policy of the 1990s was that the government did not use enough gasoline.

Japan has begun increasing the money supply, and the Bank of Japan (BOJ) has been buying Japanese government debt and doing everything it can to devalue the yen. The economy has not been growing, and the lower yen has increased, rather than decreased, the country’s trade flow.

But the Japanese stock market has more than doubled in the last two years.

Residential construction activity is at its strongest in more than a decade because of the government funding the borrowing to build. Property prices were falling at a 5-percent annual rate in 2012; this year those prices are increasing at the rate of 5 percent. Have any of the Japanese policymakers read about Japan in the 1990s?

The Japanese government’s fiscal

situation is so bad that it makes the Philippines, at its lowest point, look stable and sound. The government debt to gross domestic product ratio is at 250 percent; the Philippine ratio is the lowest in 25 years, at 49.2 percent.

Last week Japan has taken its next, desperate step: The BOJ will print $700 billion in the next 12 months. Based on the size of the Japanese economy (onethird of the US), that amount is triple the US Federal Reserve’s money-printing scheme. The yen has lost 7 percent of its value against the US dollar in the last three weeks. The Japanese money supply rose 37 percent in October.

The significant policy change is that the BOJ will be buying both Japanese stocks and into foreign markets. Honestly, this is a huge development, as these funds will be placed in markets all over the world.

The global debt crisis is still in full swing, with no end in sight, as the can has been kicked further down the road from Washington to Tokyo. But don’t worry. Tomorrow’s nasty hangover is far away and, in the meantime, the bar is open and the check will be paid by Japan.

won at least six international bowling titles; and Lea Salonga, whose acclaimed performances on West End and Broadway captured the hearts of elite audiences in Europe and the United States. The list of Filipino achievers is long. We have a fair and proud claim to being among the world’s best and brightest.

there are no informal settlers and street dwellers who live in dehumanizing conditions. Such people are now a common sight on our streets. Sadly, we have become increasingly insensitive to their plight. Some of us even place the blame on the poor themselves. As Poe lamented, we just don’t care enough.

Indeed, we have to review the solutions that we usually propose. We have to closely revisit our 1987 Constitution.

The next president of the country must bravely lead the discourse on whether our Constitution should be amended or not and decide on what action to take.

Every six years we elect our national leaders, and every three years we choose our local leaders. But we elect them using the same weak dynamics in choosing their predecessors. Platforms and programs are blurred and were never really the bases for the electorate to decide on who to vote for. The fundamental differences between political parties are not fully defined. Popularity has a premium.

Competence is not the major factor for an electoral victory. This would explain why even our best leaders failed. The problems are simply bigger than them.

As they always say, doing the same thing the same way and expecting a different result is foolish. And in a political system that does not guarantee any continuity in the good programs of our elected leaders, we shall perpetually play a game of chance and, in the process, continue to be trapped in solving longterm problems—like poverty—with short-term solutions.

Nation in crisis

BUT why is our economy weak and uncompetitive? Why can’t our political system boost our long-term chances of creating a strong nation, one where poverty is constantly decreasing? In a recent speech, Sen. Grace Poe accurately described the country’s poverty dilemma, saying that at least 15 million Filipino children are suffering from hunger. At least 2 million are perilously living on sidewalks and under bridges. Millions have no houses, no future and no basic education, and have no correct concept of a career or profession.

Human aspirations—yes, they definitely have them. But hope? Probably not.

Hope in our future

THE initiatives and programs of the Aquino administration have improved our situation. Our macroeconomic fundamentals indicate progress and give confidence in our ability to manage our perennial problems. The country’s 6-percent average economic growth is impressive. Foreign direct investments (FDI) have increased, even though our other regional neighbors have more of these. And the annual $25 billion in remittances sent by overseas Filipino workers help ensure our economic stability.

These provide us a brief window to explore the long-term solutions to eradicate poverty. In Malaysia, for example,

E-mail me at mangun@gmail.com.

Visit my website at www.mangunonmarkets.com. Follow me on Twitter at @mangunonmarkets. PSE stock-market information and technical analysis tools provided by the COL Financial Group Inc.

Ariel Nepomuceno is the deputy commissioner for the Enforcement Group of the Bureau of Customs.

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Incentives in the tourism business Atty. Julie Ann L. Aranda

Tax Law for Business

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T’S more fun in the Philippines! The government has been using this campaign slogan to promote the country as a favored tourist destination for some years now. We have seen different television commercials featuring the top tourist spots in the country—Cebu, Boracay, Bohol, Davao and Ilocos, among others—and using this oft-repeated slogan.

There is no doubt that the country boasts of many beautiful tourist attractions, but it is important that the development of tourism infrastructure and allied services should be linked to them. Even before the slogan was conceived, the government has already created laws that aim to promote investments in our tourism industry.

Indeed, certain laws were enacted in recognition of the importance of tourism as an indispensable element of the national economy, thereby ensuring its development.

Meanwhile, some incentives are provided to draw investors and partners in the development and promotion of the tourism industry. The Tourism Act of 2009 makes available to tourism economic-zone operators and other duly registered tourism enterprises some incentives. These include, but are not limited to, fiscal incentives, such as an income-tax holiday for six years, which could be extended if the enterprise substantially expands or upgrades its facilities before those six years expire; the payment of 5 percent on its gross income earned in lieu of all other national and local taxes, license fees, imposts, and assessments, except real-estate taxes and other fees, as may be imposed; 100-percent exemption of all taxes and customs duties on importations of capital investment and equipment; and exemption from customs duties and national taxes for new and expanding registered enterprises’ importation of transportation and accompanying spare parts, provided that they are not manufactured domestically in sufficient quantity, of comparable quality and at reasonable prices, and that they are reasonably needed and will be used exclusively by an accredited tourism enterprise.

This law defines tourism enterprises as facilities, services and attractions involved in tourism, such as, but not limited to, travel and tour services; tourist-transport services, whether for land, sea or air; tour guides; services involving adventure sports, such as mountaineering, spelunking, scuba-diving and others with significant tourism potential; convention organizers; establishments providing accomodations, including, but not limited to, hotels, resorts, apartelles, tourist inns, motels, pension houses and home-stay operators: tourism estatemanagement services, restaurants,

shops and department stores, sports and recreational centers, spas, museums and galleries, theme parks, convention centers and zoos.

Besides this law, there are other laws and executive issuances that provide incentives to tourism-sector players. For instance, tourism enterprises in special economic zones continue to be governed by the rules applicable to locators in these zones.

Locators in these zones are entitled to a four-year income-tax holiday and a 5-percent tax on gross income after that holiday ends. Other fiscal and nonfiscal incentives are available to these locators. For this purpose, a tourism enterprise is defined, according to Philippine Economic Zone Authority (Peza) rules, as referring to an individual, association, partnership, corporation or other business organization duly registered with the Peza that proposes to establish and operate tourist-oriented accommodations, restaurants operating as an integral part of a tourism facility (e.g. hotels, resorts, recreational centers) and sports recreational facilities within the ecozone.

Tourism involves intense competition with the entire world, and this high level of competition demands a creative and unique approach. To be successful, both public and private sectors should create a good marketing strategy in constantly putting forth the best possible image of the country, while creating interest on a broad scale in as many ways as possible. And promising tax incentives is one way of attracting partners in the development of the tourism industry. We just hope that these incentives, once given by the proper authorities, are respected by the tax-implementing agency, so that we can say, it’s really more fun in the Philippines!

The author is a senior associate of Du-Baladad and Associates Law Offices, a member-firm of the World Tax Services Alliance.

The article is for general information only, and is neither intended nor should be construed as a substitute for tax, legal or financial advice on any specific matter.

Applicability of this article to any actual or particular tax or legal issue should be supported, therefore, by a professional study or advice. For comments or questions about the article, e-mail the author at julie.aranda@bdblaw.com.ph or call 403-2001, local 312.

God’s dwelling in our midst Msgr. Sabino A. Vengco Jr.

Alálaong Bagá

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OR the Feast of the Dedication of the Archbasilica of Saint John Lateran in Rome, the mother church of all Roman Catholic churches, on November 9, we are assured of God’s presence in our midst, gladdening us and giving us strength (Psalm 46:2–3, 5–6, 8–9). Like Jesus, zeal for God’s house should be consuming us (John 2:13–22).

The Lord of Hosts is with us PSALM 46 is a psalm of trust in God, whose presence in the city has saved it from its enemies. The opening words compare God to a citadel that is inaccessible to attackers and that provides protection and strength to all those in it. God is “an ever-present help” in times of distress and danger. This is why God’s people do not fear, even if the earth shudders and the mountains—symbols of stability and strength—collapse into the depths of the sea. God’s strength is different and never fails, and is not subject to any stronger force. We have nothing to fear if God is with us and is our strength.

A symbol of God’s presence in the midst of the people is the life-giving river, whose streams gladden the city of God. Referred to is the aqueduct from the Gihon spring to the pool of Siloam inside the defenses of Jerusalem (2 Kings 20:20), enabling the city to withstand a siege. Indeed, the

holy dwelling of the Most High shall not be disturbed, and when dawn comes with its light finally conquering darkness, it would be clear to all that God protected them. God, the Lord of Hosts, the victorious leader against all enemies and forces of darkness, the God of Jacob, is our stronghold; He is with us. We can see the astounding things He has brought about on earth. The marvels of God fill us with gratitude and give us confidence and strength.

The Father’s house a marketplace?

THE Gospel story took place in the temple of Jerusalem, which Jesus calls “my Father’s house.” That is the point of conflict: Jesus’s assertion of authority in His Father’s house and His evaluation of the activities there. Using a whip, He drove out of the temple those selling cattle, sheep and doves, and overturned the tables of the moneychangers and spilled

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Inter Press Service

XFORD—When the Islamic State (IS) suddenly emerged in Iraq several months ago, it declared Shiite Muslims and what it called the Safavids as among its first targets. The Safavid dynasty (1501 to 1736) was one of the most powerful Iranian dynasties after the Islamic conquest.

At its peak, the Safavids ruled an area nearly twice the size of modern Iran, including large parts of modern Iraq, Kuwait and Bahrain; eastern parts of Turkey and Syria; large areas of western Afghanistan and Balochistan; North Caucasus; and parts of Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.

However, what irks Sunni jihadists the most is the fact the Safavids made the Twelver school of Shi’ism the official religion of Iran, something that has continued to this day.

The interesting point about this is that the Safavids had their origin in a Sunni Sufi order, but at one point they converted to Shi’ism and then used their new zeal as a way of subduing most of Iran.

The zeal of the Safavids was partly due to the fact that they were fighting against the Sunni Ottoman Empire and, therefore, their adherence to

Shi’ism was mainly political in order to set them apart from the Ottomans, who also carried the title of Sunni Caliphs. The Safavids made their capital Isfahan into one of the most beautiful cities in Iran and the Middle East as a whole.

The Iranian Constitutional Revolution (1905 to 1911) laid the foundations of modern Iran, with a constitutional monarchy. The two Pahlavi kings (1925 to 1979), while ruling as absolute monarchs, were militantly secular, and tried to modernize Iran and turn it into a Western-style country.

However, not only did the 1979 Islamic Revolution end that period of secular reforms, but it also put an end to a 2,600-year-old Iranian monarchy and replaced it with a clerical regime. What makes the Islamic Revolution unique is that, for the first time in the history of Iran and, indeed, of Islam, it

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their coins. “Take these things out of here!” Jesus said. “Stop making my Father’s house a marketplace!”

Temple worship traffics in animals, monetary donations and taxes.

Exchange is the name of worship: worshippers give God sacrificial animals and money, and God gives the worshippers blessings and help in their endeavors. This is the mentality and manner of the marketplace: dealmaking or quid pro quo (this for that).

But God does not exchange favors for sacrificial animals and coins; His free gift of love and life is not for sale or bargain. So, what may be needed in the temple is, in reality, out of place in the Father’s house.

presence makes the Father accessible and can now be immediately worshipped in Him and through Him. The greatest sacrifice to the Father, indeed, is the very sign that Jesus offers to the Jews who are asking Him for a sign to legitimize His actions and claim as the Messiah: “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” His challengers naturally misunderstand the meaning of His words. In referring to Himself as the temple, Jesus is proclaiming that God’s presence in our midst is now incarnated in and through Him, and that, in His death and resurrection, He is definitively replacing the temple and its sacrifice.

Zeal for God’s house

Alálaong bagá, Jesus is now God’s dwelling place in our midst, the temple where we encounter God and come into communion with Him. It is only with, through and in Jesus that we can celebrate the sacrifice worthy of God in spirit and truth. And it is now the whole Christ, head and body, that serves as the sign of God’s saving love in history. We, the believers, one with Jesus, are God’s temple in this world.

Every physical edifice or church, from the splendid Archbasilica of Saint John Lateran to our humble barangay bisita, becomes a sacred site because of God’s presence in the community of faith that celebrates in it Christ’s eternal sacrifice.

IN fact, it is zeal for His Father’s house that drove Jesus to action against the merchants who are doing business in the temple grounds. Jesus is acting out His prophetic message that, now with Him, the time of fulfillment has arrived, which, according to the prophet Zechariah (14:21), would mean that there is no more need for merchants in the house of the Lord.

The spiritual nature of the relationship between God and the worshippers is to be emphasized, so that true worshippers “will worship the Father in spirit and truth.... God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth” (John 4:23–24).

Jesus is actually replacing the temple, not merely cleansing it. He is the fullness of grace and truth from whom all receive, the Son who reveals the Father (John 1:14, 16, 18). Jesus’s

Join me in meditating on the Word of God every Sunday, 5 to 6 a.m. on DWIZ 882, or by audio-streaming on www.dwiz882.com.

Japan creates world’s biggest bond bubble William Pesek

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BLOOMBERG VIEW

EN years from now, will Bank of Japan (BOJ) Governor Haruhiko Kuroda be regarded as a genius or a madman?

Kuroda’s shock-and-awe stimulus move on October 31 delighted markets and won him plaudits as a monetary virtuoso.

Japan, conventional wisdom tells us, has finally gotten serious about ending deflation, and isn’t it wonderful? But what happens when a central bank buys up an entire bond market? We’re about to find out as Kuroda, like some feverish hedge-fund manager, corners Japan’s. Neglected in all the celebration is this: To reach a 2-percent inflation goal that’s both arbitrary and meaningless, the BOJ is destroying Japan’s standing as a market economy.

In announcing that it will boost purchases of government bonds to a record annual pace of $709 billion, the BOJ has just added further fuel to the most obvious bond bubble in modern history—and helped create a fresh one on stocks. Once the laws of finance, and gravity, reassert themselves, Japan’s debt market could crash in ways that make the 2008 collapse of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. look like a warm-up.

Worse, because Japan’s interest-rate environment is so warped, investors won’t have the usual warning signs

of market distress. Even before last Friday’s bond-buying move, Japan had lost its last honest tool of price discovery. When a nation that needs 16 digits in yen terms to express its national debt (it reached ¥1 quadrillon in August 2013) sees benchmark yields falling, you’ve entered the financial Twilight Zone. Good luck in fairly pricing corporate, asset-backed or mortgage-backed securities.

Considered in relation to gross domestic product, Kuroda’s purchases make the United States’s Federal Reserve’s (the Fed) quantitative-

Rivalry between Sunnis and Shiites has deep roots

By Farhang Jahanpour

Thursday, November 6, 2014

brought clerics to power.

Although Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini called his 1979 revolution an Islamic one, in reality it was a Shi’a revolution, and it derived its legitimacy from the Shi’a concept of the imamate.

True succession

ACCORDING to the Shiites, the true succession to Prophet Muhammad belonged not to the Orthodox Caliphs, but to the Shi’a imams, starting from the first Imam, Ali Ibn Abi Talib, and ending with the 12th Imam, who allegedly went into hiding and who would reappear at the end times to establish the reign of justice in the world.

After Imam Ali was assassinated by a member of the fanatical breakaway group Khawarij, his oldest son Imam Hasan decided not to challenge Mu’awiyya I, who had established the Umayyad Caliphate. However, after Hasan’s death in 669, his younger brother Hussein rebelled against Mu’awiyya’s son Yazid.

In a battle against Yazid’s forces in Karbala, Imam Hussein was martyred on October 10, 680, an event that is still marked with great sadness and self-flagellation by Shiites throughout the world.

After Imam Hussein’s martyrdom, the rest of the Shi’a imams led quiet lives, mainly acting as spiritual leaders of their followers, rather than challenging the Sunni rulers.

One of the most important concepts set forth by the Sixth Shi’a Imam, Ja’far al-Sadiq, was the separation of religion and politics. He conceded that the caliphs possessed temporal power, but he argued that the imams were spiritual teachers of society, and their inability to seize power should not be regarded as a sign of failure.

This has been the interpretation of the role of the imams—as opposed to the role of the caliphs—by the vast majority of Shi’a scholars throughout the ages. However, not only did Khomeini reject monarchical rule, he even replaced it with the rule of clerics.

Both Khomeini and the current Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, base their legitimacy on being the rightful representatives of the Hidden Imam until he returns. This is why the views of former Iranian President Mahmud Ahmadinezhad and his close friend Esfandiar Rahim Masha’i about the imminent return of the Hidden Imam caused such consternation among the leading clerics, because if the Hidden Imam

easing (QE) program look quaint.

The Fed, of course, is already ending its QE experiment, while Japan is doubling down on one that dates back to 2001. Kuroda’s latest move means that Japan’s QE scheme could last forever. The BOJ has willingly become the Ministry of Finance’s automated teller machine; reversing the arrangement will be no small task.

All this liquidity has made for surreal events in Tokyo. Take the news that Japan’s $1.2-trillion Government Pension Investment Fund will dramatically rebalance its portfolio away from bonds. Japan has enormous public debt and a fast-aging population, and now the world’s biggest pension pool is shifting to stocks. Yet, somehow, 10-year yields are just 0.43 percent. The explanation, of course, is that the parts of the market the BOJ doesn’t already own are sedated by its overwhelming liquidity. The BOJ is now on a financial treadmill that’s bound to accelerate, demanding ever more multitrillion-dollar infusions to keep the market in line.

To Japan bulls, the end justifies the means. If Kuroda changes the deflationary mindset that’s stalked Japan for 17 years now, then his gambit was worth it. One problem with this argument is that deflation isn’t the cause of Japan’s malaise,

but a side-effect. Consumer prices rising at 2 percent or more will be a big problem if Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe doesn’t push ahead with plans to deregulate the economy and prod companies to raise wages.

That’s doubly true as Tokyo mulls over another growth-denting rise in the consumption tax.

Another problem is that Kuroda is turning the BOJ into the world’s biggest asset-management company. The BOJ won’t admit it, but it’s monetizing Japan’s debt on a massive scale, and probably even retiring large blocks of it—just as the government did in the 1930s. What happens when the BOJ decides that Japan needs a credible and functioning bond market in the years ahead?

Kuroda’s successors face terrible odds disengaging from a market that he has effectively nationalized.

Perhaps, history will vindicate Kuroda’s genius. That depends on whether Abe musters the courage to attack structural impediments to growth in employment, industry, trade and energy. More likely, Kuroda is demonstrating that it’s one thing to go long on a market, and quite another if you have to stick with that bet forever. To avoid being remembered as a madman, Kuroda had better devise an exit strategy from history’s most audacious bond trade.

were to return soon, it would undercut the authority of the ruling clerics.

Thus started the birth of the Islamic Republic of Iran in February 1979. Initially, Khomeini declared that he wanted to export his revolution to the entire Muslim world, but being strongly Shi’a in nature and ideology, the Iranian revolution was not very popular with the majority of Muslims, who are Sunnis.

The glory of Iranian Islam was reflected in the Sufi literature written in Persian by great mystics, such as Attar, Rumi, Hafiz and Sa’di, who produced the most tolerant, most profound and most humane form of mysticism.

However, the Islamic Republic has been known for its narrow interpretation of Islam, its large number of executions, its stoning of women, its lashings and other inhumane practices. Its dogmatic adherence to Shi’a Islam has not helped either Iran or the cause of Islam in the world.

The present IS uprising, with the assistance of tens of thousands of former Baathist officers and soldiers in Saddam’s army that Paul Bremer, the US administrator of the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq, fired because they were Baathists, is a kind of violent revenge against the Iraqi Shiites and ultimately against Iran for what is regarded as the loss of Sunni rule and Iran’s growing influence in Iraq.

Eight-year war

THE devastating eight-year Iran-Iraq war waged

by Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, which was massively supported by the Gulf Cooperation Council to the tune of tens of billions of dollars, killed and wounded nearly a million Iranians and Iraqis. The bitter memories of that war still linger in the minds of people in both countries.

Since 2003, when the US-led coalition deposed Saddam and replaced him with a government, led by the Shiites who form a majority of the Iraqi population, Saddam’s supporters in Iraq and the Persian Gulf littoral states have not forgiven the loss of power by the Sunnis. Saudi Arabia has refused to recognize the new Iraqi governments or to send an ambassador to Baghdad.

Farhang Jahanpour is a former professor and dean of the Faculty of Languages at the University of Isfahan. He has taught in the Department of Continuing Education at the University of Oxford for 28 years.

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AEROSPACE INDUSTRY SETS 2015 ROAD SHOWS

By Catherine N. Pillas

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he country’s aerospace industry will be embarking on an aggressive campaign next year to promote its capabilities abroad, including business missions, to various countries.

“Before we set projections and targets for the next year, we want to grow the industry in terms of capability. So our target next year is to do business missions. We’re looking at countries not only in Europe but also in Japan, North America and Brazil,” said John T. Lee, president of the Aerospace Industries Association of the Philippines (AIAP).

He said the target next year is to visit at least three countries and offer the capabilities of the local industry, which, for the moment, are concentrated on maintenance,

repair and overhaul, with strong capabilities in machining, assembly, and packaging and delivery.

Vital to this campaign is the ramping up of certification of local companies for their manufactured products, a stringent accreditation process that takes two to three years, Lee added.

For 2015, Lee is hoping that four more local companies will get the international certification AS-9100C. Also significant to the upgrading of the local industry is the linking up of the AIAP with Gifas, or the French Association of Aerospace Industries, for training on maintenance, repair and overhaul capabilities, as well as other competencies.

“We’re looking at so many partnerships in terms of trainings. There are so many type See “Aerospace,” A4

SC junks petitions versus Fox, AXN T

he Supreme Court (SC) has dismissed two petitions assailing the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for allowing two media corporations to engage in business in the Philippines, despite being controlled by foreigners.

In an en banc ruling released on Wednesday, the SC denied the consolidated petitions filed by Party-list Rep. Terry Ridon of Kabataan and lawyer Jonas Julius Caesar Azura.

The SC said it “ would not want to preempt the prerogative to withdraw or uphold the state’s imprimatur on a corporate existence by giving due course to the petitions.”

The petitioners alleged that the SEC violated the constitutionally prescribed foreign-ownership restrictions on nationalized industries when it effectively allowed AXN and Fox televisions to engage as massmedia and advertising entities despite being 99.99-percent controlled by foreigners.

In his privilege speech delivered on Janu-

ary 27 at the House of Representatives, Ridon accused AXN and Fox of “encroaching upon protected industries, including the mass media and advertising.”

He said, based on the last documents submitted to the SEC, these corporations are 99.99-percent foreign-owned.

Azura also filed a separate petition questioning the same. This prompted the SC to consolidate the two petitions.

In dismissing the petitions, the SC said in filing the petitions, Ridon and Azura made collateral attack on the corporate existence of AXN and Fox in the guise of an action questioning the SEC’s issuance of its certificates of registration.

“There being an impropriety in the remedy resorted to by the petitioners and in the absence of the indispensable minimums for judicial review, the Court cannot give due course to these petitions,” the SC said. PNA

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Mining revenues up 22% to ₧57B in H1

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By Jonathan L. Mayuga

espite the drop in metal prices, the growth of the country’s mining sector remained robust, posting a 22-percent increase in the total metallic production value in the first half of 2014.

The Mines and Geosciences Bureau (MGB) of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources reported that metallic mineral production from January to June totaled P57.27 billion, higher by P10.42 billion compared to the recorded metallic production value of P46.84 billion for the same period last year.

“The good showing of the major copper-ore producers—the Didipio CopperGold Project of Oceanagold Philippines Inc. and the Padcal Copper-Gold Project of Philex Mining Corp.—was the main factor for the upswing,” MGB Director Leo L. Jasareno said.

According to data provided by the MGB, Didipio’s gold mine in Nueva Vizcaya had an output of P6.07 billion, while Philex produced P5.53 billion worth of minerals.

This is the fourth consecutive quarter that the metallic sector enjoyed positive growth, despite the drop in the prices of major metals.

Among the major minerals, only nickel displayed an upbeat price move-

JASARENO: “The good showing of the major copper-ore producers— the Didipio Copper-Gold Project of Oceanagold Philippines Inc. and the Padcal Copper-Gold Project of Philex Mining Corp.—was the main factor for the upswing.”

ment, hovering from $6.38 to $8.74 per pound in the first half.

The average price of gold from January to June dropped by 15.31 percent, from $1,524.52 to $1,291.05 per troy ounce (oz t). Similarly, the price of silver dropped from $26.64 to $20.05 per oz t. Price of copper also dropped from $3.39 to $3.11 per pound.

Jasareno said the High Pressure Acid

Leach (HPAL) Plant of Taganito Mining Corp. in Claver, Surigao del Norte, commenced operation in October 2013, and it already chipped in P4.04 billion in the first-half revenues.

He added that Taganito’s contribution cushioned the effects of the closure of the Canatuan Mining Project of TVI Resource Development (Phils.) Inc. (TVI) and the Rapu-Rapu Polymetallic Project of RapuRapu Minerals Inc. (RRMI).

In terms of percentage contribution to the total production value, direct shipping of nickel ore and mixed-nickel sulfides was the prime mover, accounting for 54.19 percent, or P31.03 billion. Gold took the second spot, with 26.69 percent, or P15.28 billion; followed by copper, with 17.72 percent, or P10.15 billion. The remaining 1.40 percent, or P0.80 billion, was shared by silver, zinc, chromite and iron.

In terms of growth rates in production value, nickel (direct-shipping ore and mixed sulphides) has the highest, with 59 percent, from P19.52 billion in 2013 to P31.03 billion in 2014 year on year, a difference of P11.52 billion.

Zinc posted the biggest loss, from P0.41 billion to zero production during the review period. This is due to the closure of the mining operations of TVI and RRMI. Both mines produced copper and zinc ores.∏ In terms of peso value, the other top producers are Coral Bay HPAL Project of Coral Bay Nickel Corp., producing an estimated value of P5.49 billion; Toledo Copper Project of Carmen Copper Corp., with P4.98 billion; and Masbate Gold Projecct of Philippine Gold Processing and Refining Corp., with P4.61 billion.

‘Obama now reduced to lame-duck president’

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ow, President Barack Obama limps into his final two years in office. All second-term presidents lose considerable clout at this mark. But Obama’s time as a lame duck comes amid a political climate so fractured that compromise between Congress and him is all but impossible. And the likely Republican takeover of the Senate only further complicates his power to confront a confounding array of foreignand domestic-policy challenges. The range of crises is daunting.

Though the US economy is growing at a healthy clip, wages are stagnant and the global economy is faltering. The Islamic State group has racked up victories in Iraq and Syria, testing the administration’s policies, even as the US rains down air strikes.

The appearance of the deadly Ebola virus in the US has rattled Americans and raised questions about whether a weary White House can handle several crises at once. A budget deal that bought peace with Congress for a while is nearing its end.

Against that backdrop, Obama will head to Asia and Australia next week for summit meetings, even as the old Congress returns to Washington for its own lame-duck session to finish work on the budget and other issues.

And a new Senate looms over the horizon, likely Republican-led.

Obama will make one move without Con-

gress. Aides said on Tuesday that he’d sign an executive order by the end of December giving temporary legal status to help some of the 11 million immigrants who are in the country illegally stay and work in the US. He’d delayed the order earlier this fall, when endangered Democrats feared that a backlash would cost them their jobs. With that, he might have little room left to work with a GOP-led Congress.

Mitch McConnell, Republican-Kentucky, said after he won reelection on Tuesday and appeared poised to become Senate majority leader that he and Obama “have an obligation to work together on issues on which we agree.”

But he also was defiant. Obama is likely to speak publicly on Wednesday about the election results. A meeting on Friday with congressional leaders at the White House could be chilly. “There would have to be some really exceptional set of events to get people who have shown no interest in cooperating to get something done,” said Ken Mayer, a political-science professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison who studies the presidency. “It is very hard to see how there is any substantial legislation.” It’s “difficult under the best of circumstances” for presidents to get much done in the closing years of their terms, Mayer said. And Republican control of both the House of Representatives and

the Senate would probably “embolden a lot of Republicans to put some oomph, some weight, behind the things they’ve been doing the last three years,” he said.

That might mean renewed efforts to repeal Obama’s signature health-care law, which the president would promptly veto.

“There is likely to be lot of gamesmanship, political chicken, to see how far they push and make it through,” Mayer said.

All this, while much of Washington and the political world tunes out Obama and starts looking in earnest for his successor.

The political calendar renders the outgoing president “yesterday’s news” as soon as the midterm elections are over and the 2016 presidential race begins, said Lou D’Allesandro, a veteran New Hampshire state senator and Democratic operative.

“If you’re the president, what big initiatives are you going to do here?” asked D’Allesandro, who’s already seen a parade of 2016 hopefuls courting voters in New Hampshire. “Republicans will do everything they can to accomplish nothing.”

Obama enters these final months already hampered by low approval ratings that made him radioactive to most Democrats running in close elections this year. He spent the last two days leading up to Election Day in meetings at the White House.

See “Obama,” A4

Palace still reviewing next move on Calax Continued from A1

worried local and foreign groups, including the Makati Business Club and the Joint Foreign Chambers, cautioned that junking the initial bidding results would send a wrong signal to investors and risk losing the credibility of the Aquino administration’s flagship public-private-partnership (PPP) projects.

Earlier, both the Ayala-Aboitiz group, which submitted the P11.65-billion winning bid; and disqualified bidder San Miguel Corp.’s Optimal Infrastructure Development Inc., which was later found to have submitted a much higher P20.1-billion bid, have assured the Aquino administra-

tion they would not go to court whether the Palace decides to eventually rebid or not.

Palace Spokesman Edwin Lacierda last week said the Department of Public Works and Highways is yet to fix a date for a new bidding. He confirmed that the Cabinet did not even take up the Calax project at the Cabinet’s marathon meeting on Wednesday.

“We did not discuss Calax today,” he told the BusinessMirror in a text message.

President Aquino announced his inclination to rebid the Calax project before foreign correspondents on October 22, citing SMC-OIDI’s explanation it was disqualified due to a “typographical error” in its bid-security document, which the is-

suing ANZ Bank (Australia-New Zealand Banking Group) had clarified to be good for 180 days, instead of only 176 days.

The President then said he would have some explaining to do with the people if he accepts the Ayala-Aboitiz group’s winning bid, “when there is an allegation that there was a much superior bid, then we will have to explain to the people the P9-billion difference that we forgo.”

“We get the infrastructure; we get a premium of P20 billion allegedly from one bid, or an P11-billion premium from another bid.

Now, at the end of the day, we have to protect the people’s interests,” President Aquino explained at the foreign correspondents forum.