Businessmirror december 14, 2014

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Sunday, December 14, 2014 Vol. 10 No. 66

P.  |     | 7 DAYS A WEEK

DBS BANK REMINDS GOV’T TO STEP UP SPENDING ON PRODUCTIVE AREAS

NG told: Avoid budget pitfall B B C

31 DAYS

WEEK AHEAD

ECONOMIC DATA PREVIEW Peso

■ Previous week: The local currency started last week’s trade on Tuesday, following the suspension of trading in the local financial markets due to Typhoon Ruby (international code name Hagupit).

The peso traded on Tuesday at 44.53 to a dollar, broadly steady compared to the previous week’s end of 44.54. The peso then exhibited slight weakness coming into Wednesday to hit 44.66 to a dollar before appreciating back to 44.48 against the greenback on Thursday. The local currency ended the week at 44.58 to a dollar. The total traded volume was at $1.915 billion.

■ Week ahead: The local currency is likely to continue its rally against the US dollar toward the week, as market players search for fresh leads toward the end of the year. Among the data sets that can sway peso-dollar rates are the statement following the upcoming monetary-policy meeting of the United States and the Philippines’s latest balance of payment (BOP) numbers.

Balance of payments (November)

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ITH the country’s continued ascent up the investmentgrade ladder since last year, the government is now urged to avoid yet again the pitfall of its inability to spend the fiscal budget to fund productive areas in the country.

In a commentary following the country’s latest upgrade to “Baa2”

by Moody’s Investors Service, regional banking giant DBS Bank said the government now needs to channel its funds to infrastructure projects and the groundwork to long-term sustainable growth for the sustainability of the economic expansion of the country.

“Moody’s raised its sovereign credit rating for the Philippines to ‘Baa2.’ The rating is now on [a] par with Standard & Poor’s rating of ‘BBB,’ while Fitch remains a

TORTURE AND THE U.S. INTELLIGENCE FAILURE

laggard. Favorable GDP [gross domestic product] growth prospects, sound fiscal balance and limited vulnerability to risks currently affecting emerging markets are the main reasons for the upgrade,” DBS Bank said.

“The bigger challenge is to ensure sustainable growth in the longer term. On the fiscal front, this will entail further infrastructure and capacity buildup in the economy, particularly given that income level remains low,” it added.

S “B ,” A

Ruby damage to agri seen to drag Q4 growth

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HE rush of unfavorable weather conditions toward the end of the year may deter the anticipated recovery of the country’s growth in the last quarter as the weather disturbances might seriously affect the agricultural sector’s performance, a local economist said.

Bank of the Philippine Islands (BPI) associate economist Nicholas Antonio Mapa said Typhoon Ruby (international code name Hagupit) is expected to be a drag on the economy “undoubtedly” because of the crop damage it caused.

December 19, Friday ■ October’s BOP: The country’s BOP for October alone hit a surplus of $24 billion. The month’s surplus is larger than the $5-million BOP surplus seen in the same month last year. It is, however, smaller compared to the previous month’s surplus of $98 million. October’s surplus was not enough to push the country’s 10-month deficit to the surplus territory. Latest data from the central bank showed that the country still suffers a $3.408-billion deficit in the period of January to October this year.

■ November BOP: Earlier, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) announced that it has revised

S “W ,” A

PESO EXCHANGE RATES ■ US 44.5770

“The third-quarter gross domestic product was slowed considerably by the poor performance of the agriculture sector, with the Neda [National Economic and Development Authority] pinning the blame on natural disasters.

Ruby’s impact will be similar and will probably slow the overall fourth-squarter GDP,” Mapa said in response to a query by the BusinessMirror.

Local financial markets, schools, and private and public offices were shut down in several S “Q ,” A

FRONTIER AWARDEE Duty

Free Philippines CEO Lorenzo “Enchong” Formoso (center) receives the Frontier Award from Butlers Chocolates Chairman Mairead Sorensen (left) and Frontier Magazine Editor Kristiane Henney at the Annual Duty and Tax Free Global Summit in Cannes, France, in October 2014.

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HE Obama administration published a series of memoranda on torture issued under the Bush administration. The memoranda, most of which dated from the period after 9/11, authorized measures including depriving prisoners of solid food; having them stand shackled and in uncomfortable positions; leaving them in cold cells with inadequate clothing; slapping their heads and/ or abdomens; and telling them that their families might be harmed if they didn’t cooperate with their interrogators.

GlobalEye»C2-C3

■ JAPAN 0.3748 ■ UK 70.0929 ■ HK 5.7514 ■ CHINA 7.2031 ■ SINGAPORE 33.9402 ■ AUSTRALIA 36.7949 ■ EU 55.2621 ■ SAUDI ARABIA 11.8774 Source: BSP (12 December 2014)

News BusinessMirror

A2 Sunday, December 14, 2014

Budget pitfall...

The government’s underspending issues brought the country’s growth downward in the previous quarter this year, hitting only 5.3 percent from the above 7 percent in the same quarter last year.

In its statement on the country’s most recent rating upgrade, Moody’s also warned that the government is poised to miss its target for the next year if the government’s spending issues are not addressed.

“Although we expect the restoration of a fiscal impulse in the first half of 2015, the government’s ambitious growth target may be difficult to achieve in the absence of a

raising productivity and improving efficiency to better compete against imported sugar and sugarcontaining products and against sugar substitutes like high fructose corn syrup, cannot afford to shoulder either directly or indirectly any new tax measure, such as the 10-percent ad valorem tax under HB 3365,” Baustista-Martin added.

She said that as a measure toward inclusive growth in the sugarcane industry, the SRA, the Department of Agriculture and the Department of Agrarian Reform are implementing a “block farm” program for the consolidation of small farms, including farms of agrarian-reform beneficiaries, to take advantage of economies of scale in the utilization of farming technologies and implements.

“The underlying objectives of this program are to improve income of these farms and keep them producing sugarcane and

Cheaper gas, food cut US producer prices in Nov

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meaningful improvement in budget execution,” Moody’s said.

In a recent interview, Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Arsenio M. Balisacan said that owing to the lower-than-expected GDP in the third quarter of the year, reaching even the lower end of the government’s target of 6.5-percent to 7.5-percent GDP growth for the whole year is a “challenge.”

He also attributed the underspending during the quarter to the “chilling effects” of the recent issues surrounding public fund misuse in the government. Balisacan also said that next year’s higher 7-percent to 8-percent GDP growth is “very realistic.”

Ad valorem tax...

B C S. R |

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The Labor Department said on Friday that the producer price index fell 0.2 percent in November, after rising by the same amount in October. In the past 12 months, producer prices have risen just 1.4 percent, the smallest yearly increase since February.

The index measures the cost of goods and services before they reach the consumer. American consumers are already seeing lower prices at the gas pump, which has left them with more money to spend on other items.

Wholesale gas prices plunged 6.3 percent, the steepest drop in more than two years. Food prices decreased 0.2 percent, led by sharp declines in pork, fresh fruit and dairy product costs.

Excluding the volatile food and energy categories, core producer prices were unchanged last month and have risen 1.8 percent in the past 12 months.

That’s below the Federal Reserve’s (the Fed) target of 2 percent.

The target is intended to guard against deflation, or falling prices.

sugar, so that the country remain self-sufficient in sugar amid projections that the gap between world production and demand of sugar is contracting, and we are entering a period of tightness of global supply of sugar. A tax on soft drinks may interfere with this objective,” she said.

Meanwhile, lawyer Adel Tamano, vice president for public affairs and communication of Coca-Cola Philippines Inc., said increasing the taxes will affect the operations of soft-drink companies.

He said the plan may also affect the industry’s work force, while retail businesses like sarisari stores and eatery will suffer more.

“There are many ways to provide employment and income, not only through taxes,” said Tamano, who also represented the Beverage Industry Association of the Philippines.

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TODAY’S WEATHER

Deflation could pull down wages, while leaving debts unchanged, and potentially trigger another recession. At the same time, the Fed also tries to stop inflation from running so high that it could erode the buying power of consumers and businesses.

The retreat of wholesale costs gives the Fed more leeway to keep interest rates at record lows in an effort to stimulate the economy.

Many economists forecast the Fed will start raising rates next June.

“Inflation pressures remain very modest in the US...which gives policy-makers more wiggle room to hold back,” said Jennifer Lee, an economist at BMO Capital Markets.

Inflation has already been below 2 percent for most of the past two years, and falling gas prices could drive it even lower.

The average price for a gallon of gas has fallen 30 cents in the past month to $2.62 on Thursday, according to AAA. Benchmark US crude oil fell below $60 a barrel on Thursday for the first time in more than five

3-DAY EXTENDED FORECAST

DECEMBER 14, 2014 | SUNDAY

.

LOW PRESSURE AREA (LPA) WAS ESTIMATED AT 480 KM EAST OF SURIGAO CITY.

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.

NORTHEAST MONSOON AFFECTING NORTHERN LUZON.

DEC 15

MONDAY

DEC 16

TUESDAY

METRO MANILA

23 – 32°C

23 – 33°C

TUGUEGARAO

23 – 31°C

23 –31°C

BAGUIO

LAOAG CITY 23 – 31°C

TUGUEGARAO CITY 23 – 30°C

SBMA/ CLARK

BAGUIO CITY 15 – 23°C SBMA/CLARK 22 – 31°C TAGAYTAY CITY 22 – 28°C

TAGAYTAY

23 – 32°C

15 – 24°C

23 – 32°C

22 – 28°C

22 – 31°C

15 – 24°C

24 – 32°C

21 – 29°C

PHILIPPINE AREA OF RESPONSIBILITY (PAR)

PUERTO PRINCESA CITY 23 – 30°C

ILOILO/ BACOLOD 24 – 30°C

TACLOBAN CITY 22 – 30°C

METRO CEBU 22 – 30°C

ZAMBOANGA CITY 23 – 34 °C

PUERTO PRINCESA

ILOILO/ BACOLOD CAGAYAN DE ORO CITY 22 – 31°C METRO DAVAO 24 – 33°C

24 – 31°C

25 – 31°C

24 – 32°C

areas of the country—including the National Capital Region—last week owing to the anticipation of the onslaught of Typhoon Ruby.

Mapa further explained that owing to the frequency and intensity of the recent typhoons, the government must rethink its agricultural and preparedness strategies.

“Given that we are a country situated right in the path of most typhoons, I think it would be better if we no longer chased rice selfsufficiency and simply import our staple food from [other] countries,” Mapa said.

“Furthermore, given the consistency of typhoons, we must set in place more stringent disaster prevention and relief operations.

In Japan, everyone undergoes stringent training on what to do during earthquakes. The Philippines would be wise to do the same for typhoons. Part of this disaster prevention would be the strict enforcement of building codes and zoning,” he added.

During the same quarter last year, Supertyphoon Yolanda (international name Haiyan) wreaked havoc in Eastern and Western Visayas, causing death and massive damage to both public and private infrastructure and dragged to country’s growth during the period.

The Philippine Atmospheric Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration earlier said the country is expected to see one more typhoon to pass by its area of responsibility before the year ends.

“There is a new weather disturbance brewing in the Pacific and given how well we prepared for Ruby, I do expect the Philippines to weather both the proverbial and literal storm,” Mapa said. Bianca Cuaresma

  A

its BOP projections for the year, now expecting a deficit toward the end of the year. This indicated that, although the BSP is still seeing some monthly surpluses coming into the country’s BOP, no significant monthly inflow is seen that will boost the country’s BOP position above the deficit line. Remittances sent toward the end of the year to fund holiday-season spending is also seen to support the country’s current account—a component of the country’s BOP.

DEC 17

WEDNESDAY

3-DAY EXTENDED FORECAST

DEC 15

MONDAY

24 – 32°C

23 – 31°C

24 – 32°C

22 – 30°C

TACLOBAN

23 – 32°C

22 – 31°C

23 – 32°C

22 – 30°C

CAGAYAN DE ORO

22 – 32°C

21 – 30°C

22 – 32°C

METRO DAVAO

24 – 33°C

23 – 34°C

23 – 34°C

24 – 34°C

24 – 34°C

24 – 35°C

14 – 23°C

23 – 30°C

ZAMBOANGA SUNRISE

SUNSET

MOONSET

MOONRISE

6:12 AM

5:28 PM

11:39 AM

11:57 PM

20 – 27°C

24 – 30°C

FULL MOON HALF MOON

23 – 30°C

CELEBES SEA

LOW TIDEMANILA HIGH TIDE SOUTH HARBOR

DEC 14

9:56 AM

0.03 METER 8:51 PM 8:27 PM Partly cloudy to cloudy skies with isolated rain showers and/or thunderstorms

Partly cloudy to cloudy skies with isolated rain showers

24 – 30°C

23 – 30°C

DEC 17

WEDNESDAY

21 – 31°C

24 – 32°C

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

Cloudy skies with rain showers and/or thunderstorms.

Light rains

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

DEC 16

TUESDAY

METRO CEBU

DEC 06 23 – 30°C

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Week ahead...

LEGAZPI CITY 23 – 30°C

LEGAZPI

Q4 growth...

years, suggesting gas prices could decline even further in the months ahead. Oil prices have fallen more than 40 percent since June.

Partly because of cheaper gas, the consumer price index was unchanged in October from the previous month. Compared with 12 months earlier, consumer prices were up just 1.7 percent.

Other trends are also keeping prices low. Average hourly pay has risen just 2.1 percent in the past year, below the 3.5 percent to 4 percent that is typical in a healthy economy. That makes it harder for consumers to pay higher costs, limiting retailers’ pricing power.

Americans are already showing some signs of spending the savings they’re seeing at the gas pump. Retail sales rose by the most in eight months in November, the government said on Thursday, a promising start to the holiday shopping season.

(AS OF DECEMBER 13, 5:00 AM)

LAOAG

METRO MANILA 22 – 31°C

The Associated Press

ASHINGTON—Falling gas and food costs pushed down overall US wholesale prices last month, evidence that cheaper oil worldwide is limiting inflation.

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Low Pressure Area (LPA) develops when warm and moist air rises from the Earth’s surface.

news@businessmirror.com.ph

@PanahonTV

1:57 AM

0.73METER

EconomySunday www.businessmirror.com.ph • Editor: Vittorio V. Vitug

BusinessMirror

Submission of price-challenge bids for SCTEx O&M set on January 30

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he deadline for the submission of bids for the price challenge for the contract to operate and maintain the longest toll road in the in the country has been set for January 30, a document from the Bases Conversion and Development Authority (BCDA) showed.

In the terms of reference released by the disposition agency late last week, interested parties were asked to submit their technical and financial proposals not later than 12 noon on the aforesaid date, while postqualification is set for February 12.

The government released the terms of reference for the price challenge despite calls from the Manila North Tollways Corp., the SubicClark-Tarlac Expressway’s (SCTEx) concessionaire, to postpone the release until both parties reach a compromise.

MNTC President and CEO Rodrigo E. Franco warned that the government that his company will exhaust all legal means to block the government from bidding the project if the two parties would not reach a common understanding.

“If the BCDA proceeds with the price challenge without our agreement on the provisions of the terms of reference and without having a common understanding that the business and operating agreement will be the basis of the contract to be executed by the successful price challenger with the BCDA, the validity of the price challenge may be questioned for having been undertaken by [the] BCDA unilaterally

and without legal basis. We may also be constrained to review our legal options in order to protect our interests,” Franco said in a letter sent to BCDA President Arnel Paciano D. Casanova. But, despite this, the government still proceeded with the price challenge by releasing the terms on Thursday.

Under the terms of reference, the competitive challenge would be based only on the up-front cash payment of the the Pangilinan-led toll-road operator. The improved commercial terms of the expressway operator, meanwhile, remain the same.

The tollroad unit of Metro Pacific Investments Corp. offered to pay the government P3.5 billion to operate and maintain the longest expressway in the Philippines.

The terms of the toll company included a 50-50 percent sharing of gross revenues between the disposition agency and the privatesector partner. It also provided that costs of the operations and the day-to-day maintenance of the toll road will be shouldered by the concessionaire.

It also assumes the BCDA’s rights and obligations under a toll-collection system integration agreement with the North Luzon Expressway, including the payment of the SCTEx portion of the cost of integration.

“Hence, there would be no additional credit for any proposal, which will improve further the commercial terms other than the up-front cash,” the terms of reference read.

Lorenz S. Marasigan

Sunday, December 14, 2014

A3

CAB told: Abolish airline fuel surcharge amid oil-price plunge

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By Jovee Marie N. dela Cruz

s global oil prices plunged to lowest levels since 2009, a party-list lawmaker on Saturday urged the Civil Aeronautics Board (CAB) to abolish the fuel surcharge tucked by airlines into passenger tickets.

House Deputy Minority Leader and LPG Marketers’ Association Rep. Arnel U. Ty said that the CAB should eliminate the fuel-surcharge mechanism as oil prices continue to decrease.

“To allow passengers to enjoy lower airfares, the CAB should eliminate the fuel-surcharge mechanism.

Better yet, it should be replaced with a fuel-discount scheme that will compel airlines to automatically lower

fares as oil prices go down,” Ty said.

“Depending on the airline and the route, the fuel surcharge is around P500 per domestic passenger and up to $400 [P18,000] per international passenger,” added Ty, a senior member of the House Transportation Committee.

The CAB originally allowed airlines to collect a fuel surcharge to help them recover some of their rising fuel costs. The extra fee is part of the ticket price and shouldered by passengers.

“There is absolutely no longer any need for the surcharge, because world oil prices are going down and nowhere else,” Ty said.

Oil prices have fallen below $60 per barrel, down 47 percent from $107 in June this year, Ty said.

He added that the multinational financial services firm Morgan Stanley projects that oil prices will fall

further to as low as $43 per barrel by the third quarter of 2015.

“The world is being swamped with oil, and still, the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries is not slashing production,” Ty said.

According to the lawmaker, airline passengers, including overseas Filipino workers (OFWs), deserve to benefit from cheaper fares as a result of the plunge in oil prices.

“Whether the OFW is returning or leaving, $400 [P18,000] is a lot of money and potential savings,” he said. Citing Philippine Overseas Employment Administration statistics, Ty said more than 5,000 Filipinos fly out of the country every day to work abroad.

Meanwhile, the volume of domestic airline passengers alone is expected to hit more than 21 million this year.

South Korea grants PHL $500-million concessional loan–Aquino

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he South Korean government is extending $500-million framework agreement loan for the country’s development projects, President Aquino announced upon his arrival from South Korea on Friday evening.

The fund is a concessional loan

with favorable interest rate for the Philippines, the President said in his arrival speech at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport Terminal 2.

Mr. Aquino said the loan was on top of the $5-million and $20- million grants Seoul is extending to the Philippines for the rehabilitation

and reconstruction efforts in the areas struck by Typhoon Yolanda (international code name Haiyan) last year.

The President did not elaborate about the loan but he said it was called a “concessional loan” that offered a good interest rate. Mr. Aquino said the

loan was discussed during his bilateral meeting with South Korean President Park Geun-hye on Thursday.

“Napakaganda po ng interest na ipagkakaloob sa atin, at kung tutuusin ay talagang tinutulungan lang tayo sa ating mga proyektong pampaunlad,” he said. PNA

SundayV

Busine

A4 Sunday, December 14, 2014 • Editor: Alvin I. Dacanay

editorial

Remembering Blas Ople

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LAS F. OPLE rose from poverty in Hagonoy town, Bulacan province, to become an adviser to a president, minister of labor, a framer of the 1987 Philippine Constitution, senator, Senate president and secretary of foreign affairs.

Ople started life in Manila as a stevedore at the North Harbor. He then became a union organizer and, later, a professorial lecturer at the Philippine College of Commerce and the University of the Philippines, the president of a public-relations firm and chairman of a think tank on public policy.

As a journalist, Ople worked as a deskman and columnist at the Daily Mirror, an afternoon daily and sister publication of The Manila Times. Fluent in English and Filipino, he wrote columns for The Manila Bulletin, Balita and the Philippines Graphic magazine.

Ople’s education was erratic. A college dropout, he considered himself largely self-taught. He received his learning from the great books on world history, civilization, literature, culture and religion. The public library was his classroom. He favored liberal education and the humanities over narrow specialization.

Ople was an intellectual.

The declaration of martial law stunned Ople. He was not in then-President Ferdinand E. Marcos’s inner circle, but he saw an opportunity to protect Filipino workers and secure labor support for the new dispensation. He proposed many labor reforms to Marcos. The president listened carefully and approved many of Ople’s ideas over the objections of his generals and fawning advisers.

Ople fathered the Labor Code of the Philippines, the National Labor Relations Commission, the National Manpower and Youth Council (now the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority, or Tesda).

In 1974 he launched the overseas-employment program at a time when unemployment was rising and the world was in the grip of an oil crisis. Today at least 8 million overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) remit more than $20 billion yearly, keeping the national economy afloat. Have you received your 13th-month pay? Give credit to Ople.

When the administration of Corazon Aquino took power in February 1986, it hounded Marcos followers who were suspected of wrongdoing. The new administration could not find a single case of corruption against Ople. The boy from Hagonoy had a spotless record.

After the first People Power Revolution, Blas worked at the Constitutional Commission. There, his contributions were considered outstanding by his peers. Among other ideas, he fathered the provision granting autonomy to Muslim Mindanao and the Cordilleras. He insisted on giving education the highest priority in the budget.

He later won a seat in the Senate, where he became the permanent chairman of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations. Even when he was in the political opposition, his colleagues voted him chairman of that powerful committee. He sponsored the Visiting Forces Agreement and the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, as well as more than 80 international conventions that became parts of the law of the land. He served two consecutive six-year terms in the Senate and was elected Senate president.

Appointed secretary of foreign affairs in 2001, he raised the level of professionalism in his department.

He challenged protocol-conscious diplomats to roll up their sleeves for the protection of OFWs. He championed trade diplomacy and people-to-people programs. During his term, the Philippines was elected as a nonvoting member of the exclusive Security Council. He was the only Cabinet member invited by thenPresident Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo to Malacañang for weekly one-on-one discussion on foreign policy.

On December 14, 2003, Ople died of a heart attack onboard a commercial aircraft to join a presidential mission in Europe and the Middle East. He was 76.

Ople left a legacy of integrity, dedication and simplicity in lifestyle. At a time when the nation is beset by numerous complex problems, and the government’s response is wanting in perceptiveness and depth, we miss the voice and counsel of Ka Blas, his wisdom and leadership.

Today as we mark his death anniversary, we remember this statesman and public servant with a deep sense of loss, respect and affection.

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Gospel

Sunday, December 14, 2014

HE Japanese are under the mistaken impression that Sunday’s elections are about the economy. What they really highlight are the costs of chronic apathy.

Every nation gets the leaders it deserves, quipped 19th-century philosopher Joseph de Maistre. Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s government has spent two years punting on the big decisions it was entrusted to tackle. Polls show that the economy is the biggest concern among voters, who also believe that it’s on the wrong track (it’s in recession, after all). Yet, with turnout expected to hit a record low, the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), which put Japan on this trajectory, is set to win in a landslide.

Abe claims that a fresh mandate will help him sell his Abenomics revival program to reluctant members of his own party. There’s little reason to believe him. In the last two years, even as inequality has grown faster than Tokyo’s debt load and the fabled salaryman has morphed into part-time man, Abe has focused inordinate attention elsewhere. He’s passed controversial secrets laws, made undemocratic end runs around the pacifist constitution, alienated China and South Korea, and tried to restart nuclear reactors against widespread public opposition.

Rewarding Abe’s party on December 14 is likely to lead to more of the same, rather than a renewed push to deregulate Japan. So why are voters about to do just that? To me, these elections are a reminder that Japan remains a one-partystate. With a couple of brief exceptions, the LDP has ruled Japan since 1955. Even during its time out of power—1993 and 1994 and from 2009 to 2012—the party’s ideals were never shunted aside. We call the Democratic Party of Japan the “opposition” more out of desire than fact. It’s populated with refugees from the LDP, and there’s negligible ideological daylight between both parties.

A well-oiled financing machine that makes Tammany Hall look like amateur hour, as well as years of

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IN this December 7 file photo, Japanese Prime Minister and Liberal Democratic Party President Shinzo Abe delivers a speech in support for his party’s candidate during an election campaign for Sunday’s lowerhouse election in Tokyo. AP

gerrymandering, will pay off handsomely on Sunday. The real question for most Japanese isn’t who to vote for, but whether to bother. Abe knows this all too well.

“I think that somebody has figured out that a disillusioned electorate makes it easier to get things done,” says Colin Jones of Doshisha Law School in Kyoto, whose opinioneditorial piece in the Japan Times this week went viral in Japanese cyberspace.

Headlined “Electoral Dysfunction Leaves Japan’s Voters Feeling Impotent,” the piece makes for depressing reading. “Everyone,” Jones writes, “seems mystified by this election, except possibly the man who called it, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. Opposition parties are in disarray and are not expected to achieve politically meaningful gains. There being no open signs of dissent within Abe’s own party that need quashing, the perfectly reasonable question on many lips is, “Who is this election being fought against?’”

On a recent trip to the western city of Kumamoto, I chatted up eight Japanese in their early 20s. All of them said they hadn’t yet felt the benefits of Abenomics. None planned to vote on Sunday; neither did anyone in their extended peer groups. When asked why, they asked what the point

here was a man sent from God, whose name was John. He came for testimony, to bear witness to the light, that all might believe through him. He was not the light, but came to bear witness to the light.

And this is the testimony of John, when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, “Who are you?” He confessed, he did not deny, but confessed, “I am not the Christ.” And they asked him, “What then? Are you Elijah?” He said, “I am not.” “Are you the prophet?”

And he answered, “No.” They said to him then, “Who are you? Let us have an answer for those who sent us. What

would be. The other night in Tokyo, I spoke with half a dozen Japanese in the late 20s and early 30s—same response.

“Me and my friends are calling this the Seinfeld election—the election about nothing” says Ayako Kobori, a 31-year-old graphic artist.

Voters should be holding Abe accountable for not fulfilling his bold pledges to increase wages, foster innovation, cut trade barriers and avoid a full-blown debt crisis in the years ahead. Instead he’s delivered sugar highs—prodding the Bank of Japan to crash the yen and the government pension fund to buy stocks—while carrying out a conservative and nationalist agenda.

Abe’s second stint in office is looking uncomfortably similar to his 2006 and 2007 tenure. Back then, he talked big about implementing the restructuring program of predecessor Junichiro Koizumi, only to get distracted with pet projects, like encouraging patriotism in school curricula and ensuring that a woman couldn’t inherit the Chrysanthemum Throne. This time around, too, distractions have gotten the better of his government.

Apathy has consequences. By rewarding Abe for a job not even remotely done, voters are giving him a mandate to continue leading Japan down the wrong path.

do you say about yourself?” He said, “I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness, ‘Make straight the way of the Lord,’ as the prophet Isaiah said.”

Now they had been sent from the Pharisees. They asked him, “Then why are you baptizing, if you are neither the Christ, nor Elijah, nor the prophet?” John answered them, “I baptize with water; but among you stands one whom you do not know, even he who comes after me, the thong of whose sandal I am not worthy to untie.” This took place in Bethany beyond the Jordan, where John was baptizing.—John 1:6-8, 19-28

Voices

essMirror

opinion@businessmirror.com.ph • Sunday, December 14, 2014 A5

No time for a silly visit to a cathedral L Free Fire

By Teddy Locsin Jr.

ATE last month Pope Francis paid a four-hour visit to Strasbourg, France, just to tell the European Parliament that Europe has become a grandma: She is old, feeble and unable to conceive, let alone give birth to a better European future.

The continent is stuck in a sclerotic free-market system (which is not a system by definition, except the parts of it that are intricately regulated to prevent free-market abuse). The European free market continues to dismantle the welfare systems that are Europe’s only redeeming feature. And it wasn’t even a European Union idea, but an ultranationalist German one. Its modern form was established by Prince Otto von Bismarck, the architect of the Second Reich, which was established after it scored its first victory over the French at Sedan—a victory proclaimed from the Hall of Mirrors in the Palace of Versailles. Feed, clothe and educate every German, so that he or she becomes a fighting and productive machine who wants nothing more than to be everything a German can be, and then send him or her off to war. After two World Wars that almost ended with German victories but for the intervention of the United States in the first and of the Soviet Union in the second, all of Europe became convinced that, to

be strong, you need strong people, not rich people, who are rather useless in the national scheme of things.

Thus, the European welfare systems emerged, of which the Scandinavian are the epitome.

“The great ideas that once inspired Europe,” Francis said, “seem to have lost their attraction only to be replaced by the bureaucratic technicalities of its institutions.” This includes the European Parliament, which he was addressing. Further aggravating this, Europe traded its principles of peace and fellowship for profit—say, of Germany at the expense of Spain, Portugal and Greece—and infected European consumers with an uncontrollable mania to spend on nonessentials and fomented among industrialists the casual habit of treating men and women as mere cogs in a machine, just so to repeat the cycle of profits, consumerism and workers’ exploitation.

Francis also denounced the persecution of religious minorities by Europe’s trading partners in the Middle East—e.g., Turkey, which is conniving with the Islamic State (IS) to exterminate a huge Kurdish minority that wants its own state; Saudi Arabia, which sympathizes with the IS for its Sunni beliefs; and the United Arab Emirates, which is supporting the IS in its efforts to

topple Syrian President Bashar alAssad, who opposes an oil pipeline to Europe to reduce its dependence on Russia for that commodity. Even if all three are pretending to be opposed to the IS, who are, most probably, US assets against Assad, who will likely oppose his country’s transmogrification into an Israeli protectorate.

“Communities and individuals today find themselves subjected to barbaric acts of violence,” Francis said.

“They are evicted from their homes and native lands, sold as slaves, killed, beheaded, and crucified or burned alive with the shameful and complicit silence of so many,” including a leftist member of the European Parliament, who said the pope was better off saying Mass in the famous Strasbourg Cathedral, instead of using the parliament as a venue to express his humanitarian view. No one was surprised by the leftist’s remark; the man is a neoliberal European, which is, to say, an idiot.

But Francis refused to even look in on the famous cathedral. Indeed, he has no time for religious rites or gaudy architecture when he needs time to address the reason there are religious rites in the first place: To save people and make this world a better place, so it merits what Christ promised: Its transformation into the kingdom of heaven—material, yet unending; truly human, yet immortal.

“I had two options. One was to remain silent and wait to be killed. And the second was to speak up, and then be killed. I chose the second one. I decided to speak up.”

—Malala Yousafzai, in her acceptance speech at the Nobel Peace Prize awarding ceremony in Oslo, Norway, on Wednesday. The 17-yearold Pakistani, a vigorous campaigner for girls’ education, is the youngest person ever to receive the prize, which she shares with 60-year-old Kailash Satyarthi of India, who is recognized for his decades-old crusade against child labor.

Multiplying goodness in our everyday lives

By Cynthia M. Allen Fort Worth Star-Telegram (TNS)

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ACH week I read the Fort Worth Star-Telegram’s Cheers & Jeers section—a feature on the opinion pages that allows readers to submit a short letter either lauding or scolding a subject of their choosing.

I’m always surprised by the number of people who submit “cheers”, thanking a random stranger for surreptitiously paying their bill at a local restaurant, stopping along the side of the road to assist a motorist in distress or returning a lost wallet without removing a dime.

Perhaps, I shouldn’t be. Goodness is abundant, even in our broken world.

Most gratifying, however, is that the majority of these writers explain how the act of kindness they received will be visited upon another, not merely as a display of gratitude, but also because they feel inspired

to multiply the good.

Some people might not see anything remarkable in this, particularly if they subscribe to the golden rule, which teaches that doing unto others as you would have done to you is a moral obligation.

But there’s more at work here than a rational sense of principled social justice.

It’s what Jonathan Haidt, a psychologist who has devoted his career to studying how and why humans evolved to be moral creatures, would call “built-in emotional responsiveness to moral beauty.”

Haidt coined the term moral elevation, a concept that Arthur Brooks, author and president of the American Enterprise Institute, recently discussed on the pages of The New York Times.

As Brooks described it, moral elevation is “an emotional state that leads us to act virtuously when exposed to the virtue of others.”

It’s why when someone in line at

Starbucks pays for your coffee, you feel an overwhelming desire to commit a similar random act of kindness—perhaps, even more than one.

“The usual impulse of experimental psychologists is to strive for parsimony, to explain away any apparently virtuous aspect of human nature as a covert manifestation of selfishness, libido, or ‘mood management,’” Haidt wrote in a 2001 paper. But the explanation is, perhaps, less cynical—that humans have developed a mechanism to “turn off the I switch and turn on the We,” perhaps, as a means of transcending our lesser, more animalistic natures.

However banal it might sound, moral elevation is more than just a passing fancy or a notion that seeing something good makes us feel all warm and fuzzy inside. Psychologists and researchers like Haidt have actually started to study the measurable mental and emotional—and ultimately social—effects of moral

behavior on those who witness others commit acts of altruism, compassion or forgiveness.

Brooks references a 2010 study in which a set of subjects who watched an uplifting video clip of people expressing gratitude to mentors “reported feeling more optimism about humanity and more desire to help others” than the subjects who watched video clips that were simply entertaining or informative. Those subjects were also immediately more willing to assist the researchers in their study than the members of the other tested groups.

Translating such amorphous and presumably fleeting feelings of virtue into action is hard to measure.

But there’s a developing body of research that suggests that moral elevation has not only short-term effects on individual emotions, but a longer-lasting inf luence on behavior.

Another 2010 study published in The Journal of Positive Psychology

found that college students who participated in a service trip felt the effects of the moral elevation weeks and months after the trip concluded.

Furthermore, they were more likely to engage or volunteer again in the specific domain that elicited the feelings of elevation.

The obvious corollary to moral elevation is that exposure to immoral or unkind acts will evoke equally powerful responses that motivate anger, hate or selfishness. We see this all too often—in the halls of our state and national capitol buildings; on the streets of Ferguson, Missouri; perhaps, even in our own homes.

But, as Brooks suggests, we need not be “passive beneficiaries.” We can “actively pursue [moral elevation], as well, by rejecting bad influences and seeking good ones,” by surrounding ourselves with people who uplift us and by limiting our exposure to acts that do not inspire our better angels.

Remembrances of our own family tree

By Gina Barreca

The Hartford Courant (TNS)

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E moved from my grandmother’s house on a fiercely cold, grizzled winter morning. My uncles drove from Brooklyn to Long Island with the heavy pieces of furniture lashed to the open beds of their trucks or tied precariously onto the tops of their cars.

It was in early December and, to this day, 50 years later, my brother and I swear to each other that we’ve never seen a better Christmas tree than the one we had that year.

“Remember that tree?” we say, and out of hundreds, there’s only one tree we mean.

But this was no Hallmark holiday.

This was no Rockwell painting. This was no Miracle on 34th Street. Instead, it was the circling of the wagons.

This was not some Christmas gift horse; this was war.

I don’t remember all that much about the big move except the outlines, stenciled in block patterns the way decorations depicting snowmen and stars were stenciled onto the windowpanes with Glass Wax: What I remember from the days preceding the move from Brooklyn was chaos.

I know my grandmother was against it, wanting to keep my father, the favorite of five sons, under her roof. She had relinquished him when he was drafted by the United States Army to be a waist gunner and a radio operator in a Liberator bomber—he was the only one of her children to fight in World War II—and she didn’t intend to lose sight of him again.

But his little French-Canadian wife he’d brought into the family had different ideas.

Almost as soon as she became part of it, my own mother wanted to get away from the weight of the Sicilian tribe into which my father had dropped her, like an insurgent

behind enemy lines who arrives with plans for an escape.

My mother’s ideas of becoming an American included fantasies of a place to call their own, not just a room down the hall where she shared a bathroom with her husband’s mother and grandmother, neither of whom spoke English, let alone shared her own native Québécois brand of French.

She didn’t want to sit in a dark living room with the votive candles flickering in front of religious statues, or sip coffee in the basement kitchen, where my father’s sisters cooked vats of food, endlessly steaming.

The older women reigned in flowered-print aprons and heavy black stockings, speaking a dialect from the outskirts of Palermo, where they’d left a life of sulfur mines and abject poverty for their own version of a new life.

My mother, in contrast, taught

herself English by watching American movies and by listening, illicitly and probably illegally, to international telephone conversations as she worked a switchboard for Bell Canada—a job she’d held since leaving a convent school at 13.

(That both our parents were operators, essentially connecting invisible parties from one end of a line to another while being left out of the conversation themselves, is something else my brother and I have discussed over the years, right along with the tree. They were conduits, our mother and father, working lines of transmission; they listened carefully and were good at remembering, as well as keeping secrets.)

While I don’t know it for a fact— because, in my family, nothing was ever known for a fact—I suspect what forced my father to leave his mother’s house and agree to my mother’s demands was her discovery that he was having an affair.

I certainly didn’t know the word “ultimatum”, but my brother and I could feel it in the frozen air. We would sneak out to the hallway and listen to my parents argue.

One day the arguments stopped.

Soon after that the uncles came with their vehicles. I remember, vividly, my grandmother giving me a dollar bill and kissing me on the head while she cried as we waved good-bye.

We were moving all of 25 miles away. But it wasn’t the distance that mattered. It was the altered boundaries.

That first year, the four of us graced by that glorious, unmatchable blue spruce, was the happiest we’d ever know.

We were together, gathered around our own family tree.

Gina Barreca is an English professor at the University of Connecticut and a feminist scholar who has written eight books.

NewsSunday BusinessMirror

A6 Sunday, December 14, 2014 • Editor: Vittorio V. Vitug

www.businessmirror.com.ph

House panel okays bill requiring registration of prepaid SIM cards

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By Jovee Marie N. dela Cruz

he House Committee on Information and Communications Technology has recently approved for plenary debate a proposed measure that would require the registration of prepaid subscriber identity module (SIM) cards.

House Bill 5231 seeks to help the law-enforcement agencies in their campaign against criminality.

The bill also establishes a system

of sale and registration of SIM card for prepaid users by registering personal data in a registration form.

Under the bill, to be known as the

“Subscriber Identity Module [SIM] Card Registration Act,” every direct seller shall require the end user of a SIM card to present valid identification with photo to ascertain identity.

It added that the direct seller shall also require the end user to accomplish and sign a control-numbered registration form issued by the respective Public Telecommunications Entity (PTE) of the SIM card being purchased. The registration form shall include an attestation by the end user that the person personally appearing before the direct seller and the identification documents presented are true and correct and that the person is one and the same who has accomplished and signed the registration form.

The bill provides that an end user

who does not produce valid identification with photo and who fails to accomplish a registration form shall be refused sale of a SIM card by the direct seller.

“The registration of prepaid SIM cards would put a stop to the brazen theft of mobile-phone units, which have become an indispensable communication tool to everyone,” said Liberal Party (LP) Rep. Rodolfo G. Biazon of Muntinlupa City, one of the main authors of the bill.

Deputy Speaker and LP Rep. Sergio A. F. Apostol of Leyte, also the author of the measure, said the registration of SIM cards would reduce kidnapping and other petty crimes.

LP Rep. Marcelino R. Teodoro of Marikina City said one of the key provisions of the measure is authorizing

the PTEs to automatically deactivate the services of unregistered existing prepaid SIM card subscriber.

The bill provides that a fine of P300,000 should be imposed for the first time if the offense is committed by a PTE, P500,000 for the second offense and for the third and subsequent offenses, a fine of P1,000,000 for every offense.

Also, the bill imposes a penalty of suspension of its operation on any direct seller who fails to comply with the provisions and a fine ranging from P5,000 to P50,000.

The National Telecommunications Commission has been mandated to promulgate the implementing rules and regulations necessary to ensure the effective implementation of this Act.

PIDS calls for stronger Apec collaboration in education, human-resource devt

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By Jonathan L. Mayuga

TATE think tank Philippine Institute for Development Studies (PIDS) has called for stronger collaboration among member-economies of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (Apec) group to develop human resources and narrow existing gaps in education.

At the same time, PIDS also said that specific measures for increasing productivity of small and medium enterprise through skills training should, likewise, be explored.

“Education and human-resource development are important in pursuing the goals of the Apec [group] and in narrowing the income gaps among its member-economies. For example, improvement in economic opportunities for women and vulnerable groups requires access to education and skills

training,” Tereso Tullao said.

A professor of economics at De La Salle University-Manila and lead author of the PIDS study, “Establishing the Linkages between Human Resource Development and Inclusive Growth,” Tullao said that Apec economies can learn from the experiences of one another in human-resource development, which is being proposed as a major thrust and theme in the 2015 Apec Ministerial Summit in Manila.

During the meeting, Tullao suggested that Apec membereconomies collaborate in developing science and technology in the Apec region.

He said there is an inadequate cooperative program among educational institutions in the region, owing to the limited appreciation of cooperation in educational systems by professors and students in Apec economies, as well as higher educational institutions of other economies.

The study said that inter-university cooperation can only proceed when there is a sense of community among professors and students in Apec economies, hence, the need to establish and maintain academic exchanges among the leading universities in each economy.

Moreover, the study revealed that synchronization of the academic calendar, standardization of course offerings, and measures of accreditation and recognition should also be pursued to facilitate academic exchanges.

Similar to the Apec business visa, the study suggested the establishment of an academic exchange visa for students and professors.

PIDS said the economic and technological gaps among Apec member-economies provide avenues for cooperation and technical assistance and cited as an example the experience of Chinese Taipei and South Korea in training technical workers to support their labor-intensive industries in the past can assist developing economies in Apec area like the Philippines to improve their technical and vocational education.

“Cooperation can take the form of sharing of moder n equipment and technolog ies, teacher

training in technical and vocational skills, and accreditation and qualification measures in technical competency, the study suggested,” the study said.

The study suggested to expand existing regional cooperative groupings in education, human-resource development, and science and technology, such as the programs and initiatives under the Asean University Network, Southeast Asian Ministers of Education Organization, Association of Southeast Asian Institutions of Higher Learning.

This can be done, the study said, by increasing their membership and widening the coverage of cooperation.

Apec member-economies are also facing common issues related to labor and talent mismatch. Thus, it is useful for countries to exchange best practices in addressing the problems of educated unemployment and talent mismatch, as well as the migration of human resources.

“There should be regular discussions of officials and researchers on how to address this problem of mismatch.

There should be mechanisms where these exchanges of best practices can be facilitated either through a web site, joint research projects, and regular conferences on the issue,” Tullao added.

The wide gaps in educational indicators and human-resource development in Apec member-economies could also be minimized through various means of cooperation and technical assistance.

Stronger partnership with universities in developed economies in the region may partner with key universities in the developing economies in terms of faculty development, program cooperation, and joint research undertakings is necessary, Tullao said, adding that the cooperative measures can, in turn, strengthen the research and development capacity of research and academic institutions, and improve graduate education in Apec member-economies.

Last, to foster connectivity, there is a need to enhance cross-border education, movement of workers, and development of an Apec area-wide qualification referencing framework, Tullao said.

The government is now gearing for the country’s hosting of the 2015 Apec summit next year.

Binay confirms execution of Saudi OFW

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ice President Jejomar C. Binay on Saturday said he got confirmation from the Philippine embassay in Riyadh that overseas Filipino worker (OFW) Carlito Lana was beheaded Friday morning.

Based on initial reports, Lana was taken from cell at around 9:30 a.m. in Saudi Arabia and executed.

“We regret to announce that our countryman Carito Lana was beheaded in Saudi Arabia yesterday [Friday] morning. It was confirmed by the Philippine embassy today [Saturday],” Binay, presidential adviser on OFW concerns, said in a news statement.

Binay said the Saudi government does not give advance notice to prisoners and their foreign embassies of execution dates. ”Official notices are sent after the execution,” he said.

Lana was convicted of murder and sentenced to death by beheading or qisas, according to Binay.

The family of his victim, a 65-year-old Saudi national, did not issue an affidavit of forgiveness, which is needed under Saudi law to prevent an execution.

Lana shot his victim then tried to flee using the victim’s car and in doing so ran over the latter’s head.

An embassy report said Lana claimed that his employer was a good man and they had good relations, but he was being pressured to pray during Muslim prayer time.

Binay said based on reports from the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA), Lana’s lawyer tried several times, but failed to convince the victim’s son to meet Lana’s mother and receive her letter asking for forgiveness.

President Aquino also wrote a letter to King Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz requesting the Saudi king’s intercession in convincing the heirs of the victim to enter into an amicable settlement.

The vice president said he is waiting for an official report from the embassy on the execution.

He has also asked the DFA to provide him an update on the cases of other jailed Filipinos where the victim’s heirs have not issued affidavits of forgiveness. PNA

SSS-registered ‘kasambahay’ reach 105,000

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iting a report of the Department of Labor and Environment’s Bureau of Workers with Special Concerns, Labor and Employment Secretary Rosalinda Dimapilis-Baldoz on Saturday said the results of the first Inter-Agency Meeting on the Implementation of the Batas Kasambahay showed that kasambahay estimated to have been enrolled with the Social Security System (SSS) have reached 105,000 as of October, up by 100,000 from the 95,000 registered kasambahay before the law took effect.

Also, the result of the meeting show that from June 2013 to June 2014, the SSS has organized task forces in each of the country’s 16 regions to disseminate information on the Kasambahay law.

“The Unified Registration System for kasambahay has been operational since December 4, 2013, and the SSS has reported some glitches, but it is coordinating with the PhilHealth [Philippine Health Insurance Corp.] and Pag-IBIG [Home Development Mutual Fund] to address them. Also, the PhilHealth reported during the meeting that it has registered an average of 2,500 kasambahay during the last three quarters,” Director Ahma Charisma Lobrin-Satumba of the Bureau of Workers with Special Concerns (BWSC) in her report to Baldoz.

Satumba further said in her report that government agencies concerned with the implementation of the Kasambahay Law, namely the DOLE’s BWSC, Department of

Social Welfare and Development, Department of the Interior and Local Government, Philippine National Police, National Bureau of Investigation, non-governmental organizations and service providers, had held nine consultative meetings and had finalized the draft Protocol on the Rescue and Rehabilitation of Abused Kasambahay.

“I have been informed that the draft joint memorandum circular on the Protocol will be signed soon at the meeting of the Human Development and Poverty Reduction Cluster of the Cabinet,” Baldoz said.

The circular outlines the system and procedures in the rescue and provision of assistance to abused kasambahay and lays down the duties and responsibilities of concerned government agencies involved.

During the first inter-agency meeting, Satumba said the BWSC has stressed the need to develop monitoring indicators and a data base on the mplementation of the law.

On compliance with labor standards, the National Conciliation and Mediation Board (NCMB) reported during the meeting that requests for assistance (RFAs) involving kasambahay account for less than 1 percent of total cases handled by the NCMB and the DOLE, excluding cases lodged at the National Labor Relations Commission.

“This year the NCMB and the DOLE settled RFAs with monetary benefits amounting to P890,660 benefiting 121 kasambahay,” the NCMB told the interagency meeting participants. PNA

RegionsSunday BusinessMirror

www.businessmirror.com.ph • Editor: Efleda P. Campos

Sunday, December 14, 2014

A7

PHL assured of US help in case of major disaster

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By Recto Mercene

HE Philippines is assured of assistance from the US if another major disaster strikes the country, even if it did not call for international assistance in the wake of Typhoon Ruby (international code name Hagupit) last week, the Philippine ambassador to Washington said on Saturday.

“Had Typhoon Ruby wrought serious damage, I am sure that the US would have dispatched assistance the same way it did during [Super] Typhoon Yolanda [international code name Haiyan],” Ambassador Jose L. Cuisia Jr. told the World Affairs Council of Missouri at a recent forum at the Sheraton Clayton Plaza.

“Our alliance and partnership could not have been more evident

than during the tragedy that was Typhoon Yolanda,” Cuisia said as he described the overwhelming and timely assistance by the US military in last year’s search, rescue and relief operations in the affected areas in the Central Philippines.

The Filipino envoy also cited the more than $86 million that Washington committed, as well as the $60 million pledged by US businesses and

non-governmental organizations to support relief efforts in the country.

“As you know, Typhoon Ruby hit the Philippines over the weekend but, due to better efforts on the part of the government to pursue mandatory evacuation early on, casualties were very minimal,” Cuisia told his audience of prominent business leaders, policy-makers, diplomats and academicians.

Although Ruby left at least 32 people dead (Philippine Red Cross count) and more than P3 billion in damage, Cuisia said the Philippine government was able to handle the post-disaster response so well that it did not ask the US to deploy the C-130 “Hercules” transport aircraft that Washington had placed on standby.

“Nonetheless, the benefits derived from the immediate support of the US on humanitarian assistance and disaster response during Typhoon Ruby clearly highlighted what we can do when we work together,” Cuisia said.

He said the Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement that was signed in April is one way the US is helping the Philippines maintain and develop

its maritime security and domain awareness and humanitarian assistance and disaster-relief capabilities.

Cuisia also touched on other aspects of the bilateral relations between the Philippines and the US and Washington’s relations with the Asean. He also discussed the situation in the West Philippine Sea (South China Sea), including the recent massive reclamation being undertaken by China in several disputed reefs in the Spratlys.

Cuisia said the Philippines recognizes China’s peaceful rise as a world power but Beijing’s recent actions at the West Philippine Sea raises serious doubts whether it could honor its international obligations and respect the rule of law.

“We acknowledge China’s role in world affairs and support its peaceful rise. To be truly viewed as a positive force and a responsible power, China must manifest its adherence to and respect for the rule of law,” Cuisia said.

“A world power following the rule of law is now an obligation, not a choice.”

Cuisia’s statements came in the wake of reports that China has been

conducting massive reclamation activities that have resulted in the destruction of the marine environment in Johnson Reef, McKennan and Hughes Reef, Cuarteron Reef and Gaven Reef that are part of the Kalayaan Island Group.

He said the Philippines openly and fully acknowledges the emergence of China as an economic power and that its ascendance has greatly benefited not only the Asia Pacific but also the world.

“All of us hope that China’s unprecedented growth would further expand world trade, investment and tourism,” he said, adding that the Philippines and the rest of the world also appreciate China’s positive role in expanding science and technology, undertaking functional cooperation, deepening cultural connections and enhancing people-to-people understanding.

However, Cuisia pointed out that “it is only in advocating and practicing the rule of law that we can ensure that our dynamic and thriving community continue to exist for everyone’s benefit.” “The challenge before

us is to encourage the major players, in this case, China, to adhere to the rule of law,” he said. “What is needed is a shared and serious commitment by all stakeholders to exert political will that transcends national propaganda and the dynamics of international affairs.”

Cuisia said the Philippines continues to believe that the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea provides a viable mechanism to resolve conflicts, particularly through the process of arbitration that Manila initiated. “We see arbitration as an open, friendly, and durable solution to the dispute. We believe it benefits everyone.”

“For China, arbitration will define and clarify its maritime entitlements.

For the Philippines, arbitration will clarify what is ours, specifically our fishing rights, rights to resources and rights to enforce laws within our Exclusive Economic Zone,” he added.

“For the rest of the international community, the clarification of maritime entitlements will assure peace, security, stability and freedom of navigation in the South China Sea.”

Australia provides health, dignity kits to Ruby victims Ambushed Iligan City

congressman wants mastermind unmasked

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ADDENED by the loss of life and damage to infrastructure in the Philippines wrought

by Typhoon Ruby (international code name Hagupit), Australia mobilized in-country resources to provide further support to communities affected by the typhoon.

Australia delivered help through its prepositioned stocks with the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) and the Philippine Red Cross (PRC).

The assistance includes health and dignity kits containing toiletries, feminine hygiene and sanitation kits to be distributed to at least 3,000 pregnant and lactating women in Eastern and Western Samar through the UNFPA, Australian Ambassador to the Philippines Bill Tweddell said.

“Through the Philippine Red Cross, family survival kits containing sleeping mats, blankets, mosquito nets, jerry cans and kitchen sets will also be delivered to 500 families in Easter Samar and Sorsogon,” Tweddell said. This is in addition to the 800 tons of rice Australia provided to some 40,000 affected families in the Visayas and Southern Luzon that the country gave through the World Food Program.

“I welcome continued reports that preparedness by local authorities has helped to limit the impact of the typhoon,” Tweddell said.

“Australia will continue to work with the Philippine government and international partners to support the typhoon response as required.”

Red Cross officials survey Ruby devastation in Samar

RANKING officials of the PRC, International Federation of the Red Cross (IFRC) and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), conducted a field visit on Thursday in the areas hit by Ruby in Samar to guide the emergency-response operations there.

PRC Chairman Richard Gordon led the field inspection of the devastation in Samar with Red Cross movement partners IFRC and ICRC after Ruby slammed into the province, and met with residents of various communities in the province.

“A lot of places elsewhere in the country that was in the path of Typhoon Ruby got lucky, and saw little or no devastation. Unfortunately, I can’t say the same here, where it’s clear that things are really bad,” Gordon said. He added that despite the relatively low death toll which the PRC pegged at 32 lives lost during the typhoon “we must never forget the lessons taught to us by Typhoon Yolanda, which is that we must always be prepared for the worst, so that lives may be saved.

We must never be complacent.”

Gordon, together with IFRC Federation Head of Delegation of the Philippines Kari Isomaa, met the board of directors, staff and volunteers of Leyte, Northern Samar, Eastern Samar and Lapu Lapu City Rec Cross Chapters who led the PRC response during the typhoon.

Gordon, who had earlier ordered a PRC humanitarian relief caravan to proceed to Samar, said that Red Cross “will continue to assist in the recovery of these communities.”

PRC Secretary-General Gwendolyn Pang said, “We were able to determine the extent of damage and needs on the ground, so that we can respond accordingly. There will be more supplies and resources brought to these communities from the national headquarters and our logistical centers in the area in order to help families here recover from Typhoon Ruby as fast as possible.”

Over all, Pang said the devastation brought by Ruby was not as bad as typhoons Yolanda or Pablo “but many families were still left without a home and livelihood.”

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PHILIPPINE Red Cross (PRC) Chairman Richard Gordon leads a field visit to Samar in the aftermath of Typhoon Ruby, together with Red Cross movement partners. With him are International Federation of the Red Cross Head of Delegation for the Philippines Kari Isomaa (right) and PRC Secretary-General Gwendolyn Pang (second from right).

Pang added that there was also extensive damage to public facilities like schools and hospitals, including other public facilities and that “we also need to send water sanitation, welfare, and psychosocial experts to join the humanitarian caravan here.

Pang said that children “will also need to be taken care of, so that trauma from the typhoon won’t affect them as much. We will bring toys and shoes, also.”

Coke gets award for Yolanda assistance

SUPERTYPHOON Yolanda’s (international code name Haiyan) fury might have brought a tsunami of grief— literally and figuratively—to many of people in the affected areas, but it also brought out the best in people as well its aftermath.

This was exemplified by Coca-Cola Philippines, that bagged this year’s Award for Corporate Excellence (ACE), besting nine other American companies worldwide.

US Ambassador to the Philippines Philip Goldberg, who nominated the beverage giant, presented the award to Coca-Cola Philippines during a brief ceremony on Friday. “It’s a recognition by the US government that what American companies do around the world is an important contribution to our country’s efforts to help in stricken areas, in carrying out important social and conscious work,” Goldberg said.

“And so it’s the US government, recognizing US companies that help our country and help the US government in many cases to carry out very important, socially responsible activities.”

Coca-Cola was among the first companies to respond to the Yolanda crisis by donating $2.5 million from its global office for various relief and humanitarian efforts.

In December 2013 the company suspended all advertising for Christmas and rechanelled resources toward the same cause.

Goldberg said that Coca-Cola help the typhoonstricken communities not by selling just products but providing livelihood and helping the economy— “giving back to the community from where it works.”

In addition to providing relief services and helping communities get back on their feet, Coca-Cola sponsored sustainability programs addressing their

basic needs such as water, nutrition and education.

These include the Agos Ram Pump Water Project, installed in 50 communities nationwide. The beverage giant helps improve water quality and increase the number of families with access to safe water, especially those families in relocation sites. It addressed malnutrition among 35,000 schoolchildren from various elementary schools, providing them with ironfortified Nutrijuice for 120 days.

In the wake of Yolanda, Coca-Cola deployed kiosks, coolers and product bundles to its partner sari-sari stores to help restore and jump-start their livelihood, reaching 1,000 stores in Leyte and Samar.

The company also implemented its initiatives through the US Agency for Internal Development, PRC, Habitat for Humanity, Negros Women for Tomorrow Foundation, Alternative Indigenous Development Foundation Inc., the Department of Education, Philippine Business for Social Progress and local governments among others.

“By realigning our core community programs in areas affected by Yolanda, we believe we can make these initiatives sustainable,” said lawyer Adel Tamano, the company’s vice president for public affairs and communication.

“Our call has been to make a positive difference in the lives of individuals and communities, because we believe that we can only be as sustainable as the communities we proudly serve.”

This year, ACE had nine finalists that Coca-Cola bested, including Chevron Corp. Burma; Contour Global, Togo; GE International Inc.,Tunisia; GlassPoint Solar, Oman; and the Linden Center, China. The other ACE winners are EcoPlanet Bamboo Group in Nicaragua and Wagner Asia Equipment in Mongolia. Recto Mercene and Claudeth Mocon-Ciriaco

LIGAN CITY—Liberal Party Rep. Vicente “Varf” Belmonte of Iligan City’s lone congressional district, on Saturday said he wants the mastermind in the ambush in Laguindingan, Misamis Oriental, be identified swiftly.

Belmonte issued the statement after he was informed that one of the three suspects who reportedly waylaid his convoy on Thursday afternoon was arrested in the village of Gasi in Laguindingan on Saturday morning.

Belmonte’s police escort died on the spot while two others who were initially wounded died of gunshot wounds in a hospital in Alubijid, Misamis Oriental.

Belmonte and two other bodyguards were also wounded but survived.

“I am commending the military and the police for the successful arrest of one of the suspects on Saturday morning. I am confident that the mastermind would be exposed and the motive for the ambuscade be immediately known,” Belmonte, said in a radio interview.

The police arrested the suspect, identified as Dominador Tumala, 52, of Sergio Osmeña, Zamboanga del Norte. Two other suspects reportedly remain at large and could be still in the coastal villages of Laguindingan, the police said.

The village residents tipped the police of Tumala’s presence in Gasi

after he reportedly asked residents on where he could buy food.

During the initial investigation at the town hall of Laguindingan, Tumala reportedly confessed that he did not know his companions and was in the area to inform his brother of their mother’s death.

Investigators recovered from the suspect a cellular telephone with a text message “paninguha nga makagawas ka diha [try to find ways so you could get out there].”

The village officials also noted that the suspect has the same features of the artists sketch of one of the suspects released by law enforcers on Friday.

Police administered a paraffin test on the suspect to determine if he fired a gun lately.

Investigators said the paraffin test result would be analyzed at the police regional headquarters in Cagayan de Oro City.

Gov. Yevgeny Vincente Emano of Misamis Oriental on Friday organized local officials in Laguindingan, especially those in the barangays, to report immediately the presence of any suspicious person or persons in their areas.

Earlier, Emano instructed the town police in coordination with the military to conduct a surgical operation of the villages in Laguindingan after receiving reports that three of the alleged suspects were left in the area when the other suspects fled after the ambush. PNA

2nd Front Page BusinessMirror

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Sunday, December 14, 2014

PDIC TO CONDUCT INSURANCE-RISK EVALUATION ON ‘DEFICIENT’ BANKS T

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HE Philippine Deposit Insurance Corp. (PDIC) will conduct an insurance-risk evaluation on banks that fail to meet the minimum capital requirements.

PDIC, in its draft of the bill that amends its charter, said banks that were found by the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas to have failed to meet the minimum capital requirements will have to undergo PDIC’s insurancerisk evaluation.

PDIC aims to ensure the continuous insurance coverage of banks’ depositors.

“PDIC may conduct insurancerisk evaluation on a bank at any time to enable it to assess the risks to the deposit-insurance fund,” it said.

The evaluation will include the determination of the fair market value of the assets and liabilities of the bank in question. It may also evaluate possible resolution modes, subject to the conditions that may be prescribed by the PDIC Board.

In the conduct of an insurancerisk evaluation, PDIC’s duly authorized officers or employees will have the authority to examine,

inquire or look into the deposit records of a bank.

For this purpose, banks, their officers and employees will have to disclose and report to PDIC or its duly authorized officers and employees deposit-account information.

PDIC assured that the information obtained will not be disclosed to any person, government official, bureau or office.

“Any Act done pursuant to this section shall not be deemed to have violated Republic Act [RA] 1405, as amended; RA 6426, as amended; RA 8791; and other similar laws protecting or safeguarding the secrecy or confidentiality of bank deposits; provided that any unauthorized disclosure of the information under this section shall be subject to the same penalty under the foregoing laws protecting the secrecy or confidentiality of bank deposits,” it said.

The PDIC Board also plans to establish a risk-based assessment system and impose a risk-based assessment rate which will not exceed two-fifths of 1 percent per annum multiplied by the assessment base.

www.businessmirror.com.ph

Opposition to ad valorem tax on soft drinks mounts

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LAWMAKER and leaders of the sugar industry over the weekend assailed the plan to impose ad valorem tax (AVT) on sweetened beverages. Liberal Party (LP) Rep. Alfredo Benitez of Negros Occidental said the imposition of AVT on sweetened beverages would adversely affect the livelihood of sugar-industry workers, and added that he would block the move in the Lower House.

Benitez, head of the Visayas bloc in the House of Representatives, is also expected to rally lawmakers from Visayan-speaking regions to join the opposition against the bill.

“Sugar is not the culprit in the rising obesity and diabetes prob-

lems of rice-eating Filipinos,” said Benitez, chairman of the House Committee on Housing and Urban Development.

Meanwhile, in a letter to LP Rep. Romero Quimbo of Marikina City, chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, sugar-industry leaders said that, while there remains no local findings pointing to sugar as the cause of diabetes and obesity among Filipinos, proponents of the measure should instead determine the link between rice to the health issues they raised against sugar.

The letter was signed by Rafael Coscolluela, president of the Confederation of Sugar Producers Associations Inc.; Enrique Rojas, president of the National Federation of Sugarcane Planters Inc.; Manuel Lamata, president of the United Sugar Producers Federation of the Philippines; Danilo Abelita, president of the Panay Federation of Sugarcane Farmers Inc. and Francisco D. Varua of the Philippine Sugar Millers Association.

The industry leaders also aired their fears that the new tax will trigger an increase in prices of their soft drinks, and will result in the “contraction of the market of refined sugar” and a reduction of purchases of refined sugar.

They said sugar planters, or sugar farmers, will be placed in an adverse position of absorbing the tax.

“Sugar production will be affected, as producers cannot sustain a reduction of their market or the burden of tax,” the sugar-industry leaders said.

The group added that the sugar

industry has also been contributing its share of value-added taxes (VAT) that reached over P2.52 billion.

Sugar planters also contributed P10 for every 50-kilogram bag of raw sugar to the Sugar Amelioration Fund, which is allocated as cash bonuses to farm and mill workers, death benefit or maternity fund, they added.

“As for [the health] issue [raised on human consumption of soft drinks], there is no conclusive study proving that consumption of sugar alone causes obesity or diabetes,” industry leaders added.

“It is usually a combination of sedentary lifestyle and increased carbohydrate consumption that leads to the disease,” they said.

The group said that rice, not sugar, can be the reason many Filipinos face obesity and diabetes issues.

“Often, Filipinos ask for second serving of rice, and can do without sugary desserts or beverages. It is, therefore, unfair to blame and tax soft drinks as culprits obesity and diabetes,” the group said.

They also called for a riskmanagement analysis in the country to determine a direct link between sugar and obesity or diabetes.

Quimbo earlier disclosed that the imposition of taxes on sodas, juice drinks and other sweetened beverages is included in the House leadership’s priority measures.

He also expressed confidence that the new tax proposal will draw strong bipartisan support, as the passage of the bill would help the government recover the income that it will lose as a result of the grant of higher incometax exemption on 13th-month pay and other cash incentives received by workers.

Nueva Ecija Party-list Rep. Estrellita Suansing of Unang Sigaw, through House Bill (HB) 3365, is now eyeing soft drinks, other carbonated and nonalcoholic beverages as next in line after Congress’s successful moves against cigarette and liquor through the so-called sin tax.

The bill seeks to increase by 10 percent the AVT on soft drinks and carbonated beverages sold in bottles and other tight containers.

For his part, Health Undersecretary Nemesio Gaco backed the proposal, saying reduction in the consumption of sweet products would lessen the diabetes cases and other related diseases in the country.

Gaco said that about 44 Filipinos die of diabetes-related ailments every day, and this may be attributed to high consumption of sweetened

drinks, such as soft drinks.

“We are fully supporting the bill. Reports said the No. 2 cause of death is lifestyle-related diseases,” Gaco said.

Stella Montejo, head of the Department of Finance’s Fiscal Policy and Planning Office, said that about P10.5 billion in revenues can be generated from higher tax on soft drinks and other nonalcoholic drinks.

Suansing said the revenues collected from soft-drink tax would go to a rehabilitation fund for calamity victims, and would be used to fund programs such as infrastructure projects, housing and livelihood.

She also said taxation of nonalcoholic beverages is not a new concept.

“Other countries, like the United States, France, the Netherlands and Finland, have realized the need to impose taxes on soft drinks,” she added.

Currently, Suansing said the soft-drink industry is being subject to VAT, income tax, withholding tax, local and real-property taxes, and customs duties.

On the other hand, flavored and colored syrups used in the manufacturing of soft drinks are not subject to excise tax, but only to the 12-percent VAT and customs duties if these are imported.

The bill said the secretary of finance, upon consultation with the secretary of budget and management and the commissioner of internal revenue shall promulgate the necessary rules and regulations for the effective implementation of the law, if the bill were to be passed.

Earlier the Sugar Regulatory Administration (SRA) has expressed concern on the bill imposing a 10-percent AVT on soft drinks.

Maria Regina Bautista-Martin, in a position paper on HB 3365, said the proposed 10-percent AVT on softdrinks and carbonated drinks will negatively affect the income of sugarcane farmers and hamper development plans in the sugar industry.

“With soft drinks comprising 44 percent of total industrial consumption, a 10 percent ad valorem tax will surely affect income of farmers either through a reduction in the volume of sugar purchased or reduction in the price as payment of the tax shall be passed on to producers through discounted purchases,” she said.

“Most of our farmers have small farms. About 80 percent of farms have areas of five hectares or less. Any sugarcane farmer, particularly farmers with small farms and narrow profit margins who is S “A   ,” A

Emirates stops selling tickets for third daily flight B L S. M

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ULF carrier Emirates is now taking necessary steps to stop selling tickets for its third daily Manila–Dubai flight beyond its allowable period, after Philippine regulators deemed the practice illegal.

Emirates Philippines Country Manager Abdalla Al Zamani said the airline, despite being surprised with the P1.8-million fine ordered by the Civil Aeronautics Board (CAB), will abide by the decision of the government.

“We were surprised by the CAB’s order to cease the sale of tickets for our third daily flight out of Manila after December 26, as it is a common industry practice to do so while flights are subject to government approval,” he said.

“However, we are taking steps to stop the sale of seats, as instructed by the CAB on December 12.”

The regulator ordered Emirates on Friday to stop the sale of its third daily flight beyond December

26, the expiration date of the second 30-day period it was allowed to operate a third daily flight.

The carrier was also penalized for “violating the rules when it sold services until October 2015 for a third daily flight, knowing that its authority to operate said flight is only until December 26.”

“The law prohibits an airline from selling fl ight services without authority to operate such fl ight, obviously for reasons of public policy that seeks to protect the public from the hazards arising from the uncertainty and unreliability of an unauthorized fl ight,” CAB Executive Director Carmelo L. Arcilla explained.

Al Zamani noted, however, that his airline has “always been transparent” in its practices, acting upon the regulations of the Filipino regulator and the International Air Transport Association (IATA) The decision of the CAB was in response to the separate petitions of Filipino flag carrier Philippine Airlines (PAL) and

budget carrier Cebu Pacific (CEB).

Emirates used to operate a third daily flight under a codeshare agreement with PAL. But PAL decided to let the agreement expire, thus leaving Emirates with no recourse but to petition for an extension of the third flight until March 2015.

The petition was turned down by the regulator, prompting Emirates to ask for a reconsideration. The petition was once again rejected.

Under the air-services agreement between the Philippines and the United Arab Emirates, each nation is given the privilege to operate 28 fl ights per week between Manila and the territories under the UAE. The entitlements of the Philippines are held by PAL with 14 flights, its sister carrier PAL Express with seven, and CEB with seven.

Emirates and Etihad Airways equally share the coefficients of the UAE. Dubai is home to 850,000 Filipinos, most of whom are overseas workers.