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SaturdaySeptember 18, 2014 Vol.19, 10 No. 40 Saturday, 2015 Vol. 10 No. 345
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MALACAñANG WANTS CONGRESS TO PASS BBL, 2016 BUDGET, RFI BILLS BEFORE GOING ON RECESS
Palace giving priority bills extra push
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alacañang is making an extra push for the passage of several Palace-endorsed reform measures, including the longpending Rationalization of Fiscal Incentives (RFI) bill that is seen to lure more investors to put up businesses and encourage existing ones to expand their stake in the country.
INSIDE
education for real life Life
BusinessMirror
Editor: Gerard S. Ramos • lifestylebusinessmirror@gmail.com
Saturday, September 19, 2015
“Not only that,” President Aquino’s Deputy Spokesman Abigail Valte said on Friday when asked if the Palace would nudge lawmakers to finally pass the RFI bill to attract new investments. At a news briefing, Valte confirmed that the Office of the President is prodding the Senate and the House of Representatives to pass other pending Palace-certified priority reform measures before law-
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Education for real life something like life ma. stella f. arnaldo
http://stella-arnaldo.blogspot.com @Pulitika2010
YOu’re maKInG me faT! (WhO’S reSPOnSIBLe fOr ‘LOve ChuB’?)
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EACHING is one of the toughest professions but also the most noble. When a person has the gift of shaping the lives and thinking of the youth, it is indeed God-sent. And it should be encouraged. “can voice out their concerns, ’yung mga inhibitions nila sa buhay na familiar sa kanila, alam nilang nararanasan nila every day, but they don’t know kung ‘Ano nga ba itong ginagawa ko? Tama pa ba ’yung actions ko?’ We want also to help the parents, the teachers and the kids to understand what they are doing in everyday life.” Using games, art projects and interactive guides, the children learn values, the importance of teamwork, how to reach out and ask for help, and foster good relations with others. Rabaca says in one of the workshops, the children just play various games. “But in the end, doon nila mari-realize na ‘Meron pala akong dadatingan.’ In one game, they learn that they can work as a group, na minsan, kailangan din nating magbigay. Hindi lagi sa sarili natin. Hindi naman sa akin nakaikot ’yung mundo. So we have a team.... It’s a very big world na kung ikaw lang ang mag-isa, hindi mo kakayanin. So dito sa workshop na ’to, tinuturuan namin sila how to deal with other people.” Lopez stresses that CFL is also open to “educators” which include the students’ parents aside from the teachers. Through CFL the parents and teachers are able to touch base, ask each other “kumusta ka na?” and talk about their concerns. “Isa sa mga pinakamagandang topics ng educators’ workshop ay favorite ng mga teachers: stress and conflict management. Stress, kasi for obvious reasons, and conflict kasi hindi maiiwasan ang pagaaway-away lalo na ’pag tumatanda mas mahirap na mag-patch up ng things, ’di ba, kasi ’yung pride natin. So stress and conflict management are two topics that really struck all of us CFL participants. It’s not only for one’s physical health, but also for our mental and emotional health.” After inking the Coke and Teach partnership in 2013, CFL was rolled out to 15 public schools in Metro Manila in 2014. On its first year of implementation, the program was received by 2,178 elementary students and 304 parents and teachers. Clarissa Delgado, CEO of Teach for the Philippines, said: “We’ve had very promising results during our pilot year.” Feedback from the parents and teachers show that some of the most disruptive and undisciplined students exhibited improvements in their behavior and attitude in the first year after the implementation of the workshops. There was also an improvement in the students’ performance in school and in their relationships with their family and peers. Parents also
It worries me to no end that our youth are running out of well-educated, professional and committed educators. Teachers aren’t exactly the highest paid professionals—although I think they should be—and understandably, they are tempted by betterpaying jobs abroad. We’re all too familiar with stories of teachers who have gone to Hong Kong and worked as domestic helpers because of the higher salaries they receive. Fortunately, there is Teach for the Philippines (bit.ly/1YcEAOa), a nonprofit social enterprise founded in 2012 that enlists young leaders to teach for two years in public schools around the country. At present, the organization has 86 teacher fellows assigned to 23 schools in eight local government units— Quezon City, Marikina, Mandaluyong, Navotas, Biñan and Santa Rosa in Laguna, Cagayan de Oro in Misamis Oriental and Del Carmen in Siargao, Surigao del Norte. These teachers are not volunteers but actual paid employees of the organization with a salary equivalent to that of Teacher 1 in public schools. In partnership with Coca-Cola Femsa Philippines, Teach for the Philippines also implements the Coordinates for Life (CFL) education program. CFL is a series of training modules for children and young adults to develop and strengthen their decision-making skills, as well as decrease their vulnerability when faced with difficult situations. The program also provides training support for parents, teachers and mentors through lectures and workshops so they can be better equipped to participate more actively in the child’s holistic development as they go through various stages in life. The program is designed around 16 life skills, such as assertiveness, empathy, understanding consequences, peer pressure, and anger and stress management. Aside from imparting decision-making skills, CFL also aims to promote better communication and self-awareness. Ohne Lopez, a Grade 5 English teacher of Kapitbahayan Elementary School in DagatDagatan, Navotas, explains that some of the issues facing public school students these days include “bullying, peer pressure, dishonesty, violence, trauma, family issues, indifference ’pag dating sa academics and discouragement…. Ang bata-bata pa nila, stressed na sila.” Through the CFL workshops, explains another teacher, Jerlyn Rabaca, the students
By Emily G. W. Chau Fitbie.com
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E’RE not about to point fingers, but since you asked, yes, your partner could be behind those extra pounds. Instead of exchanging chocolates on red-letter days, exchange a vow to get healthy together. Below are eight ways your partner could be helping you pack on the pounds. Plus, some smart strategies to keep love chub at bay. He: Considers French Fries a Vegetable n Ask him to toss on some peppers and asparagus on to the grill or keep a bag of baby carrots on hand. She: Always Orders Dessert n The next time she asks if you want to go halfsies on the tiramisu, try suggesting a scoop of the sorbet instead. He: Always Super Sizes His Meal n Instead of falling into the portion distortion trap, gauge your hunger on internal, not visual, cues. n Let your food digest for about 20 minutes, and ask yourself if you’re really hungry before going up for another serving. She: Is a Stickler for Dinner Dates n Think about changing up your traditional Friday night plans with a round of bowling or a walk in the park. n Variation isn’t just good for your body; it can also rekindle feelings of adventure and romance if you’ve fallen into a rut. He: Has Domino’s on Speed Dial n If your husband is grabbing dinner for the two of you, handle the order yourself. n You can tell the restaurant to hold the mayo or ask for your salad dressing to come on the side. n For a low-prep nutritional boost, keep a bag of frozen vegetables ready to supplement your takeout. She: Wants to “Split” Everything n The calories in half portions can add up quickly, so it’s just as important to consider the calories in her tapas free-for-all before you indulge in a large entree. He: Cracks Open a Beer—Or Four—While Watching the Game n On game day, remember that the usual drinking rules hold true: moderation equals one drink for women, two for men. She: Snacks All Afternoon n If you are struck by an afternoon craving, lay off her snack packs and instead create your own mini-meal. n The perfect snack should be part protein, part carbohydrate, so opt for power combos, such as an apple with peanut butter or string cheese with whole-wheat crackers.
TeaCherS Jerlyn rabaca (from left), nico fos and Ohne Lopez with their students under the Coordinates for Life Program
COfOunder and CeO of Teach for the Philippines, Clarissa delgado (left) and Juan dominguez, corporate affairs director for Coca-Cola femsa asia division renew their partnership for the Coordinates for Life education program
expressed appreciation for the workshops as a safe place for them to share their concerns and receive feedback and advice from other parents, she noted. For his part, Juan Dominguez, corporate affairs director for Coca-Cola Femsa Asia, said: “In the first year of our partnership, we focused our efforts on customizing the workshops and educational materials so that it applies to the Philippine context, since this was a program that was developed in Mexico and primarily implemented in Latin America.” Because of the positive reception from the students and teaching community for CFL, Coke and Teach recently renewed their partnership to expand the program’s reach to more Filipino students. “We have seen the potential impact of Coordinates for Life and are excited to bring this to even more schools and more Filipino communities,” Dominguez enthused.
He said the bottler will be investing another P10 million over the next two years for its CFL program with Teach. The next phase of the program will be implemented in 20 public schools in Metro Manila and Mindanao. “With the right skills and values, students can create a better life for themselves and those around them,” Delgado stressed. “As the fellows of Teach for the Philippines grow in number, so will the opportunities for more schools to benefit from the CFL program.” Coca-Cola Femsa is the largest franchise bottler of Coca-Cola products in the world. n Interested in committing two years of your life to mold the minds and values of our youth? Contact Teach for the Philippines at 808-8837 or admissions@teachforthephilippines.org. If you wish to support the teacher fellows, visit bit.ly/ChampionsUnite.
Brother Industries inks ‘cooperation’ pact with PHL govt J
APANESE-OWNED manufacturing firm Brother Industries Ltd. recently signed an agreement with the Philippine government, whereby the company promises to cooperate with the latter in growing its business, while positively contributing to the country’s economic growth. Brother Industries President Terry Koike penned the agreement during the recent state visit of President Aquino and key Cabinet members in Japan, where Koike was among the executives of Japanese manufacturing firms who met with the Philippine delegation. Koike said, “It is important for Brother to strengthen trust relationships with the Philippine government, which provides necessary support for businesses like ours to thrive. In the same way, it is also vital for the government to generate significant jobs
and revenues from industries.” During the meeting, Koike requested the Philippine government—also represented by Philippine Economic Zone Authority Director General Lilia B. de Lima, Trade Secretary Gregory L. Domingo, and Secretary to the Cabinet Jose Rene Almendras—to further improve infrastructure and human-resource skills training in the country. More specifically, Koike emphasized the need for the Philippine government to build key infrastructures, like roads and ports, and to strengthen the foundation for developing engineers specialized in mold design and automation, among other skills needed by the industry. President Aquino’s team had, in turn, assured Koike that budget allocation for improving infrastructure has been
significantly increased, and that a second highway between Manila and Batangas will be built to improve access to ports. Mr. Aquino, who was the guest of honor in August 2013 at the opening ceremony for Brother Industries’s new manufacturing plant in Batangas, also praised the company for its growth. After two years since it started operations in the country, the number of Brother Industries Philippines manpower complement has grown markedly during Fiscal Year 2015. Koike said, “I have been calling on all of our employees to contribute toward the company’s growth, hoping that our sales and production in the Philippines will increase steadily, and that Brother can truly contribute to Philippine society.”
life
Trade Secretary Gregory L. domingo (from left), Philippine economic Zone authority director General Lilia B. de Lima, President aquino, Brother Industries President Terry Koike and Secretary to the Cabinet Office Jose rene almendras
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right on course
Sports
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AturdAy, September 19, 2015 mirror_sports@yahoo.com.ph sports@businessmirror.com.ph Editor: Jun Lomibao
Miguel Tabuena rattled off three straight birdies from No. 1 against Jhonnel Ababa’s lone birdie, then knocked down a pair of 7-footers on Nos. 6 and 8 for a sizzling 31, turning the Luisita Golf and Country Club into a virtual playground under preferred lies rule.
TABUENA
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IGUEL TABUENA put on a brilliant show of shotmaking, solid iron game and superb putting and came away with a bogey-free, eagle-spiked eightunder 64 to all but wrap up another championship—and perhaps the coveted Order of Merit (OOM) crown—on the tour. Clutching a shaky one-stroke lead over Jhonnel Ababa halfway through the Central Azucarera de Tarlac Open on Friday, Tabuena rattled off three straight birdies from No. 1 against Ababa’s lone birdie, then knocked down a pair of 7-footers on Nos. 6 and 8 for a sizzling 31, turning the Luisita Golf and Country Club into a virtual playground under preferred lies rule. With a 31 and two pars at the back, the 21-year-old ace shotmaker drove to the left side 5with a terrific 5-wood second shot from 236 yards to within 15 feet for eagle. He did slow down with one birdie in the last six holes but his 64 and a 17-under 199 put him eight shots ahead of Ababa, who carded a 71 for a 207, and 10 strokes up on American Micah Shin and local bet Zanieboy Gialon, who both shot 69s, and Dutch Guido Van der Valk, who turned in a 71, for 209s. The last 18 holes of the P2.5 millionchampionship could be a victory walk for the hottest player on the tour, who has primed himself up for a series of tournaments in Japan starting next week, along with absentee Angelo Que and Japan-based Juvic Pagunsan. “My game plan is to place safety shots off
the tee and make the most of my birdie chances,” said Tabuena, a three-leg winner who has been playing with a high level of confidence following his come-from-behind win over Tony Lascuña in Wack Wack last week. “But I’ve really been working hard on my game, trying to build some confidence and momentum for the Japan Tour,” said Tabuena, whose impending victory, barring any major disaster today, worth P450,000 will put him unassailably ahead in the OOM race with one tournament left at Sherwood next week. After 13 legs, Tabuena leads the money race with earnings of P2,601,917, with Lascuña dropping to second with P2,334,960. Que is closely behind at third with P2,272,131. Lascuña finally found his touch after a 71 and 75 but failed to sustain a hot 32 start with a bogey on the last hole, settling for a 69 for solo 13th at 215. Ababa failed to match Tabuena’s scorching start, picking up just two birdies in 15 holes before dropping a stroke on the par-5 16th for a 71, while van der Valk, playing in a featured threesome for the first time in a long while, also had a roller-coaster round of four birdies against three bogeys for a similar one-under card. Shin and Gialon rallied with a pair of 69s to tie van der Valk at third, while Jun Rates fought back with a 68 to join Keanu Jahns, who made a 71, at 211 followed by Jay Bayron, who charged back with a bogey-free 66, and Japanese amateur Yuto Katsuragawa, who birdied the last three holes for a 71, at 212s.
Arcilla conquers PCA’s clay court, bundles out unseeded Obdina
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OHNNY ARCILLA scored an easy 8-2 victory over Laurence Joy Obdina on Friday to make his presence felt even stronger in the 34th Philippine Columbian Association (PCA) OpenCebuana Lhuillier Wildcard Event at the PCA clay courts in Paco, Manila. But the new clay surface of the PCA also gave discomfort to the losing finalist last year. “Almost all of us are adjusting to the surface, it’s tough and slippery,” the 35-year-old Arcilla said. The PCA was a shell court for decades. Patrick John Tierro, Arcilla’s tormentor last
KYLE PARPAN is all concentration. NONIE REYES
ATIONAL University (NU) sets out for another crack at the Shakey’s V-League crown, hopeful of emerging on the winner’s podium after a shutout loss the last time out. The Lady Bulldogs actually nailed their first V-League plum two seasons ago, when they edged the Ateneo Lady Eagles, 3-1, in sudden death, only to be swept by the Far Eastern University (FEU) Lady Tamaraws in last year’s title playoffs. But for NU Coach Roger Gorayeb, bringing the school back to the finals of the league sponsored by Shakey’s, already makes them feel like champions. “Our target is to make the finals. Now that we’re here, we already feel like champions. Winning it altogether would be a bonus,” Gorayeb said. University of Santo Tomas and FEU, meanwhile, start their own best-of-three series for third onSaturday, also starting at 12:45 p.m. to be aired live on GMA News TV Channel 11, according to the organizing Sports Vision. The Spikers’ Turf also begins its series for third with National College of Business and Arts and Emilio Aguinaldo College clashing in their side of the opener starting at 3 p.m. on Saturday. Winning it all would entail a lot of hard work, determination and patience, especially against a team as fancied as Ateneo. Gorayeb, however, said they only have to stymie one player to fuel their championship drive in the event presented by PLDT Home Ultera. “Ateneo is strong because of Alyssa,” said Gorayeb, who also handled Valdez and Ateneo in the past before moving back to NU. “She packs so much power and has matured a lot that she can carry a team to a championship.” Still, he remains upbeat of their chances and hopes to surprise the Lady Eagles with a superb all-around game when Game One of the best-of-three title series is fired off on Sunday at 12:45 p.m. at The Arena in San Juan.
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AKE FOREST, Illinois—Jason Day already had seven birdies on his card and one eagle, courtesy of a shot he holed from 79 yards out of a fairway bunker. He was walking across a bridge on Thursday at the BMW Championship when someone asked him during an exchange of greetings, “How are you doing, Jason?” Jordan Spieth was a few steps ahead of Day, and he could hardly contain his laughter. “Really? You’re asking him THAT?” Spieth said. Day has never been better. He powered his way around Conway Farms and was at 10-under par through 17 holes when thunderstorms halted the opening round. His final shot was a 346yard tee shot with the wind at his back that settled in light rough and left him 44 yards away from a front pin on No. 9. Day has to hole that Friday morning for a 59. And he didn’t even know it. “I thought it was a par 72, so I’m sitting there going, ‘10 under, there’s no chance at all I can get it.’ But if it goes in, it goes in,” he said. “Right now, I’m just trying to play the best I can. I’m just trying to get off to a good start.” He is playing better than anyone at the moment, a winner in three of his last five tournaments, including his first major. A victory in the third FedEx Cup playoff event would send him to No. 1 in the world for the first time, and not many would argue with that. Day was four shots ahead of Professional Golfers’ Association Tour rookie Daniel Berger, who had a six-under 65. Brendon Todd had a 66. Only 17 players completed the opening round. Spieth finally got on track. Coming off consecutive missed cuts that eventually cost him the No. 1 ranking, he had a holein-one on the par-3 second hole to end a peculiar drought. It was the first time in 72 holes that he was under par during any round in a tournament. And then he chipped in from 80 feet for birdie on the next hole. AP
year, looked to have the clay surface all figured out and shut out newcomer Ken Philip Paradela never, 8-0, in the event supported by Cebuana Lhuillier, Puma, Dunlop, Head, Babolat, Compass/ IMOSTI and Sarangani Rep. Manny Pacquiao. Fifth seed Rolando Ruel Jr. was also unstoppable against Hans Asistio, 8-1, and joined Tierro, as well as ninth pick Marc Reyes and No. 15 Arcie Mano, who scored 8-1 victories over Bernardine Siso and Jason Timbal, respectively, in the third round. Third pick Elbert Anasta, No. 4 Alberto
Lim Jr., No. 8 Ronard Joven and No. 12 Roel Capangpangan also advanced. Anasta trounced Jomari Guira, 8-2, while Lim prevailed over Rey Mayo, 8-1. Joven struggled at first but was able to pull through against Dave Mosqueda, 8-5. Capangpangan defeated Joshua Kinaadman, 8-4. Other first-round winners were Joel Atienza against Bernanlou Bering (8-5), Dheo Talatayod versus Jeric de los Santos (8-7), Argil Lance Canizares over Raymund Malapitan (8-0) and Arjohn de la Cruz versus Larius Laforteza (8-4).
TIGERS EYE NO. 4
LADY BULLDOGS HANDS FULL VS LADY EAGLES
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DAY
Day never been better, builds big lead in Illinois
TAIWANESE RIP PETRON GALS
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ETRON suffered another disappointing setback, this time at the hands of Taiwan Power of Chinese Taipei, 25-20, 25-16, 25-9, in the quarterfinals of the 2015 Asian Volleyball Confederation Asian Women’s Club Volleyball Championship on Friday at the Ha Nam Competition Hall in Phu Ly, Vietnam. The Blaze Spikers were simply overpowered throughout the one-hour and seven-minute battle, as the Taiwanese paraded the core of their national team to grab the first semifinal seat in the tournament serving as qualifier for the International Volleyball Federation World Women’s Club Championship next year. Taiwan Power will be joining the winners between Bangkok Glass of Thailand and 4.25 Sports Club of North Korea, Hisamitsu Springs of Japan and Zhetyssu of Kazakhstan, and Zhejiang of China and Thong Tin
Lietvietpost Bank of the host country in the semifinals. Petron, on the other hand, kissed its championship hopes good-bye and was relegated to the battle for fifth to ninth places. It will face the loser of the Kazakstan and Japan duel in the classification match at 5 p.m. on Saturday. No one from Petron emerged with a double-digit performance, with Aby Maraño, Rachel Anne Daquis and Dindin Manabat delivering seven points apiece. Brazilian reinforcement Rupia Inck Furtado added six markers, while Erica Adachi had 44 of the team’s 49 excellent sets. “We ran against a strong and powerful team,” said Petron Coach George Pascua, who said his other objective in the tournament is to prepare the team for the Philippine Superliga Grand Prix which starts on October 10 at the Alonte Sports Arena in Biñan, Laguna.
Mapua, Perpetual Help prevail M APUA continued to play the spoiler’s role, this time scalping Arellano University, 81-76, to remain unbeaten in the second round of the 91st National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) seniors basketball tournament on Friday at the Filoil Flying V Arena in San Juan City. The Cardinals used a 17-4 spurt at the start of the fourth quarter to break the backs of the Chiefs. Allwell Oraeme, Justin Serrano, Mark Braña and JP Nieles combined for 24 points in the fourth quarter to propel Mapua to its 10th win in 15 games to tie Arellano University at fourth place in the standings. Oraeme led the Intramuros-based team with 30 rebounds he laced with 15. Exeqiel Biteng pumped in 15 points, while Serrano and Braña had 14 and 11, respectively, for the Cardinals. Rookie guard Michael Salado led Arellano University with 17 points, while Jio Jalalon added 16 points with 11 rebounds and six assists. Mapua Assistant Coach Ed Cordero called the shots for Mapua in lieu of Atoy Co, who served the second of his twogame suspension. “This team is mostly [made up of] rookies and sophomores, and they are just delivering. They are not playing
like rookies and sophomores, and they have all that confidence with Allwell [Oraeme] with that kind of intensity,” Cordero said. Earl Scottie Thompson, meanwhile, recorded his sixth triple-double of the season to lead University of Perpetual Help past College of Saint Benilde in a lopsided contest, 70-47. Thompson, the reigning Most Valuable Player, wound up with 21 points, 10 rebounds and 10 assists to pace the Altas (10-4). Diego de la Paz
» MAPUA’S Allwell
Oraeme and Mark Braña, and Adamson University’s Dioncee Holts and Allen Enriquez box each other out for the rebound. KEVIN DE LA CRUZ
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NIVERSITY of Santo Tomas (UST) braces for another tough challenge as it stakes its unbeaten slate against winless National University (NU) in the main game of Season 78 University Athletic Association of the Philippines (UAAP) men’s basketball action on Saturday at the Mall of Asia Arena. The league-leading Growling Tigers (3-0) meet the skidding Bulldogs (0-3) at 4 p.m., while University of the East (UE) and Ateneo de Manila eye their third straight win when they face off at 2 p.m.
UST Head Coach Bong de la Cruz expects NU to come out strong as the defending champions have yet to score a victory after three games. “Babawi sila for sure. They are the defending champions. Pride nila ang nakataya kaya they will go for the win,” said de la Cruz, whose team is coming off a week’s rest after beating season host University of the Philippines, 67-59, last weekend to grab the solo lead. Veterans Ed Daquiaog and Kevin Ferrer have been providing stability for the Growling Tigers, while Karim Abdul is slowly returning to his usual fiery form. The Bulldogs, off to their worst start since Eric Altamirano became their coach in Season 74, are hurting from a heartbreaking 70-74 double-overtime loss to the Blue Eagles. But Altamirano is seeing improvements in their game. “We are playing better defense compared to our previous two games. We just have to continue working hard and stay positive,” Altamirano said. The Red Warriors and the Blue Eagles, meanwhile, enter the match with a two-game winning streak each. UE downed Adamson University, 89-78, in its previous match, while Ateneo shocked NU in the double-overtime thriller behind the exploits of reigning Most Valuable Player Kiefer Ravena and Nigerian Chibueze Ikeh. Standings: UST 3-0; FEU 2-1, UP 2-1, UE 2-1, Ateneo 2-1, DLSU 1-2, NU 0-3, Adamson 0-3. Joel Orellana
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makers go on recess next month. A Palace certification means a bill may be subsequently approved by Congress on second and third reading on the same day. “Not just the fiscal rationalization but also other priority measures that we have identified,” Valte said. “We understand the timetable. We understand the level of priorities, as well. We will give them all equal See “Priority bills,” A6
BSP: EMERGING MARKETS GIVEN NEAR-TERM RELIEF
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BusinessMirror
RIGHT ON COURSE
By Butch Fernandez
he Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) on Friday welcomed the decision of the US Federal Reserve (the Fed) keeping its key interest rate unchanged, saying the decision allowed emerging markets, like the Philippines, collectively to heave a sigh of relief. In a statement following the conclusion of the US Fed meeting, BSP Governor Amando M. Tetangco Jr. said the decision keeping the Fed funds rate steady should have a positive effect for markets over the near term. “What would this imply for emerging markets [EMs], including the Philippines? We may see some near-term relief for EMs with good fundamentals and yield pickup as we have seen the
past few days,” Tetancgo said. Immediately and as conse quence, the local currency closed 2.5 centavos higher to P46.415 per dollar after having approached the P47-per-dollar territory at various times in recent weeks. The Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE) similarly closed the week higher, with the PSE index up by 0.11 percent. “While the cloud of uncertainty still remains, I guess at this point many economists and analysts have anticipated that because of mixed signals coming from the labor market, inflation, the real sector, the US Fed would continue to maintain their policy stance,” BSP Deputy Governor Diwa C. Guinigundo said. Bianca Cuaresma
OUTSTANDING PARTNER BusinessMirror Editor in Chief Jun Vallecera (center) receives one of three special citations handed out by the Social Security System (SSS) at the Balikat ng Bayan Award ceremonies held at its headquarters in Quezon City on Friday. SSS Chairman Juan B. Santos (left) and SSS President and CEO Emilio S. de Quiros Jr. recognized 13 other partner-institutions in four other award categories to highlight the system’s 57 years of providing social and financial security to private-sector workers. NONOY LACZA
Asian policy-makers shrug at Fed decision to delay rate-rise liftoff
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ndia’s central bank governor said he was focused on his own monetary policy, not the Federal Reserve’s (the Fed). Japan said the Fed made the right move in holding off on raising interest rates. The Bank of Thailand noted little impact on financial markets. All in all, Asian officials had limited reaction to what was one of the most keenly observed Fed decisions in recent years. The MSCI Asia Pacific Index of stocks reflected the mood, ticking up 0.3 percent by
5:20 p.m. Tokyo time. “What we’ll have to do is continue doing what we are doing—which was, anyway, the intention regardless of the Fed decision,” Reserve Bank of India Governor Raghuram Rajan told reporters at a conference in Mumbai. Others considered that a delay in the first Fed rate increase could be helpful. Thai Finance Minister Apisak Tantivorawong said it makes it easier for his country’s central bank to maintain an accommodative monetary-policy stance. Higher Fed
rates could raise the risk of capital flows out of emerging economies. Japanese Finance Minister Taro Aso said that emerging-market members of the Group of 20 had expressed concern at their most recent gathering about any move by the Fed to boost borrowing costs. That may have influenced the US decision, he told reporters in Tokyo. Japan’s economy minister and chief Cabinet secretary separately said the Fed acted appropriately. See “Rate-rise liftoff,” A6
PHL rises 17 notches in 2015 Global Innovation Index By Catherine N. Pillas
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BusinessMirror media partner
he Philippines’s ranking in the 2015 World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) Global Innovation Index (GII) jumped by 17 notches to 83rd from last year’s 100th, the country’s best performance so far in the GII in the last five years. Data from the National Competitiveness Council (NCC) showed that the
PESO exchange rates n US 46.5170
country’s standing in the GII has been erratic since 2011. The Philippines fared poorly last year, when its ranking fell to 100th from 90th the previous year. “Happy [that the Philippines)] bounced back by 17 notches. This makes the country the fifth most improved among the 144 economies,” said NCC Cochairman Guillermo Luz, who is also COO of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (Apec) 2015 CEO Summit.
“We’ve moved up in the businesssophistication pillar. This basically refers to how sophisticated the business community is in adopting technology. Many small start-ups in the Philippines are still small but they’re already sophisticated with their application of technology,” Luz added. In the latest GII, the Philippines’s ranking jumped by 32 notches to 81st, from 113th last year.
Specifically, business sophistication refers to linkages to the acquisition and transfer of knowledge from the private sector and academic institutions to the private sector, and the ability of an economy to produce knowledgable workers. Luz said rising to the top 3 of the 2016 GII next year may already be a tall order for the Philippines, but he remains optimistic that the country would be able to make a big leap next year.
“If we have improved information technology and telecom infrastructure, then you will see a strong foundation for more innovation and business sophistication, especially in start-ups,” he said. This year’s GII considered two main indices—the Innovation Input Subindex and the Output Subindex, both of which are composed of input and Continued on A6
n japan 0.3876 n UK 72.4921 n HK 6.0025 n CHINA 7.3071 n singapore 33.2787 n australia 33.2359 n EU 53.1364 n SAUDI arabia 12.4082 Source: BSP (18 September 2015)
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Saturday, September 19, 2015 • Editor: Dionisio L. Pelayo
news@businessmirror.com.ph
Extension of rice QR disadvantageous to poor–Neda
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By Cai U. Ordinario
HE recent extension of the quantitative restriction (QR) on rice was disadvantageous to poor Filipinos, according to the National Economic and Development Authority (Neda).
balisacan
In a briefing on Friday, Economic Planning Secretary Arsenio M. Balisacan, one of the country’s top agriculture economists, told reporters the QR keeps rice prices high. “Although the QR affords some protection for our farmers, the cost, the overall cost on the economy has been so high, especially among the poor because that has led to a double-digit inflation for rice when overall inflation was only 2 percent to 5 percent. So it was very antipoor,” Balisacan said. Balisacan added that this is one of the reasons there is a need to move for the tarrification of the QR. He said imposing a tariff of 30 percent to 40 percent would be enough to
that over time,” Balisacan said. “The whole point is even at [a] 30 percent tariff, that’s a much better regime than a QR.” A study by the Philippine Institute for Development Studies (PIDS) said that if the QR were removed, rice prices will go down to around P19.8 per kilogram from P33.08 per kilo. Under a free trade scenario, the PIDS study stated, total rice imports could have reached 4.2 million tons. This will bring down retail prices to P19.8 per kilo and wholesale prices to P17.66 per kilo. This would result in a consumer surplus of P178.07 billion. However, this would cause a P33.99-billion worth reduction in producer sur-
protect farmers from imported rice that would come into the country. However, removing the QR on rice will necessitate the repeal or amendment of Republic Act 8178, or An Act Replacing Quantitative Import Restrictions on Agricultural Products, Except Rice, with Tariffs, Creating the Agricultural Competitiveness Enhancement Fund, and for Other Purposes. In addition, Balisacan said the government must also implement agriculture reforms such as increases in irrigation investment and rural infrastructure, among others. “We can start with the tariff equivalent of the QR to 30 percent to 40 percent but commit to reduce
plus and a P5.63-billion reduction in importer’s revenue. This means the net gain under this scenario would be P138.46 billion, on top of the baseline which is P442.49 billion. “Obviously, with repeal or relaxation of these restrictions, producer surplus must fall, to the detriment of farmers,” the PIDS study stated. “One way to ease the burden of adjustment is to apply a moderate level of tariff, thereby striking a compromise between the benefits to consumers and the losses to producers.” When the Philippines acceded to the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 1995, the country agreed to convert QRs into equivalent tariffs (tariffication). However the Philippines obtained a Special Treatment for rice up to 2005, allowing it to maintain its rice QR. To make up for the special treatment, the country conceded to a minimum market access, ranging from 30,000 tons in 1995 up to 224,000 tons in 2004. Upon expiration of the special treatment in 2005, the authors said the country negotiated and obtained an extension of up to 2012. Last year the national government convinced the WTO to grant its appeal to extend the QR to 2017.
FPI pushes greenhouse-gas reduction By Lenie Lectura
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HE Federation of Philippine Industries (FPI) urged lawmakers and concerned stakeholders on Friday to support greenhouse-gas (GHG) reductions through alternative measures, such as energy efficiency and the optimized use of natural resources. “While the FPI recognizes the seriousness of the climate-change issue, the Philippines only has a very small contribution to global GHG emissions based on recognized global inventories and official reports of the Philippine
Climate Change Commission,” FPI Chairman Jesus Arranza said. The FPI official pointed out that energy efficiency is already one of the Department of Energy’s cornerstone projects and, is in fact, one of the initiatives promoted by the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation group. “There should be a deeper analysis from the relevant agencies on the level of GHG reduction the Philippines is willing to commit in the forthcoming Paris convention. The Philippines should not commit to a level of GHG reduction that will sacrifice its development
objectives and be left behind by its neighboring countries,” he added. Aranza said these alternative measures should be a priority instead of curtailing industrial activities and large investments suc h a s t he const r uc t ion of power plants. “Creating barriers for baseload fossil fuel-fired power-generating facilities, especially coal-fired power plants are heavy disincentives that will eventually affect the economy and the consumers, but will have an insignificant impact on global GHG,” he said. To date, the countr y lacks
reliable baseload power plants. These are power plants that can operate reliably and efficiently generating electricity 24 hours a day, seven days a week. He pointed out that as the country progresses, electricity demand will increase and the need for even more baseload plants will heighten. Currently, coal-fired power plants are the most feasible solution to address the country’s power needs. “Power plants which are ready for implementation and are targeted to address the need for energy should not, in any way, be delayed,” the FPI official added.
Financial analyst with cerebral palsy is Happiest Pinoy 2015
Harvard U chooses Albay for DRR study
FTER an almost yearlong search that gathered hundreds of thousands of entries from all over the Philippines and abroad, a financial analyst with cerebral palsy was hailed as the newest winner of a remittance company’s “Search for the Happiest Pinoy.” During the Filipiniana-themed awards night, 28-year-old Richardson Navor of Caloocan City, bested nine other finalists and took home a cash prize worth P1 million and a trophy. Navor is the third winner of the Search for the Happiest Pinoy which was first introduced in 2009. Launched in October of last year, the third edition came with the introduction of its own jingle, social media ambassadors and activations across the country. The campaign also rolled out several promotional activities, coordinating with different government sectors, school organizations and partners to encourage more Filipinos to submit nominations. Breaking its own record, over 280,000 nominations were received this year, the most in the campaign’s three-year history. Navor joins the ranks of Winston Maxino and Rommel Arellano with his own inspiring story. Despite being born with cerebral palsy, Navor has gone through life inspiring and influencing people, and always looking at the positive side of circumstances. His condition did not hinder him from getting a good education as he excelled in his studies. Besides being elected as the Student Council president, he also graduated magna cum laude and was given various leadership awards and recognitions including Outstanding Jose Rizal Model Student of the Philippines and 10 Outstanding Students of the Philippines.
EGAZPI CITY—Harvard University in Boston, Massachussetts, through its Harvard Humanitarian Initiative (HHI), has chosen Albay’s award-winning disaster risk-reduction (DRR) program as a case study. HHI is a university-wide academic and research center in humanitarian crisis and leadership. A team from the institute recently visited the Albay Provincial Safety and Emergency Management Office (Apsemo) for consultation and coordination. The HHI team included its Executive Director Vincenzo Bolletino, Director for Finance and Administration Susan Tannehill and Disaster NET consultant Tilly Alcayna. Bolentino explained that HHI’s mission is to conduct research and education on practices in relieving human suffering in times of war and disaster to advance the science and practice of humanitarian response worldwide. It is based at the Department of Global Health and Population at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.
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By Johnny C. Nuñez Philippines News Agency
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In a meeting with Apsemo head Cedric Daep, Bolentino said HHI has chosen Albay as a project development case study for its comprehensive humanitarian DRR program. Albay’s pioneering DRR management program, initiated by Gov. Joey Salceda in 2007 had become popular for its innovations, among them the now widely accepted “Zero Casualty Goal” in handling disasters. Only recently, the province received the 2015 Galing Pook Award for the third time in a row, with its humanitarian group Team Albay as its entry. The win assures Albay a niche in the coveted award’s Hall of Fame. The Galing Pook Award, conferred on local governments by the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) and the Galing Pook Foundation, is regarded as the most prestigious recognition for local government unit’s best practices in good governance. Organized by Salceda in 2007 primarily as a home front emergency response team, Team Albay-OCDV (Office of Civil Defense V) had since then undertaken at least 13 humanitarian missions in various disasterhit areas around the country. Records show its had served some 103,642
families, or 518,208 persons and produced and distributed 4,863,612 liters of clean potable water, using its water filtration machines. Team Albay had taken over the operations of two hospitals in at least two of these missions, to restore order and health conditions of victims. It had also packed and distributed volumes of relief goods for the Department of Social Welfare and Development and from donors. Salceda said Team Albay, a composite group whose members include elements from various provincial and national government agencies in the province, represents four essentials of the province’s DRR program: “giving back, equality, unity, and constant kindness.” Albay had also earlier earned a Hall of Fame seat in DILG‘s Gawad Kalasag Awards after three consecutive wins from 2009 to 2011 as Best Provincial Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council (DRRMC), proving its leadership in DRR-CCA. The United Nations (UN) has, likewise, chosen Albay as its Global Model in DRR and CCA, and Salceda himself was given the title of UN Senior Global Champion in DRR-CCA.
‘Temperature may be fatal to farm animals’
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N animal health expert on Thursday warned against the adverse effect of current temperature extremes caused by the onset of the monsoon season and the effect of El Niño which could be very stressful to farm animals. Farm animals are susceptible to stress which could lead to higher susceptibility to infections, says Allen Valdeavilla, an extension veterinarian of Univet Nutrition and Animal Healthcare Co. (Unahco). Valdeavilla said respiratory diseases will be more common nowadays because of current temperature extremes that could lead to possible outbreaks, subsequently affecting the country’s farm productivity. This could be prevented by what he calls biosecurity measures like disinfection and vaccination. “The abrupt changes in ambient temperature that we are experiencing now, highlight the need to reinforce farm biosecurity measures like disinfection and vaccination, to prevent the entry or spread of disease-causing microorganisms in a farm,” he said. Animal raisers, he said, need to
be educated. Backyard swine raisers who supply the bulk of market pigs, he added, should be taught proper biosecurity measures to help ensure food security and safety. “We must also be conscious of the fact that humans and other animals are usually the ones that carry these harmful germs, so there must be serious efforts to limit the exposure of farm animals to potential carriers of pathogenic organisms,” he added. “Disease-causing microorganisms are invisible, and the usual soap-and-water solutions are not enough to disinfect our animal pens and cages,” he added. “There must be a program on disease prevention, including the regular disinfection of pens and farm equipment once a week and giving appropriate vaccines against diseases prevalent in the area,” he said. Valdeavilla has been promoting biosecurity measures under Unahco’s “Oplan Iwas Disease” campaign which was started in 2009 as part of the company’s veterinary missions to help farmers increase yield and profitability. Jonathan L. Mayuga
CDC gets tourism award
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LARK FREEPORT—The leadership at this free port’s main managing company continues to get recognition from various groups and individuals in the area and even in Metro Manila. Clark Development Corp. (CDC) President Arthur P. Tugade recently received an award from the SKAL International-Makati during the 25th SKAL International Tourism Personality Awards held at the Grand Ballroom of New World Makati Hotel in Makati City. The event also coincided with the 34th SKAL International Founding Anniversary. SKAL, which is a Scandinavian acronym that stands for Sundher (Health), Karlek (Love), Alder (Longlife) and Lycka (Happiness). SKAL International-Makati is headed by its President Robert Lim Joseph Jr. SKAL is a professional organization of tourism leaders around the world, promoting global tourism and friendship. Among the recipients of the 25th SKAL International Tourism are Hans T. Sy for Integrated Tourism Enterprise, Mina T. Gabor for Sustainable Community-based Rural Tourism Development and George T. Yang for International Fast Food Chain, among others. The first club was founded in 1932 in Paris by travel managers, following an educational tour of Scandinavia. The idea of international goodwill and friendship grew, and in 1934, the “Association Internationale des Skal Clubs” was formed with Florimond Volckaert as its first president, who is considered the “Father of SKAL.” Tugade was first recognized by the same organization in 2013, but respectfully declined to receive the award as he has just then started to serve as president and CEO of CDC.
He explained that he would rather receive the award on the basis of real and actual performance and not on the basis of a mere appointment to a position. He told the officers of SKAL that he would implement a revised tourism program for Clark that would make the free port one of the country’s top tourist destinations. Since then, Clark has hosted series of tourism events, conventions and global business gatherings that include the successful hosting of the Meetings, Incentive Travel Conventions and Exhibitions/Events (Micecon) 4D in 2014 and the First AsiaPacific Economic Cooperation Senior Officials’ Meeting (SOM1 Apec) here in January this year. MICECON is a gathering of major players in the tourism industry in the Philippines, while SOM1 Apec served as preparatory activity for the Apec Leaders Summit in November. The CDC also renovated top tourist attractions that include the Clark Museum, including the construction of 4D Theater and redevelopment of Parade Ground that now includes a rubberized jogging path. In accepting the award few days ago, Tugade acknowledged the contributions of CDC officers and employees, attributing the success of Clark’s tourism programs to their efforts. CDC management, its officials, employees and programs continue to get recognition for the past several months. Given the said performance and continuing program of activities in Clark, he is privileged and honored to accept the SKAL award. Recently, Philippine Economic Zone Authority (Peza) Director General Lilia B. de Lima cited Tugade during the groundbreaking of the product distribution center project of Texas Instrument in Clark for being “Facilitator of Development.”
NFA starts construction of climate-resilient warehouse in Ormoc
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HE National Food Authority (NFA) said on Friday that the construction of its climateresilient warehouse in Leyte will start this month. The agency said once the warehouse is complete, it will ensure better rice supply in the province. Located in Or moc Cit y, the warehouse will be designed to be able to withstand 350 kilometers per hour (kph) winds and 8.0 in-
tensity earthquakes. It can resist winds even stronger than that of Typhoon Yolanda, which had maximum sustained winds reaching 315 kph. It is expected to be operational by March next year. NFA Ad m i n ist rat ion R en a n Dalisay said the warehouse will secure food supply in Leyte, which is frequently threatened by natural calamities. “This warehouse is important to
ensure food security and availability in Ormoc and the rest of Leyte. Due to Leyte’s central location and vulnerability to natural calamities, it is important that there be adequate prepositioned supplies to boost existing rice production, especially during emergencies,” Dalisay said in a statement. “The abnormal change in climate is our new normal. We have to make sure that our warehouses,
which store our rice stock, can withstand any disaster, to make sure that the food security requirement is intact,” he added. The warehouse in barangay San Pablo, Ormoc City—80 km away from the NFA Provincial Office in Palo, Leyte. It has a capacity of 100,000 bags of rice, and will augment the existing 30,000-bag capacity warehouse in the area. According to the NFA, the ad-
ditional warehouse can store and supply the food security requirements of Ormoc and eight other towns in the province, namely, Albuera, Merida, Isabel, Palompon, Matagob, Villaba, Tabango, San Isidro, Capoocan, and Kananga. It will also serve as a terminal warehouse for shipments of grains coming in via air and sea. Ormoc is location to Leyte’s major ports and airport, the NFA said.
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news@businessmirror.com.ph
Saturday, September 19, 2015
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Legislators call on Natl Police to stop crime wave
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By Rene Acosta
HE government’s anti-criminality campaign Operation Plan Lambat-Sibat is failing and legislators are joining the mounting call of ordinary Filipinos for the National Police to do more in fighting crimes.
While the National Police has been trumpeting that it was managing to lower crime rates through Oplan Lambat-Sibat, which was crafted by former Interior Secretary Manuel Roxas II, legislators, including National Unity Party Rep. Benhur Salimbangon of Cebu and Party-List Rep. Lito Atienza of
Buhay, believe otherwise. Atienza noted that the “crime wave” has not even spared the country’s tourist destinations, not only impeding the country’s efforts to lure more tourists, but could even result in the decline of tourist arrivals. Atienza reiterated his call for the government to address “more
effectively the deteriorating peace and order condition in the country, especially in the various tourist destinations.” The House of Representatives was thrown into the issue of surging crimes and degrading peace and order situation after Salimbangon raised the case of four female Chinese who were robbed on the highway in Cebu on their way to the famed tourist spot Malapascua. Salimbangon raised the possible effects of the crime, which happened in broad daylight, into the tourism industry. “Palawan, Boracay and Malapascua have been ranked No. 1 in the quality of their beaches and the hospitality of our people. Pero nakalulungkot na kulelat tayo sa bilang ng mga bisita,” Atienza said in his interpellation of Salimbangon. “Incidents like the robbery of four
Recto laments delay in processing Medal of Valor award for SAF 44
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S E N AT OR o n Fr i d a y pressed the administration to expedite the evaluation of the recommendation to award the Medal of Valor to some, if not all, of the 44 Special Action Force (SAF) troopers killed, as well as the survivors in the January 29 Mamasapano Massacre. That is the best epilogue to President Aquino’s unequivocal declaration that it was the SAF group that killed Marwan, Sen. Ralph Recto said. He said the review should be
over by now so that the awarding ceremonies can be set and “the debt of gratitude we owe our heroes, in terms of the honors withheld, be finally paid.” This gesture will also help heal the pain of their loved ones, comforted by the official recognition that they died as heroes, Recto said. “Hopefully, the awards can be given before the nation remembers its dead in November, so that anyone who stands before the grave of a Fallen 44 would be reminded that
here lies the remains of a Medal of Valor awardee.” In addition, Recto said the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, many of whose fighters were involved in the massacre, should retract its investigation report absolving its fighters and casting doubt on the heroism of the SAF 44, for being unfounded. “Our partnership for peace with them demands their honesty, and their adherence to truthful accounts on all matters at all times.” Recto L. Mercene
Neda blames slow agriculture growth for poverty in countryside
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By Cai U. Ordinario
F the agriculture sector only met its target of increasing growth to 3 percent to 4 percent in the medium term, there would have been a significant reduction in the number of poor Filipinos in rural areas. In a briefing on Friday, Economic Planning Secretary Arsenio M. Balisacan said this will lift the incomes of millions of Filipinos working in the farm sector. Collectively, agriculture workers comprise one-third of the country’s labor force. Based on the Philippine Development Plan (PDP), the national government aimed to increase the farm and fishery sector’s growth to around 3.2 percent to 4.5 percent annually between 2013 and 2016. “If agriculture can grow at 3 [percent] to 4 percent, this is about the average for the world, we should be able to substantially reduce poverty. As you’ve seen earlier, our growth in the agricultural sector was only 1.7 percent yearly for the last five years, that’s too low,” Balisacan said. Data from the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) showed that fishermen, farmers and children consistently posted the highest poverty incidence among the nine basic sectors in the Philippines in 2012 at 39.2 percent, 38.3 percent and 35.2 percent, respectively. Also, five of the nine basic sectors, consisting of fishermen, farmers, children, self-employed, unpaid family workers and women, have higher poverty incidence than the general population estimated at 25.2 percent in 2012. Balisacan said growth in the agriculture sector can be boosted through the removal of the quantitative restriction (QR) on rice; changes in property rights; policy investment reforms; and finding new sources of productivity. He said removing the QR will
help reduce rice prices, while changes in property rights will help give farmers access to credit. Balisacan, in his 2009 paper “Pathways Out of Rural Poverty: Is Agrarian Reform Passé?” said there are inherent problems with the country’s Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP). He said the government, under the CARP, has distributed only Collective Certificate of Land Ownership Award, which cannot be used as collateral to access credit facilities. He explained that apart from that, being a recipient of the CARP even acts as a disadvantage for farmers looking to tap credit facilities since banks immediately consider them “risky” borrowers simply because they are poor and may not have enough means to repay loans. In terms of policy-investment reforms, Balisacan said the national government must invest in transportation and infrastructure,
such as irrigation facilities. He said the government will finally increase its infrastructure spending to gross domestic product (GDP) ratio to 5 percent next year, after years of investing only 2 percent of GDP. However, Balisacan said increasing infrastructure investment to around 7 percent to 8 percent of GDP will place the Philippines at par with infrastructure development in various parts of the world. In terms of finding new sources of productivity, Balisacan said the government must increase investments in research and development (R&D) to create new products that could improve agriculture productivity. Balisacan said, currently, the country’s R&D investments in agriculture have only reached 0.1 percent to 0.2 percent of GDP. He said this must be increased to at least 0.5 percent to 1 percent of GDP.
Salimbangon
female Chinese nationals on a national highway in Cebu to visit Malapascua Island reverberates around the world, discouraging tourists from visiting our country. Who in his right mind would like to come to a place where he is not safe?” Atienza added. He lamented the fact that the country has failed to reach its target of 10 million tourists, which he also pointed out to Tourism Secretary
Ramon R. Jimenez Jr. during the budget hearings of the Committee of Appropriations. He criticized Jimenez for denying that there was a peace and order problem in the country, while putting the blame again on alleged problems they inherited from the previous administration. “Our country is overflowing with beautiful beaches and wondrous destinations to visit, and yet the country was recently ranked No. 6 among Asean nations in terms of tourist arrivals, posting a mere 4.8 million. Malaysia topped the list with 27 million, Thailand 24 million, Singapore 15 million, Indonesia 9.4 million and Vietnam with 7.8 million. Cambodia, which ranked No. 7 had 4.5 million,” Atienza said. “We cannot seem to convince tourists to come. It is high time that the DOT [Department of Tourism]
face the fact that deteriorating peace and order and the horrible traffic conditions in Metro Manila have been adversely affecting tourist arrivals for the past five years. These are what they should be addressing, instead of using the previous administration as a convenient alibi for failure,” he added. Crime incidents around the country rose by as much as 46.8 percent during the first half of this year compared to the same period last year, despite the implementation of the Lambat-Sibat, which the National Police said was responsible behind the crime “downtrend.” Statistics gathered by the National Police Directorate for Investigation and Detective Management showed that crime incidence was pegged at 885,445 from January to June 2015 compared with 603,085 during the same period in 2014.
Apec preparation costs Clark hotels P2.6B
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HE country’s hosting of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (Apec) summit has proved to be a boon for the hospitality industry in the Clark Freeport Zone, as hotel operators have infused at least P2.6 billion for the expansion and construction of more facilities in the past year. The Clark Development Corp. said the numerous hotels in the free port have aggressively been investing in the
improvement of facilities since 2014. Fontana Hot Springs and Leisure Parks have spent more than P2 billion in renovation. For the expansion of its convention center alone, Fontana spent P500 million to accommodate the delegates attending the First Apec Senior Officials’ Meeting in January. The Widus Hotel and Casino, one of several gaming establishments in the zone, has spent P2 billion in 2013
for similar expansions and is set to invest P200 million more next year. Renovations costing P200 million were also undertaken by the Oxford Hotel in Clark. The hotel added more rooms to house Apec delegates for the Senior Officials’ Meeting. Xenia Hotel, a Korean company and a subsidiary of Donggwang Clark Corp., has spent some P200 million in renovation and improvement since early this year. Catherine N. Pillas
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Opinion BusinessMirror
editorial
What qualities does a president need?
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hould the president of the Philippines be a top-rated manager or an inspiring leader? Is the character of a person more important than past accomplishments? Does experience take precedence over vision? Should voters cast their ballots for someone they personally trust or for someone in whose abilities they have confidence in?
While each individual’s vote does not seem to matter in the larger scheme of things, we know that each vote, in fact, represents a large group of people who feel the same way. That is why we do opinion polling. The “elites” criticize the masa for voting for the wrong reasons; the masa criticizes the elite for not knowing the true problems of the country. Both groups are absolutely right, and both groups are just as incorrect. Ultimately, after all the thinking and reasoning out, studies have shown that, in the voting booth, people vote with the “gut feelings.” There have been many studies made around the world of those individuals who are considered long after they left office of being “great” at the job of being a nation’s leader. The nature of their accomplishments was not the determining factor of “greatness” but the similarity of characteristics that shaped the leadership. The countries they represented varied widely, from Margaret Thatcher to Lee Kuan Yew and Ronald Reagan to Jawaharlal Nehru. The No. 1 quality of all these leaders was their accountability. They all accepted the successes and failures of their policies and decisions equally. They never forgot who was in charge and who was the ultimate boss of the nation. While each of the examined leaders represented their own viewpoint in an environment of disagreement, all of them proactively reached out to the other side to keep the nation moving forward in a unified and consistent manner. There was always room for dissent and discussion, but no room for personal and meaningless fighting. A great national leader must be both hard-working and proactive. A president must be a role model and an inspiration to the people of personal sacrifice—if even just a little—for the greater good of the nation. Further, an effective leader must be a decision-maker who is not insecure about taking action. All people cannot be leaders anymore than everyone could be a great cook or wise teacher. Leaders, in part, rise above the rest of us by their ability to create with a clear vision and the ability to bring it to reality. Motivational writer Arnold Glasow said, “One of the tests of leadership is the ability to recognize a problem before it becomes an emergency.” Gen. Douglas MacArthur may have described best what the country needs in its president: “A true leader has the confidence to stand alone, the courage to make tough decisions, and the compassion to listen to the needs of others. He does not set out to be a leader, but becomes one by the equality of his actions and the integrity of his intent.”
The Fed loses; the Philippines wins John Mangun
OUTSIDE THE BOX
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he Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) of the United States Federal Reserve System (the Fed)—responsible for setting interest rates—met this past week and decided against making any changes in its “zero-interest rate policy.”
There were expectations after six years—and 54 previous FOMC meetings—of the lowest interest rates in the 5,000 years of recorded financial history, rates would be raised by 0.25 percent. I have been saying for many months that there would not be any increase in interest rates this year, or even in the foreseeable future. The conventional rationale for the Fed to have raised rates is that the US economy has bottomed out and is moving along rather nicely with unemployment very low. Unfortunately, every other data benchmark that the Fed had said it would consider—inflation, economic growth, and real wages—is not even close to the numbers it wanted before raising rates. But, apparently, it is not the US economy that is the problem, it is everyone else. This is from the Fed statement: “Recent global economic and financial developments may restrain economic activity somewhat, and are likely to put further down-
ward pressure on inflation in the near term.” Further, the Fed added that it was “monitoring developments abroad.” Regardless of all the upbeat and cheery talk from Western governments and central banks, those economies are a disaster area, and not even China can bail out the global economy now. While the Fed is trying to talk up the economy by highlighting all the supposedly good points, on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean, European Central Bank (ECB) President Mario Draghi has been hinting that maybe more aggressive stimulus policies are needed. You cannot have it both ways, as the Fed is finding out. Draghi made it very clear a couple of weeks ago that if the Fed raised rates, it would not be good for the European economy. But, at the same time, in an effort to put some cool water on the firestorm of volatility that has been burning the financial markets, he also said that even if the Fed did raise rates, its long term
attitude would be “dovish,” leaving room for the ECB to go with more quantitative easing (QE). Does this all make sense? Of course, not. Trying to explain current central-bank policy is just as confusing as the policy itself. But here is the bottom line. Interest rates were put at zero to get the banks to lend. Banks have not been lending, but, instead, just been using cheap central-bank money to loan back to the governments at a low but guaranteed rate of interest. All that has happened is that the governments have increased their debt by trillions that can never be paid back. The purpose of an interest-rate increase was to scare the financial markets, the banks and the governments to get real about how this debt is going to eventually create financial Armageddon (yes, I do like that word), and to start putting their financial houses in order. But the global economy is so far in the mud hole, it cannot even afford to pay the amortization on all the debt if rates are raised by even 0.25 percent. To put that 0.25 percent in perspective, it is like you walking down the street with P100 in your pocket and finding 25 centavos. Think that is going to change your financial life for the better? Or put another way, it is like you losing 25 centavos. Here is how this is going to play out. The Fed has admitted that its policies have failed, and the global economy is in the proverbial toilet.
Samsung slapped with injunction
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By Howard Mintz | TNS
AN JOSE, California—In what may be a symbolic legal win, a federal appeals court on Thursday blocked the sale of an older line of Samsung smartphones found by a San Jose jury last year to have copied key technology in Apple’s iPhones.
The US Federal Circuit Court of Appeals, in a divided 2-1 ruling, backed a permanent injunction sought by Apple that would force Samsung to remove the copied features from the devices or take them off the shelves. Samsung has indicated that it could do such a “design around,” but had urged the Washington, D.C.-based appeals court to reject the bid for an injunction in the ongoing patent war between the two tech giants. In the second trial between the two companies, an eight-member jury in 2014 determined that Samsung violated two Apple patents, including its popular slide-to-unlock feature on iPhones, and awarded Apple nearly $120 million in damages. That came after a first trial in 2012 that ultimately resulted in Apple claiming more than $500 million in damages for Samsung’s patent violations on even older smartphones and tablets, a verdict that was upheld earlier this year by the Federal Circuit (Samsung plans to soon appeal that ruling to the US Supreme Court).
The jury in the second trial found nine Samsung smartphones had in some way infringed two iPhone technology patents, the slide-to-lock and auto-correct features, after a judge earlier found one other patent also had been violated. Samsung’s Galaxy S3, the most recent smartphone involved in that trial, accounted for the largest chunk of the damages award, about $52 million of the total. To underscore how far the legal battle has lagged behind new products, Samsung is now on to its Galaxy S6 versions, while Apple has unveiled its iPhone 6S. Thursday’s ruling, however, gives Apple further ammunition in a patent fight that seemingly will not go away. US District Judge Lucy Koh denied the injunction after trial, in part because the Federal Circuit has previously shot down such requests in the AppleSamsung patent battle. But the appeals court found that Apple’s request for an injunction that requires Samsung to remove technology considered important
to iPhone consumers was fair, observing, “The right to exclude competitors from using one’s property rights is important.” “This is not a case where the public would be deprived of Samsung’s products,” the appeals court ruled. “Apple does not seek to enjoin the sale of lifesaving drugs, but to prevent Samsung from profiting from the unauthorized use of infringing features in its cell phones and tablets.” “Apple established that Samsung believed these features were important and copied them,” the court added. Samsung vowed to ask the Federal Circuit, a Washington, D.C.-based court that hears the nation’s patent appeals, to rehear the case with its full roster of judges. “We want to reassure our millions of loyal customers that all of our flagship smartphones, which are wanted and loved by American consumers, will remain for sale and available for customer service support in the US,” Samsung said in a statement. Several tech companies, including Google, had sided with Samsung in the case, arguing against such injunctions. Samsung indicated in the appeal that most of the technology at issue in the trial has already been removed from its products, but nevertheless warned of
The economic confidence model is going to turn at the end of the month, and “money” is going to realize that lending to countries like Sweden at negative rates is foolish. The only safe haven left is the US and the US dollar into which massive amounts of capital will flow. We have already seen this in the foreign selling on the local stock market. The only viable US investment is their stock market, which will boom again. But a rising dollar from all that capital inflow is a further disaster to the US economy. So how will the Fed cool a rampaging stock market and US dollar? I said several months ago that there was a remote possibility of the US going to negative interest rates in the hope that would lessen capital flows into the US. Some and maybe all of that money that left the Philippines this year is going to remember how peaceful and profitable being in the Philippine peso and the Philippine stock market was. The Fed has only two choices now: It goes full-European with another round of QE, or it goes with negative interest rates. Either way, the Philippines wins. E-mail me at mangun@gmail.com. Visit my web site at www.mangunonmarkets.com. Follow me on Twitter @mangunonmarkets. PSE stock-market information and technical analysis tools provided by the COL Financial Group Inc.
larger consequences if Apple got its way and won any kind of sales ban. Samsung’s overall appeal of the verdict is still pending in the Federal Circuit. In a dissent, Sharon Prost, the appeals court’s chief judge, found Apple had failed to prove meaningful harm from the patent violations, describing the technology as “minor features” in iPhones. “This is not a close case,” Prost wrote. During the 2014 trial, Samsung argued that Apple was, in fact, targeting software features for the most part developed by Google for its Android operating system, which ran the 10 Samsung products involved in the trial. Samsung’s lawyers told the jury that Apple’s case was about its “holy war” against Google, quoting a comment from an internal e-mail from late CEO Steve Jobs, and not truly aimed at Samsung. But Apple accused Samsung of trying to hide behind Google, telling the jury that Samsung, not Google, decides what technology to include and sell in its smartphones and tablets. Apple also introduced evidence that Google has agreed to cover at least part of Samsung’s legal costs if it loses the patent case. Samsung could not immediately be reached for comment, but can ask the Federal Circuit to rehear the case with its full court.
Opinion BusinessMirror
opinion@businessmirror.com.ph
Greed and wrong economic policies
Rev. Fr. Antonio Cecilio T. Pascual
SERVANT LEADER
database Second part
T
O deal with the worsening energy situation, Congress, despite strong opposition, passed into law Republic Act (RA) 7648, or the Electric Power Crisis Act of 1993 (EPCA) empowering then-President Fidel V. Ramos with emergency powers to enter into negotiated contracts with independent power producers (IPPs). Subsequently, Congress complemented EPCA with RA 7718, or the expanded build-operate-transfer (BOT) law, granting the private sector a broad range of investment incentives. Between them and Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, a total of 46 IPP contracts were signed with the National Power Corp. (Napocor) playing the lead role for the government’s overall power project. Before the end of Ramos’s term, however, Napocor gradually went down into bankruptcy; its liabilities grew as income declined over the years, while the ratio of loans to capital expenditures consistently increased. In terms of debt-to-equity ratio, Napocor had become increasingly dependent on debt, registering from 60-40 in 1993 and 82 in 1997. According to the Bureau of the Treasury and the Freedom from Debt Coalition (FDC), obligations to the IPPs rose to P244 billion from only P35 billion in 1995, while long-term debt had risen to P441 billion in 1997. By June 2003, Napocor had $7 billion worth of debt to its name. These debts do not include the $250-million bond partly backed by the Overseas Private Investment Corp. (around $500 million of $7 billion had matured toward the end of 2003) and other sovereign contingent guarantees. Napocor obligations as of mid2004 reached more than P1 trillion, P700 billion of which is due the IPPs. Napocor’s financial obligations represented at one time more than one-fifth of the P5.39-trillion national debt. Earlier, a government study commissioned by the Credit Suisse First Boston and Arthur Andersen estimated Napocor’s net liabilities from obligations to the IPPs at a staggering range of between $6.1 billion and $6.77 billion. Worse, these liabilities and obligations continued to grow. The heavy financial losses, the huge capital requirement for upgrading power facilities and so-called inefficiencies of the public sector eventually became the government’s major reasons for pushing the passage of the emergency-power law. More compelling reasons, however, lay in new loans dangled by international financial institutions (IFIs), the approval of which depended on the enactment of the proposed measure, the FDC said. The emergency-power bill met sustained opposition from people’s organizations, led by Sen. Juan Ponce Enrile and the FDC, who vigorously exposed some of the onerous contracts and the many threats they posed to consumers’ interests. In reaction, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) intervened. In a letter addressed to the Lower House Committee on Energy, Marcos Rodlauer, IMF’s chief mission officer, called for the immediate passage of the emergency-power law, stressing the importance of “investor confidence and the adherence to international financing institutions’ conditionality.” The letter further noted: “We are disappointed to learn that the ‘Electricity Reform Bill’ which you have sponsored appears to have run into some further delays in passing through the House of Congress. As you are aware, the program supported by the IMF expected passage of this bill before the end of the year which already represented a significant delay from earlier schedules.” The IMF pressure was part of its Precautionary Standby Arrangement for the Philippines worth $1.4 billion for the year 1998-1999. The IMF had
included the privatization of Napocor as part of its “exit program” prescription for the Philippines. According to the FDC, the policies of the IMF, the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank toward power-sector reform stemmed from the perspective that developing countries need energy for social and economic development. Today, their primary focus is on rural electric cooperatives (RECs), allocating almost $201.3 million thus far. Other energy projects in the Philippines with World Bank loans amounted to $1.5 billion, including $65.5 million in loan extended to the country’s biggest distribution company, the Manila Electric Co. The World Bank’s other lending window, the Global Environment Project, financed some $442 million in different Philippine power projects. These projects carried sovereign guarantees. Another indicator of significant IFIs’ involvement in power privatization was the role of the ADB, whose biggest lending in the Philippines goes also to the power sector. The bank’s investments are designed to create a competitive market in the electricity sector through the privatization of Napocor and the restructuring of the entire sector. Six months after assuming office, President Arroyo hastily enacted a new version of the reform, the Electric Power Industry Reform Act. After its approval, the ADB and other funding agencies recommended changes in the law, stipulating that the changes are a precondition to loan approval and disbursement. These changes included an unbundling process of Napocor’s power plants into several groups. For instance, transmission has been transferred to the newly formed National Transmission Corp. Heated controversy surrounded the issue of Napocor’s stranded costs. In 1995 the lease obligation to IPPs only amounted to P35 billion; by 2002, the amount had reached P700 billion. In large part, the government’s contractual obligation to the IPPs, whose revenues it guaranteed regardless of whether the contracted electricity was actually generated or used, caused the huge increase. Moreover, the government continued to forge 25-year contracts with IPPs even as the country was already experiencing power oversupply in the late 1990s. Privatizing the transmission asset is a key element in the power privatization program. However, the Power Sector Assets and Liabilities Management Corp. has already failed many times to bid out Napocor’s transmission assets. It recently announced plans to enter into negotiation with lone bidder Singapore Power. In 2002 the ADB awarded the Philippine government $40 million of $105 million Electricity Market and Transmission Development project outlay. The ADB further extended its support to the power-sector restructuring program by guaranteeing ¥61.8 billion. This increases the total financial assistance to the power-sector reform program to more than $1 billion (ADB, 2003). To be continued
To reach the writer, e-mail cecilio. arillo@gmail.com
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Buying is the new way of giving in Caritas Margins expo
(A historical perspective)
Cecilio T. Arillo
Saturday, September 19, 2015
O
n its third consecutive year, Caritas Manila will hold its Social Enterprise Expo “Buy and Give Expo 3” this September 23 to 25 in the Activity Center of TriNoma Mall in Quezon City.
The expo will launch Caritas Margins as the social brand to help end poverty. Caritas Margins provides skills and training to the urban poor communities and marginalized sector, as well as honing them to become social entrepreneurs. It upholds each person’s dignity through the spirituality of work, the building of a culture of self-reliance and community empowerment, and inculcating the discipline of entrepreneurship and financial literacy. The three-day Expo will showcase various Caritas Margins products from different marginalized community partners, ranging from food, home and ladies accessories, personal-care products, artwork from resident inmates of penal communities cared by Caritas Restorative Justice Ministry, and other gift items and décors. The opening and ribbon-cutting ceremony will be led by His Excellency Most Rev. Rolando J. Tria Tirona, DD, chairman of Episcopal Commission on Social Justice and Peace, and Archbishop of Archdio-
cese of Caceres with special friends Julius and Tintin Babao (TV personalities and Caritas Manila donors), Mayor Herbert Bautista of Quezon City, and Ambassador Leonida Vera (trustee of Caritas Manila). Tintin Babao, a mompreneur, will likewise be giving an inspirational message on entrepreneurship, and will, likewise, be donating copies of her children’s books and some of their family’s personal items for the Expo fund-raising. Other celebrities who have donated their personal items for this event are Chris Tiu, Caritas Manila Youth ambassador, and his teammates in Rain or Shine PBA team; celebrity couple Marian Rivera and Dingdong Dantes; Senators Nene and Koko Pimentel; Senators Bam Aquino, Loren Legarda and Nancy Binay; Charo Santos-Concio; Cherie Gil; Richard Yap; Aiza Seguerra and many more. Get the chance to own your beloved celebrity’s personal items for a special cause! Celebration of the Holy Mass and Healing will be held every afternoon,
with guest priests Rev. Fr. Jerry Orbos, SVD, and Rev. Fr. Ferdinand Hernando, MB. Come, shop and help, and enjoy variety shows with featured performing artists, Caritas Manila Youth Servant Leadership and Education Program (YSLEP) scholars, and Caritas Margins product demonstration. Buy and Give Expo 3 not only supports the livelihood of micro-entrepreneurs, but, likewise, helps send youth to college through Caritas Manila’s flagship program, YSLEP. To date, Caritas Manila supports over 900 micro-entrepreneurs and more than 5,000 youth scholars nationwide. Caritas Margins is one of the social-entrepreneurship programs of Caritas Manila, the Archdiocese of Manila’s lead social services and development ministry. It is a disaster-risk reduction and management program (DRRMP) that allows for quick-response relief operation and effective crisis intervention. Apart from Caritas Margins, Caritas Manila runs diverse projects that help the poor fulfill their human potential, such as YSLEP, All is Well Health Program, Restorative Justice Ministry, Caritas Damayan and Segunda Mana. Meanwhile, to keep the “Pope Francis fever” alive among Filipinos, Radio Veritas, the No. 1 faith-based AM radio in the Philippines, together with Pioneer Films and SM Cinema, held a special screening of Papa Francisco: The Pope Francis Story on September 17 at SM Megamall Cinema 3. The film on the life of the current
Supreme Pontiff and Successor of Saint Peter, told from the point of view of a young Spanish journalist named Ana, is based on a book titled Pope Francis: Life and Revolution written by world-renowned journalist and Vatican correspondent Elisabetta Pique. According to Rev. Fr. Anton C.T. Pascual, president of Radio Veritas, the showing of the film in local cinemas is a way to keep the fervor and goodwill of the recent visit of Pope Francis and his message of mercy and compassion imprinted in the hearts and minds of Filipino Catholics. The film stars Dario Grandinetti, who won an International Emmy Award for Best Actor in 2012, as Pope Francis, and Silvia Abascal, Malaga Spanish Film Festival 2006 Best Actress, as Ana. It is directed by award-winning director-writer Beda Docampo Feijoo. Regular screenings of Papa Francisco: the Pope Francis Story will be on September 30 on SM Cinemas nationwide. We will continue with our series on Laudato Si next week. To know more about Caritas Margins and other programs of Caritas Manila, visit www.caritasmanila.org. ph. For your donations, please call our DonorCare lines 563-9311, 564-0205, 0999-7943455, 0905-4285001 and 0929-8343857. Make it a habit to listen to Radio Veritas 846 in the AM band, or through live streaming at www.veritas846.ph. For comments, e-mail veritas846pr@ gmail.com.
Alibaba’s wipeout leaves investors questioning what comes next
A
By Lulu Yilun Chen | Bloomberg View
libaba Group Holding Ltd. looked like a sure thing a year ago when it pulled off the largest initial public offering (IPO) ever. It had a lock on China e-commerce as the economy was surging and consumer spending was steadily rising. Shares soared 76 percent from the IPO price in just two months. Then it all crumbled. Alibaba came under fire from a China government agency, it cut deals that baffled investors and it replaced its chief executive as growth slowed. Most important, China’s economy turned wobbly, jeopardizing the rise in consumer spending Alibaba needed. Its stock slid down, down, down to the IPO price and then below. The sure thing was no such thing. W hat now? Investors who watched $128 billion in market value disappear shouldn’t expect a reprieve any time soon. Atlantic Equities Llp.’s James Cordwell, the top-ranked analyst covering the stock, predicts the slowing Chinese economy will undercut e-commerce transaction growth until at least 2016. The many deals Alibaba has negotiated will take time to pay off too. “All the operating metrics seem to be pointing in the wrong direction,” said London-based Cordwell, who topped Bloomberg Absolute Return rankings for his calls on Alibaba and also recommendations across the portfolio he covers. “Until investors feel some comfort in that slowdown bottoming out, it will be hard for the stock.”
Deal spree
Jack Ma, Alibaba’s chairman and cofounder, isn’t known for
coddling investors. In a letter with the IPO filing, he said explicitly shareholders would be the third priority after customers and employees. He and his partners didn’t want short-term market volatility to distract from building a successful business for the long term. Indeed, many of Alibaba’s troubles derive from a domestic economy over which it has no control. While conceding some missteps in its first year, Alibaba isn’t one for introspection. “We don’t think about events backward looking, we try to look forward,” Vice Chairman Joseph Tsai said in an interview. “We have made our mistakes and we learned from them.” The Hangzhou-based company is trying to push beyond China and e-commerce, announcing $15 billion of deals. Many of the investments make clear strategic sense, but others have been harder to rationalize, like the stakes in a Guangzhou soccer team, a minor player in Chinese smartphones and an unprofitable entertainment studio.
Come together
“Its investment strategy does sometimes seem befuddling,” said Li Muzhi, a Hong Kong-based analyst at Arete Research Service Llp., who
rated Alibaba a D for wealth creation in his one-year report card on the stock. “When its core business was doing fine all these investments for future development were option values, but with the slowdown they make less sense.” Ma and his partners do have a vision for how all this comes together in the next decade. The aim is for Alibaba to evolve beyond commerce into content like movies and sports, to provide payment systems for its own trade and for others and to get technology, like its homegrown operating system and its cloud-computing service, used more broadly. The billionaire is also counting on new investments to help connect information on the Web to consumers in the real world. The idea, known in the technology industry as O2O for online-to-offline, is to let people tap their smartphones to get almost anything they want, from groceries or dinner to a TV or a car wash. To make this a reality, Alibaba has invested in a department store chain, an electronics retailer and the ridehailing service Didi Kuaidi.
Government dispute
The deals may ultimately make sense, but they aren’t adding to earnings yet and the company hasn’t said when they will. “If the e-commerce business was growing really well, then investors wouldn’t worry at all about all these investments that Alibaba’s making,” Cordwell said. Along with disputes with China over counterfeits, the company has had to deal with media criticism. Barron’s magazine this month
The Fed tests the market’s patience
R
arely has the policy announcement of a central bank commanded such close attention. For weeks, investors and analysts have been talking about little else but whether the US Federal Reserve (the Fed) would raise interest rates this week, or wait awhile longer. On Thursday it gave its answer: not quite yet. In one sense, the decision matters less than the fever of anticipation would suggest. The precise timing of a small rise in interest rates—this month, next month or soon after that—is no big deal. More important is the longer-term schedule of interest-rate changes as monetary policy gets back to normal, and whether the Fed explains itself clearly as this process unfolds.
The case for a first rise this month was finely balanced. The economy continues to strengthen, if slowly, and spare capacity is gradually declining. In August the unemployment rate fell to 5.1 percent. A year ago, that would have been seen as “full employment”—the point at which the demand for workers starts to push wages up, with prices of goods and services right behind. In addition, the Fed has to take account of lags in monetary policy. If it waits until inflation is moving briskly toward its 2-percent target before acting, it will be too late to stop an overshoot. It would also have to raise rates more abruptly, causing greater turmoil in financial markets. As Fed Chairman Janet Yellen said during her news conference, a certain amount
of anticipation is necessary. And there is this: The financial world is hungry for leadership, and a dysfunctional Congress has failed to provide it. The central bank needs to be in command —and be seen to be in command. Any suspicion that it’s dithering is dangerous. The Fed was not without reason to stay the course. The recent stock-market corrections have reduced demand: They amount to a financial tightening in their own right. Consumer confidence, a good indicator of future demand, has fallen. Dig deeper into the unemployment figures and there’s a bit more slack than the headline rate suggests. That’s why there’s little sign yet of mounting wage pressure. Core inflation is still below target, and
predicted the stock could tank another 50 percent. Alibaba said the report was based on incorrect calculations, contained factual inaccuracies and selectively used information. John Choi, an analyst at Daiwa Capital Markets, says that despite the bad press and unfavorable economy, the fundamentals of Alibaba remain positive with e-commerce still growing. “It’s really about the sentiment right now, the sentiment on China is so negative right now,” said Choi, who has a buy rating on the stock. “E-commerce is one of the very few verticals that is still delivering decent growth in the overall Internet sector.”
Bullish analysts
Other analysts haven’t given up on Alibaba either. Of the 52 tracked by Bloomberg, 44 rate the stock a buy with just two recommending investors sell. Shareholders haven’t been so bullish. Billionaires Daniel Loeb and George Soros have sold all or most of their holdings in Alibaba, as have funds run by protégés of Julian Robertson, the so-called Tiger cubs. In addition, bearish bets on the stock have risen, with short interest rising to a record. Atlantic’s Cordwell, who has a neutral rating, sees light at the end of the tunnel, with the company ultimately emerging stronger. “There’s going to be another two to three tough quarters for the company,” he said. The current challenge “is making Alibaba a better company for the next 10 years.”
expectations of inflation are also low. For nine of the Federal Open Market Committee’s members (Jeffrey Lacker of the Richmond Fed dissented), a further delay was warranted. Most of the policymakers, though, still expect rates to lift off before the end of this year. Yellen explained that the decision will continue to depend on the data. And that’s the real problem: Which data, exactly? The confusion that preceded this meeting doesn’t speak well of the Fed’s forward guidance. The longer the economy stays at the so-called zero lower bound, even as output and employment continue to expand, the more potential there is for confusion—and the greater the risk on that account to financial stability. Patience has its limits. Bloomberg News
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Saturday, September 19, 2015
News
BusinessMirror
‘Govt lost ₧5B due to CA order on John Hay case’
F
By Lorenz S. Marasigan
ORGONE revenues amounting to P5 billion from the “grossly disadvantageous” decision of the Court of Appeals (CA) in the Camp John Hay Development Corp. (CJHDevco) case could have been used to build social infrastructure, a government official said. Bases Conversion and Development Authority (BCDA) President Arnel Paciano Casanova said the people of the Cordilleras would have benefited from the billions of pesos in revenues from the private company if CA Associate Justice Noel Tijam did not overturn the decision of the arbitration court.
“The lost revenues could easily translate to infrastructure projects, such as schools, hospitals, roads and a new landfill area, not to mention better health and social services for the people of the Cordilleras in particular, and the nation in general,” he said. But this could have been avoided
if Casanova accepted the company’s offer to pay rentals in 2011, C JHDevco C h a ir m a n Rober t John L. Sobrepeña said. “Had Casanova accepted CJHDevco’s offer to pay rentals in 2011 per restructuring agreement instead of rejecting it without even entertaining said CJHDevco’s written proposal, then BCDA would have made over P5 billion in rentals and Baguio City would have had their 25-percent share, as well,” he said. W h at C J H D e vco re qu i re d from the government was an assurance on development permits, he added. “But, instead, Casanova refused to give the permits guarantee to CJHDevco and rejected said proposal and demanded CJHDevco to pay P3.3 billion without honoring the restructured agreement,” Sobrepeña explained. He added: “It is entirely the fault
of Mr. Casanova for the BCDA losing billions of pesos. It was the decision of the arbitral tribunal, which the BCDA agreed to in court, to cancel their P3.3-billion rentals and refund over P1.42 billion to CJHDevco.” To recall, Tijam, in a 67-page decision, modified the ruling of the arbitration court requiring the private company to deliver the leased property to the state-run disposition agency as dependent on BCDA’s payment of P1.4 billion. Due to the decision of the appellate court, the BCDA, which was supposed to recover all new construction and permanent improvements as stated in the final award, will get nothing. The court also ruled that sublessees should not be evicted, contrary to the pronouncement of CJHDevco that its contractual relationship with the so-called third parties was a sublease.
PHL rises 17 notches in 2015 Global Innovation Index. . .
output pillars. The two indices reflect the regulations the economy has in enabling innovation, and the actual evidence of innovation, respectively. The GII 2015 finds that a wellcoordinated innovation policy plan with clear targets and a matching in-
stitutional setup have proven to be a “tool for success.” GII analysis shows that increasing business sophistication—business linkages to science and its institutions, foreign subsidiaries, and the recruitment of scientists—is often the single biggest challenge in
developing economies. The report noted that an underexplored area in many developing countries is steering innovation and research to context-specific solutions, which may not produce frontier technologies or comprise part of existing global value
Continued from A1
chains, but which offer solutions to local challenges. Copublished by Cornell University, WIPO and graduate business school INSEAD, the 2015 GII ranked the innovation per formance of 144 economies.
news@businessmirror.com.ph
Priority bills. . .
Continued from A1
attention,” she added. The Palace deputy spokesman asserted that Malacañang also expects Congress to give priority to the passage of the proposed P3trillion 2016 national budget, the Bangsamoro basic law (BBL) and, as cited by Presisdent Aquino himself, the RFI. Valte acknowledged there are a number of bills endorsed for congressional approval by the Aquino administration. “But whether it will be passed within this Congress or the next is something that we cannot answer. That will be mainly up to our legislators, considering they have many other priority bills right now because we are in the budget season. There is also the ongoing deliberations for the BBL, as well as other proposed bills,” she said, including a number of “priority pieces of legislation mentioned by the President, such as the RFI bill and a number of other legislative priorities also from the President.” Malacañang earlier said it al-
Rate-rise liftoff. . . The central bank governor of Indonesia, Southeast Asia’s largest economy, opined that his US counterpart Janet Yellen was unlikely to oversee a rate rise this year. The Federal Open Market Committee’s statement was quite dovish, and the Fed panel may not even raise its benchmark next year, Governor Agus Martowardojo told reporters in Jakarta. For her part, Yellen said in the post-decision media briefing that the committee still did anticipate lifting the main rate by year-end. She also said emerging-market concerns, particularly with regard to China, had influenced
ready moved to reconcile the Department of Finance’s (DOF) and the Department of Trade and Industry’s (DTI) reported conflicting positions on the RFI bill. “The DTI and DOF are working with Congress to ensure timely enactment of this vital legislation,” Communications Secretary Herminio B. Coloma Jr. said on Thursday, allaying concerns that the RFI’s early passage may be derailed due to the DOF-DTI row. It was earlier reported that finance and trade officials were locked in disagreements over the impact of the measure on their respective agencies, with the DOF tasked to raise more revenues, while the DTI is enticing investors by offering tax privileges. Coloma confirmed that Trade Secretary Gregory L. Domingo is close to finishing DTI’s review of the reconciled version of the administration measure. “According to Secretary Domingo, vetting of the [RFI] bill is in the final stages of completion,” Coloma told the BusinessMirror.
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the decision on Thursday. South Korean officials used their typical language when addressing overseas developments— the central bank said it would closely monitor Fed policy. Governor Amando M. Tetangco Jr. said his Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas would also be keeping an eye on how markets digested the Fed call. The Philippines would also monitor the impact of portfolio flows on domestic liquidity and evaluate new inflation forecasts “to see if there is a need to fine-tune policy levers or communication,” he said in a mobile-phone message. Bloomberg News
Editor: Gerard S. Ramos • lifestylebusinessmirror@gmail.com
Life
BusinessMirror
Saturday, September 19, 2015
A7
Education for real life something like life ma. stella f. arnaldo
http://stella-arnaldo.blogspot.com @Pulitika2010
You’re making me fat! (Who’s responsible for ‘love chub’?)
T
EACHING is one of the toughest professions but also the most noble. When a person has the gift of shaping the lives and thinking of the youth, it is indeed God-sent. And it should be encouraged. It worries me to no end that our youth are running out of well-educated, professional and committed educators. Teachers aren’t exactly the highest paid professionals—although I think they should be—and understandably, they are tempted by betterpaying jobs abroad. We’re all too familiar with stories of teachers who have gone to Hong Kong and worked as domestic helpers because of the higher salaries they receive. Fortunately, there is Teach for the Philippines (bit.ly/1YcEAOa), a nonprofit social enterprise founded in 2012 that enlists young leaders to teach for two years in public schools around the country. At present, the organization has 86 teacher fellows assigned to 23 schools in eight local government units— Quezon City, Marikina, Mandaluyong, Navotas, Biñan and Santa Rosa in Laguna, Cagayan de Oro in Misamis Oriental and Del Carmen in Siargao, Surigao del Norte. These teachers are not volunteers but actual paid employees of the organization with a salary equivalent to that of Teacher 1 in public schools. In partnership with Coca-Cola Femsa Philippines, Teach for the Philippines also implements the Coordinates for Life (CFL) education program. CFL is a series of training modules for children and young adults to develop and strengthen their decision-making skills, as well as decrease their vulnerability when faced with difficult situations. The program also provides training support for parents, teachers and mentors through lectures and workshops so they can be better equipped to participate more actively in the child’s holistic development as they go through various stages in life. The program is designed around 16 life skills, such as assertiveness, empathy, understanding consequences, peer pressure, and anger and stress management. Aside from imparting decision-making skills, CFL also aims to promote better communication and self-awareness. Ohne Lopez, a Grade 5 English teacher of Kapitbahayan Elementary School in DagatDagatan, Navotas, explains that some of the issues facing public school students these days include “bullying, peer pressure, dishonesty, violence, trauma, family issues, indifference ’pag dating sa academics and discouragement…. Ang bata-bata pa nila, stressed na sila.” Through the CFL workshops, explains another teacher, Jerlyn Rabaca, the students
“can voice out their concerns, ’yung mga inhibitions nila sa buhay na familiar sa kanila, alam nilang nararanasan nila every day, but they don’t know kung ‘Ano nga ba itong ginagawa ko? Tama pa ba ’yung actions ko?’ We want also to help the parents, the teachers and the kids to understand what they are doing in everyday life.” Using games, art projects and interactive guides, the children learn values, the importance of teamwork, how to reach out and ask for help, and foster good relations with others. Rabaca says in one of the workshops, the children just play various games. “But in the end, doon nila mari-realize na ‘Meron pala akong dadatingan.’ In one game, they learn that they can work as a group, na minsan, kailangan din nating magbigay. Hindi lagi sa sarili natin. Hindi naman sa akin nakaikot ’yung mundo. So we have a team.... It’s a very big world na kung ikaw lang ang mag-isa, hindi mo kakayanin. So dito sa workshop na ’to, tinuturuan namin sila how to deal with other people.” Lopez stresses that CFL is also open to “educators” which include the students’ parents aside from the teachers. Through CFL the parents and teachers are able to touch base, ask each other “kumusta ka na?” and talk about their concerns. “Isa sa mga pinakamagandang topics ng educators’ workshop ay favorite ng mga teachers: stress and conflict management. Stress, kasi for obvious reasons, and conflict kasi hindi maiiwasan ang pagaaway-away lalo na ’pag tumatanda mas mahirap na mag-patch up ng things, ’di ba, kasi ’yung pride natin. So stress and conflict management are two topics that really struck all of us CFL participants. It’s not only for one’s physical health, but also for our mental and emotional health.” After inking the Coke and Teach partnership in 2013, CFL was rolled out to 15 public schools in Metro Manila in 2014. On its first year of implementation, the program was received by 2,178 elementary students and 304 parents and teachers. Clarissa Delgado, CEO of Teach for the Philippines, said: “We’ve had very promising results during our pilot year.” Feedback from the parents and teachers show that some of the most disruptive and undisciplined students exhibited improvements in their behavior and attitude in the first year after the implementation of the workshops. There was also an improvement in the students’ performance in school and in their relationships with their family and peers. Parents also
By Emily G. W. Chau Fitbie.com
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Teachers Jerlyn Rabaca (from left), Nico Fos and Ohne Lopez with their students under the Coordinates for Life Program
Cofounder and CEO of Teach for the Philippines, Clarissa Delgado (left) and Juan Dominguez, corporate affairs director for Coca-Cola Femsa Asia Division renew their partnership for the Coordinates for Life education program
expressed appreciation for the workshops as a safe place for them to share their concerns and receive feedback and advice from other parents, she noted. For his part, Juan Dominguez, corporate affairs director for Coca-Cola Femsa Asia, said: “In the first year of our partnership, we focused our efforts on customizing the workshops and educational materials so that it applies to the Philippine context, since this was a program that was developed in Mexico and primarily implemented in Latin America.” Because of the positive reception from the students and teaching community for CFL, Coke and Teach recently renewed their partnership to expand the program’s reach to more Filipino students. “We have seen the potential impact of Coordinates for Life and are excited to bring this to even more schools and more Filipino communities,” Dominguez enthused.
He said the bottler will be investing another P10 million over the next two years for its CFL program with Teach. The next phase of the program will be implemented in 20 public schools in Metro Manila and Mindanao. “With the right skills and values, students can create a better life for themselves and those around them,” Delgado stressed. “As the fellows of Teach for the Philippines grow in number, so will the opportunities for more schools to benefit from the CFL program.” Coca-Cola Femsa is the largest franchise bottler of Coca-Cola products in the world. n Interested in committing two years of your life to mold the minds and values of our youth? Contact Teach for the Philippines at 808-8837 or admissions@teachforthephilippines.org. If you wish to support the teacher fellows, visit bit.ly/ChampionsUnite.
e’re not about to point fingers, but since you asked, yes, your partner could be behind those extra pounds. Instead of exchanging chocolates on red-letter days, exchange a vow to get healthy together. Below are eight ways your partner could be helping you pack on the pounds. Plus, some smart strategies to keep love chub at bay. He: Considers French Fries a Vegetable n Ask him to toss on some peppers and asparagus on to the grill or keep a bag of baby carrots on hand. She: Always Orders Dessert n The next time she asks if you want to go halfsies on the tiramisu, try suggesting a scoop of the sorbet instead. He: Always Super Sizes His Meal n Instead of falling into the portion distortion trap, gauge your hunger on internal, not visual, cues. n Let your food digest for about 20 minutes, and ask yourself if you’re really hungry before going up for another serving. She: Is a Stickler for Dinner Dates n Think about changing up your traditional Friday night plans with a round of bowling or a walk in the park. n Variation isn’t just good for your body; it can also rekindle feelings of adventure and romance if you’ve fallen into a rut. He: Has Domino’s on Speed Dial n If your husband is grabbing dinner for the two of you, handle the order yourself. n You can tell the restaurant to hold the mayo or ask for your salad dressing to come on the side. n For a low-prep nutritional boost, keep a bag of frozen vegetables ready to supplement your takeout. She: Wants to “Split” Everything n The calories in half portions can add up quickly, so it’s just as important to consider the calories in her tapas free-for-all before you indulge in a large entree. He: Cracks Open a Beer—Or Four—While Watching the Game n On game day, remember that the usual drinking rules hold true: moderation equals one drink for women, two for men. She: Snacks All Afternoon n If you are struck by an afternoon craving, lay off her snack packs and instead create your own mini-meal. n The perfect snack should be part protein, part carbohydrate, so opt for power combos, such as an apple with peanut butter or string cheese with whole-wheat crackers.
Brother Industries inks ‘cooperation’ pact with PHL govt J apanese-owned manufacturing firm Brother Industries Ltd. recently signed an agreement with the Philippine government, whereby the company promises to cooperate with the latter in growing its business, while positively contributing to the country’s economic growth. Brother Industries President Terry Koike penned the agreement during the recent state visit of President Aquino and key Cabinet members in Japan, where Koike was among the executives of Japanese manufacturing firms who met with the Philippine delegation. Koike said, “It is important for Brother to strengthen trust relationships with the Philippine government, which provides necessary support for businesses like ours to thrive. In the same way, it is also vital for the government to generate significant jobs
and revenues from industries.” During the meeting, Koike requested the Philippine government—also represented by Philippine Economic Zone Authority Director General Lilia B. de Lima, Trade Secretary Gregory L. Domingo, and Secretary to the Cabinet Jose Rene Almendras—to further improve infrastructure and human-resource skills training in the country. More specifically, Koike emphasized the need for the Philippine government to build key infrastructures, like roads and ports, and to strengthen the foundation for developing engineers specialized in mold design and automation, among other skills needed by the industry. President Aquino’s team had, in turn, assured Koike that budget allocation for improving infrastructure has been
Trade Secretary Gregory L. Domingo (from left), Philippine Economic Zone Authority Director General Lilia B. de Lima, President Aquino, Brother Industries President Terry Koike and Secretary to the Cabinet Office Jose Rene Almendras
significantly increased, and that a second highway between Manila and Batangas will be built to improve access to ports. Mr. Aquino, who was the guest of honor in August 2013 at the opening ceremony for Brother Industries’s new manufacturing plant in Batangas, also praised the company for its growth. After two years since it started operations in the country, the number of Brother Industries Philippines manpower complement has grown markedly during Fiscal Year 2015. Koike said, “I have been calling on all of our employees to contribute toward the company’s growth, hoping that our sales and production in the Philippines will increase steadily, and that Brother can truly contribute to Philippine society.”
Sports BusinessMirror
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aturday, September 19, 2015 mirror_sports@yahoo.com.ph sports@businessmirror.com.ph Editor: Jun Lomibao
RIGHT ON COURSE Miguel Tabuena rattled off three straight birdies from No. 1 against Jhonnel Ababa’s lone birdie, then knocked down a pair of 7-footers on Nos. 6 and 8 for a sizzling 31, turning the Luisita Golf and Country Club into a virtual playground under preferred lies rule.
TABUENA
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IGUEL TABUENA put on a brilliant show of shotmaking, solid iron game and superb putting and came away with a bogey-free, eagle-spiked eightunder 64 to all but wrap up another championship—and perhaps the coveted Order of Merit (OOM) crown—on the tour. Clutching a shaky one-stroke lead over Jhonnel Ababa halfway through the Central Azucarera de Tarlac Open on Friday, Tabuena rattled off three straight birdies from No. 1 against Ababa’s lone birdie, then knocked down a pair of 7-footers on Nos. 6 and 8 for a sizzling 31, turning the Luisita Golf and Country Club into a virtual playground under preferred lies rule. With a 31 and two pars at the back, the 21-year-old ace shotmaker drove to the left side 5with a terrific 5-wood second shot from 236 yards to within 15 feet for eagle. He did slow down with one birdie in the last six holes but his 64 and a 17-under 199 put him eight shots ahead of Ababa, who carded a 71 for a 207, and 10 strokes up on American Micah Shin and local bet Zanieboy Gialon, who both shot 69s, and Dutch Guido Van der Valk, who turned in a 71, for 209s. The last 18 holes of the P2.5 millionchampionship could be a victory walk for the hottest player on the tour, who has primed himself up for a series of tournaments in Japan starting next week, along with absentee Angelo Que and Japan-based Juvic Pagunsan. “My game plan is to place safety shots off
the tee and make the most of my birdie chances,” said Tabuena, a three-leg winner who has been playing with a high level of confidence following his come-from-behind win over Tony Lascuña in Wack Wack last week. “But I’ve really been working hard on my game, trying to build some confidence and momentum for the Japan Tour,” said Tabuena, whose impending victory, barring any major disaster today, worth P450,000 will put him unassailably ahead in the OOM race with one tournament left at Sherwood next week. After 13 legs, Tabuena leads the money race with earnings of P2,601,917, with Lascuña dropping to second with P2,334,960. Que is closely behind at third with P2,272,131. Lascuña finally found his touch after a 71 and 75 but failed to sustain a hot 32 start with a bogey on the last hole, settling for a 69 for solo 13th at 215. Ababa failed to match Tabuena’s scorching start, picking up just two birdies in 15 holes before dropping a stroke on the par-5 16th for a 71, while van der Valk, playing in a featured threesome for the first time in a long while, also had a roller-coaster round of four birdies against three bogeys for a similar one-under card. Shin and Gialon rallied with a pair of 69s to tie van der Valk at third, while Jun Rates fought back with a 68 to join Keanu Jahns, who made a 71, at 211 followed by Jay Bayron, who charged back with a bogey-free 66, and Japanese amateur Yuto Katsuragawa, who birdied the last three holes for a 71, at 212s.
Arcilla conquers PCA’s clay court, bundles out unseeded Obdina
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OHNNY ARCILLA scored an easy 8-2 victory over Laurence Joy Obdina on Friday to make his presence felt even stronger in the 34th Philippine Columbian Association (PCA) OpenCebuana Lhuillier Wildcard Event at the PCA clay courts in Paco, Manila. But the new clay surface of the PCA also gave discomfort to the losing finalist last year. “Almost all of us are adjusting to the surface, it’s tough and slippery,” the 35-year-old Arcilla said. The PCA was a shell court for decades. Patrick John Tierro, Arcilla’s tormentor last
KYLE PARPAN is all concentration. NONIE REYES
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Day never been better, builds big lead in Illinois
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AKE FOREST, Illinois—Jason Day already had seven birdies on his card and one eagle, courtesy of a shot he holed from 79 yards out of a fairway bunker. He was walking across a bridge on Thursday at the BMW Championship when someone asked him during an exchange of greetings, “How are you doing, Jason?” Jordan Spieth was a few steps ahead of Day, and he could hardly contain his laughter. “Really? You’re asking him THAT?” Spieth said. Day has never been better. He powered his way around Conway Farms and was at 10-under par through 17 holes when thunderstorms halted the opening round. His final shot was a 346yard tee shot with the wind at his back that settled in light rough and left him 44 yards away from a front pin on No. 9. Day has to hole that Friday morning for a 59. And he didn’t even know it. “I thought it was a par 72, so I’m sitting there going, ‘10 under, there’s no chance at all I can get it.’ But if it goes in, it goes in,” he said. “Right now, I’m just trying to play the best I can. I’m just trying to get off to a good start.” He is playing better than anyone at the moment, a winner in three of his last five tournaments, including his first major. A victory in the third FedEx Cup playoff event would send him to No. 1 in the world for the first time, and not many would argue with that. Day was four shots ahead of Professional Golfers’ Association Tour rookie Daniel Berger, who had a six-under 65. Brendon Todd had a 66. Only 17 players completed the opening round. Spieth finally got on track. Coming off consecutive missed cuts that eventually cost him the No. 1 ranking, he had a holein-one on the par-3 second hole to end a peculiar drought. It was the first time in 72 holes that he was under par during any round in a tournament. And then he chipped in from 80 feet for birdie on the next hole. AP
year, looked to have the clay surface all figured out and shut out newcomer Ken Philip Paradela never, 8-0, in the event supported by Cebuana Lhuillier, Puma, Dunlop, Head, Babolat, Compass/ IMOSTI and Sarangani Rep. Manny Pacquiao. Fifth seed Rolando Ruel Jr. was also unstoppable against Hans Asistio, 8-1, and joined Tierro, as well as ninth pick Marc Reyes and No. 15 Arcie Mano, who scored 8-1 victories over Bernardine Siso and Jason Timbal, respectively, in the third round. Third pick Elbert Anasta, No. 4 Alberto
Lim Jr., No. 8 Ronard Joven and No. 12 Roel Capangpangan also advanced. Anasta trounced Jomari Guira, 8-2, while Lim prevailed over Rey Mayo, 8-1. Joven struggled at first but was able to pull through against Dave Mosqueda, 8-5. Capangpangan defeated Joshua Kinaadman, 8-4. Other first-round winners were Joel Atienza against Bernanlou Bering (8-5), Dheo Talatayod versus Jeric de los Santos (8-7), Argil Lance Canizares over Raymund Malapitan (8-0) and Arjohn de la Cruz versus Larius Laforteza (8-4).
TIGERS EYE NO. 4
LADY BULLDOGS HANDS FULL VS LADY EAGLES ATIONAL University (NU) sets out for another crack at the Shakey’s V-League crown, hopeful of emerging on the winner’s podium after a shutout loss the last time out. The Lady Bulldogs actually nailed their first V-League plum two seasons ago, when they edged the Ateneo Lady Eagles, 3-1, in sudden death, only to be swept by the Far Eastern University (FEU) Lady Tamaraws in last year’s title playoffs. But for NU Coach Roger Gorayeb, bringing the school back to the finals of the league sponsored by Shakey’s, already makes them feel like champions. “Our target is to make the finals. Now that we’re here, we already feel like champions. Winning it altogether would be a bonus,” Gorayeb said. University of Santo Tomas and FEU, meanwhile, start their own best-of-three series for third onSaturday, also starting at 12:45 p.m. to be aired live on GMA News TV Channel 11, according to the organizing Sports Vision. The Spikers’ Turf also begins its series for third with National College of Business and Arts and Emilio Aguinaldo College clashing in their side of the opener starting at 3 p.m. on Saturday. Winning it all would entail a lot of hard work, determination and patience, especially against a team as fancied as Ateneo. Gorayeb, however, said they only have to stymie one player to fuel their championship drive in the event presented by PLDT Home Ultera. “Ateneo is strong because of Alyssa,” said Gorayeb, who also handled Valdez and Ateneo in the past before moving back to NU. “She packs so much power and has matured a lot that she can carry a team to a championship.” Still, he remains upbeat of their chances and hopes to surprise the Lady Eagles with a superb all-around game when Game One of the best-of-three title series is fired off on Sunday at 12:45 p.m. at The Arena in San Juan.
Day
TAIWANESE RIP PETRON GALS
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ETRON suffered another disappointing setback, this time at the hands of Taiwan Power of Chinese Taipei, 25-20, 25-16, 25-9, in the quarterfinals of the 2015 Asian Volleyball Confederation Asian Women’s Club Volleyball Championship on Friday at the Ha Nam Competition Hall in Phu Ly, Vietnam. The Blaze Spikers were simply overpowered throughout the one-hour and seven-minute battle, as the Taiwanese paraded the core of their national team to grab the first semifinal seat in the tournament serving as qualifier for the International Volleyball Federation World Women’s Club Championship next year. Taiwan Power will be joining the winners between Bangkok Glass of Thailand and 4.25 Sports Club of North Korea, Hisamitsu Springs of Japan and Zhetyssu of Kazakhstan, and Zhejiang of China and Thong Tin
Lietvietpost Bank of the host country in the semifinals. Petron, on the other hand, kissed its championship hopes good-bye and was relegated to the battle for fifth to ninth places. It will face the loser of the Kazakstan and Japan duel in the classification match at 5 p.m. on Saturday. No one from Petron emerged with a double-digit performance, with Aby Maraño, Rachel Anne Daquis and Dindin Manabat delivering seven points apiece. Brazilian reinforcement Rupia Inck Furtado added six markers, while Erica Adachi had 44 of the team’s 49 excellent sets. “We ran against a strong and powerful team,” said Petron Coach George Pascua, who said his other objective in the tournament is to prepare the team for the Philippine Superliga Grand Prix which starts on October 10 at the Alonte Sports Arena in Biñan, Laguna.
Mapua, Perpetual Help prevail M
APUA continued to play the spoiler’s role, this time scalping Arellano University, 81-76, to remain unbeaten in the second round of the 91st National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) seniors basketball tournament on Friday at the Filoil Flying V Arena in San Juan City. The Cardinals used a 17-4 spurt at the start of the fourth quarter to break the backs of the Chiefs. Allwell Oraeme, Justin Serrano, Mark Braña and JP Nieles combined for 24 points in the fourth quarter to propel Mapua to its 10th win in 15 games to tie Arellano University at fourth place in the standings. Oraeme led the Intramuros-based team with 30 rebounds he laced with 15. Exeqiel Biteng pumped in 15 points, while Serrano and Braña had 14 and 11, respectively, for the Cardinals. Rookie guard Michael Salado led Arellano University with 17 points, while Jio Jalalon added 16 points with 11 rebounds and six assists. Mapua Assistant Coach Ed Cordero called the shots for Mapua in lieu of Atoy Co, who served the second of his twogame suspension. “This team is mostly [made up of] rookies and sophomores, and they are just delivering. They are not playing
like rookies and sophomores, and they have all that confidence with Allwell [Oraeme] with that kind of intensity,” Cordero said. Earl Scottie Thompson, meanwhile, recorded his sixth triple-double of the season to lead University of Perpetual Help past College of Saint Benilde in a lopsided contest, 70-47. Thompson, the reigning Most Valuable Player, wound up with 21 points, 10 rebounds and 10 assists to pace the Altas (10-4). Diego de la Paz
» MAPUA’S Allwell
Oraeme and Mark Braña, and Adamson University’s Dioncee Holts and Allen Enriquez box each other out for the rebound. KEVIN DE LA CRUZ
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NIVERSITY of Santo Tomas (UST) braces for another tough challenge as it stakes its unbeaten slate against winless National University (NU) in the main game of Season 78 University Athletic Association of the Philippines (UAAP) men’s basketball action on Saturday at the Mall of Asia Arena. The league-leading Growling Tigers (3-0) meet the skidding Bulldogs (0-3) at 4 p.m., while University of the East (UE) and Ateneo de Manila eye their third straight win when they face off at 2 p.m.
UST Head Coach Bong de la Cruz expects NU to come out strong as the defending champions have yet to score a victory after three games. “Babawi sila for sure. They are the defending champions. Pride nila ang nakataya kaya they will go for the win,” said de la Cruz, whose team is coming off a week’s rest after beating season host University of the Philippines, 67-59, last weekend to grab the solo lead. Veterans Ed Daquiaog and Kevin Ferrer have been providing stability for the Growling Tigers, while Karim Abdul is slowly returning to his usual fiery form. The Bulldogs, off to their worst start since Eric Altamirano became their coach in Season 74, are hurting from a heartbreaking 70-74 double-overtime loss to the Blue Eagles. But Altamirano is seeing improvements in their game. “We are playing better defense compared to our previous two games. We just have to continue working hard and stay positive,” Altamirano said. The Red Warriors and the Blue Eagles, meanwhile, enter the match with a two-game winning streak each. UE downed Adamson University, 89-78, in its previous match, while Ateneo shocked NU in the double-overtime thriller behind the exploits of reigning Most Valuable Player Kiefer Ravena and Nigerian Chibueze Ikeh. Standings: UST 3-0; FEU 2-1, UP 2-1, UE 2-1, Ateneo 2-1, DLSU 1-2, NU 0-3, Adamson 0-3. Joel Orellana