the standard - 2015 november 23 - monday

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VOL. XXIX � NO. 284 � 3 Sections 32 Pages P18 � MONday : NOVEMBER 23, 2015 � www.thestandard.com.ph � [email protected]

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‘Make fast,Apec-styleInternetavailable’

Only 40 of48,000 votegadgets inby January

PNoy: World watching China’s behavior

DUTERTE ENTRY‘CHANGES GAME’

18th Summit. President Benigno Aquino III listens to the discussions during the 18th Asean-Japan Summit in Kuala Lumpur on Sunday. Malacañang Photo Bureau

PRESIDENT Benigno Aquino III told an Asia-Pacific summit on Sunday that “the world is watching” whether China would behave as a responsible power in the simmering standoff over maritime territory.

Aquino kept up a drumbeat of grow-ing criticism of China’s expansion of tiny atolls into fully fledged islands, as

leaders including Chinese Premier Li Keqiang met in Malaysia.

The issue has increasingly loomed over the regional diplomatic and se-curity outlook, with China accused of upsetting the status quo by moving to enhance its presence in the South China Sea.

“We are hopeful that China would

honor its word and respect the rule of law,” Aquino said, according to a copy of his address to the 18-country East Asia Summit in Kuala Lumpur.

Aquino’s comment referred spe-cifically to a dispute with China over maritime territory, which Manila is bringing before an international court.

By christine F. herrera, Joyce Pangco Pañares and Macon ramos-araneta

THE entry of Davao City May-or Rodrigo Duterte into the 2016 presidential race is a game changer as he is likely to take votes away from Liberal Party standard bearer Manuel Roxas II and hurt survey frontrunner Senator Grace Poe, political ana-lysts said Sunday.

“He is a game changer, not in the sense that he will be the frontrunner. Nor will he likely change the top one and top two posts held by Senator Grace Poe and Vice Presi-dent Jejomar Binay,” said Ramon Casiple, executive director of the Institute for Politi-cal and Electoral Reform.

“He is a game changer because the votes will now be spread around and one candi-date will lose votes more than the others. And it is Mar [Roxas] who will really suffer from this development. In previous surveys, Roxas was in the third spot while Duterte was in the fourth. If Duterte performs well, he can easily dislodge Mar for the third spot,” he added.

Casiple said Roxas’ bailiwick—the Visa-

yas—will likely go for Duterte, who is also very popular among Mindanao-based voters.

But Casiple said it is unlikely for Duterte to dislodge Poe because she is already “too high” in recent surveys.

“Even if she loses some votes to Duterte, I think she will still be the frontrunner,” he said.

Antonio Contreras, the political science professor from De La Salle University who filed a disqualification case against Poe be-fore the Commission on Elections, said Du-terte’s entry could also change the votes in the Senate Electoral Tribunal that recently dismissed a separate petition filed by Riza-lito David to oust her from the Senate on questions about her citizenship.

In the SET, Senator Pia Cayetano, the sis-ter of vice presidential candidate Alan Peter Cayetano, had voted with the 5-4 majority to dismiss the disqualification petition.

But Contreras said Duterte’s decision could spur Pia Cayetano to change her vote, since Duterte could choose her brother as his running mate.

In fact, he said, the Cayetano siblings had earlier gone to Davao City to convince Du-terte to run for President.

Over the weekend, Duterte said he would run for President because he was angered by the SET decision that said Poe, a foundling, was a natural-born citizen and therefore qualified to sit as a senator and to seek the presidency. Next page

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EU-style economic bloc for Asean soon

“The world is watching and expects no less from a responsible global leader,” Aquino said.

Beijing has vowed not to take part in the case, saying the Permanent Court of Arbitra-tion in The Hague has no juris-diction over a matter concern-ing Chinese sovereignty.

Heads of government from 18 countries including the United States, China, India, Russia, Japan and nations in Southeast Asia are meet-ing for the annual East Asia summit, this year hosted by Malaysia.

A Philippine diplomat confirmed Aquino made the comments in the closed-door meeting.

The Kuala Lumpur diplo-matic and political meetings follow a trade-related forum in Manila earlier in the week that included many of the same leaders.

The maritime issue has become the stage for a big-power confrontation between China and the United States, which warns that Beijing’s ac-tions could threaten freedom of navigation.

US President Barack Obama, who also attended both summits this week, has called on China to halt its land reclamation.

China has declared own-ership of virtually all of the South China Sea, conflicting with the various claims of Vi-etnam, Malaysia, the Philip-pines, Taiwan and Brunei.

The Philippines has been the most vocal in challenging China.

Aquino said Beijing’s is-land reclamation was “in to-tal disregard of international law” and its assertiveness had “come to a point wherein we are now no longer allowed to enter areas within our Exclu-sive Economic Zone.”

Manila insists the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, which the Philippines and China have both ratified, should be used to settle the bitter row.

“The great equalizer is the rule of law. Under the rule of law, right prevails over might,” he told his fellow leaders.

The annual season of sum-mitry has so far been domi-nated by expressions of con-cern and calls for action over the extremist attacks in Paris and Mali, and bombings in Lebanon.

Sunday’s gathering brings China to the same table as rival claimants to the South China Sea, plus Obama.

China’s island-building is aimed at reinforcing its toe-hold in the strategic sea but has sparked concern of a Chi-nese territorial grab.

Obama met Saturday with counterparts from the As-sociation of Southeast Asian Nations and they issued a joint statement stressing the need to maintain freedom of navigation and over-flight rights in the South China Sea.

Obama also backed Asean’s calls for progress with China on agreeing on a code of conduct at sea to pre-vent conflict.

China has been accused of

dragging its feet on the code—which could limit its freedom of action at sea—while it works to turn its disputed claims into a fait accomplit.

“For the sake of regional stability, claimants should halt reclamation, new con-struction, and militarization of disputed areas,” Obama said Saturday.

Washington has repeat-edly warned that traffic through the South China Sea, a key conduit for world trade, could be threatened by China’s moves.

It recently sent US naval vessels to the region to stress the right to free passage, a move that angered Beijing.

China insists on sover-eignty over virtually all the resource-endowed South China Sea, which is also claimed in part by a handful of other countries.

Southeast Asian foreign ministers who met Friday in Kuala Lumpur issued a joint statement saying they were “seriously concerned” over the land reclamation.

Malacañang said Sunday the Philippines is confident it will win its arbitration case in the Arbitral Tribunal of the Permanent Court of Arbitra-tion in The Hague filed against China over territorial disputes in the South China Sea.

“We have anticipated all angles and, again, are we con-fident? Yes, we are confident that we can present a very good case before the arbitral tribunal, and we certainly hope that the jurors will see it our way,” said Edwin Laci-erda, the President’s spokes-man, during an interview over state-run radio station dzRB.

“You know, we studied the case. Before we filed it, we studied already the case. We studied our claims in the light of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea,” Lacierda said.

“We have seen the initial response of the tribunal with respect to the issue of juris-diction. Our lawyers have prepared for this. We are now in the phase where we are go-ing to discuss the merits of the petition itself. Our lawyers have studied it very thoroughly from all angles,” Lacierda said.

Also on Sunday, the Armed Forces said it saw nothing wrong with the plan of retired Marine Capt. Ni-canor Faeldon to sail to the Kalayaan Island Group with at least 10,000 youth volun-teers by Nov. 30.

AFP spokesman Col. Res-tituto Padilla said the pro-posed caravan “Kalayaan Atin Ito” only shows the pa-triotic fervor of the volunteers who have decided to join the former Marine officer.

He also said that the sail-ing has no implication on the ongoing territorial dispute between the country and China over some areas of the West Philippine Sea.

“Demonstration of patriotism is not prohibited. We are thankful that some of our citizenry are showing their patriotic fervor and civic-mindedness. It goes to show that a lot of our youth are still concerned with events ongoing in the country,” Padilla said in Filipino. Sandy Araneta, AFP, PNA

At the group’s annual sum-mit, held this year in Kuala Lumpur, the heads of the As-sociation of Southeast Asian Nations signed a declara-tion that the bloc hailed as “a milestone in the integration process.”

The 10 leaders then put an aural exclamation mark on the agreement by bang-ing once in unison on a tra-ditional drum from each of their nations.

However, diplomats have admitted Sunday’s declara-tion has no practical effect, and was largely meant to avoid having Asean—regu-larly criticized for its lack of concrete achievements—miss its own deadline of 2015.

Several years ago, Asean set a 2015 target for launch-ing the Asean Economic Community, a single mar-ket with a free f low of goods, capital and skilled

labor across borders.The summit’s host, Ma-

laysian Prime Minister Najib Razak, urged his counter-parts to step up efforts to re-alize a vision that many ex-perts view as difficult, if not impossible, to achieve.

“We now have to ensure that we truly create a sin-gle market and production base with freer movement of goods and services with com-mon standards, far greater connectivity and removal of barriers,” Najib said.

Achievement of that vision will cause foreign investment in the region to “expand ex-ponentially.”

The AEC is aimed at mar-shaling the combined eco-nomic force of a resource-rich and growing market of more than 600 million people to enhance its trading clout and help it compete with the likes of China for foreign in-

SOUTHEAST Asian leaders on Sunday symbolically declared the establishment by year-end of an EU-style regional economic bloc, but diplomats admitted it will be years before the vision of a single market can be realized.

vestment.Great progress has been

made on lower-hanging fruit like slashing tariffs and re-moving other hurdles such as clashing customs systems.

But significant non-tariff and other barriers remain in a region marked by extremes in development levels, de-mocratization, and institu-tional capability.

A Southeast Asian dip-lomat conceded the single market vision is many years away but argued the declara-tion will help change Asean’s “mental map” and provide momentum.

“We hope this will help the people and governments to think more and more on the basis of regional interests rather than purely national interests,” the diplomat said.

Asean includes wealthy Singapore, one of the world’s most developed countries, oil-rich Brunei, developing states like Malaysia, Indone-sia, Thailand, the Philippines and Vietnam, and poorer nations like Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar.

Its members range from free-wheeling to controlled democracies, communist-ruled states and an absolute Islamic monarchy.

Najib on Saturday ac-knowledged much work re-mained, saying “non-tariff barriers, which affect daily life and employment across our nations, are too exten-sive.”

Although Asean’s plans were inspired by Europe, officials insist they want to pursue integration in a way suitable to the region’s cir-cumstances, and have ruled out a common currency.

US President Barack Obama, who was in Kuala Lumpur for a Sunday sum-mit of Asean and regional partners such as China, Ja-pan and India, praised the AEC and pledged American support.

Speaking Saturday, he called the declaration a “ma-jor step toward integrating economies and greater re-gional stability.”

During the summit, New Zealand said it would invest NZ$200 million in Asean over the next three years, fo-cusing on capacity building for people in the region.

Prime Minister John Key said the country’s formal re-lationship with Asean would be upgraded from a compre-hensive partnership to a stra-tegic one. AFP, PNA

“I cannot accept an American presi-dent,” Duterte said, referring to Poe, who had once renounced her Philippine citi-zenship to become an American citizen.

Senatorial candidate Leyte Rep. Fer-dinand Martin Romualdez, and other House leaders welcomed Duterte’s change of heart.

On Saturday, Duterte announced at the Iloilo Convention Center before the Philippine Gastroentrologists Society that because the SET was “flaunting the Constitution,” his presidential candida-cy was “on the table.”

Later that evening, at a birthday party of his friend, lawyer Alfred Lim in Cav-ite, Duterte said he was definitely run-ning for President.

Romualdez said Duterte was a wel-come addition to the presidential race, saying he will be a good leader because of his “malasakit” (compassion).

“He will definitely add spice to the presidential contest and I believe Mayor Duterte will make a good President,” said Romualdez after the Davao City mayor confirmed he will run for Presi-dent next year.

“Mayor Duterte has been a good friend and is close to my heart.The Ta-clobanons appreciate the fact that the mayor immediately came to their rescue after the Super Typhoon ‘Yolanda’ flat-tened Tacloban City and several other areas in Eastern Visayas in November 2013,” Romualdez said.

“When he learned about the extent of Yolanda devastation in Tacloban, Du-terte immediately provided the much-needed help for the victims and survi-vors, such as engineers, medicine and relief packages,” Romualdez said.

The ruling Liberal Party and admin-istration allies welcomed Duterte’s an-nouncement, but said their standard bearer is “capable of waging a good and

clean battle to win the presidency.”“We welcome Mayor Duterte’s entry

to the presidential race, but we are not threatened,” said party-list Rep. Carol Jane Lopez of the You Against Corrup-tion and Poverty, a staunch Roxas ally. “One thing is for sure, we have our own brand and strong campaign message and platforms of government to sell, which are both anchored on the conti-nuity of the straight path. Secretary Mar remains formidable and strong and the most qualified... among the presidential candidates. It’s a democratic country and everybody has the right to seek the presi-dency for as long they are qualified.’’

Davao City Rep. Karlo Alexie Nog-rales, a stalwart of the National Unity Party, endorsed the presidential bid of Duterte, who may team up with Cayetano of the Nacionalista Party.

Nograles said the country needs a strong leader with an iron fist to imple-ment the full force of the law.

“I am one with the people of Davao and the entire nation in supporting Mayor Rody Duterte for President. In times like these where peace and order are sorely lacking in the country and we are facing terrorism within and outside our shores, where injustice prevails and the rule of law is set aside at the whims and caprices of the powerful, we need a leader who is decisive...who wields an iron-fist against transgressors of the law, but cares for the downtrodden and the victims, who is swift to act and results-oriented, one who comes from the Fili-pino masses and whose heart belongs to them. We need Rody Duterte to lead us to a better Philippines and a more peace-ful future for all Filipinos to share,” Nog-rales said.

Quezon Rep. Mark Enverga, a stal-wart of the Nationalist People’s Coali-tion, which is believed to be supporting the tandem of Senators Grace Poe and Francis Escudero, agreed that Duterte would be a welcome addition to the pres-idential race.

“We hope to hear his platforms of gov-ernment if he does finally decide to run for President. But yet again, the NPC is still undergoing its deliberative and con-sultative process of selecting its choice for the presidency in 2016 to support,” he said.

The Davao City mayor is being seen as a substitute presidential candidate of the Partido Demoktratiko Pilipino-Lakas ng Bayan to which he belongs, after his party mate Martin Diño withdrew his certificate of candidacy for President.

Earlier, Senator Aquilino Pimentel III, president of the PDP-Laban, said Duterte is not obliged to run in next year’s presidential polls despite the party’s designation of him as a substi-tute candidate for President based on a resolution approved by the party’s na-tional council.

Pimentel said members of the PDP-Laban would not force Duterte to run though they want them him to join the presidential race.

Duterte has up to Dec. 10 to file his CoC for President.

Also on Sunday, Escudero slammed Duterte for attacking Poe.

“Mayor Duterte does not need to hit Senator Grace and use the decision of the SET in her favor as an excuse to run,” Escudero said.

“In fact, quite the contrary, an unfa-vorable decision against Senator Grace could have been a putatively better ex-cuse, according to some analysts,” he added.

Escudero, the running mate of Poe in the upcoming polls, issued the statement in the wake of Duterte’s pronounce-ments that Poe cannot run for President because she is not a natural-born Fili-pino citizen.

Reports quoted Duterte as saying that he was terribly disappointed with the decision of the nine-man tribunal that junked Poe’s disqualification case over question on her citizenship. With Rio N. Araja

PNoy: ...From A1

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VP thanksUS, Japanfor givingmilitary aid

Only 40 out of48,000 countinggadgets arriving

Poe: Make fast, Apec-likeInternet available for all

Know more about the 21 awardees in aSpecial pull-out Feature on November 29

Vision. Purpose. Passion.

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VISIONARY AWARDS

Straight path on zig-zag roads. The campaign posters of Liberal Party standard bearers Manuel Roxas II and Leni Robredo are all over Baguio City in violation of Comelec rules. DaviD Chan

VICE President Jejomar Binay thanked the United States and Japan on Sunday for promising to donate military equipment to the Philippines to boost its defense capability.

“They promised to give us ships, so thanks to Japan and America,’’ Binay told reporters in Batangas.

He said he would always be open to dealing with countries based on what was best for the Philippines.

“We will always deal and be an ally of countries based on what’s best for our interest,” Bi-nay said.

“Whatever decision a coun-try makes vis-a vis another country, we’ll insert our inter-est. As a President, I will also be saying that we will deal with any country that will be of help to our interest.”

Binay said the Philippine will always fight for its sovereignty over the West Philippine Sea.

“What we are doing today is in furtherance of our claim to those areas [in the South China Sea], and that is non-negotia-ble,” he said.

During the Asia-Pacific Eco-nomic Cooperation meetings in Manila, United States President Barack Obama said he intended to transfer two warships to the Philippine Navy “to bolster the navy’s ability to conduct long-endurance patrols.”

Japanese Deputy Press Sec-retary Koichi Mizushima said the Philippines and Japan were working on a deal to transfer military equipment to the Phil-ippines.

FORTY vote-counting machines out of the 48,000 to be used in next year’s elections were expected to arrive starting this month up to January 2016, the Commission on Elections said Sunday.

Commissioner Christian Robert Lim said five vote-counting machines arrived on Oct. 2 and 34 more were received early this month.

“We are expecting 6,000 units by Novem-ber 30,” Lim said.

“For December we are expecting about 17,500 units and for January the rest of al-most 31,000 units,” Lim said, adding 3,540 more units were expected to be delivered at the end of March next year.

He said a 48,000-square-meter warehouse in Santa Rosa, Laguna, where the new ma-chines would be stored, was expected to be fully functional by the middle of next month. It would also be used as a production area.

“We call it the production line, Lim said.“There’s a room there that we call memory

configuration room, and that’s where they will produce all the SD cards.” Pna

IF THE Internet provider for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meetings in Manila was able to speed up the connection to 8.5 gigabytes per second, the same fast service should be made available to the public, Sen-ator Grace Poe said Sunday.

“Not just for VIPs,” said Poe, the leading candidate for President in the surveys for next year’s elections.

“A faster Internet service should be for every-one and not just for VIPs,” Poe said.

She said the public—especially students and those who needed the Internet to work—should also be given access to a faster Internet service because this formed part of the public’s right to information.

Poe made her statement even as Malacañang said hosting the Apec meetings in Manila was a “lifetime opportunity” to show the world the Philippines’ best despite the recent terrorist at-tacks in Paris.

“Let me also take this opportunity to thank the entire Filipino people for their coopera-tion,” Presidential Spokesman Edwin Lacierda told dzRB radio.

“I know we have pleaded for understanding, but this is a once-in-a lifetime opportunity for us to show our best foot forward and, considering the difficulties, and considering the recent Paris attacks, the security concerns, we were able to successfully host the Apec Leaders’ Summit.”

Poe said that, in 2013, the delegates to the first World Summit on the Information Soci-ety, which was launched by the United Nations in Geneva, affirmed the role of information and communication in nation-building.

The public’s right to access to information and communications technology was again af-firmed in a convention in Tunis in 2005.

“There are a lot of Filipinos who are complain-ing about the slow Internet speed,” Poe said.

“Broadband speed still feels like dial-up con-nections in the 90s.”

Poe said that when it comes to the average Internet speed, the Philippines’ 3.7 mbps falls behind the 5.1 mbps in Myanmar, 5.6 mbps in Laos, 7.45 mbps in Malaysia, 9.42 mbps in Cambodia, 20.63 mbps in Thailand, 30.5 mbps in China, 73.3 mbps in the US, 103.2 mbps in Japan, and 133.1 mbps in Singapore.

“We can fix our ICT infrastructure if we want to,” Poe said.

“We can attain the fastest Internet speed that is necessary to facilitate learning, informa-tion access and business transactions online.” Macon Ramos-araneta and Sandy araneta

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Resolve massacre case, SC told

On Nov. 23, 2009, 58 people—mostly journalists—were killed in the incident, considered one of the worst cases of election-related violence.

The massacre was also denounced as the single deadliest attack against the press by the US-based Commit-tee to Protect Journalists, because the victims included 32 journalists.

“Once again, we ask our judicial branch if there’s any way that they [can] speed up the pace of the case. We understand that the Supreme Court has done a number of re-

forms to ensure that the case will be expedited and hopefully, the case will be resolved at the earliest pos-sible time,” said Secretary Edwin Lacierda, presidential spokesman in an interview over state-run radio station dzRB.

Lacierda noted that the Supreme Court has already responded to que-ries about why the case is still pend-ing in court.

“We, both media and govern-ment, [have asked] if the trial could be expedited. It is already in Court. What I know is that the prosecu-

By Sandy Araneta

Malacañang on Sunday urged the Supreme Court to speed up the resolution of the case of the Maguindan-ao Massacre, which took place six years ago.

‘Be vigilant,cooperatein fight vsterrorism’

‘Hellish’ Christmas traffic awaits public

MALACAÑANG urged the public on Sunday to be vigilant against terrorists, amid the resurgence of attacks such as the bomb-ings in France and the beheading of a Malaysian tourist by the Abu Sayyaf Group in Mindanao.

“Let’s cooperate [with the authorities] and let’s be vigilant [against ter-rorism],” said Secretary Edwin Lacierda, presiden-tial spokesman, during an interview over state-run dzRB.

The Islamic State has claimed responsibility for the bloody wave of bombings and shoot-ings across Paris that left nearly 130 people dead and which French Presi-dent François Hollande denounced as an “act of war” that must be coun-tered “mercilessly.”

Last week, Malaysian engineer Bernard Then, a hostage of the Abu Sayyaf terror group, was behead-ed on the island of Jolo.

Then is the first Malaysian hostage to have been behead-ed by the Abu Sayyaf.

Lacierda said one of the important components in the fight against terror-ism is intelligence sharing among countries.

President Benigno Aquino III has expressed solidarity with the people of Malaysia and vowed “to continue to fight terrorism in all its forms.”

In his final appear-ance at the Association of Southeast Asian Nations Summit in Kuala Lumpur, President Aquino reiter-ated his government’s re-solve to use the full force of the law against terror-ists. Sandy Araneta

tion has rested its case. It is already the defense’s job to present its evi-dence or file what we call a demur-rer to evidence,” said Lacierda.

Lacierda recalled that the massacre took place during the election cam-paign in 2009.

The massacre was allegedly mas-terminded by the powerful Ampatu-an clan of Maguindanao, to derail the gubernatorial bid of Esmael Mangu-dadatu against Andal Ampatuan Jr.

The victims were on their way to the provincial capitol to file Man-gudadatu’s Certificate of Candidacy when the convoy bearing members of his family, his supporters and local media workers was attacked in Sitio Masalay, Barangay Salman, Ampatu-an, Maguindanao.

Of the 197 charged for the mas-sacre, only 100 are now in jail facing multiple murder charges, while many

are still at large. Among those in jail are some of

the principal suspects belonging to the warlord clan, like former Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao Gov. Zaldy Ampatuan and his brother, Andal “Datu Un-say” Ampatuan Jr. The Ampatuan patriarch, former Gov. Andal Am-patuan Sr., died earlier this year due to a liver ailment.

Meanwhile, a “state of impunity” continues to reign six years after the massacre, Bayan Muna Reps. Neri Colmenares and Carlos Isagani Za-rate said on Sunday.

“For six years, justice is still elusive for the 58 victims of that

carnage in Ampatuan, Maguin-danao. The massacre is a monument to the state of impunity that still reigns under the Aquino administra-tion,” Zarate said.

Back into the water. Young Manila residents go for a swim in the Manila Bay on Sunday, days after security forces prevented public use of Roxas Boulevard and the waters beyond it for security purposes during the Asia- Pacific Economic Leaders’ Summit last week. EY ACASIO

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Massacre recalled. The National Press Club building in Intramuros, Manila is draped with black signs on Sunday, a day ahead of the commemoration of the sixth anniversary of the Maguindanao Massacre on Nov. 23, 2009. A total of 58 persons, including 32 journalists, were killed in the massacre, which is believed to be the deadliest single attack on the press. DANNY PATA

AFTER the chaos on the streets during last week’s Asia-Pacific Eco-nomic Cooperation summit, brace yourselves for “hellish” traffic dur-ing the Christmas season.

A group calling itself the Filipino Alliance for Transparency and Em-powerment gave this warning, as it accused the government of turning its back on its promise to improve the country’s commuter rail sys-tems.

Benjamin Peralta, FATE secretary general, said Filipinos are made to suf-fer by President Benigno Aquino III while his trusted officials like Transpor-tation Secretary Joseph Emilio Abaya “continue to make unprecedented blunders and hold on to their posts like untouchable gang chiefs.”

“The slogan of this administra-

tion, ‘kayo ang boss ko,’ is just a slo-gan, a brainwashing tool to make us continue hoping for the best while public money is being wasted on unwanted projects and money-making schemes to line the pockets of the crooks in the government,” Peralta said.

Abaya said in a press briefing in 2014 that about P9.7 billion in rail projects, including the acquisition of 48 new train coaches valued at P3.76 billion, are expected to be completed from September 2015 until the end of 2016, as well as a private sector-funded P1.09-billion automated fare collection system.

Other projects include spending P1.16 billion to overhaul 28 trains, which will be done by 2016, P870 million for ancillary systems and

even P50 million to replace “obso-lete” escalators.

Despite these promises, Abaya so far, has only completed the up-grading of the fare collection sys-tem of both the Metro Rail Transit and Light Rail Transit system. This is despite the increase of fares im-posed last January supposedly to improve services for the commut-ers and for the purchase of addi-tional train coaches.

“Is the government saying, ‘bahala na uli tayo sa buhay na-tin ngayong Kapaskuhan’? After showing the world this last Apec summit the seamless organizing of the event, will we return to the real-ity of a chaotic society and services, especially in the mass transport system?” Peralta asked.

A5MO NDAY: NO VEMB ER 2 3 , 2 0 1 5

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Noy pressed to make pay-hike bill priority

House Speaker Feliciano Bel-monte Jr., along with San Juan City Rep. Ronaldo Zamora’s mi-nority bloc and Leyte Rep. Martin Romualdez’s independent minor-ity bloc, supported the immedi-ate passage of the bill to allow the 1.53-million state workers benefit from salary hike as early as Janu-ary.

Romualdez insisted there was no reason for the President to dilly-dally and all the more no reason not to show his “malasakit” in having the SSL bill approved since the budget department has already allocated P57 billion to fund the salary increases on its first year of implementation.

The bill calls for a four-year se-ries of pay hikes that will entail the

government a total of P226 billion. On the first year of the law’s imple-mentation, the President’s salary is pegged at P160,924 and will increase to almost P400,000 in the fourth year under Salary Grade 33.

However, President Aquino, who will step down on June 30, 2016, will no longer enjoy the series of increases.

The House leaders have renewed their commitment to immediately pass on third and final reading the proposed SSL and the granting of 14th month pay during the first year of its implementation in 2016.

As Congress resumes its ses-sions Monday, senatorial candi-date Romualdez, Belmonte, and House Majority Leader Mandalu-yong City Rep. Neptali Gonzales II

stressed the need to catch up on the passage of important legislations after the four-day Asia-Pacific Eco-nomic Cooperation summit last Nov. 18 to 22 made the priority list take a back seat.

“We are committed to pass this very important legislation to ex-tend malasakit to our state workers. They really need economic relief to decently support their basic needs,” Romualdez stressed.

But Romualdez, a lawyer and president of the Philippine Con-stitution Association, underscored the need to give more “malasakit” to ordinary workers like teachers and nurses by further increasing the salary of low-level and middle-level employees.

Palace pushes BBL approvalBy Sandy Araneta

MALACAÑANG on Sun-day called on all lawmak-ers to attend and vote for the draft Bangsamoro Basic Law when they resume session to-day after a week-long break to make way for the Philipp-pines’ hosting of the Asia Pa-cific Economic Cooperation’s summit.

“Maybe, our call would best be left to the call of the leaders in both Houses to en-sure the attendance of all their members. We certainly would hope to see the passage of the BBL,” Presidential Spokes-man Edwin Lacierda said in an interview over state-run

radio station dzRB.Laciarda said the BBL has

been debated in the commit-tee level, and it has been dis-cussed in public.

“All angles have been ad-dressed. So it’s time for the legislators who will pass the law to buckle down and we re-quest them to take a hard look at the BBL,” said Lacierda.

Lacierda cited that the pro-posed BBL is an affirmative action needed to mind the neglected regions in Muslim Mindanao.

“So this will unlock the potentials of it and with re-spect to the development of Muslim Mindanao,” Laci-erda also said.

The Palace spokesperson said he is hoping that the lawmakers would listen to the call of Senate President Franklin Drilon.

“All of us have an interest and we have a stake in the de-velopment of Muslim Mind-anao because it will redound to the benefit of all the peoples of Mindanao and, in general, to the people of the Philip-pines,” Lacierda also said.

Last Saturday, Drilon re-affirmed the Senate’s com-mitment towards the estab-lishment of peace in Mind-anao through the proposed BBL, allaying fears that the Mindanao peace measure is now in limbo.

Stiffer penalty eyed for smuggling

Protest icon. An artist puts the finishing touch on an effigy characterized as Pinoycchio that will be used in a protest against the six-year-old unresolved case of the Maguindanao massacre on Nov. 23, 2009 which claimed 58 victims including 32 journalists. DANNY PATA

By Christine F. Herrera

WITH only nine session days remaining, House leaders on Sunday put pressure anew on President Benigno Aquino III to certify as urgent the proposed Salary Standardization Law to skip several procedures that might delay its passage in the Senate.

By Rio N. Araja

CONGRESSMEN are mov-ing to declare large-scale smuggling of agricultural products as economic sabo-tage and punishable by stiff sanctions.

Marikina City Rep. Romero Quimbo has filed House Bill 6259 or the Anti-Agricultural Smuggling Act of 2015 that aims to impose higher sanctions for large-scale smuggling of agricul-tural products to secure the agricultural sector, ensure food security and prices stability, protect the income and well-being of Filipino farmers, and regain govern-ment revenues lost, to be used for improving the de-livery of social services for the country.

Quimbo’s proposal is a counterpart of Senate Bill 2923 filed by Senator Joseph Victor Ejercito.

“In my shared vision and commitment with Sena-tor Ejercito to address the growing cases of smug-gling of agricultural prod-ucts, the passage of this bill is earnestly sought,” Quimbo said.

Citing a Samahang In-dustriya ng Agrikultura report, Quimbo said from 2013 to 2014, the govern-ment incurred P64-billion foregone revenue due to widespread smuggling of agricultural products.

“This amount represents a P32-billion loss per year, which could have been used for the construction of ap-proximately 21,000 class-rooms, or 2,600 health cent-ers. In fact, the amount of loss reported for these two years is more than enough to cover the budget of the Department of Agriculture for 2016, and with an excess sufficient to help rehabilitate our agricul-tural sector,” he added.

Persistent. Vendors are mushrooming at Manila’s Baywalk on Sunday Nov. 22, 2015, a few days after government forces locked down the stretch of Roxas Boulevard and nearby roads for security purposes during the Apec Leaders’ Summit held from Nov. 18 to 19, 2015.


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Solons want irrigation fee scrapped

MMDA power over billboard ads upheld

A totAl of 3,810 Philippine-educated nurses took the US National Council li-censure Examination for the first time from January to September this year, in the hopes of practicing their profession in America, Cebu Rep. Gerald Anthony Gullas Jr. said over the weekend.

“the number is up 17 percent versus the 3,253 Filipino nurses who took the NClEX for the first time, excluding re-peaters, in the same nine-month period in 2014,” Gullas, vice chairman of the House committee on higher and techni-cal education, said.

the NClEX refers to the licensure ex-amination administered by the US Na-tional Council of State Boards of Nurs-ing Inc.

the number of Filipino nurses taking the NClEX for the first time is consid-ered a good indicator as to how many of them are trying to obtain US licenses, or seek gainful employment in America.

USNCSBN statistics show that among foreign-educated nurses, Filipinos re-main the most active job seekers in

America, according to Gullas. He said a total of 708 Indians, 382

Puerto Ricans, 292 South Koreans, and 207 Jamaicans also took the NClEX for the first time from January to September this year.

Since 1995, a total of 161,181 nurses educated in the Philippines have taken the NClEX for the first time.

Meanwhile, Gullas wants all nurses employed by the Philippine govern-ment to receive a monthly salary that is P6,000 to P7,000 higher than what they are now getting.

“our nurses deserve all the support and encouragement that we can give them,” Gullas, a strong backer of the Filipino nursing profession, said.

Section 32 of the Nursing law of 2002, or Republic Act 9173, provides that the basic pay of nurses employed in hospitals run by the national government “shall not be lower than Salary Grade 15,” or not lower than the range of P24,887 to P26,868—depending on their length of service.

Nurses seeking US jobs on the rise

By Rey E. Requejo

The Court of Appeals has overturned a ruling rendered by a Makati City regional trial court in 2013 that restrained the Metro Manila Development Authority from exercising its authority to issue clearances and permits for billboards and advertising signs along major and secondary thoroughfares in Metro Manila.

In a 21-page decision, the CA’s Second Division through Associate Justice Reme-dios Salazar-Fernando dismissed the com-plaint filed by advertising firms—Summit Publishing Co. Inc., Bigboard Advertising Corp. and Sygoo Enterprises—questioning the legality of the memorandum of agree-ment between the Department of Public Works and Highways and the MMDA dep-utizing the latter to implement provisions of the National Building Code that regulates the issuances of clearances to applicants of billboard permits.

the advertising firms also assailed the va-lidity of memorandum circulars issued by the MMDA pertaining to guidelines for the issu-ances of clearances and permits for billboards.

In its order issued on october 25, 2013, the Makati City Regional trial Court of Makati City, Branch 58, Presiding Judge Eugene Paras issued a writ of preliminary injunc-tion restraining the MMDA from consfis-cating, rolling down and demolishing their billboards and all other entities similarly engaged in the business of outdoor media advertising on the basis of non-compliance with the memorandum circulars and the MoA between the DPWH and the MMDA.

the respondent advertising firms initi-ated the petition for the issuance of a writ of injunction against the MMDA after the their applications for billboard clearances were denied for failure to comply with the requirements as to height, size and setback prescribed under the circulars and the MoA between MMDA and DPWH.

In ruling against the advertising firms, the appellate court ruled that Judge Paras committed grave abuse of discretion that would warrant the reversal of its order.

“Anent the writ of preliminary injunction, public respondent Judge gravely abused its discretion when it issued the same despite private respondents’ failure to prove that they have a clear and unmistakable right to the re-lief sought and that they would suffer great and irreparable injury,” the CA stressed.

By Rio N. ArajaSAYING that it is the government that should provide the necessary and vital support services and assistance to the farmers, at least six party-list lawmakers have called for a stop to the collection of irrigation service fees.

Representatives Fernando Hicap of Anakpawis, Neri Colmenares and Carlos Isagani Zarate of Bayan Muna, Emmi de Jesus of Gabriela, Antonio tinio of ACt teachers and terry Ridon of Kabataan have filed House Bill 6224, or the Free Ir-rigation Services Act of 2015 that seeks to amend Republic Act 3601, Presidential Decree 552 and Presidential Decree 1702.

“Given the strategic importance of irri-gation in pursuing sustained agricultural growth and development, rice self-suffi-ciency, food security, and the upliftment of the welfare of Filipino farmers, it is the obligation of the State to provide free ir-rigation services,” Hicap said.

Irrigation is needed to increase the pro-

ductivity of farmers, especially in the pro-duction of rice and corn, and is therefore the key in ensuring the food security of the Filipino people, he noted.

Adopting the World Bank’s principle that water resource is a commodity, the government has been implementing vari-ous finance mechanisms to collect irriga-tion service fees from farmers, he said.

“Farmer-beneficiaries of the national irrigation system program administered by the National Irrigation Administra-tion and irrigators associations under the communal irrigation systems are forced to pay exorbitant irrigation service fees,” he said.

“this has led to huge amount of back accounts or unpaid irrigation service fees. these back accounts, which are imposed with penalties and interests, have further burdened the already poor farmers with bigger debts.”

NIA was also studying the scrapping of irrigation service fees, Administrator Florencio Padernal told a House budget

hearing in August.the collection of fees is part of NIA’s

mandate under RA 3601 which created the agency.

Padernal earlier said policy experts such as the World Bank and Asian De-velopment Bank, including the Japanese International Cooperation Agency, were consulted on the impact of the fee aboli-tion on NIA itself and the farmers.

the irrigation service fees are being used to shoulder the operation and main-tenance cost of NIA’s irrigation facilities.

House Bill 6224 seeks to provide the necessary subsidies to farmers and ir-rigators associations and cooperatives to ensure the effective and grassroots-based management of irrigation systems.

Farmers belonging to the irrigators as-sociations and stakeholders are united in demanding for free irrigation services, abolition of irrigation service fees and “genuinely just program” that would ac-celerate irrigation development nation-wide, Hicap said.

Grateful. Senatorial candidate and Leyte Rep. Martin Romualdez (right) answers questions from radio anchor Danny Garcia during the live interview at a radio station in Bicol Region. Romualdez expresses gratitude to the people of Albay for helping Typhoon ‘Yolanda’ victims in Leyte. Looking on is Albay gubernatorial candidate and (2nd District ) Rep. Al Francis Bicharra. VER NOVENO

PCSO’s 48th branch. Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office vice chairman and general manager Jose Ferdinand Rojas II (third from right) leads the opening of the PCSO Nueva Vizcaya Branch at the Municipal Hall, Bayombong, Nueva Vizcaya on Nov. 16. With him are (from left) PCSO director Mabel Mamba, executive assistant Gerald Rojas, Office of the General Manager; Nueva Vizcaya Rep. Carlos Padilla, PCSO/OGM executive assistant Noy Consolacion, PCSO Nueva Ecija branch manager Byron Joseph Bumanglag, Bayombong Mayor Ramon Cabauatan Jr., and PCSO assistant general manager for Branch Operations Remeliza Gabuyo (behind).This is the 48th branch of the charity agency. JOSEPH MUEGO


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By Orlan MauricioMALOLOS CITY—Bulacan police have raised the cash reward for any information leading to the identity of the killers of Regional Trial Court Judge Wilfredo Nieves from P2.5 million to P3 million.

Nieves was shot Nov. 11 along McArthur Highway in front of the Bulacan Industrial Park in Brgy. Tikay in Malolos.

Police are still investigating the motive of the killing and have scoured all cases handled by Nieves the past 12 months to identify any possible parties that may have been adversely affected by the judge’s decisions.

Sr. Supt. Ferdinand O. Divina, Bulacan police provincial director, told members of the Bulacan PNP Press Corps that he believes that Nieves’ murder was work-related.

Nieves sentenced Raymond Dominguez, one of the suspected leaders of a car theft gang “Dominguez Carnapping Group” operating in Metro Manila and Central Luzon, up to 30 years imprisonment in April 2012. He has been sent to the Bilibid prisons while his brothers, Roger, Ryan, and other co-accused are still detained at the Bulacan Provincial Jail pending the hearing on four pending cases before the Regional Trial Courts here.

Judge Nieves was the second judge to be killed this year in Central Luzon. Last Sept.1, Judge Jude Erwin U. Alaba of Branch 91 in Baler, Aurora was killed by a lone assassin just outside the Baler-RTC compound.

Alaba, only 46 years, was appointed judge only on Jan. 14, 2013. At the time of his

murder, he was handling 250 criminal and civil cases.

So far, it has been established that the four pending cases of the Dominguez brothers were also raffled to the sala of Judge Nieves in early October after Judge Olivia Escubio-Samar (Branch 79) inhibited herself from hearing the carnapping and robbery cases.

The four pending cases are Criminal Case No. 1710-M-2010 (violation of R.A 6539-Carnapping); CC No. 1711-M-2010 for robbery; CC No. 2391-M-2012 (Carnapping) and CC. No. 2392-M-2010 also for robbery.

However, unknown to many and to the public especially the parties involved in the four pending cases, is that Judge Nieves had already issued an ‘Order’ inhibiting himself from hearing the said cases as early as Oct. 29, or 13 days before Nieves’ ambush.

In his Order, Judge Nieves said he is voluntarily inhibiting from hearing the case to allay any impression that he might have a pre-judgement or partiality considering that he has already convicted Raymond Dominguez, the elder brother of Roger and Ryan, who are the principal suspects in the four pending cases.

It was only on Nov. 9, a week after the All Saints’ Day weekend vacation, that the records of the four cases were transmitted for reraffle to the RTC’s Office of the Clerk of Court. Until now, the cases have not been reraffled yet amid the jittery atmosphere at the Bulacan Hall of Justice.

As of presstime, crack team of police operatives are still tracing the whereabouts of a silver Toyota Innova and a gray Hyundai Tucson believed to have been used as getaway vehicles of the assassins.

How about this? Supply of galunggong is expected to wane, and so fishermen from Dalahican at the Lucena City Fish Port bring to the market the giant eel. DIANA B. NOCHE

Guiuan marker. Guiuan, Eastern Samar Mayor Christopher Gonzales leads the unveiling of the Russian refugee marker on Tubabao Island in the municipality. Dozens of Russians who had fled the communist regime in their country lived here in the 1950s. MEL CASPE

TACLOBAN CITY—The Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources has imposed shellfish ban in two bays and several municipal waters in Leyte, Samar and Biliran provinces.

BFAR found the red tide bloom in bays and some coastal waters in the region through laboratory analysis on Nov. 19.

The presence of red tide calls for prohibition in the gathering, trading and consumption of shellfish from identified areas.

Tagged as red-tide positive are Cambatutay Bay in Samar; Carigara Bay in Leyte; municipal waters of Naval, Caibiran, Culaba, Kawayan, and Cabucgayan in Biliran; and coastal waters of Daram and Villareal in Samar province.

Fishes caught in these areas are safe for human consumption provided that they are fresh, washed and cooked thoroughly, according to BFAR’s advisory.

The BFAR, however, is still waiting for the result of confirmatory test of shellfish meat gathered in the municipal waters of Biliran and Samar.

“To safeguard human lives while waiting for the results of confirmatory tests of shellfish samples sent to BFAR central office, we are issuing this warning as a precautionary advice to the public to refrain from gathering, trading and consumption of shellfish from affected areas,” said BFAR regional director Juan Albaladejo.

Bays previously hit by red tide that are now free of toxins are Cancabato Bay (Tacloban City in Leyte); San Pedro Bay (Palo and Tanauan in Leyte); Ormoc Bay (Ormoc City, Albuera and Merida in Leyte); Sogod Bay (Sogod, Southern Leyte); Villareal Bay (Villareal, Samar), and Maqueda Bay (Jiabong, Samar).

Authorities launch hunt for S. Kudarat grenade throwersISULAN, Sultan Kudarat—Police and military authorities here have launched a manhunt against two men who tossed a hand grenade on revelers during the provincial foundation anniversary celebration on Saturday night.

Initial reports said at least 15 persons were hurt, mostly late night shoppers at an agri-trade fair on an 800-meter stretch of the highway in front of the Sultan Kudarat provincial capitol.

Senior Supt. Rex dela Rosa, Sultan Kudarat police provincial director, said the blast occurred in a line of “ukay-ukay” (used clothing) stalls in front of AG Ad-vance Gasoline Station at about 8:30 p.m.

Dela Rosa said the province, which was celebrating its 42nd foundation anniversary with a “Kalimudan” (communal thanks-giving) festival, was always under threat from lawless groups.

“We have threats from bombings of im-provised explosive devices on bus, public places, so we sought the public support,” he said at the opening of the week-long cel-ebration.

People from all walks of life, including children, were milling around “ukay-ukay centers” and garden plants stalls

along the Isulan-Tacurong highway when unidentified suspects tossed the grenade.

Supt. Jemuel Siason, chief of Sultan Kudarat police provincial public safety battalion, said the wounded victims were rushed to the provincial hospital just across the blast site.

No one has claimed responsibility for the attack.

Dela Rosa also appealed to anyone with information on the perpetrators to come forward so they can be brought before the bar of justice.

Isulan and Sultan Kudarat province have been subjected to grenade attacks in the past, mostly blamed by authorities on Maguindanao-based extortion gang known as al-Khobar.

The group had been preying on bus firms, asking “protection money” and sub-jecting to harassment firms that ignored the lawless elements’ demands. PNA

Police look into cases heard by slain Bulacan trial judge

Fisheries bureau imposes shellfish ban in Region 7

opinionA8

[ EDI TORI A L ]

Cheapening the presidenCy

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ADELLE chuAe d i t O r

M O N D AY : N O V E M B E R 2 3 , 2 0 1 5

opinion

In moral theory as well as in law, attribution is supremely crucial. Who did it? and “who” demands a proper name, a de-monstrative pronoun, a definite description—and more than all that, an “individual” in the sense that a person is an indi-vidual. We emerge as individu-als in the measure that we are able to attribute actions to our-

selves, a competence that also allows us to attribute actions also to others. It is common for toddlers to refer to them-selves in the third person. It takes some degree of maturity to meaningfully say “I”, ako.

That is the problem I have with the attribution of the gore and the mayhem of Paris and, possibly, mali to ISIS (or ISIl, if you prefer an exotic arabic term). ISIS is not a person. It may be a close-knit, highly co-hesive, centrally directed as-sociation, very much like the nazis were, but it will not do to attribute to it the atrocities that

Attribution And iSiS

The world is facing an even more evil enemy than its precursors, the Tali-ban and al Qaeda The Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (known as ISIS or IS for short) was borne out of the fires of hell arising from the ruins of the violent internecine strife in Syria and Iraq.

americans called for sending US troops home after invading and win-ning the war in Iraq. now everyone, particularly republican presiden-tial candidates, are ganging up on Barack obama for pulling them out too early.

The shift of the pendulum from re-calling the troops to sending back boots on the ground is now seen as the solu-tion to stamping out IS at the source in Syria. But this poses a problem how russia will look at a Syria without its longtime ally Bashar al assad. This, despite determining a chartered jet-liner carrying 224 russian soldiers was brought down by a bomb planted by ISIS which had claimed responsi-bility. russia, like France and the US, has also been carrying out bombing strikes of ISIS strongholds in Syria to shield al assad.

an ISIS video showing footage of Times Square in new York with a threat to attack the city next after Par-is sent a chill to americans who have not forgotten 911, when terrorists hi-jacked US jetliners and crashed them into the Trade Center’s Twin Towers.

There is a heightened security alert in new York but other cities like San Francisco, los angeles and even a sleepy town in Iowa are not ruling out terrorists targeting them. It could all be a terrorist ploy to single out new York so as not to draw the attention of authorities to other urban centers.

Sources at the US Department of homeland Security think the video re-leased by IS could be a recycled one of the planned bombing on Times Square during last new Year’s celebration which was foiled by police

Can we expect an ISIS attack in the Philippines? This is not remote consid-ering we are a known US ally. In fact, the bombings in some mindanao cities may just be a probing incidents prior to pulling off a major attack in met-ro manila, most probably in crowded shopping malls.

The ISIS, the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters and the abu Sayyaf are more than cousins in their violent extremist ideology. The same Dna runs in their veins. It is already con-firmed by our intelligence that some muslim rebels in mindanao have traveled to Pakistan and afghanistan to receive military training.

has the moro Islamic liberation

the iSiS Scourge

dreadful and hated symbol of the acme of irrationality—the ISIS flag—no longer flutters in the breeze anywhere in the world? most certainly not! It is only when whoever it was who gave the order to behead, to bomb, to enslave, and whoever it was who beheaded, bombed and enslaved is made to an-swer for his acts in the manner the laws see fit!

The reason for the importance of attribution and the pursuit of the agent, the actor, the culpable subject

is that the threat that hangs over us all (no part of the world seems safe anymore) can so easily lead us into endless squabbling about ideology and about the impossibility of van-quishing ideas. We can—and have been—lured into the cul de sac of historical gripes and continuing wrongs, real or imagined, and forget that persons can make decisions and do make them. The entire dimen-sion of moral responsibility should not be lost to us as we debate with

each other —often at futile length—over what we take to be the sociologi-cal and ideological roots of what re-ally is ultimately the decision of an individual—of individuals—to be cruel, thoughtless and stupid!

once more, the senseless attack on an audience armed with nothing more than eagerness for a concert and the bloodied bodies the murderers left in their wake painfully but forcefully demolishes the relativist thesis. There is no way you

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THE latest word from in-again, out-again candidate Rodrigo Duterte is that he will run for President in 2016 after all.

Up to this point, the outspoken mayor of Davao, who began a nationwide “listening tour” some months ago ostensibly to promote federalism, has made it a point to deny any presidential ambitions, while his faithful allies and political lieutenants—and even his daughter—kept the pot boiling with hints, possible scenarios and even the occasional shaved head.

Toward the deadline for the filing of certificates of candidacy in October, there were even well-circulated rumors suggesting that the Davao City mayor would fly to Manila for a last-minute change of heart. When the day passed with no such result, the mayor’s supporters insisted he could still run for President by becoming a substitute for the candidate of his party, the PDP Laban. As if on cue, that candidate—with no national following whatsoever—withdrew from the race, throwing the door open for Duterte.

It was political theater that worked for a while, then quickly lost its luster. Over the last few weeks, people grew weary of the drama and Duterte himself, dismissing him as indecisive, at best, and manipulative, at worst. Most sensible newspapers relegated stories about his on-again, off-again candidacy to the inside pages, if they used them at all.

Back in May, when the story was still fresh, Duterte said he might run for President because of the criticism leveled at him by the likes of the Justice secretary and the Human Rights commissioner over his alleged links to the infamous Davao Death Squad.

On Saturday, the Davao City mayor had a new reason for running, saying he was disappointed by the Senate Electoral Tribunal’s decision to dismiss the disqualification case against presidential candidate Senator Grace Poe, who has fared well in recent opinion polls.

“For me, that’s on the table. I am running for President because I am so disappointed and sad at that ruling,” Duterte was quoted as saying. “Grace can run for governor [or] mayor. I am willing to vacate my position and give it to her, but not the presidency.”

He also suggested that a win in the 2016 elections for Poe would cheapen the presidency because by Philippine law she was not a natural-born citizen.

‘’If you run for the highest office of the land, it is really reserved to a true-blue Filipino,” he added.There may be many who subscribe to this view, but very few of them threaten to run for

President as a response. A lawyer himself, Duterte could have joined the many petitioners against Poe, or filed his own case before the Commission on Elections or the Supreme Court. He had ample opportunity to do this but he did not. Instead, he went around the country saying he was not running for President.

On the record, then, Duterte has offered two reasons for running for President. First, he wanted to get back at the critics of his human rights record. Second, he wanted to stop a person he saw as unqualified to become President.

Are these the best motives for wanting to run for the highest office in the land? The Davao City mayor likes to project himself as a reluctant candidate moved to running

out of a sense of duty to his country. But the last time we had a reluctant candidate, he became a President who squandered time, public funds and his political capital on a program of political vendetta, with disastrous results for the country.

We do not need another reluctant President who sees his office as a huge, personal sacrifice or a tool to get even with his enemies. We need President who genuinely wants to lead for all the right reasons.

When Mayor Duterte warns about cheapening the presidency, he speaks from experience. In our book, he has done that already.

have revived the question of what it is to be “civilized”! I am by no means exonerating ISIS. membership in a criminal or-ganization is criminal, but that does not excuse us from going after the criminal who commits the crime and to whom must ul-timately be attributed the act of terror and arrant cruelty!

It is the same thing with other crises that have wracked the world. We blame China for acts of aggression in the South China Sea (what we call the West Philippine Sea). But it is a Chinese leader who makes de-cisions. It is a Chinese military

officer who directs acts of prov-ocation. always an individual. I am by no means denying fun-damental postulates of sociol-ogy. But I am not ready to al-low the culpable individual the convenience of disappearing behind the anonymity of the collective. hitler was clearly the geni maligne of the everlasting

horror that the holocaust is. True, the nazis were a deranged lot, but hitler is rightly blamed because he gave the orders and approved the dastardly plans.

I can understand why Vladimir Putin and Francois hollande are hot on the heels of ISIS, but when will they be able to claim victory? When that

there is no way you can relativize the moral evil of these murders. pensées

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OPINIONM O N D AY : N O V E M B E R 2 3 , 2 0 1 5

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In July 2013, a bill reinstating the mandatory character of the ROTC program in all colleges and universities was introduced in Congress by Representative Francis Gerald Abaya. His explanatory note said that in the event of foreign incursions, the Philippines will be duty-bound to protect its territory. He emphasized too that the Philippine Constitution states that the government may call upon the people to defend the state and to render personal, military or civic service. The bill, unfortunately, has been relegated to the back burner. Meanwhile, China has gone full steam in creating islands on reefs that the Philippines claims as belonging to its territorial waters, with no regard to

marine and environmental destruction. If the Philippines is ever forced to go to war to defend

its territory, will it have enough men to render military service? We, Filipinos, are not war-driven. Yet, when we are left with no other choice, we must at least have some muscles to flex. While the US and other nations support us in principle, in the end it will be just us if we wish to be respected as a nation. Prayers help but, then again, even God expects us to help ourselves.

Email: [email protected] Visit: www.jimenolaw.com.ph

THe world is at war. Pope Francis said that Christmas festivities are a charade because the world has chosen war and hate. The

Holy Pope’s statement came in the heels of an attack in Paris on the 13th of November by suicide bombers and terrorists killing some 130 people and injuring about 350, some seriously. This was followed by France’s swift reaction—launching an airstrike against ISIS strongholds in Syria—two days later. A few days thereafter, terrorists, believed to be Islamic, stormed an American-owned hotel in Mali, a former French colony, killing some 20 people and taking into hostage hotel guests. The reality is, there has never been a day in the world where war has not been happening some place or the other.

Here at home, war has been happening in several parts of Mindanao for decades now. even Metro Manila has had its share of terrorist attacks that have claimed lives. On top of terrorist threats, recent events relating to the Philippines’ and other South east Asian countries’ sea dispute with China have caused tensions that could potentially escalate into serious security concerns. A friend of mine who looks at all events from a spiritual standpoint said that the world is going through a cleansing and reconstruction phase—a painful but essential process toward attaining world order.

Still, even as there are spiritual warriors among us who pray for world peace we, as citizens of the world, cannot just stand by and watch as destruction and chaos happen. A fellow lawyer who used to be a member of Congress and an active advocate of national defense and security told me that we can no longer delay the reactivation in college curricula of the Reserved Officers’ Training Corps Program, better known as ROTC. The concept of military training of college students via the ROTC program originated from the United States of America. The first university to adopt it in the Philippines was the University of the Philippines which made it a course in 1922. Several other universities followed suit. When the National Defense Act was passed in 1935, the ROTC program became mandatory in all colleges and universities, paving the way for the filling up of reserved officers’ posts in the Philippine Army.

The ROTC cadets from the 33 colleges and universities that had active ROTC units took part in World War II. The cadets from Manila defended Bataan while the cadets from the Visayas comprised 45 percent of the 75th Infantry Regiment of the US Armed Forces in the Far east or the USAFFe. In 2001, however, after an ROTC cadet from the University of Santo Tomas was brutally murdered after the exposés he made concerning corruption and irregularities in the ROTC training in UST, Congress passed a law in 2002 making ROTC a non-mandatory course and replacing it instead with the National Service Training Program. The problem with the new program was that most students chose the other options allowed in the program such as civic welfare service or literacy training rather than military training service.

Is there reason to reinstate ROTC as a mandatory course? The Association of Generals and Flag Officers believe so because it arouses in students a sense of patriotism and service-orientation and teaches them discipline. The ROTC program, according to the organization of generals and flag officers, prepares male students for national defense and trains them with leadership skills and the basics of military service in order to produce capable Armed Forces reservists.

Time To revive roTC

The CosT of a Campaign

If the Philippines is ever forced to go to war to defend its territory,

will it have enough men to render military

service?

I ASk a veteran of presidential campaigns what its minimum cost is today. Two billion pesos was his reply. “And that’s the poverty line,” he quickly added.

As I couldn’t believe that any war chest below that amount would put a wannabe in the league of paupers, I asked for a breakdown.

He rattled off components of what would he thought would make for a “decent run,” and the corresponding cost of each, which all came up with multiple zeroes.

The P2-billion floor price he quoted would translate to a “mere” daily spending budget of P20 million for a 100-day campaign, ten more than the official 90 days.

Obviously, it didn’t include activities done before the official start of the campaign which according to Comelec calendar is February 9 next year. That’s five days before Valentine’s and our suitors have been shouting sweet nothings into our ears—since two Valentine’s days ago.

Only a person who has been living under a rock would not notice that the de facto presidential derby had long begun. The horses had left the starting gate months, if not years, ago. At first they were prancing around. Next they were jockeying for position. Now they’re on full gallop.

In this age of the perpetual campaign, it is hard to bookend campaign periods. Some say that the campaign for reelection starts on the very same day one is elected. And the spending, too. Mileage, both media and sorties, entail costs.

The frequency with which we hear their ads on TV and their speeches on the stump might not give us the faintest idea on how fast they burn money. But if you want ads to serve as money counter, then that’s P400,000 for a primetime 30-seconder.

So that P20-million daily budget would only buy one spot every 30 minutes from 6 to 11 in the evening, plus a couple in a noontime show, in each of the two major stations.

And that’s just for reminding the telenovela nation that one is in the ballot—at a cost equivalent to one daycare center per 30-second slot.

Or as Dick Gordon had counted it, “thee 200 TV 30-seconder ads spent for the duration of the entire campaign could send 150,000 to state colleges or build 164 fully furnished classrooms.”

Such an expensive memory pill. But raising awareness and instilling recall is but one facet of a campaign. Polls must be commissioned, posters plastered, planes chartered, press releases churned out on industrial scale. Rallies must be staged, and the rah-rah boys paid.

This is not to count the money given to gatekeepers—bosses of congressional districts, lords of provinces and rulers of cities.

If one would cover all bases, then the budget must breach the P2-billion mark. This begs the next question: How are the stratospheric amounts beyond this threshold raised?

One campaign veteran tells me that elections are like casinos: the big bulk of revenues comes from high rollers. True, because who has ever heard of bake sales or bingo games to raise campaign funds in this land?

The high rollers he was referring to are the billionaires in the Forbes list, the likes of whom won’t flinch if they flick away a billion pesos into the hat a candidate passes around .

The chatter is that the Top 10 can easily fork out a billion pesos each, which they would probably book as an insurance premium, against a worst disaster which can hit a business—that of an unfriendly Palace tenant.

But most probably the contributions will be treated as an IOU which can be redeemed in the future.

All of these deep pockets are reputedly equal opportunity donors, meaning every presidential aspirant will get help from them. They bet on all horses.

But not all aspirants are equal nor the bets the same. Frontrunners get

more which is why for both the giver and the receiver, survey numbers are important. High poll ratings is currency on which you can base a transaction. They can be redeemed for cash.

The high cost of campaigning in this archipelago of 7,100 islands, 102 million souls, 40 million Facebook commentators, and 18,000 elective positions is what drives candidates to scrounge around for contributions .

Unless one is a billionaire , a presidential run can never be a self-financed exercise.

Because if there’s bank insane enough to lend P2 billion to a presidential candidate to be solely amortized by his anticipated P120,000 monthly, then it would take him, and his descendants, a millennium, or 1,282 years to be exact, to full pay the loan.

The presidency is a job that pays P4,000 a day, less BIR, GSIS, Pag-IBIG, PhilHealth deductions. But if one would spend P2 billion to win it, then that’s like paying in advance almost a million pesos a day for the privilege of being called His excellency while riding the No.1 limousine. That’s P2 billion divided by the 2,190 days of a six-year presidential term.

Thus, a governor who spent P100 million to win his post, and will stay there for 1,095 days, did so at a campaign cost of P91,324 per day in office, more than his legal monthly pay.

A city mayor who shelled out P50 million would have invested about P46,000 per day in office.

Down the political food chain, politicians are spending more to win a post than what the post would legally pay them.

However, if the stories are true, there is one who has repeatedly re-sisted entreaties from big contribu-tors. While many have rushed to em-brace them to plant their hands into their deep pockets, this one report-edly has kept distance.

I could be wrong in saying that bake sales to raise funds for a candi-date has not been done in this land. Well, we might just see a people-funded campaign in the days ahead. Hopefully, all candidacies are.

can relativize the moral evil of these murders. To even attempt to do so is to assault what characterizes human persons: the ability to distinguish right from wrong. There are some things that are absolutely, unquali-fiedly wrong. The Paris nightmare is one of them!

Let us, by all means, go on with discourse on ideology, on the

phenomenology of religion and the kinks of history—discussions that I have myself indulged in. But there are culpable persons out there who must be looked for and held to account for their criminal acts. More importantly, there are young consciences to form, per-sons who, in the future, will have sufficient inf luence and power for bane or boon, to whom we must pass on the convictions by which

we are human. Moral maturity is the ability to pass upon my acts as good or evil, and so to commend myself as good or reprove myself as evil because of what I do. It is this eminently human capacity that can be taught only to individ-uals by individuals!

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attrIbutIon... From A9

out of the box

rIta lIndav. jImeno

PlumblIne

Pastor aPollo

quIboloy


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chong ardivilla#failocracy

A11

Front really renounced vio-lence? Is it really sincere in its quest for peace? The ap-proval of the proposed Bang-samoro Basic Law will depend on MILF’s good faith. This was not shown by the MILF and BIFF in the Mamasapano massacre of 44 Philippine Na-tional Police -Special Action Force commandos.

Like the United States, the Philippine could be facing

a challenge on two fronts. There is the aggressive, ex-pansive move of China in nearly the entire South Chi-na Sea and an even more dangerous foe in ISIS whose threat to bring the war to America’s front yard cannot be taken lightly.

Arrests were made in Brus-sels after French police raided Saint Denis, a suburb of Par-is and killed three IS suspect-ed of carrying out the carnage in Paris, including ringleader

and mastermind Abdelhamid Abaaoud.

After the terrorist attacks in Paris, there is now wide-spread paranoia against ac-cepting more migrants from Syria after it was revealed some of the Paris perpetra-tors slipped into France pos-ing as refugees. The members of the IS suicide squad came from nearby Belgium. It is a two-hour-and-40- minute drive from Brussels to Paris. I have driven the distance

myself when I was assigned as press attache at the Phil-ippine Embassy in Brussels and would sometimes spend the weekend in Paris.

Outrage and global condem-nation of the attack against humanity has impacted the policy of granting asylum to refugees. It will also call for a review of the Schengen Treaty and the concept of a Europe without borders.

Having taken a two-week sabbatical from Manila’s Apec

lockdown, I’m writing this column from the haven of my son and his wife’s home in the almost sylvan setting of their place in New York’s Long Is-land where Fall bursts into a canvas of red, yellow,and or-ange leaves.

Against my better judg-ment, I’ll take a train to New York and still see a play on Broadway. Like New Yorkers who will not allow themselves to be intimidated by terrorists, I decided life must go on.

the isis... From A9

No loNger ‘ewaN’SO THE administration’s greatest show on earth is over. Now what?

Back to “tanim-bala”? To daily traffic (which was eased for many workers by the simple expedient of canceling work and classes)? To brokedown MRT trains? To grinding urban poverty, and the wretched life of the countryside poor, especially the lumad?

What will the Apec summit bring to the average Filipino?

Government enthuses about the benefits that the new international economic order foisted by Apec, the World Trade Organization, the nascent Trans-Pacific partnership, as well as international financial institutions as the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and the Asian Development Bank will bring upon the macro- economy of this land of more than a million souls.

That is still debatable. It’s been 27 years since Apec was formed. In 1996, with much less expense, inflation factored in, the nation hosted the meeting of leaders in Subic. Many progressives argue that these international agreements have not resolved our execrable poverty indicia. While there is truth to their arguments, one also wonders where the bigger problems are internal, such as short-sighted and ever-changing policies, lack of political will to undertake reforms, a demented political framework, and lack of national discipline, nay, even a sense of nationhood.

Still and all, one heaves a sigh of relief that nothing untoward happened during the Apec show. In the immediate aftermath of the senseless carnage in Paris, every Filipino could only wish for the best in terms of security for the foreign guests. And while many of us suffered inconveniences, especially the working class who lost daily wages, and those who had to walk to their places of work because roads were cordoned off, we still thank God the show came and left without mishap.

For that, we must credit the Philippine National Police for a job well done. No such thing as over-reaction in the light of what happened in Paris on the eve of Apec. The police were well-trained, well-fed, taken care of by their leadership, and they were in turn cool, patient, snappy. Congratulations!

* * *Thursday, Nov. 12, while having

lunch with friends, we speculated about the forthcoming decision of the Senate Electoral Tribunal. We even took friendly bets. Four of us bet on Grace Poe being disqualified by the SET, four negative. To sweeten the pot, we had another round of bets—will Duterte run for President or not?

Someone said, “pag na- DQ si Grace, tatakbo ‘yan.” I countered, “on the other hand, pag pro- Grace and SET decision, all the more reason Duterte should run.”

I added that Duterte will have a moral obligation to the nation

to prevent a “foreigner” from becoming President.

But I did not tell the Davao mayor about that bet, neither my opinion. I have kept a hands-off stance since Oct. 16, occasionally meeting with him, but leaving him to his better lights. If he decides to run, then I will volunteer whatever I can to help. If he decides not to, I will respect his decision. No pressures, no trying to influence the good mayor. It should be a purely personal decision on his part, weighing the interests of the country with his own doubts.

I thought that if the SC justices were unanimous, three or two senators would vote along with them. What happened, as we all know, was only Senator Nancy cast her lot with the justices. Some Grace-Chiz rooters I have talked to kept telling me that they had at least one of the justices in their corner. Surveying the legal erudition of the three, I merely smiled at their “nervous” and over-stretched interpretation of the law, convinced the justices would follow the dictates of the Constitution.

Last Thursday, Nov. 19, Duterte in a speech in Davao, lashed at the SET vote, and said because of this, “my candidacy is on the table.”

Two of my Thursday friends called me to say, “mukhang tama ang basa mo.”

So on Saturday, Nov. 21, I decided to fly to Iloilo City to see the mayor, who was scheduled to address a convention of the Philippine Society of Gastro-enterologists. Alan Cayetano arrived ahead of Duterte, and we talked about the SET decision. He confided to me how sad and disappointed he was, particularly at his Ate Pia’s (Senator Pia Cayetano) vote.

When Duterte spoke and started lambasting the SET decision before the physicians who applauded his explanation of the constitutional requirements vis- à-vis the “foundling” arguments of Poe and her spokespersons, Alan who sat on the stage was visibly embarrassed. He wanted to applaud the mayor’s legal and even “moral” points (to borrow Leni Robredo’s succinct description of the matter) because he agreed with these, but how does a younger brother publicly exhibit his disappointment with an elder and only sister?

“Because I cannot accept a presumptive citizen to become President of the land, my own candidacy is now on the table,” Duterte said, and was met by thunderous applause.

“Bigyan mo ako ng Aeta, o Ifugao, o Badjao, basta tunay na Pilipino. Maski plumber, or a carpenter, basta huwag lang foreigner. Especially one who

renounced us and swore to a foreign flag, and then, dahil binigyan ng trabaho dito, babalik, and then run for President? Huwag naman. I cannot accept that,” the mayor said.

Leaving the convention at around half-past six that evening, we flew to Manila to attend the birthday party of Atty. Alfredo Lim (the Bicolano namesake of the former Manila mayor who was among Duterte’s closest friends and a law fraternity brother).

There, without first having dinner, Rodrigo Roa Duterte declared: “It may be just a few pieces of paper, but the Constitution is what binds our nation together. Disregard and disrespect that, and we fall apart.”

And then, in the presence of a few media persons who got wind of the social affair from one of the guests, Duterte said: “I have never expressed a desire or ambition to become President. I have given you may reasons so many times before. But this is too much. First the oppression that many ordinary citizens experience at the hands of government officials themselves, such as the poor, helpless victims of “tanim-bala,” and then now, this outright disregard of our fundamental law.”

Finally, “Yes, I am running for President!”

Finally, this space can write—no longer “ewan.”

so i see

Litobanayo

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mo nday: no vemb er 2 3 , 2 0 1 5

sports

Cavs win, but James walks out

The superstar playmaker had 19 points, 11 rebounds and eight assists while Kevin Love had 25 points and 11 rebounds to spark the Cavaliers, who boosted the best record in the Eastern Conference to 10-3.

But the most memorable mo-ment in the rout came when James watched Jared Cunningham throw a bad pass out of bounds, then abruptly signaled to be replaced by a substitute and stormed off the

court for a seat on the bench.The Cavaliers didn’t have enough

time to get a replacement into the game and were whistled for a tech-nical foul for only having four play-ers on the court.

“I blew a gasket,” said James, who apologized to his teammates after the game.

“He was frustrated, knew we weren’t playing right,” Cavaliers coach Dave Blatt said. “I under-

CLEVELAND—LeBron James walked off the court in frustration at bad passes and silly turn-overs Saturday—and that was with Cleveland leading by a game-high 26 points in an NBA romp over Atlanta.

DjokovicbattlesFedereragain innet finale

Rigondeauxbeats PH’sFrancisco

$40k at stake in ICTSI PH kiteboardingJohn Hay takes2-shot golf lead

LONDON—Novak Djokovic will face Roger Federer in Sun-day’s World Tour Final when he attempts to lift the trophy for a fifth time and become the first player to win the season-ending showpiece four years in a row.

Djokovic said clashes be-tween the pair were always nervy affairs as he prepared to face his rival for a second time at London’s O2 Arena this week -- Federer having got the better of the Serb in the group stage.

But Djokovic pulled out a near-perfect performance as he downed the resurgent Rafael Nadal 6-3, 6-3 in their semi-final clash on Saturday.

Federer then defeated Swiss compatriot Stan Wawrinka 7-5, 6-3 to book his place in the final.

Sunday is a repeat of last year’s final, which Djokovic won by a walkover after Fe-derer withdrew with an injury, something he has rarely done in his career.

“I don’t feel unbeatable, but it does definitely feel great when I’m playing the way I played,” Djokovic said after his dazzling display against Nadal.

“I’ve lost against Roger three times this year. When he’s on, it’s hard to play him,” said the Serb, who has also beaten Federer four times in 2015, all in finals.

“We always play matches with a lot of tension. There is a lot at stake. I know I have to be on top in order to win against him. Hope-fully I’ll be able to play better than I’ve done a few days ago. AFP

By Ronnie Nathanielsz

WBA super bantamweight champion and two-time Cu-ban Olympic gold medalist Guillermo Rigondeaux easily defeated Filipino Drian Fran-cisco in a boring, 10- round bout roundly booed by the fans when it ended at the Mandalay Bay Events Center on Sunday.

The unbeaten Rigondeaux, who hadn’t fought for 11 months because no one wished to pro-mote his fights due to his tech-nically sound but lackluster style, was recently stripped of his WBO belt because of inactivity.

He resorted to jabbing, moving and holding en route to a victory, where judges Steve Morrow and Richard Ocasio scored it by a 100-90 shutout, while the third judge, Don Trella was gener-ous in giving Francisco three rounds for a 97-93 score.

Rigondeaux, who has ap-pealed against the WBO deci-sion stripping him of his title, is waiting for the decision on his appeal. If he loses, the de-cision will make Nonito “The Filipino Flash” Donaire’s showdown with Cesar Juarez of Mexico on Dec. 13 in Puer-to Rico a title fight.

stand his frustration but obviously you shouldn’t do that.”

Blatt said he didn’t like first half shot selection and lammented bad passes, turnovers and defensive breakdowns in the second half.

“It was kind of disjointed in terms of how well we played at some mo-ments and then how helter-skelter and off-keel we played at other mo-ments,” Blatt said. “That’s not what we should be. We know better than that, let’s put it that way.”

The Cavaliers were down to a pair of healthy regular starters with Rus-sian center Timofey Mozgov side-lined by a right shoulder strain while star Kyrie Irving and his backcourt injury replacement, Mo Williams, were both absent.

Tristan Thompson grabbed 16 re-bounds and matched a career high with five assists for the Cavaliers, who stayed unbeaten after seven home games.

Kyle Korver and Paul Millsap each had 14 points the for Hawks, who fell to 9-6.

The winless Philadelphia 76ers led late in the fourth quarter at Mi-ami and appeared set for their first victory of the season, but the Heat rallied for a 96-91 triumph, drop-ping the Sixers to 0-14.

Dwyane Wade scored a season-high 27 points for the Heat while Isaiah Canaan scored 22 for Miami.

Philadelphia has lost 24 games in a row dating to last season, the 76ers most recent victory last March 25 at Denver. AFP

Philippine Kiteboarding Association president Jay Ortiz (left) poses with (second from left) champion kiteboarder Christian Tio, PKA treasurer Carlo Leongson and Manny Cabili, president of Philippine Watersports Association during the launch of the ICTSI Philippine Kiteboarding Tour Season 3 at Solaire Resort and Casino in Pasay City yesterday. The circuit fires off Nov. 27-29 in Siargao Island.

By Peter Atencio

A TOTAL of $40,000 in cash prizes will be at stake in the third season of the ICTSI-Philippine Kiteboarding Tour, which will be held in four dif-ferent stops from November to March.

Siargao Island in Surigao del Norte will kick off the first leg from Nov. 27 to 29. It will be fol-lowed by a second leg in Boracay Island from Jan. 8 to 10.

The third leg will be in Anguib Beach in Cagayan from Feb. 12 to 14, before moving on to the final leg in Cuyo Island, Palawan from March 11 to 13.

Philippine Kiteboarding Association president Jay Or-tiz said interest in the sport has been growing. More par-ticipants joined after they formed the association and established competitions over the last three years.

“This is our third season. Kite-boarding is now, in fact a growing extreme sport. We’ve seen a lot of growth in Asia, Europe and in the United States. We see a lot of

LeBron James of the Cleveland Cavaliers drives to the basket against the Atlanta Hawks at Quicken Loans Arena in Cleveland, Ohio. AFP

people who win in the Asian circuit who are Filipinos,” said Ortiz.

Filipino-Norwegian Christian Tio is among the new breed of kite-boarders seeing action.

The 14-year-old Tio, ranked no. 2 in the freestyle juniors’ division, is ex-pected to be one of the kiteboarders to watch as the tour kicks off in Siargao.

Each leg will feature three disci-plines. These are race, hangtime and freestyle.

There will be a race in the men’s division, the women’s and the mas-ters category (40 and above).

There will be winners in the men’s and women’s divisions of the free-style and hangtime events.

BAGUIO CITY—Former three-peat winner Camp John Hay looks seri-ous to regain the title it lost in 2013 as the city’s top man, mayor Mauri-cio Domogan, led the charge for the co-host team, which took a two-shot lead at the start of the Seniors Fil-Championship flight on Sunday in the 66th Fil-Am Golf Invitational Championship.

The Baguio Country Club golf course proved to be very difficult that scores dipped and where 28, an eight over, was good enough for Domogan and Rudy Lockey as they led CJH to 106 and a two-shot lead on Manila Southwoods.

Thanks also to the penalty on Southwoods’ fifth man, CJH took the initial lead in the premier flight of the 55-year-and-older side of the Fil-Am in an attempt to end a two-year ab-sence at the top podium.

Retired police general Clyde Cabre-ros had 27 points, while Bong Man-dapat and Jeong Sek Jun had a pair of 23s, with the latter failing to count in the five-to-play, four-to-count tourna-ment title presented by San Miguel.

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sports

Savchenko bagsPSC chess crown

Donaire determined to recapture glory

Running coach, studentathlete top Milo race

Ira Christian Alido displays his Faldo Series award.

Locals of about 12,000 took part in the last provincial leg of the 39th Na-tional MILO Marathon in Cagayan de Oro City.

AlreAdy up by two points at the end of the ninth round, the 29-year-old Savchenko still went out for a win against Gupta, essaying a 53-move win via the Sicilian Najdorf to pocket the title by a whopping 2.5-point mar-gin ahead of Chinese GM Shanglei lu and GM Vitaly Sivuk of Ukraine, who finished with identical 7.0 points.

Lu, however, took the second spot because of a higher tiebreak than Sivuk, who topped the Philip-pine International Chess Champi-onship also held here a week ago.

The no. 8 seed Savchenko fin-ished his campaign with nine wins and a single draw against Indian GM Chakkravarthy Deepan in the 7th round.

GM Darwin Laylo, seeded 18th here, emerged as the highest Fili-pino placer in the tournament at fourth place with 6.5 points, earn-ing the better tiebreak score over GM Tigran Kotanjian of Armenia and International Master Chen Lin of China, who also had the same

output. Laylo could have gone on to fin-

ish second overall, but only man-aged a draw against Sivuk in the 10th round after 31 moves of a Slav Defense Exchange.

The 16th seed Kotanjian upend-ed Russian GM Vladimir Belous, while Lin downed Deepan in 56 moves of a Sicilian Schaveningen.

Russian GMs Anton Dem-chenko and Vladimir Belous and Vietnamese GM Duc Hoa Nguy-en finished a half point adrift with similar 6.0 points, while a big group of 5.5 pointers, includ-ing Filipino bidders International Master Jan Emmanuel Garcia

IRA Christian Alido pulled off an extraordinary come-from-behind victory in the eighth edition of the Faldo Series Phil-ippines Championship.

Trailing tournament favorite Rupert Zaragosa by 10 strokes with just nine holes remaining, Alido eventually pre-vailed on the first hole of a sudden-death play-off in the 54-hole World Amateur Golf Ranking [WAGR] event.

For 14-year-old Alido, a student at De La Salle Zobel, it was a stunning upset win that is sure to raise his stock and propel him into the golfing limelight here.

While Alido snared five birdies for an inward 32 and a closing one-under-par 70, Zaragosa suffered a late wobble at Beverly Place Golf Club in Pampanga, about 70 kilometers north of the capital Manila.

After three successive bogeys to open the back nine, Zara-gosa steadied the ship by covering the next four holes in even-par. But the national team representative then came unstuck at the par-five 17th where he ran-up a double-bogey seven.

A par at the long 18th meant he signed for a 78 – no fewer than 13 shots worse than his sparkling opening-round 65 that saw him leap to the top of the leaderboard. Following that up with a 69, Zaragosa appeared set fair for a runaway success.

Instead, he ended with a three-day aggregate of one-under 212, losing out on the overall title to Alido in extra time in the 14th leg of the record-breaking 2015-2016 Faldo Series Asia season.

CAGAYAN De Oro City– Arnold Unabia and Christine Hallasgo proved their mettle as they clinched the top spots of the 21K centrepiece events in the 39th National MILO Marathon Cagayan De Oro leg. Around 11,900 runners conquered the exciting chal-lenge of a new race route on the streets of the city dubbed as the Gateway to Mindanao. The Cagayan de Oro leg is the last qualifying race this sea-son, with the National Finals slated to be held on December 6 in Ange-les Pampanga.

Unabia and Hallasgo each took home the top prize of P10,000 in cash and a trophy; and earned their slots to the National MILO Marathon Finals where they will meet the nation’s elite runners in a heated race to claim the MILO Marathon King and Queen titles. To provide another level of pres-tige to the competition and incentive for the runners, this year’s King and Queen will be sent by MILO to the USA on all-expense paid trips, for a chance to run in the prestigious 2016 Boston Marathon.

It was a tight race in the men’s di-vision, with only seconds separating the top three finishers. Unabia came out on top with a time of 01:15:27, followed closely by Jerald Zabala

(01:15:40) in second place and Bryan Quiamco (01:15:50) in third place. In the distaff side, Hallasgo dominated with a time of 01:28:25. Michelle Ann Sampang (01:39:41) and Ailene Tolen-tino (01:45:35) finished in second and third place, respectively.

Unabia has quite a number of feats to his name. Since first joining the MILO Marathon in 1997, the 37-year-old Misamis Oriental native has al-ready won five qualifying legs to date, winning two in General Santos and three in Cagayan De Oro. Unabia is an athletics coach in Tangub City who trains elementary and high school students, and out of school youth. He also trains MILO marathon runners and MILO Little Olympics student-athletes. “I was not able to focus that much on my training because I was busy coaching my students for the MILO Little Olympics National Finals held in October. I train with them, but of course, preparing for the 21K event is different, so I also train on my own every week,” he shared. “Coaching these kids is my way of giving back and helping them. They kids can also use sports to help them in open-ing up opportunities in school, like scholarships. They have very bright futures in sports.”

By Ronnie Nathanielsz

FORMER five-division world champion and 2012 Fighter of the Year Nonito “The Filipino Flash” Donaire is determined to recapture his past glory and has trained hard-er than ever for his WBO super bantamweight showdown with No. 1-ranked Cesar Juarez of Mexico on Dec. 13 in Puerto Rico.

Donaire told The Standard/box-ingmirror.com that he has been sparring 10 rounds with Fidel Na-varette, a 24-year-old super feath-erweight from Highland, Indiana, who has a record of 8-1-2 with 4 knockouts and 27-year-old Fred

Bowen, a lightweight from Jackson, Tennessee with a record of 5-2-1 with 2 knockouts.

Donaire said the two sparring partners push him and “keep com-ing at me,” and that in the face of the aggression he is “doing really excellently.”

“I feel great, my mental aspect is on a different level and helps me prepare for this fight. It’s amazing,” said Donaire. “This is the hardest I have trained for a fight. I am more committed and have direction in my training” unlike in the past.

The Filipino Flash maintained that whether the WBO, which stripped Guillermo Rigondeaux of

the title acts positively on his appeal or not, “it doesn’t matter. I am fight-ing for victory.”

Nonito’s wife Rachel, a former national taekwondo champion in the US, said she too was amazed at how well her husband has looked in training.

After a crushing sixth-round TKO loss to Jamaica’s bigger and stronger Nicholas Walters, Donaire decided to drop down to super bantamweight and since then, has scored two second-round TKO victories over William Prado of Brazil and Anthony Settoul of France, the former European ban-tamweight champion.

La Salle bet stunsfavorite in Faldo tilt

and GM Joey Antonio followed.Aside from the 53-year-old

Antonio and Garcia, also with 5.5 points are Fide Master Ahuja Rohan of India, Gupta, Deepan, Russian GM Mikhail Mozharov, (RUS), GM Abhimanyu Puranik of India, second seed Ukranian GM Alexander Zubov, Russian GM Anton Shomoev, Belous and Xiangyi Liu of Singapore.

In the Challenger Divison of the tournament organized by the National Chess Federation of the Philippines and supported by the PSC, Philippine Olympic Com-mittee, Puregold, Asia United Bank, Burlington Socks and Marc Ventures and Mining Corp., top seed Franz Robert Grafil and Prince Mark Aquino completed the nine-round event with simi-lar 7.5 points, but Grafil, who split the point with NM Efren Bagamasbad after 37 moves of the Bogo Indian, won the title via a superior tiebreak.

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[email protected]

Tri United 4 at Fontana lures 650 participants

Ateneo-Iloilo, Sun Yat Sen win SBP-Passerelle

Thai rookie is RW Masters king

ATENEO de Iloilo and Sun Yat Sen High School bagged the championship titles in the re-cently held Visayas Regional Fi-nals of the Small Basketeers of the Philippines-Passerelle Twin Tournament held at the Univer-sity of St. La Salle court in Ba-colod City.

Ateneo de Iloilo dominated the SBP division with a final score of 42-35 over the deter-mined University of the Visayas. In the third place playoff, St. John’s Institute defeated Colegio de la Purisima Concepcion of Roxas, 63-24.

In the Passerelle division, Sun Yat Sen High School emerged victorious after defeating Tay Tung High School with a final

score of 71-58. Sacred Heart School–Ateneo de Cebu came in the third place after beating Col-lege of St. John-Roxas, 65-23.

Ateneo de Iloilo and Sun Yat Sen High School will represent Visayas in the upcoming SBP-Passerelle Twin Tournament National Championships to be held in Baguio City on Decem-ber 5 and 6. They will battle it out against NCR’s La Salle Greenhills in SBP and Adam-son University in Passerelle and Mindanao’s Ateneo de Davao in both divisions.

Meanwhile, the Luzon Finals will be held on November 28 to 29 at the University of the Assumption Gym in San Fernando, Pampanga.

Now on its 30th season, the

SBP-Passerelle Twin Tourna-ment is the country’s biggest interschool basketball competi-tion for kids. Organized by the Basketball Efficiency Scientific Training (BEST) Center and sponsored by Milo and Chris Sports, the competition pits the country’s best school teams and the most promising basketball players against each other. The young cagers give all their best for the ultimate victory and the chance to make a mark in the country’s basketball scene.

To know more about the schedules of SBP-Passerelle Twin Tournament 2015, visit BEST Center’s Facebook page at www.facebook.com/pages/BEST-Cen-ter-Sports-Inc/66172039922.

Thai Natipong Srithong holds his huge trophy after scoring a stirring come-from-behind victory in the $1 million Resorts World Manila Masters.

Srithong bucked overwhelming odds just to wheel back into contention, including erstwhile leader Hung Chien-yao’s ace on No. 13, and pulled through in a nerve-wracking stretch by drilling clutch birdies, including a big two-shot swing on No. 17, before watching his rivals waver at the finish before a big gallery.

With his earlier 71, 69 and 66, Srithong pooled a 15-under 273 and pocket the top $180,000 purse in the country’s richest golf championship hosted by the Manila Southwoods.

“I kept telling myself to stay calm because in the last few tournaments on the Asian Development Tour, I got excited about being in contention but ended up not playing well in the last round,” said Srithong, who turned pro just two months ago and played here on a sponsor’s invite. “I took it one shot at a time and played at my own pace.”

A flight ahead of the championship group but three off Kruger, Srithong worked his back from a bogey mishap on No. 2 with birdies on Nos. 6, 7 and 9 then closed to within as Kruger fumbled with a double-bogey on No. 10. He tied the South African with another birdie on No. 15 then struck for the decisive birdie on No. 17 which Kruger bogeyed to wrest control.

Not even Kruger’s birdie on the 18th could force a playoff as Srithong holed out with a rou-tine two-putt par to clinch the victory. Kruger ended up with a 71 for a 274 worth $110,000.

“I knew I had to hit an eagle to try to tie him and I nearly did it. But it showed it wasn’t meant to be,” said Kruger, adding that his final chip ran over the lip of the cup.

Hung Chien-yao, who surged ahead by one af-ter 54 holes, fell off the leaderboard with a slew of bogeys at the front for a 39 but bounced back with a hole-in-one on No. 13 and birdies on Nos. 15 and 16, only to drop two strokes on the par-5 closing hole and lost by two with a 73 and a 275. He settled for joint third with compatriot Lee Chieh-po, who closed out with a 70.

“Hopefully I can do better next time.” said Hung, who nevertheless won a unique VIP aircraft service from Red Tail Aviation worth $250,000 for acing the 241-yard No. 13.

Angelo Que failed to sustain a fiery 66 Saturday and ended up with a 72, joining Miguel Tabuena, who shot a 70, at 18th at 280 for the Philippines’ best finish in the 72-hole championship, the fourth to last leg of this year’s Asian Tour. Each got $10,935.

“I missed some birdie putts. But that’s no ex-cuse. I have to keep going and practice even more on the greens,” said Que, a former three-time Asian Tour winner.

WITH a field of 650 participants composed mainly of first-timers, Tri United 4 estab-lished itself as the premier triathlon event for newbies last Sunday at the scenic Fontana Leisure Park in Clark, Pampanga, giving the 2015 Tri United series of Unilab Active Health a fitting conclusion.

Organized by Bike King (headed by Raul Cuevas), the race saw triathletes enjoy the beginner-friendly course of 600-meter swim at the water park’s pool, 20-kilometer bike around the park and 5-km run on the resort’s rolling paths. With the execution of the rolling start-style, participants were evenly distributed in the pool, resulting in much less physical contact between them.

In the event sponsored by ULAH, Fon-tana Leisure Parks and Casino, Active

Health Carb Gel, Enervon Active, Enervon HP, Oral Rehydration Salts Hydrite Gran-ules, WeatherPhilippines, TIMEX, Sau-cony, Orbea, Clark Freeport and Gardenia, the age-group category winners were Brent Valelo and Maria Margarita Delos Reyes (15-17), Chadwick Tsai and Maria Danielle Infantado (18-24), Miguel Rigor and Kylee Therese Lagman (25-29), Francis Fred-eric Cruz and Richelle Hizon (3034), Paolo Leano and Mary Grace Olfindo (35-39), Richard Ulat and Martha Goebel (40-44), Ronald Honrade (Male 45-49), May Bola-nos (45-above), Mark Way (Male 50-54) and Brigilio Balaba (Male 55-above).

On the team relay of the race that also drew the support of media partners Multi-sport Magazine, SwimBikeRun.ph, Spin.ph

and RaceDay, 2600 Teri Team (members Al-fred Gonzales, John Thomas Gonzales and Geoffrey Perez) took the gold.

Next team was Circuit Runners for the sil-ver, while Team BANG bagged the bronze.

“With the higher than expected turnout of participants, who enjoyed the race and our venue combined with the efficient organizing of Bike King, we are very happy with the over-all result of hosting Tri United 4 and we look forward to hosting more triathlon events here at Fontana,” said Fontana Leisure Parks and Casino recreational manager Bresnen Lom-boy, who took part in the awarding ceremony.

Full results can be viewed online at bikek-ingphilippines.com or the event’s Facebook page. Next season will commence on Feb. 28 at the Subic Bay Freeport Zone.

CARMONA, Cavite—Thai rookie Natipong Srithong charged back from three strokes down in the last nine holes to snatch the rich Resorts World Manila Masters crown, putting on a scorching finish to edge South African Jbe Kruger by one on a five-under 67 at the Manila South-woods’ Masters course here yesterday.

Sun Yat Sen High School emerged victorious after defeating Tay Tung High School.

Jang, Kerr share lead as Ko-Park duel tightensNAPLES—Rookie Jang Ha-Na and veteran Cristie Kerr shared the lead after Saturday’s third round of the LPGA Tour Championship, while Lydia Ko and Park In-Bee took their fight for world number one into the final round of the season.

South Korean Jang shot a three-under par 69 while American Kerr fired 66 to stand level at 13-under 203, two strokes ahead of New Zealand

teen Ko and American Gerina Piller.Top-rated Ko fired a 69 while

South Korea’s Park shot 67 to stand on 207 with Japan’s Ai Miyazato in a share of eighth, one stroke behind France’s Karine Icher and Ameri-cans Brittany Lincicome and Lexi Thompson.

If Park can win the title, she would overtake Ko for the world number one ranking and capture

the season points title. The two are also very close for

the Player of the Year award, Vare Trophy for season low scoring aver-age and the season money crown, those prizes as well coming down to Sunday’s last round.

“I should be proud that I’m in this position. Anything can hap-pen. If I play well, it might end up being a good day where I’m holding

a couple trophies,” Ko said.“At the same time, because ev-

erything is on the line, there is more added pressure. It’s more kind of those first couple holes where you do get nervous anyway, but to know at the end of the 18th hole, there could be a lot of things on the line, a little bit more added pressure. But that’s why I’m not going to not think about all that.” AFP

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SPORTS

It’s Tigers-Tamsfor UAAP title

Home Ultera’s Aiza Pontillas (8) unloads a spike against UP’s Justine Dorog (13) and Katherine Bersola (8) during their semis showdown in the Shakey’s V-League Reinforced Conference semis clash yesterday.

By Peter Atencio

A CHAMPIONSHIP battle that last happened 36 years ago is about to unfold.

Alvarez outpoints Cotto for middleweight title

Ultra Fast Hitters reachV-League volley finals

� e University of Santo Tomas Growling Tigers made sure of this when they took control early and put away the defending champion National University Bulldogs, 64-55, yesterday in the Final Four of the 78th University Athletic Association of the Philippines men’s basketball tournament at the Araneta Coliseum.

� e win sent UST into a rare best-of-three � nals showdown with the Far Eastern University Tamaraws, who banked on Mac Belo’s follow-up shot at the buzzer o� Mike Tolomia’s miss to escape with a 76-74 win over Ateneo last Saturday.

UST and FEU last met in the Finals in 1979, when the Tamaraws beat the Tigers for the crown, 100-89.

� e Growling Tigers, with Louie Vigil, Kevin Ferrer and

Sheak Sheri� , scoring in double digits, gained the initiative from the start with their 9-2 lead in the � rst 10 minutes.

� ey never looked back and banked on their interior defense to stay in front even if NU managed to cut the gap to 12-15 at the end of the � rst period.

Back-to-back baskets from Kareem Abdul and Mario Bonleon saw UST hike its lead again, 21-12.

UST tightened its trapping defense, which shut down NU’s proli� c shooter Angelo Alolino in the � rst period. Bonleon’s triple in the dying seconds of the � rst half allowed the Espana-based cagers to enjoy a 28-18 spread.

“Iyung mga players, nilabas nila ang puso nila. Sabi namin, one game lang. So, pinakita nila

LAS VEGAS—Mexico’s Saul “Canelo” Alvarez captured the vacant World Boxing Council middleweight title Saturday with a unanimous decision victory over Puerto Rico’s Miguel Cotto.

Judges awarded Alvarez the ver-dict by scores of 119-109, 118-110 and 117-111, the Mexican improving to 46-1-1 while Cotto fell to 40-5.

Alvarez, 25, became only the second Mexican � ghter to claim

the world middleweight throne, taking the title Cotto, 34, surren-dered earlier in the week rather than pay sanctioning fees.

“It’s an emotion I just can’t put into words,” Alvarez said. “I’m very happy. Much respect to Miguel Cotto. He’s a great champion. But now it’s my era.”

Unbeaten Kazak � ghter Gen-nady Golovkin, 34-0 with 31 knockouts, owns the other two ma-

jor middleweight titles and Alvarez said he is ready to face him to de-termine an undisputed champion.

“If he wants to � ght right now, I’ll put on the gloves and � ght him right now,” Alvarez said. “He’s a great champion. But right now I’ll put the gloves on against him.”

Cotto suffered only his second defeat in 10 fights against Mexicans, the other coming to Antonio Margarito in 2008.

“It’s a great victory for me, not just me

but all of my country,” Alvarez said.� e � ghters traded impressive

exchanges through the early rounds of a bout fought at a catchweight of 155 pounds.

But the pace increased in the eighth round as Cotto pressed the attack against the larger Alvarez, his jab setting up power punches against the Mexi-can, who responded with left hooks and combinations to keep Cotto at bay over the final rounds. AFP

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TOP seed Army and No. 2 PLDT Home Ultera lived up to the hype and eased out their respective semi� nal rivals in emphatic fashions yesterday to set up a keenly awaited clash for the Shakey’s V-League Season 12-Reinforced Conference crown at � e Arena in San Juan City.

� e Lady Troopers feasted on the Navy Lady Sailors’ poor reception, coming away with 10 aces on their way to a 25-16, 25-10, 25-22 romp that virtually matched the Ultra Fast Spikers’ 25-11, 25-17, 25-17 demolition of the UP Lady Maroons in their side of the Final Four in the season-ending conference of the league sponsored by Shakey’s.

Army and Home Ultera begin their best-of-three title series on Saturday with the Lady Troopers seeking a payback from their Open Conference title setback to the Ultra Fast Hitters early this year.

Jovelyn Gonzaga scored 10 hits while Honey Royse Tubino, Nerissa Bautista, Mary Palma, Sarah Gonzales and setter Tina Salak combined for 30 points for the twice-to-beat Lady Troopers, who struggled a bit in the third but pulled through just the same to complete their 68-minute victory.

Also armed with a twice-to-beat bonus, the Ultra Fast Hitters hardly gave the Lady Maroons a chance for a reversal as Aiza Pontillas and Sue Roces spearheaded a series of Home Ultera attacks right from the start while the rest backed them up with superb reception and net defense to

fashion out the 64-minute demolition.� e win thus sent Home Ultera

to the � nals of the season-ending conference of the league sponsored by Shakey’s and kept Roger Gorayeb’s bid for a rare coaching slam alive a� er winning the Open Conference crown for PLDT and the Collegiate diadem for National U.

Gorayeb also found no need to � eld in imports Victoria Hurtt and Sareea Freeman as Pontillas and Roces took charge with 13 and 11 hits and Janine Marciano, Laurence Ann Latigay and Charo Soriano chipped in nine, eight and six markers, respectively.

“I let them (Hurtt and Freeman) sit out this game because I want them to see and adjust to how the locals play and not the other way around,” said Gorayed, whose wards also the Diliman-based squad, 25-12, 22-25, 25-15, 25-17, in the elims of the tournament presented by PLDT Home Ultera and backed by Mikasa and Accel.

� e Ultra Fast Hitters also used their experience to blast the young third seeded UP side, producing 42 spikes against the Lady Maroons’ 25, including a combined 12-kill output by Isabel Molde and Alisa Buitre.

UP had more blocks, 4-2, but the Lady Maroons struggled with their service reception, enabling the Ultra Fast Hitters to knock in seven aces.

Molde topscored for UP with seven hits while Buitre and Diana Carlos tossed in six points apiece and Katherine Bersola added � ve markers.

IN my over two decades of cover-ing sports, I have always proven that the saying “magnanimity in victory and grace in defeat” always rings true.

Some athletes sell themselves by showing o� , looking intimidat-ing, talking big and not shaking the hands of opponents.

Others tend to be carried away by success. But sports fans cannot be deceived, they know if it’s for real or not. Perhaps, that’s what they saw on Ronda Rousey, the fallen MMA champion.

Prior to her fateful loss in the UFC 193 more than a week ago, Ronda was on top of the world. For her, taking on Holly Holm was go-ing to be a walk in the park.

But Holm, a three-time boxing champion, had other things in mind and ended up exposing Ronda.

***Holm did what she does best,

punishing Rousey with solid punches—mostly by using her ef-fective le� hooks—� nishing her o� with a big head kick for the KO win in the second round.

� e world was shocked not only because of the knockout, but by the way Holm essayed the win, making it so lopsided and taking in what Ronda had to o� er.

At the weigh-in a day before the � ght, Rousey tried to make it per-

sonal by intimidating and talking trash to Holm, who remained calm and composed.

Before the � ght, the poker-faced Rousey refused to touch gloves. Two rounds later, Rousy crashed back to earth.

Holm, a preacher’s daughter, im-mediately o� ered peace though and hugged the still stunned Rousey.

It was a scene that was a stark contrast to the one when Rousey beat Meisha Tate for the knockout win few months ago. � e beaten Tate extended her congratulatory hand a� er the � ght, but Rousey ignored the o� er and proceeded to celebrate her victory in the cage.

In the week that followed the day Holm crowned herself the new UFC women’s bantamweight champion, experts gave their cent’s worth trying to � gure out where Rousey had gone wrong.

Some said her coach had the worst plan by allowing Ronda to pursue Holm all night.

Elite trainer Freddie Roach said nobody taught Rousey any boxing. Well, Rousey de� nitely looked like an amateur � ghter out there.

� ey also said Rousey was not at her best during the � ght because she was too con� dent against Holm, who it turned out, prepared hard in training and defended well against the arm-bar attempt of the Olympic judo medalist. Holm also reversed Rousey’s takedown charge.

***What observers did not empha-

size was that Rousey was � ghting a southpaw. Even if Rousey trained for

years in boxing and made herself a contender, she would de� nitely � nd it hard against a le� y like Holm.

In boxing, orthodox (right-handed) boxers � nd it di� cult to solve southpaw � ghters. Boxing greats like Antonio Barrera, Miguel Cotto, Oscar de la Hoya, to name a few, su� ered crushing defeats against southpaw Manny Pacquiao.

An orthodox fighter’s bet-ter chance against a southpaw is to counter-punch. Just like what Mexican legend Juan Man-uel Marquez did in his last fight against Pacquiao.

With the aggressive, plodding style of Rousey, she was de� nitely a sucker for those solid le� hooks by Holm, who completely dominated the � ght.

There is no doubt though that Ronda would be back. She’s tal-ented and has a champion’s heart. Next time, however, she has to throw her emotions to the trash bin and fight tactically.

And please, Ronda, touch gloves with your opponent before the � ght. It’s a gesture that gives es-sence to what � ght sport really is all about.

***COMBO PUNCHES: Listen to

Fightnews Hour on DZSR Sports Radio 918 with JM Siasat and yours truly and follow Fightnews Asia on Facebook. Join our contest to win free tickets to ONE Championship: Spirit of Champions slated Dec. 13 at the Mall of Asia. ONE Cham-pionship items will also be given away as prizes.

Swift lesson for RondaLOCKER

ROOMRANDY

CALUAG

from the start. Dumepensa sila hanggang dulo,” said UST coach Bong de la Cruz.

Vigil tallied a game-high 19 points to go with seven rebounds. Ferrer added 11 points and Sheri� made 10.

On the other hand, NU drew 17 points from Nico Javellona while Jay Alejandro had eight. Alfred Aroga put in seven points and 15 rebounds.

UST stayed on its toes at the start of the second half. They posted a 33-20 spread in the last 9:27 of the period off Ferrer’s trey.

Vigil’s drive in the remaining 1:21 saw UST posting a 15-point edge, 44-29.

NU coach Eric Altamirano said this could be the team’s worst game of the whole season.

“What a time to play our worst game. We were not able to get it done at both ends. You can attribute it to UST’s good defense,” said Altamirano as NU failed to the return to the � nals.

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reUeL vIdaLA S S I S TA N T E D I T O R

turn to A15turn to A15

AlvArezoutpointscotto forworldcrown

ultrAfAst hittersin finAls

June Mar Fajardo flexed his muscles on the way to another sensational outing. The reign-ing two-time Most Valuable Player had a 20-20 game with game-highs of 28 points and 20 rebounds to spearhead the Beer-men’s attack.

With the Beermen down, 104-105, with 10 seconds remain-ing, San Miguel mapped out a plan to find Fajardo inside. But with the big man guarded down low, the Beermen went to Mar-cio Lassiter instead.

After Lassiter’s jumper

By Jeric lopez

IT was one wild finish.In what was probably the best game of the season, Arwind Santos sank a game-winning putback with 0.6 of a second remaining to lift San Miguel Beer to a 106-105 escape win over Barako Bull as the Beermen dodged an upset bullet and regained the solo lead in the 2015 Philippine Basket-ball Association Philippine Cup at the Ynares Sports Cent-er in Antipolo City yesterday.

Santos’ putback lifts SMBrimmed out, Santos came to the rescue, grabbing the offensive rebound and putting it right back up for what turned out to be the winning basket for the Beermen.

Barako Bull had a final chance to win the nip-and-tuck battle. With 0.6 left on the clock, the Energy went to RR Garcia, but the former Far Eastern University guard missed a desperation jumper, al-lowing San Miguel Beer to hold on to the victory.

San Miguel Beer coach Leo Austria said he was ‘’happy’’ with his team’s win, but he was far from satisfied with how his

wards played.‘’A one-point win is still a win

at tatanggapin ko ng buong puso ito. I’m happy that Arwind (San-tos) made the game-winning shot,’’

said Austria. ‘’From the start, kita na sa body language ng Barako na gusto nila manalo at naging kampante kami. I hope this game can teach us a lesson.’’

As a result, the de-fending champion is once again in sole pos-

session of the tournament lead with its 5-1 card following this third straight victory.

On the other hand, the Energy saw their two-game winning streak snapped. Barako (3-3) fell to the mid-dle of the standings.

Bullpupsgrab leadBy peter Atencio

THE National University Bullpups drew big baskets from John Lloyd Clemente and Justine Baltazar in the third period to whip the La Salle-Zobel Junior Archers, 68-53, Saturday in the 78th University Athletic Association of the Philippines Junior Basketball Tournament at the Blue Eagle gym.

Clemente and Baltazar struck hard at the start of the second half, scoring eight points apiece. Their efforts car-ried the Bullpups to their third straight win and into the solo leadership.

Ahead, 30-29, at halftime, the Bullpups moved away by 11, 51-40, at end of the third.

The Junior Archers now share sec-ond spot with the defending cham-pion Ateneo Blue Eaglets, Far Eastern University and University of Santo Tomas with identical two wins, one loss cards.

Gian Mamuyac and Jolo Mendoza made 20 and 16 points , respectively, for the Blue Eaglets in their 71-55 wal-loping of the Adamson Baby Falcons.

Mamuyac, a mainstay of Batang Gilas, also had six rebounds, two as-sists and two steals in Ateneo’s second straight triumph.

SMB’s Arwiind Santos (right) scores on a jumper in a PBA Philippine Cup game won by the Beermen, 106-105. It was Santos, who scored the game-winner later, a putback off a Marcio Lassiter miss with 0.6 of a second left in the game.

Games tuesday (Smart Araneta

Coliseum):4:15 p.m. - NLEX vs.

Meralco7 p.m. - Star vs.

Alaska

RODERICK T. DELA CRUZASSISTANT EDITOR B1

MONDAY: NOVEMBER 23, 2015

[email protected]@gmail.com

RAY S. EÑANOEDITOR

ERC reviews cross-ownershipsBUSINESS

Voyager Innovations strengthened its position as the financial technology pioneer and leader for emerging markets with another prestigious recognition, this time from the coveted Meffys global Mobile awards 2015 held in London recently.

Chosen from among a global shortlist was Charge2Phone (C2P) which was recognized as the world’s best mobile money service.

C2P is the country’s first sticker-based innovative card feature that allows contactless payments for over-the-air counter purchases and online payments using a Smart or Sun mobile number. This innovation was developed through a collaboration with Citi Philippines and Visa. C2P was also shortlisted under the Innovations in Financial Technology category.

“We’re honored that C2P, a homegrown innovation, was recognized at the global stage. Together with this award, the positive feedback from consumers and our partners validates our leadership in the financial technology space in emerging markets,” said orlando B. Vea, president and Ceo of Voyager Innovations.

organized by the Mobile ecosystem Forum, a global trade association of the expanding mobile ecosystem, the annual Meffys is a prestigious international award-giving body considered as a global benchmark in the mobile industry.

It recognizes the most influential technology companies from around the world across 17 mobile categories. Finalists chosen from hundreds of entries from companies all over the world were judged by a panel of journalists, academics, analysts, and venture capitalists.

Voyager Innovations and Smart eMoney, Inc., both digital units of PLDT and Smart, earned the most number of finalists at this year’s Meffys with four, and are the only Philippine-based companies in the shortlist that includes Barclay PCL, Telefonica, aVg Securities, F-Secure, evernote, Skyscanner, easy Taxi, airtel and other global leaders in the converging digital, telecommunications and financial services arena.

also shortlisted as finalists were LockByMobile (Consumer Trust Category) and Mobile Loan Saver (Consumer First Category).

LockByMobile is the world’s first mobile-based anti-fraud and card control security solution. Developed by Voyager Innovations, LockByMobile empowers card users to “lock” and “unlock” their aTM, prepaid, debit, and credit cards with the use of their smartphones.

LaNDBaNK Mobile LoanSaver was launched in partnership with the Land Bank of the Philippines which is the country’s first paperless and electronic salary loan program with auto savings and insurance features. In less than a year, the award-winning service has processed over P4 billion in salary loans for more than

30,000 employees from about 580 government agencies.“all financial technology products and platforms that we are

developing are demand driven and customer-centric. We are here to enable, engage and empower all stakeholders in the ecosystem. This includes consumers, enterprises, small and medium businesses, entrepreneurs, banking and finance institutions, government and humanitarian agencies and regulators,” said Lito Villanueva, Vice President and Head of Financial Innovations, Digital Inclusion and alliances at Voyager Innovations.

Both Voyager Innovations and Smart eMoney are pioneering digital services in the financial technology space, initially implementing in the Philippines with an eye on the regional and global market. among the areas they are dominating are digital payments, mobile

consumer loans, government to person disbursements, remittance and digital financial services security.

early this month, Voyager Innovations introduced Lendr, the first online consumer loans marketplace platform, to members of the rural Bankers association of the Philippines. Lendr is expected to significantly help expand the reach and increase efficiencies in the consumer loan offerings of financial institutions.

The company also signed a deal with Bulgarian based fintech startup Cash Credit for consumer loans credit scoring. Most recently, Voyager Innovations and Smart entered into a strategic partnership agreement with the CIMB group, the Malaysian-based universal bank that has presence across Southeast asia.

In august this year, Smart eMoney introduced PayMaya, the newest digital payments mobile app that

generates an instant virtual Visa, allowing consumers to immediately shop online once reloaded. PayMaya also comes with a physical Visa card that can be used to swipe for face-to-face transactions. a variant, PayMaya Visa card with beep, comes with a beep wallet and can be used to tap at LrT and MrT stations.

Voyager Innovations and Smart eMoney have been developing platforms and services that are garnering traction and recognition globally. The companies are the key vehicles in the PLDT group’s global innovations thrusts especially in the areas of financial technology, digital commerce and communications innovations, mostly for emerging markets.

Last year, Smart eMoney also won the Best in Mobile Money award at the Meffys for its mobile cash transfer program with the Land Bank of the Philippines which was deployed in the aftermath of super typhoon yolanda. Smart eMoney enabled the payment fulfillment facility for the cash-for-work disaster relief intervention of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).

Best in Mobile Money at the Meffys Global Mobile Awards. Lito Villanueva, Vice President and Head of Financial Innovations, Digital Inclusion and Alliances at Voyager Innovations receives the Best in Mobile Money Award from Rimma Perelmuter, CEO & Global Board Director at the Mobile Ecosystem Forum during the Meffys Gala Dinner held in London.

Charge2Phone chosen as world’s best mobile money serviceVoyager Innovations at the Meffys Global Mobile Awards in London

2016 bets dared to baretheir climate change stand THE Philippine Solar Power Alliance has asked the presidential aspirants to disclose their cli-mate change and energy agenda, after US Pres-ident Barack Obama cited the need to cut car-bon emissions.

“The leader of the free world has spoken and shared their views in mitigating climate change. We in the solar industry believes that reducing emissions by building gigawatt-size solar installations is a win-win solution for countries that in growth path like the Philip-pines—solar and wind energy add capacity in the system and address the growing need for power in a sustainable way,” PSPA president Tetchie Capellan said.

PSPA is the umbrella organization of solar pow-er developers in the country.

“We call on all presidential aspirants to bare their climate change and energy agenda. We call on all of them to share their installation targets for RE and the generation mix they support including the policy instruments they would implement to achieve their targets,” Capellan said.

“We want to hear detailed reform programs in climate change and not just rhetorics,” she said.

Obama, in a speech during the Asia Pacific Eco-nomic Cooperation Summit in Manila, cited an urgent need to arrest climate change and urged companies to invest in renewable energy and clean technologies.

“The patterns and the science don’t lie–tem-peratures and sea levels are rising; ice caps are melting; storms are strengthening. If we want to prevent the worst effects of climate change before it’s too late, the time to act is now,” Obama said.

The Philippines has a taken a giant stride to-wards addressing climate change with the pas-sage of the Renewable Energy Law of 2008.

The law ushered the entry of foreign and local investments in the industry with the Energy De-partment approving around 616 renewable ener-gy projects with a potential capacity of 12,138.41 megawatts as of end-October.

Bulk of the projects approved were hydro with 343 projects, with potential capacity of 7,390.42 megawatts, followed by solar with 93 projects and combined capacity of 2,554.81 MW. Alena Mae S. Flores

By Alena Mae S. Flores

THE Energy Regulatory Commission is re-viewing the rules on cross-ownership and market shares restrictions to prevent abuses.

ERC chairman Jose Vicente Salazar said the regulator was re-visiting the provisions under the Electric Power Industry Reform Act of 2001 “in order to prevent anti-competitive behavior and market abuse by certain compa-nies.”

The Epira said “no partici-pant in the electricity industry may engage in any anti-com-petitive behavior including...

cross-subsidization, price or market manipulation, or other unfair trade practices detri-mental to the encouragement and protection of contestable markets.”

The law said no generation company or distribution util-ity engaged in generating and supplying electricity should be allowed to hold any interest Na-tional Transmission Corp. or its

concessionaire.The provision further stated

that Transco or its concessionaire, or any of its stockholders or offi-cials or relatives within the fourth civil degree of consanguinity or affinity should “not hold any in-terest, whether direct or indirect, in any generation company or distribution utility.”

“Except for government-ap-pointed representatives, no per-son who is an officer or director of TransCo or its concessionaire shall be an officer or director of any generation company, distri-bution utility or supplier,” the Epira said.

The law also directed ERC to set the market share limitations

annually to prevent any person, company or independent power generators to own, operate or control more than 30 percent of the installed generating capac-ity of a grid or 25 percent of the national installed generating ca-pacity.

Several groups have raised its concerns on the cross-ownership provision of the EPIRA.

The National Association of Electricity Consumers for Re-forms earlier said there must be absolute prohibition on cross ownership between and among owners and stockholders of a dis-tribution utility and generation company.

“Absolute prohibition will allow

a level playing field in the genera-tion and supply sectors,” Nasecore said.

The National Electrification Administration, in a comment regarding the Epira amend-ments, earlier said the law barred cross-ownership be-tween generation or distribution and transmission.

“Safeguards should therefore be strengthened against co-owner-ship and abuse of market power,” NEA said.

It proposed a possible restric-tion on firms of “vertical market power” from further acquisition of generation assets owned by National Power Corp. to avoid cartel.


BUSINESSMONDAY: NOVEMBER 23, 2015

B2

NOVEMBER 16-20, 2015 NOVEMBER 9-13, 2015STOCKS Close Volume Value Close Volume Value

The STandard BuSineSS Weekly STockS revieW

FINANCIALAG Finance 2.55 27,000 69,430.00 2.79 184,000 480,860.00Asia United Bank 49.2 55,300 2,706,965.00 49.25 1,713,200 82,142,670.00Banco de Oro Unibank Inc. 99.25 7,538,490 749,826,641 101.50 12,159,070 1,221,712,871Bank of PI 86.75 6,415,050 544,157,707.00 84.10 7,684,100 649,433,409.50China Bank 39.4 128,500 5,076,595.00 39.6 195,000 7,797,660.00Bright Kindle Resources 1.57 66,000 105,440.00 1.70 605,000 1,005,780.00COL Financial 15.6 11,300 175,830.00 15.68 20,900 324,694.00Eastwest Bank 18.92 266,600 5,036,788.00 19.08 344,200 6,631,894.00Filipino Fund Inc. 7.70 1,100 8,464 7.70 3,200 24,238First Abacus 0.65 20,000 13,000 I-Remit Inc. 1.60 96,000 154,510.00 1.63 149,000 246,480.00Manulife Fin. Corp. 750.00 110 82,500.00 770.00 1,510 1,151,780.00MEDCO Holdings 0.490 580,000 277,600.00 0.495 4,413,000 2,299,855.00Metrobank 81.1 6,864,290 550,750,975.50 80.05 7,288,760 598,955,996.50Natl Reinsurance Corp. 0.97 212,000 200,570.00 0.95 267,000 253,770.00PB Bank 18.00 226,400 4,063,962.00 18.00 560,800 10,087,722.00Phil. National Bank 51.90 291,530 14,837,106.00 51.90 413,530 21,895,553.00Phil. Savings Bank 104 1,140 112,320.00 103.9 1,800 181,995.00PSE Inc. 296 1,580 468,074.00 303 5,520 1,657,400.00RCBC À’ 33 139,400 4,495,355 32.6 434,100 13,891,575Security Bank 136 836,410 111,963,012.00 137 1,020,400 141,008,177.00Sun Life Financial 1535.00 155 237,825.00 1550.00 880 1,364,285.00Union Bank 56.90 54,740 3,113,803.00 57.00 344,080 19,583,578.50

INDUSTRIALAboitiz Power Corp. 42 8,679,800 359,780,450.00 40.9 13,973,600 571,152,775.00Agrinurture Inc. 3.41 5,367,435 33,864,460.00 2.09 1,733,000 3,615,190.00Alliance Tuna Intl Inc. 0.84 57,000 47,880.00 0.88 763,000 648,600.00Alsons Cons. 1.54 862,000 1,335,090.00 1.57 1,378,000 2,159,260.00Asiabest Group 10.98 2,600 27,264.00 11 3,900 41,850.00C. Azuc De Tarlac 98.95 1,050 103,899.50 95.00 40 3,800.00Century Food 17.6 1,303,000 23,090,744 18.32 5,798,500 102,932,858Cirtek Holdings (Chips) 20.75 4,112,100 85,098,275.00 20.85 30,650,700 664,640,945.00Concepcion 41 506,600 20,809,755 41.2 126,500 5,520,930Crown Asia 2.4 1,290,000 3,025,420.00 2.39 5,194,000 12,648,580.00Da Vinci Capital 1.47 2,904,000 4,399,460.00 1.5 6,010,000 9,361,610.00Del Monte 9.94 31,300 309,183.00 10.18 75,700 758,856.00DNL Industries Inc. 9.500 14,703,100 135,533,412.00 9.120 37,582,500 343,152,044.00Emperador 9.10 13,829,100 125,327,819.00 9.09 28,193,400 251,631,575.00Energy Devt. Corp. (EDC) 5.85 42,074,900 244,039,812.00 5.95 87,779,300 535,739,218.00EEI 5.53 1,523,400 8,446,200.00 5.50 8,880,100 52,176,548.00Euro-Med Lab. 1.71 6,000 10,260.00 1.69 20,000 35,140.00First Gen Corp. 22.2 5,849,200 130,082,085.00 23 7,693,300 179,290,220.00First Holdings ‘A’ 68.8 1,090,720 74,870,152.50 69 1,262,560 86,985,402.50Ginebra San Miguel Inc. 11.88 36,200 427,178.00 11.80 300 3,530.00Holcim Philippines Inc. 14.62 221,500 3,222,594.00 14.62 341,300 4,894,084.00Integ. Micro-Electronics 5.88 828,100 4,874,199.00 6.04 4,375,500 26,908,633.00Ionics Inc 2.370 18,959,000 46,077,920.00 2.550 79,573,000 175,989,610.00Jollibee Foods Corp. 200.00 1,403,980 275,279,651.00 200.00 3,880,400 794,126,452.00LBC Express 12.66 48,100 599,486.00 12.5 174,500 2,142,434.00Liberty Flour 42.00 1,900 76,600.00 42.00 5,700 244,800.00LMG Chemicals 2.03 45,000 90,950.00 1.95 61,000 121,170.00Mabuhay Vinyl Corp. 3.69 88,000 309,010.00 3.01 111,600 365,310.00Macay Holdings 41.00 5,200 199,470.00 41.00 5,200 208,435.00Manila Water Co. Inc. 24 7,447,000 178,768,845.00 23.9 11,457,400 274,957,415.00Maxs Group 22.8 721,800 16,301,470.00 22.85 3,106,400 72,766,460.00Megawide 6.3 2,684,900 16,933,565.00 6.2 39,800 246,654.00Mla. Elect. Co À’ 297.80 1,869,060 554,583,278.00 300.00 7,784,180 2,439,439,618.00Panasonic Mfg Phil. Corp. 4.00 5,000 20,000.00 Pepsi-Cola Products Phil. 3.96 5,496,000 22,360,650.00 4.1 21,846,000 90,436,660.00Petron Corporation 7.77 2,314,500 17,736,566.00 7.70 7,264,500 57,827,770.00Phil H2O 3.17 44,000 140,430.00 3.4 88,000 321,810.00Phinma Corporation 11.80 8,200 96,904.00 11.92 38,500 458,240.00Phoenix Petroleum Phils. 3.69 206,000 753,500.00 3.65 574,000 2,071,830.00Phoenix Semiconductor 1.83 3,138,000 5,904,180.00 1.94 2,631,000 5,241,680.00Pryce Corp. À’ 2.35 468,000 1,102,710.00 2.44 1,076,000 2,570,440.00RFM Corporation 4.28 862,000 3,623,330.00 4.17 1,770,000 7,317,540.00Roxas and Co. 2.8 2,000 5,600.00 Roxas Holdings 6 16,600 92,355.00 San Miguel’Pure Foods `B’ 134 143,450 19,191,596.00 134.5 118,750 15,866,589.00SPC Power Corp. 3.5 88,000 310,590.00 4 231,000 852,420.00Splash Corporation 2.3 1,775,000 3,994,790.00 2.2 9,405,000 22,158,510.00Swift Foods, Inc. 0.148 4,480,000 662,920.00 0.148 33,350,000 5,035,590.00TKC Steel Corp. 1.17 116,000 124,990.00 1.07 417,000 449,060.00Trans-Asia Oil 2.10 571,000 1,182,700.00 2.05 4,691,000 9,763,220.00Universal Robina 198 4,143,070 822,050,230.00 202.4 8,495,720 1,712,551,320.00Victorias Milling 4.7 2,000 9,240.00 4.54 22,000 100,240.00Vitarich Corp. 0.66 1,414,000 894,180.00 0.65 3,250,000 2,162,680.00Vulcan Ind’l. 1.16 352,000 414,400.00 1.23 3,175,000 3,860,160.00

HOLDING FIRMSAbacus Cons. À’ 0.405 8,180,000 3,157,450.00 0.390 2,780,000 1,082,950.00Aboitiz Equity 57.8500 5,261,400 296,883,633.50 57.0000 7,008,470 396,111,512.50Alliance Global Inc. 17.90 8,980,000 158,292,862.00 17.82 15,887,800 284,776,516.00Anglo Holdings A 1.11 31,000 34,500.00 1.04 179,000 191,230.00Anscor À’ 6.33 12,400 79,002.00 6.40 94,600 603,290.00ATN Holdings A 0.245 7,430,000 1,781,930.00 0.250 11,650,000 3,019,590.00ATN Holdings B 0.246 230,000 57,460.00 0.250 720,000 183,460.00Ayala Corp À’ 756 869,370 651,827,185.00 759 1,219,640 919,300,110.00Cosco Capital 7.59 9,060,400 67,917,583.00 7.4 9,488,600 70,507,777.00DMCI Holdings 13.00 27,772,200 360,068,120.00 13.18 18,326,000 241,134,308.00F&J Prince ‘A’ 5.6 201,000 1,077,340.00 4.7 357,000 1,787,450.00Filinvest Dev. Corp. 4.26 1,244,000 5,161,670.00 3.90 194,000 718,700.00Forum Pacific 0.260 770,000 197,550.00 0.245 640,000 153,450.00GT Capital 1286 462,165 596,069,235.00 1326 534,065 707,241,240.00House of Inv. 6.00 418,000 2,268,741.00 5.56 562,800 3,166,469.00JG Summit Holdings 69.90 5,602,330 383,841,674.00 70.40 7,259,150 520,616,745.00Jolliville Holdings 3.7 4,000 14,800.00 3.8 2,000 7,600.00Keppel Holdings À’ 4.53 1,000 4,530.00 Keppel Holdings `B’ 7.74 15,133,000 112,365,797.00 7.3 15,094,500 110,335,453.00Lopez Holdings Corp. 0.73 197,000 141,870.00 0.72 1,325,000 976,100.00Lodestar Invt. Holdg.Corp. 13.98 10,576,000 148,076,864.00 13.88 114,205,400 1,581,828,054.00Mabuhay Holdings À’ 0.53 1,027,000 523,970.00 0.51 1,478,000 762,750.00Metro Pacific Inv. Corp. 5.3 71,497,700 374,307,299.00 5.31 90,880,400 478,985,611.00Minerales Industrias Corp. 9.72 6,951,100 67,006,304.00 9.57 8,143,400 77,279,779.00MJCI Investments Inc. 3 5,000 15,000.00 3.01 3,000 9,030.00Pacifica À’ 0.0310 342,400,000 10,547,900.00 0.0320 2,580,300,000 95,987,500.00Prime Media Hldg 1.460 511,000 671,690.00 1.220 398,000 552,720.00Prime Orion 1.790 12,007,000 21,201,410.00 1.840 7,960,000 15,002,100.00San Miguel Corp À’ 48.00 640,400 30,725,735.00 49.50 1,732,300 82,580,440.00Seafront À’ 2.70 41,000 109,920.00 2.95 75,000 201,700.00SM Investments Inc. 862.00 669,220 564,844,685.00 848.50 1,285,150 1,098,787,035.00Solid Group Inc. 1.22 83,000 97,800.00 1.17 540,000 637,180.00South China Res. Inc. 0.75 786,000 575,260.00 0.75 678,000 521,380.00Top Frontier 76.400 3,700 282,314.50 76.050 58,220 4,539,713.00Unioil Res. & Hldgs 0.3200 7,370,000 2,343,700.00 0.3250 4,100,000 1,332,850.00Wellex Industries 0.2180 8,540,000 1,849,330.00 0.2170 1,920,000 417,680.00Zeus Holdings 0.300 1,380,000 399,200.00 0.280 2,490,000 670,250.00

P R O P E R T Y8990 HLDG 7.330 2,208,200 15,823,377.00 7.040 8,913,800 60,503,376.00Anchor Land Holdings Inc. 8.08 13,700 102,819.00 A. Brown Co., Inc. 0.84 13,919,000 11,783,730.00 0.81 32,073,000 28,761,620.00Araneta Prop À’ 1.160 121,000 144,200.00 1.180 165,000 184,840.00Arthaland Corp. 0.209 300,000 62,610.00 0.203 250,000 50,750.00Ayala Land `B’ 35.200 18,383,100 626,409,375.00 33.400 51,517,600 1,276,471,235.00Belle Corp. À’ 3.2 3,758,000 11,846,850.00 3.35 3,004,000 9,636,570.00Cebu Holdings 5.08 11,300 57,410.00 5.1 32,923,300 167,906,815.00Centennial City 0.58 10,503,000 5,978,790.00 0.57 20,492,000 11,933,290.00City & Land Dev. 0.92 6,000 5,520.00 0.92 111,000 102,050.00Cityland Dev. À’ 1.05 118,000 118,100.00 1.00 65,000 65,320.00Crown Equities Inc. 0.138 16,300,000 2,208,470.00 0.139 128,330,000 17,758,310.00Cyber Bay Corp. 0.465 3,200,000 1,488,450.00 0.470 11,200,000 5,328,950.00Double Dragon 23 5,040,400 114,872,015.00 22.75 12,847,300 281,382,120.00Empire East Land 0.850 207,000 176,050.00 0.850 1,067,000 938,540.00

NOVEMBER 16-20, 2015 NOVEMBER 9-13, 2015STOCKS STOCKS Close Volume Value Close Volume Value

Ever Gotesco 0.165 1,560,000 256,130.00 0.164 420,000 68,480.00Global-Estate 1.09 7,677,000 8,363,560.00 1.12 13,987,000 16,107,800.00Filinvest Land,Inc. 1.77 80,706,000 142,269,220.00 1.68 94,163,000 159,733,430.00Interport À’ 1.22 190,000 231,780.00 1.20 3,553,000 4,337,100.00Megaworld Prop. 4.49 53,734,000 237,645,110.00 4.37 99,040,000 443,034,660.00MRC Allied Ind. 0.082 1,640,000 133,400.00 0.085 11,220,000 897,350.00Phil. Estates Corp. 0.2700 1,220,000 312,300.00 0.2550 20,000 5,100.00Phil. Realty À’ 0.4050 50,000 20,250.00 0.4050 2,440,000 987,050.00Primex Corp. 8.45 286,100 2,417,166.00 8.49 576,900 4,844,098.00Robinson’s Land `B’ 30.60 36,525,100 1,109,729,365.00 30.50 43,414,700 1,301,986,285.00Rockwell 1.47 327,000 479,790.00 1.47 1,158,000 1,710,680.00Shang Properties Inc. 3.2 4,000 12,710.00 3.15 20,000 60,940.00SM Prime Holdings 20.90 35,683,000 731,649,807.00 21.10 64,805,100 1,386,039,825.00Sta. Lucia Land Inc. 0.74 1,919,000 1,401,570.00 0.74 5,275,000 3,850,750.00Starmalls 7.89 27,000 188,046.00 3.89 143,500 1,134,965.00Suntrust Home Dev. Inc. 0.900 1,785,000 1,547,720.00 0.900 4,594,000 4,259,040.00Vista Land & Lifescapes 5.390 9,142,600 48,358,080.00 5.370 20,751,900 116,595,845.00

S E R V I C E S2GO Group 7.29 525,200 3,741,542.00 7.2 1,953,700 15,112,965.00ABS-CBN 64 98,860 6,237,596.00 63.55 134,710 8,727,757.00Acesite Hotel 1.12 110,000 128,600.00 1.12 132,000 146,680.00APC Group, Inc. 0.550 675,000 373,290.00 0.550 4,132,000 2,297,380.00Asian Terminals Inc. 11.8 400 4,720.00 11.12 88,300 997,762.00Bloomberry 5.11 18,696,000 94,107,490.00 5.10 34,960,300 187,682,351.00Boulevard Holdings 0.0490 101,010,000 4,994,540.00 0.0520 224,560,000 11,900,380.00Calata Corp. 3.55 7,643,000 27,923,380.00 3.69 13,977,000 50,791,760.00Cebu Air Inc. (5J) 84.4 1,092,650 91,530,531.50 84.9 2,222,210 190,085,717.00DFNN Inc. 5.90 118,000 667,185.00 5.85 2,783,000 16,417,266.00Easy Call “Common” 2.95 1,000 2,950.00 2.83 1,000 2,830.00FEUI 978 1,120 1,075,060.00 960 1,020 978,200.00Globe Telecom 2000 309,425 619,678,960 2096 297,750 624,968,340GMA Network Inc. 7.39 727,100 5,359,025.00 7.12 1,081,700 7,874,156.00Harbor Star 1.26 276,000 343,680.00 1.25 291,000 358,520.00I.C.T.S.I. 71 4,393,230 297,613,481.50 68.25 7,709,110 532,503,228.50IPeople Inc. À’ 11.4 43,300 494,368.00 11.42 55,600 634,952.00IP E-Game Ventures Inc. 0.011 200,000 2,200.00 0.011 37,000,000 373,700.00Island Info 0.174 2,400,000 412,210.00 0.172 9,230,000 1,614,800.00ISM Communications 1.4100 1,120,000 1,524,490.00 1.3700 4,820,000 6,740,020.00Jackstones 2 81,000 163,850.00 2.07 77,000 162,990.00Leisure & Resorts 8.98 788,400 7,053,632.00 8.77 767,900 6,841,777.00Liberty Telecom 4.32 3,364,000 14,520,440.00 4.46 23,833,000 107,977,810.00Macroasia Corp. 2.40 29,000 66,440.00 2.30 122,000 267,200.00Manila Broadcasting 24.00 600 13,900.00 30.00 3,600 106,305.00Manila Bulletin 0.590 146,000 85,700.00 0.600 171,000 99,320.00Manila Jockey 2 20,002 73,000.00 2 91,000 181,840.00Melco Crown 3.65 17,664,000 63,631,300.00 3.47 32,839,000 120,604,100.00MG Holdings 0.260 510,000 128,950.00 0.270 2,039,600 510,100.00NOW Corp. 0.680 16,032,000 10,822,820.00 0.670 59,506,000 43,686,540.00Pacific Online Sys. Corp. 17.92 9,100 163,348.00 18 53,100 292,246.00PAL Holdings Inc. 4.52 53,000 240,890 4.65 104,000 486,170Phil. Racing Club 9.47 13,600 124,061.00 Phil. Seven Corp. 100.00 55,500 5,551,258.00 105.00 56,650 6,160,673.00Philweb.Com Inc. 20.00 137,100 2,723,514.00 20.20 1,059,000 21,173,725.00PLDT Common 2000.00 400,010 793,734,835.00 1970.00 599,820 1,193,503,480.00PremiereHorizon 0.540 4,498,000 2,295,990.00 0.540 1,687,000 923,610.00Premium Leisure 1.000 27,234,000 27,102,810.00 1.000 37,099,000 38,604,890.00Puregold 32.55 6,882,100 219,450,330.00 31.25 6,658,500 221,473,955.00Robinsons Retail 69.95 369,090 34,740,241.50 69.00 3,028,710 212,596,069.00SBS Phil. Corp. 5.54 15,498,400 86,803,547.00 5.84 16,280,300 99,169,999.00SSI Group 3.76 110,040,000 396,927,790.00 3.91 92,941,200 409,599,112.00STI Holdings 0.430 11,860,000 5,092,750.00 0.435 29,920,000 13,569,350.00Transpacific Broadcast 1.5 40,000 60,000.00 1.5 27,000 40,730.00Travellers 4 2,065,000 7,999,010.00 3.85 8,255,000 34,802,820.00Waterfront Phils. 0.325 290,000 97,500.00 0.330 5,620,000 1,745,950.00Yehey 4.130 159,000 656,800.00 4.110 1,476,000 6,103,940.00

MINING & OILAbra Mining 0.0050 348,000,000 1,709,100.00 0.0050 1,764,000,000 8,803,000.00Apex À’ 2.20 462,000 1,015,670.00 2.19 291,000 610,590.00Atlas Cons. À’ 4.78 532,000 2,591,090.00 4.93 1,692,800 8,795,922.00Basic Energy Corp. 0.210 2,050,000 430,500.00 0.211 140,000 30,140.00Benguet Corp À’ 5.7000 200 1,140.00 5.7000 1,300 7,828.00Benguet Corp `B’ 5.7300 100 573.00 Century Peak Metals Hldgs 0.65 1,578,000 1,020,390.00 0.68 4,506,000 3,154,560.00Coal Asia 0.64 1,101,000 695,000.00 0.64 2,250,000 1,456,770.00Dizon 8.04 44,400 357,546.00 7.75 64,900 532,533.00Ferronickel 0.79 15,586,000 12,348,010.00 0.81 34,526,000 28,162,570.00Geograce Res. Phil. Inc. 0.295 130,000 38,250.00 0.295 1,990,000 593,900.00Lepanto À’ 0.188 9,000,000 1,677,700.00 0.190 7,181,000 1,425,330.00Lepanto `B’ 0.204 2,670,000 536,850.00 0.201 1,840,000 369,850.00Manila Mining À’ 0.0100 302,400,000 3,324,900.00 0.0110 45,900,000 480,400.00Manila Mining `B’ 0.012 11,300,000 135,300.00 0.012 1,100,000 12,600.00Marcventures Hldgs., Inc. 2.36 1,223,000 2,926,290.00 2.59 1,467,000 3,916,780.00Nickelasia 6.73 5,430,200 36,897,389.00 6.96 15,465,100 113,432,963.00Nihao Mineral Resources 3 2,430,000 7,296,570.00 2.89 667,000 1,956,200.00Omico 0.5600 20,000 11,220.00 0.5800 199,000 116,390.00Oriental Peninsula Res. 1.4400 152,000 210,340.00 1.4000 154,000 216,670.00Oriental Pet. À’ 0.0110 3,700,000 37,100.00 0.0110 104,600,000 1,127,500.00Petroenergy Res. Corp. 3.60 56,000 200,680.00 3.99 99,000 378,410.00Philex À’ 5.00 1,222,200 6,133,046.00 5.03 1,510,600 7,673,711.00PhilexPetroleum 1.44 847,000 1,186,590.00 1.42 2,390,000 3,420,240.00Philodrill Corp. À’ 0.0120 216,700,000 2,509,600.00 0.0130 118,000,000 1,515,700.00Semirara Corp. 134.80 774,920 104,557,645.00 136.50 1,188,310 161,106,992.00TA Petroleum 2.33 161,000 368,590.00 2.33 603,000 1,385,560.00

PREFERREDABS-CBN Holdings Corp. 64 194,870 12,326,333.00 64.8 651,150 42,305,649.00Ayala Corp. Pref ‘B1’ 515 2,220 1,152,940.00 519.5 2,530 1,314,210.00Ayala Corp. Pref ‘B2’ 525 4,680 2,467,000 525 50,000 26,250,000First Gen G 117 950 110,438.00 116.2 11,870 1,381,872.00GLOBE PREF P 520 260 135,190.00 519 8,110 4,211,990.00GMA Holdings Inc. 7.25 105,100 756,831.00 7.24 190,900 1,366,600.00MWIDE PREF 109 45,080 4,913,720.00 109.5 26,900 2,940,650.00PCOR-Preferred A 1050 150 157,700.00 1065 14,725 15,449,600.00PF Pref 2 1020 5,050 5,155,910.00 1030 5,995 6,200,725.00SMC Preferred B 85 15,100 1,282,300.00 81 15,810 1,259,460.00SMC Preferred C 83.5 158,350 13,043,525.00 82 175,500 14,442,113.00SMC Preferred D 79.05 45,700 3,612,623.00 79.2 136,840 10,830,676.00SMC Preferred E 79.9 67,400 5,374,295.00 79.25 101,250 8,011,185.00SMC Preferred F 80.5 120,000 9,638,609.50 80.35 342,220 27,411,086.00Swift Pref 2.79 2,000 5,580.00 2.8 1,000 2,800.00

WARRANTS & BONDSLeisure & Resort Warr. 2.650 1,104,000 2,931,020.00 2.690 523,000 1,440,450.00

S M EAlterra Capital 3.61 205,000 820,270.00 4 755,000 3,620,220.00Makati Fin. Corp. 2.84 11,000 31,220.00 2.84 65,000 177,290.00Xurpas 16.5 6,730,800 110,187,326.00 16.7 19,088,000 324,122,024.00

EXCHANGE TRADED FUNDSFirst Metro ETF 113.2 110,190 12,330,387.00 112.8 87,410 9,926,355.00

WEEKLY MOST TRADED STOCKS VOLUME

Abra Mining 348,000,000Pacifica À’ 342,400,000Manila Mining À’ 302,400,000Philodrill Corp. À’ 216,700,000SSI Group 110,040,000Boulevard Holdings 101,010,000Filinvest Land,Inc. 80,706,000Metro Pacific Inv. Corp. 71,497,700Megaworld Prop. 53,734,000Energy Devt. Corp. (EDC) 42,074,900

STOCKS VALUE

Robinson’s Land `B’ 1,109,729,365.00Universal Robina 822,050,230.00PLDT Common 793,734,835.00Banco de Oro Unibank Inc. 749,826,641.00SM Prime Holdings 731,649,807.00Ayala Corp À’ 651,827,185.00Ayala Land `B’ 626,409,375.00Globe Telecom 619,678,960.00GT Capital 596,069,235.00SM Investments Inc. 564,844,685.00



B3

Smart’s broadbandrevenues hit P15.6b

Apec CEO Summit tickets worth the price

Market expected to sustain advance

KPMG recognition. KPMG R.G. Manabat & Co., the Philippine member firm of KPMG International, is named once again as a Tier 1 tax practice in the Philippines by the Inter-national Tax Review’s World Tax 2016, a com-prehensive guide to the world’s leading tax law and accounting prac-tices. Shown are KPMG tax team led by (from top left) tax principals Herminigildo Murakami Jr., Kathleen Saga, Ma-ria Georgina Soberano, Manuel Salvador III, Maria Carmela Peralta, vice chairman, head of tax and chief operat-ing officer Emmanuel Bonoan and tax partner Maria Myla Maralit.

BUSINESSMEN who paid as much as $4,000 to attend the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation CEO Summit in Makati City last week remain exhilarated over a series of events that allowed them to rub elbows with powerful heads of state and business leaders.

Over 1,500 businessmen attended the celebrated forum, with foreign delegates paying $4,000 and local participants half the price for the three-day Apec CEO Summit at Makati Shangri La Hotel.

Francis Chua, chairman and president of BA Securities, said the fee was worth every cent, as he was able to see and listen to US President Barrack Obama and China President Xi Jinping in one forum. “It is worth every dollar for any delegate because you saw many heads of state and billionaires like Jack Ma,” Chua said, referring to the founder and chairman of the Alibaba Group.

Chua exchanged greetings with President Jinping, Peru Presi-dent Ollanta Moisés Humala and Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos. Chua, the honorary consul general of Peru, said he even found himself in a conversation with Humala, who thanked him for his assistance extended to Peruvian delegates and officials. “There is plenty of collaboration with Peru since they will host Apec next year,” Chua said. Othel V. Campos

Japan firm investing P1.7b in BatangasA Japanese precision parts manufacturer, which traces its

roots in watchmaking, is investing P1.7 billion to set up a fac-tory in Batangas province that will manufacture quartz crys-tal blank, a component for products such as watches, mobile phones and appliances.

Data from the Philippine Economic Zone Authority show that Citizen Machinery Philippines Inc., the local subsidiary of Ja-pan’s Citizen Finedevice, will employ at least 530 workers, once the facility at the First Philippine Industrial Park II in Sto. To-mas, Batangas is fully operational.

Citizen Finedevice is currently the world’s largest manufac-turer of quartz crystals and oscillators in cylindrical, plastic, metal and ceramic packages.

Apart from plants in Japan, the company also operates two factories in Guangxi and Jiangsu China, one in Kowloon Hong Kong, another in Colorado, USA and a facility in Thailand. Othel V. Campos

Wenceslao may cut IPO sizeAmid the volatile market activities, construction and proper-

ty company Datem Inc. decided to defer its P4.65-billion initial public offering. This could put pressures on another construc-tion company, DM Wenceslao & Associates Inc., which is also planning to conduct its maiden offering in December.

While it had not indicated plans to defer the IPO, DM Wenc-eslao was reportedly planning to significantly reduce the IPO size to somewhere between $150 million and $200 million, from an initial size of $476 million, given the market volatility.

Still, this would be the country’s largest IPO this year.D.M. Wenceslao also slightly moved the timetable for the IPO.

From the initial offer period of Nov. 24 to Dec. 1, the sched-ule was changed to Dec. 9 to Dec 15. The listing date was also changed from Dec. 17 to Dec. 22. Jenniffer B. Austria

BSP spares credit program from politicsBangko Sentral ng Pilipinas is wary that the creation of credit

surety funds in some parts of the country may be politicized dur-ing the national elections next year. So to make sure that these will be spared from politics, Deputy Governor Diwa Guinigundo said the regulator would resume the establishment of the credit scheme for small businesses after the May 2016 elections.

“We have done 45 so far [for 2015]. Since 2016 is an election year and we don’t want to politicize the program, we can only start in June 2016,” Guinigundo said in a text message.

Cabanatuan City Credit Surety Fund was the last facility put up in 2015. It was created on Nov. 9, becoming the 45th CSF in the country.

Guinigundo also said Bangko Sentral planned to create four more credit surety funds next year “bringing it to around 49 by the end of 2016.” The additional credit facilities will be es-tablished in Ilocos Sur, Camarines Sur, Quezon province and Dinagat Islands.

Introduced in 2008, the CSF program is a credit enhancement scheme designed to help micro, small and medium enterprises which cannot borrow from banks due to lack of acceptable col-laterals, credit knowledge and credit track records as well as gain access to banks’ credit facilities for their working capital requirements. Julito G. Rada

By Darwin G Amojelar

SMART Communications Inc. said com-bined mobile Internet and broadband rev-enues increased 14.4 percent in the first nine months to P15.6 billion, on renewed digital strategy that focuses on new mobile data of-fers and digital partnerships.

By Jenniffer B. Austria

THE stock market is expected to sustain last week’s advance, with the benchmark Philippine Stock Exchange index likely to return to the 7,000-point level, analysts said over the weekend.

Analysts said the upcoming initial public offerings of several companies could also lure inves-tors back into the market.

“We expect follow-up advanced on PSEi this week as oversold ral-lies have been triggered and mo-mentum indicators have shown a short-term reversal,” Regina Capital and Development Corp. managing director Luis Limlin-gan said.

Limlingan said he expected the index thhis week to trade be-tween 7,044 and 7,093. He said if

the 7,100 level was breached, the market could extend the rally to 7,160.

Investors will closely monitor the release of third-quarter gross domestic product data on Thurs-day as basis for further optimism.

The PSEi gained 0.5 percent over last week’s shortened trading period, amid the country’s host-ing of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation Summit, to close at 6,932.81 on Friday, despite the initial panic brought by the terror attacks in Paris.

The broader all-share index also gained 0.6 percent to settle at 4,001.22.

Property and services posted the highest gains of 2.3 percent and 1.1 percent, respectively. They were followed by financials and holding firms, which rose 0.4 percent and

0.2 percent, respectively.RCBC Securities said the prop-

erty sector was boosted by state-ment of Federal Reserve’s vice chairman Stanley Fischer that the Fed’s rate hike approach would be gradual to avoid adverse effects on emerging markets.

Mining and oil declined by 1.6 percent, while the industrial in-dex dropped 0.6 percent.

Foreign investors were net sell-ers last week by P1.56 billion, as total overseas selling reached P10.8 billion, while overseas buy-ing amounted to P9.2 billion.

Top gainers last week were Star-malls Inc., which jumped 102.8 percent to P7.89; Agrinurture Inc., which climbed 63.1 percent to P3.41; and Mabuhay Vinyl Corp., which advanced 22.4 per-cent to P3.69.

Revenues were supported by an upsurge in mobile data us-age, which posted a 139-percent growth in the amount of data traffic being exchanged within Smart’s mobile network, the wireless unit of Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co. said.

Smart executive vice president and head of consumer business Ariel Fermin attributed the com-pany’s breakthrough data perfor-mance to the back-to-back part-nerships that it recently signed

with global digital technology companies.

He said these partnerships brought a slew of new digital offers into the hands of more mobile users in the country un-der the ‘Smart Life’ campaign, which gives them the best of en-tertainment, convenience, ur-ban comforts and peace of mind wherever they go.

This includes Smart’s partner-ships for entertainment with iFlix, Fox, MCA Music, and Sony Mu-

sic, as well as with leading digi-tal companies such as Uber, the world’s most popular ride-sharing service and Airbnb, the world’s leading community-driven hospi-tality company.

“We’re now seeing the effects of a revitalized digital strategy for mobile which focuses on providing a superior ‘Smart Life’ proposition to subscribers. Our partnerships that bring them the best offers from the world’s leading digital companies will continue to drive data growth as more users access the Internet on their smartphone devices,” Fer-min said.

These new partnerships are tied into a more streamlined suite of mobile data offerings, bannered by its Big Bytes 50 offer that in-cludes 350 MB of open-access data, plus 600 MB of additional data for iflix, FOX and SPINNR, valid for three days.

B4

Govt toll freeze hurts MNTC

Govt debt payments up 7% to P456bMGB set to approveKing-king mine study

Gaisano partner. Leading homegrown retailer Metro Retail Stores Group Inc. is set to establish four new Metro stores in Luzon and the Visayas in line with its partnership with Ayala Land Inc. Metro stores will be the anchor tenants in four Ayala commercial developments under a partnership agreement. Shown after signing the partnership deal are (from left) ALI commercial business group head Jose Emmanuel Jalandoni, Metro chairman and chief executive Frank Gaisano, ALI president and CEO Bernard Vincent Dy, Metro executive director Margaret Gaisano Ang, Metro president and chief operating officer Arthur Emmanuel, ALI vice president and chief operating officer for Visayas and Mindanao Aniceto Bisnar Jr., ALI head of operations and support services Rowena Tomeldan and ALI assistant VP for commercial business group-Visayas and Mindanao Clavel Tongco.

By Darwin G Amojelar

THE operator of North Luzon Expressway said net income rose 22 percent in the first nine months of the year, but a delay in toll adjustments could ham-per the company’s revenue growth.

Manila North Tollways Corp. said net income amounted to P2.22 billon in the January-to-September period from P1.82 billion year-on-year, mainly due to high traffic growth and toll revenues generated during the period.

MNTC’s revenues in the nine-month period grew 10

percent to P6.04 billion from P5.47 billion on year.

Average daily traffic during period hit 199,196, up 9 percent in 2014.

MNTC, however, said “the continuing inaction of the Toll Regulatory Board on periodic toll rate adjustments filed by the company for 2013 and 2015

can hamper growth in toll rev-enues moving forward.”

The NLEx operator in Sep-tember last year filed a petition with the TRB for the bi-annual toll adjustment that was sup-posed to fall due on January 1, 2015 as provided in the conces-sion agreement.

MNTC’s new petition is in addition to a pending request it filed in 2012 for a toll increase scheduled in January 2013.

The current petition will bring the cumulative toll adjust-ment to 15 percent, including 12 percent that is long overdue.

MNTC said it sent the gov-ernment through TRB a final

demand letter for compensa-tion amounting to P2.44 billion based on overdue 2013 and 2015 toll adjustments, respectively, which the TRB has declined to implement.

“With the Republic/TRB not heeding the final demand let-ter, MNTC sent a notice of dis-pute in accordance with Clause 19 [Settlement of Disputes] of the STOA. As a procedural matter, MNTC confirmed its availability to agree on the am-icable means by which to settle the dispute,” the NLEX opera-tor said.

MNTC president and chief executive Rodrigo Franco said

revenues could increase 15 per-cent next year if the TRB grant-ed the toll hike petition. The company expects revenue to hit P8 billion this year.

NLEX is currently imple-menting the construction of Segment 10, part of the Harbor Link project leading to the Port Area, which is estimated to cost around P10.5 billion. Segment 10 is expected to open by the second quarter of 2017.

The Bases Conversion and Development Authority has formally turned over the man-agement, operation and mainte-nance of the Subic-Clark-Tarlac Expressway to MNTC.

By Gabrielle H. Binaday

DEBT payments of the gov-ernment in the first nine months of the year increased 7 percent to P459.54 billion on higher amortization from P429.25 billion year-on-year, Treasury data show over the weekend.

Interest payments in the January-to-September period declined less than 1 percent to P225.75 billion, while amor-tization rose 19 percent to P203.79 billion a year ago.

Data showed the govern-ment amortized P149.047 in domestic liabilities and P54.74 billion in foreign debt.

Debt payments by the gov-ernment in September de-creased 15 percent to P41.411 billion from P48.755 billion on year.

The treasury said the gov-ernment paid P30.09 billion in interest payments in Sep-tember, up 4 percent from

P28.83 billion a year earlier.Interest payments on do-

mestic debt rose 12 percent to P15.959 billion from P22.107 billion, while those on for-eign obligations dropped 13 percent to P7.98 billion from P9.14 billion a year ago.

Principal amortization de-clined to P11.317 billion in September from P19.92 billion last year.

Domestic debt amortization fell to P6.64 billion in Septem-ber from P14.86 billion a year ago, that on foreign debt de-creased to P4.66 billion from P5.06 billion.

“Interest payments for the month comprise a smaller portion of total expenditures at 16 percent from 18 percent a year ago,” the Bureau of Treasury said.

The national government incurred a budget deficit of P22.1 billion in September as government expenditures rose 17 percent to outpace the

6-percent revenue expansion in September.

Government revenues in September grew 6 percent to P164.1 billion while govern-ment spending increased 17 percent year-on-year to P186.2 billion, the fourth consecutive month of double-digit growth

The national government reduced its borrowing require-ment from the original target after posting a fiscal surplus in the first half of 2015, compared with a programmed deficit for the six-month period.

The revised net financing program for 2015 is pegged at P296.8 billion from the original program of P310.4 billion.

The borrowing mix was also revised from 86 percent in the domestic market and 14 per-cent in foreign debt to 75 to 25.

The government plans to borrow P241.8 billion from the domestic market this year and P55 billion from foreign sources.

By Anna Leah E. Gonzales

THE Mines and Geosciences Bureau said over the weekend it might approve within this month the feasibility study of US miner St. Augustine Gold and Copper Ltd. for its King-king Copper Gold Project in Pantukan, Com-postella Valley.

“The [feasibility study] of King-king is currently at MGB right now for final evaluation. We might release it next week,” said MGB director Leo Jasareno.

St. Augustine is the developer of the $2-billion mining project, while local partner Nationwide Development Corp. holds the mineral production sharing agree-ment over the King-king mine.

The MGB in 2013 suspended the evaluation of the company’s feasibility study amid a corporate dispute.

Two groups—the Calalang family and the Ricafort faction—

are contesting the management of Nadecor.

Corazon Ricafort and her chil-dren claimed they were deprived of their right to vote during the annual stockholders’ meeting on August 15, 2011.

Conrado Calalang, however, said Corazon’s husband was present during the meeting and signed the attendance sheet on their behalf.

The Court of Appeals in a de-cision in February declared the August 15, 2011 election of the Calalang group to the board of directors of Nadecor valid.

The court’s ruling empowered the current board of directors led by Calalang to act on behalf of Nadecor.

“The MGB will give the author-ity to Nadecor so their dispute is internal to them. We are not giv-ing the authority to board 1 or board 2 but to Nadecor,” Jasareno said.


M O N D AY : N O V E M B E R 2 3 , 2 0 1 5

BUSINESS B5

Germany’s ZAMA bullish on PH

MetroPacs seeks tender offer extension

Tarlac’ssolar farmahead ofschedule

4 PNB awards. Philippine National Bank and PNB Capital and Investment Corp. achieve international recognition in lending and loan arrangement after winning four awards from the recently-concluded The Asset Triple A Asia Infrastructure Awards 2015 held at the Island Shangri-la Hong Kong on October 30, 2015. PNB Capital president and chief executive Gerry Valenciano receives the award from The Asset editor-in-chief Daniel Yu.

Local millers facingUS wheat challenge

By Othel V. Campos

GERMAN tool maker ZAMA has committed to in-vest billions of pesos into the Philippines and pro-vide more employment opportunities in pioneering projects.

“We are glad to be partners with government in its efforts to promote employment. Once our facility is up and running, we can create more than 650 new jobs for Filipinos,” Zama Precision Industry Manufacturing Inc. managing director Karsten Wag-ner said.

ZAMA, a unit of STIHL, the German manufacturer of chain-saws and other handheld power equipment, including trimmers and blowers, noted that unem-ployment rate in the Philippines was still at a high of 6.4 percent,

while underemployment was at 17.8 percent.

The company plans to employ as much 650 employees once the P2.5-billion manufacturing plant Batangas becomes operational in January next year.

Wagner said it would hire at least 150 employees by yearend and another 500 in 2016, mostly skilled mechanics with back-ground in electronics and highly experienced in production work

The Batangas plant is part of a multi-billion peso investment commitment of ZAMA when

the company registered with the Philippine Economic Zone Au-thority.

ZAMA’s entry into the domes-tic market is recognized as one of the biggest local investments of a German company in the Philip-pines.

The facility, located at the First Philippine Industrial Park in Sto. Tomas, Batangas, broke ground in September.

Filipino workers would have accounted for one-third of ZA-MA’s workforce worldwide once the plant’s operations are in full swing.

“A great part of the staff will be sent to China for training and there will also be experts from China who will come to train to the employees for machine op-erations as well as other technical aspects,” said Wagner.

Wagner said additional train-

ing was needed to ensure they work in accordance with ZAMA’s strict, high technology and qual-ity standards.

The company will also invest heavily on hands-on coaching.

“We are eager to work with Fili-pinos as we have heard so many good things about them. In part-nership with them, we are confi-dent that ZAMA’s operations in the Philippines will surpass ex-pectations and will greatly con-tribute to STIHL Groups’s consol-idated operations,” Wagner said.

Zama Holding GmbH is recog-nized as a technology leader and the world’ largest manufacturer of diaphragm carburetors.

It operates plants in Japan, Hong Kong, China and the United States. It employs 2,400 workers worldwide and produces more than 14 million carburetors in about 350 different models.

WHILE large wheat harvests around the world have increased global supplies and led to price declines, the situation for wheat used to make cookies, crackers and cakes has become more challenging.

Manufacturers of these products in the Philippines and many other Asian countries, such as Japan, Korea and Thai-land, rely nearly exclusively on flour made from soft white wheat, grown in the Pacific Northwest region of the US.

The area, comprised of Washington, Oregon and Idaho states, have seen a harsh drought for the past two years, decreasing production and hurting the quality of the soft white wheat crop.

While bakeries prefer high protein wheat flour to make bread, cake manufacturers prefer low protein flour to make fluffy products, as do cracker manufacturers to make crispy products.

The drought in the US northwest has driven up pro-tein levels in soft white wheat, exacerbating the already short supply situation. Millers in the Philippines have been forced to raise the protein levels in their purchase contracts, decreasing the amount of flour they can pro-duce that meets their customers’ demands.

By Alena Mae S. Flores

PETROSOLAR Corp., a unit of PetroEnergy Resources Corp., aims to complete its 50-mega-watt Tarlac solar power project by January next year, two months ahead of the March feed-in tariff deadline set by the Energy Regu-latory Commission.

“PetroSolar will continue with the construction of the solar farm and transmission line through contractors and intends to complete the 50-MW solar facility by mid-January in time for the inclusion in the 500-MW solar FIT allocation by the DoE,” PetroEnergy said in a report to the Philippine Stock Exchange.

The company said much of the activities during the third quarter focused on securing permits and certificates and site development works.

PetroGreen Energy Corp., another unity og PetroEnergy, signed a service contract with the Energy Department in March to develop the 486-hectare area of the 50-MW solar project in Tar-lac, near Hacienda Luisita,

PetroEnergy, however, sold its 10-percent stake in PetroGreen, its renewable energy arm, to EEI Power Corp., a unit of listed EEI Corp., to raise funds for other projects.

“PetroSolar and our contrac-tors are committed to completing the project at the earliest possible time and of the highest quality,” PetroEnergy vice president Fran-cisco Delfin Jr. said earlier.

PetroEnergy reallocated P175 million from the proceeds of a stock rights offering to finance the Tarlac solar project, in-stead of the second phase of the 36-megawatt Nabas wind farm in Aklan.

By Jenniffer B. AustriaCONGLOMERATE Metro Pacific Investments Corp. has asked the Se-curities and Exchange Commission to extend for one month the tender offer on the remaining shares it does not own in the 315-bed Davao Doctors Hospital.

Metro Pacific Hospital Holdings Inc. president Augusto Palisoc said it sought the extension until Dec. 19, 2015 to give the shareholders of Davao Doctors more time to review the offer.

“We have 2,700 shareholders for Davao Doctors and we got word that a lot of the shareholders have not re-ceived the tender offer materials. There are also some shareholders who want more time to consider the offer as well as to put together the docu-ments they have to collate in order to proceed with the offer,” Palisoc said.

The tender offer was scheduled to end on Nov 19, 2015. “We are now awaiting the SEC approval for the ex-tension,” Palisoc said.

Metro Pacific Hospital currently owns 313,655 shares representing 34.82 percent of the outstanding capi-tal stock of Davao Doctors. It has of-fered to acquire the remaining 65.18 percent stake in the hospital under a tiered-pricing scheme.

If Metro Pacific Hospital acquires less than 136,747 Davao Doctors shares, the purchase price under the proposal will be fixed at P2,300 per share. But if as a result of the tender offer Metro Pacific Hospital buys at least 136,747 shares but less than 286,881 shares, the purchase price will be pegged at P2,600.00 apiece.

Metro Pacific Hospital first invested in Davao Doctors in 2008 when it ac-quired the shares at P1,600 apiece. Since

its entry, Davao Doctor’s profits and rev-enues have increased significantly.

From profits of P130 million, Davao Doctor’s income now stands at P190 million, while revenues hit over P1 billion from P700 million when the Metro Pacific Hospital bought in.

Metro Pacific operates and man-ages nine hospitals under its portfolio. Aside from Davao Doctors, it operates Western Mindanao Medical Center in Zamboanga City, Makati Medi-cal Center, Asian Hospital & Medical Center, Cardinal Santos Medical Cen-ter, Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital, De Los Santos Medical Center, Riverside Medical Center in Bacolod and Cen-tral Luzon Doctors Hospital in Tarlac.

Metro Pacific Hospital early this month announced it planned to pur-chase a 20-percent stake in Manila Doctors Hospital located along United Nations Avenue, Ermita, Manila.



B6

DBS predicts 6% growth in Q3

Apec, Pata meetings fi lled Albay hotels

“THE rich keep getting richer, the poor keep getting poorer.” This cliché has far too often been used in n e w s p a p e r s and articles, to emphasize a growing divide between the rich and the poor. It perhaps also serves as a foreboding reminder of revolutions in the past, which were often preluded by social inequality and de-privation of basic human rights.

Society creates a divideNonetheless, the cliché is not very far from the truth. The rich

would always have more capital to invest in new businesses to make more money. Unless the rich catastrophically waste their money like the prodigal son, which happens much less than one might think, the rich would more often retain and even grow their riches. Save for a handful of exceptions, the poor, on the other hand, are stuck in a vicious cycle or a rat race of earn-ing money, only to spend on basic necessities with little or no opportunity to spend to improve themselves, resulting in their children being in the same situation all over again. Thus, society creates a divide on its own between rich and poor that, if left uncheck, could result in another revolution.

Of course, no one wants another revolution. They are volatile periods in a society that, while could be interesting times, could also be a period of bloodshed and anarchy. The French Revolu-tion, the Russian Revolution—does history really repeat itself?

A just and humane wagePerhaps the secret to preventing any societal upheaval has

been with human resource management. Human resource de-partments have much influence over society, and many times, they do not even realize it. Human resources have the ability to influence wages and to provide training to allow the poor to improve their situation in life. Human resources have the abil-ity to break the vicious cycle of the poor, where the children of janitors and grocery baggers will not have to be janitors and baggers as well.

Companies, employers, “rich people” are required by law to pay a minimum wage, which is, a living wage. This living wage is often sufficient to support the most basic of needs of “poor people.” However, we often know that this wage will never be enough to allow a poor person to improve his or her lot in life, or at least of his or her children. How often do employers pay a “just and humane wage” to the poor?

In a ground breaking encyclical written over a century ago, Rerum Novarum, Pope Leo XIII already noted the importance of paying a fair wage, where a wage earner would be able to comfortably support himself, his wife and his children, with enough left for savings. This would allow the poor to escape the vicious cycle which could last for generations. If a janitor or a grocery bagger is able to send his or her children to school, then perhaps those children would have better paying jobs. In turn those children could send their own children to even better schools, who will in turn be able to find even better paying jobs. Eventually, they may even be able to start a business, and earn more money. However, this would only happen if the janitor or grocery bagger, at the start, is paid a just and humane wage, where they could, not only feed themselves, but also send their children through college.

Improve society for the betterIndeed, if history teaches us something, and that something

is how to avoid another revolution, then perhaps meaningful change in society’s view of human resource management is what is needed to avoid another revolution. Many of us probably do not even realize the importance and impact of human resource management to society. But human resource has this capability to improve society for the better. After all, society is comprised of human resources.

The author is an MBA student at the Ramon V. Del Rosario College of Business of De La Salle University. He currently works as a legal manager at Republic Cement Services Inc. This article is part of his reflections for the course on Human Resource Manage-ment with Organizational Behavior.

The views expressed above are the author’s and does not nec-essarily reflect the official position of De La Salle University, its administration, and faculty.

BERNARD JOSEPHMABILIRAN

GREEN LIGHT

How HR management can prevent a revolution

Organic farming. Agriculture offi cials led by (from left) Undersecretary Jose Reaño, Undersecretary Bernadette Romulo-Puyat and National Organic Agriculture Program coordinator Elsa Parot lead the open-ing of the fi rst National Organic Agriculture Month and exhibit at the lobby of the Agriculture Department in Quezon City. The theme for month-long celebration is “Ligtas at masustansyang ani, mula taniman hanggang hapagkainan.”

By Julito G. Rada

THE Philippine economy likely expanded by 6 percent year-on-year in the third quarter, faster than the 5.6-percent expansion in the second quarter, as government spending ac-celerated during the period, DBS Bank of Sin-gapore said over the weekend.

LEGAZPI CITY—Hotels in Al-bay province were overbooked, in the wake of the just concluded Asia Paci� c Economic Coopera-tion Summit in Manila and the staging of the Paci� c Asia Travel Association conference in this city this week.

Albay bene� ted from the spill-over of the Manila 2015 Apec Summit, even before Legazpi City’s hosting of Pata conference in the last week of November. Ho-tel rooms have been overbooked, according to Albay Governor Joey Salceda.

Recent related events may have also contributed to in� ux of tourists, including the intensive marketing support from popular ABS-CBN TV reality show Pinoy

Big Brother � nals on Nov. 7 and 8, which featured Albay’s prime tourism assets.

Salceda said Manila-based em-ployees and their friends, taking advantage of the seven-day break from work created by the Apec Summit, opted for out-of-town sorties. Many of them came to sa-vor Albay’s top destinations, with their panorama still lingering fresh in their minds from watch-ing PBB’s � nal episode. Two of PBB’s winners are Albayanos.

Albay is hosting on Nov. 25 to 27 Pata’s regional conference, bannered as the New Tourism Frontiers Forum 2015, at the Oriental Hotel in Legazpi. Par-ticipants and guests booked prac-tically all premiere hotel rooms

here, said Salceda.� e international travel and

tourism group named Albay as its top global destination and win-ner of the $1-million CEO Chal-lenge Award.

� e New Frontiers Forum’s originally projected 191 attendance swelled to over 360, and top hotels in Albay are now overbooked.

Aside from the Manila-based employees who opted to convert their “instant holiday” into an en-joyable vacation, uno� cial Apec summit participants and students from colleges and universities in Manila found their way to Albay, home to the majestic Mayon Vol-cano and historic Cagsawa Ruins, both favorite sel� e objects in the social media.

� e bank said while in� ation was set to miss the o� cial tar-get of 2 percent to 4 percent this year, the gross domestic product growth remained strong. In� a-tion in the � rst 10 months aver-aged 1.5 percent, lower than the government’s target range.

“[� e] third-quarter 2015 GDP data next week is likely to show that growth has returned to the 6-percent territory in the period. Even if low base e� ects might have played a part, it is no sur-prise that domestic demand re-mains robust,” DBS said.

� e government is set to release the third-quarter data on Nov. 26.

DBS said the government played a signi� cant role on the expected third-quarter expan-sion. It said � scal spending ac-

celerated in the period, growing close to 20 percent year-on-year and brought the year-to-date growth to 12 percent.

“A� er two consecutive years of seeing a 5-percent growth, � s-cal spending is � nally back to the double-digit territory. � ere are some concerns if the 2016 elec-tions may weigh on the pace of � scal spending ahead,” it said.

� e bank said while this was clearly something to monitor closely, it was also important to note that private sector growth remained resilient.

It said private consump-tion growth continued to trend around the 5.5 percent to 6 per-cent level and constantly con-tributed 4 percentage points to overall GDP growth in the past

� ve years. DBS also said “monthly data,

including retail sales, continues to paint a strong outlook into next year.”

� e � rst quarter GDP at 5 per-cent was dragged down by the government’s anemic � scal ex-penditures which actually began in the third quarter of 2014. � e government became cautious to spend a� er the Supreme Court earlier ruled the administration’s Disbursement Acceleration Pro-gram as unconstitutional. � e high tribunal, however, reversed the ruling later.

� e government vowed to ac-celerate � scal spending at the start of the second quarter. Sec-ond-quarter GDP grew 5.6 per-cent, bringing the � rst-half aver-age to 5.3 percent, which was still below the government’s target of 7 percent to 8 percent for the year.

Moody’s Analytics, a divi-sion of Moody’s Corp., said that despite the rosy outlook in the third quarter, exports remained a “weak point” due to weakened global demand, especially from China. � e world’s second-largest economy is an important trading partner of the Philippines.

B7CESAR BARRIOQUINTOE D I T O R

[email protected]

M O N D AY : N O V E M B E R 2 3 , 2 0 1 5

WORLD

HK votes in first polls since protests

In attendance. Holland Roden attends the premiere of Focus Features’ “The Danish Girl” at Westwood Village Theater on November 21, 2015, in Westwood, California. AFP

Mali starts huntinghotel siege suspects

Dhaka hangs opposition leaders

CYAN MAGENTA YELLOW BLACKManila

StandardTODAY

CYAN MAGENTA YELLOW BLACK CYAN MAGENTA YELLOW BLACK

Republ ic of the Phi l ippinesPROVINCIAL GOVERNMENT OF ORIENTAL MINDORO

Camilmi l , Calapan City 5200, Oriental Mindoro

BIDS AND AWARDS COMMITTEE

INVITATION TO BIDIB No. GS-2015-191, 135 - A and 135 - A-1

The Provincial Government of Or iental Mindoro invi tes Phi lGeps registered suppl iers (Dea le rs /D is t r ibu to rs / Impor te rs) to Apply for El ig ib i l i ty and to Bid for the hereunder l is t of i tem/pro jec ts .

I tem/DescriptionApproved Budgetfor the Contract

(ABC)Bid Document

FeeSource ofFunding

1. Supply and del ivery of Const ruc t ion Mater ia ls and Supp l ies fo r Const ruc t ion o f O f f i ce Bu i ld ings (PTIEDO, EESDO) a t Cap i to l Complex , Ca lapan C i t y, Or ienta l M indoro

2 . Supply and delivery of Sani tar y Toi let Bowl, Porcelain for Indigent Famil ies - Provincewide

13,395,087.0 0

3,150,0 0 0.0 0

Php 25,000.00

Php 5 ,0 0 0.0 0

Genera l Fund

General Fund

The schedule of bidding activit ies is as fol lows:1. Advert isement/Post ing of ITB

ØBul let in Board of the PGOM : November 23 ,2015ØPGOM Websi te : November 23 ,2015ØPhi lGEPS Websi te : November 23 ,2015ØNewspaper of General Nat ionwide Circulat ion : November 23 ,2015

2 . Issuance of Bidding Documents : November 26 - December 16 , 20153 . Pre-Bid Conference : December 0 4, 2015 at 10:00 a .m. at BAC Off ice4 . Deadl ine of Submission of Bids : December 16 , 2015 at 1:30 p.m. at BAC Off ice5. Opening of Bid in sealed envelope

a) .El ig ibi l i ty Requirements and Technical Proposal : December 16 , 2015 at 2:00 pm at BAC Off iceb) .Financial Proposal : December 16 , 2015 at 2:00 pm BAC Off ice

Bidding wil l be conducted through open competit ive bidding procedures using non-discretionary pass/fail criterion as specified in R.A. 9184 and its IRR otherwise known as the Government Procurement Reform Act.

The complete set of b idding documents may be purchased at the BAC Secretar iat upon payment of non-refundable pr ice of b id documents indicated above.

Pre-Bid Conference shal l be opened to al l interested part ies, however only those who purchased the Bidding Documents may part ic ipate in the discussion at said conference.

Al l part iculars relat ive to el ig ib i l i ty requirements and screening, bid secur i ty, performance secur i ty, pre-bid conference, evaluat ion of b ids, post qual i f icat ion and award of contract shal l be governed by the provis ion of R.A. 9184 and i ts IRR.

The PGOM reserves the r ight to accept or reject b id to annul b idding process, and to reject a l l b ids at anyt ime pr ior to contract award without thereby incurr ing any l iabi l i ty to the af fected bidder or bidders.

For fur ther informat ion, p lease refer to:

MR. JULIO R. ICALHead, BAC Secretar iatProvincial Capi to l , Camilmi l , Calapan CityTel . (043) 286-7120 (043) 286-7447 (Sgd.) ENGR. ELMER V. DILAY Provincial Engineer BAC Chairman(TS-NOV. 23 , 2015)

Thousands of extra police and bor-der guards were deployed in Dhaka and other major cities and towns on the eve of a general strike called to protest against the executions.

Supporters of the ruling Awami League meanwhile greeted the ex-ecutions of Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mujahid and Salahuddin Quader Chowdhury by holding street parties and doling out sweets to children.

Bangladesh has been roiled by vio-lence for much of the last three years since a domestic tribunal began de-livering its verdicts on opposition figures accused of orchestrating mas-sacres during the 1971 war.

A total of 18 people have been con-victed but only two had been sent to the gallows before Mujahid and Chowdhury were hanged at Dhaka’s Central Prison shortly before 1:00am.

While the other three were mem-bers of the largest Islamist party, Jamaat-e-Islami, Chowdhury was a senior figure in the main opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP).

Jamaat, banned from contesting the 2014 general election, said the execu-tions were part of a strategy “aimed at eliminating” its leadership.

The BNP also accused Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina of presiding over a politically-motivated killing, which was carried out only hours af-ter BNP leader Khaleda Zia returned from a lengthy stay in London.

Some of the tightest security mea-sures were in force in the home towns of the two executed men, whose fu-nerals were held on Sunday morning.

“We’ve stepped up security across the country to prevent any violence, including on the roads along which

the bodies were taken,” police spokes-man Munstashirul Islam told AFP.

Hundreds of police were deployed outside the central city of Faridpur, where Mujahid was buried soon after daybreak. Reinforcements were also sent to Chowdhury’s home town of Raojan in the southeast.

A television journalist suffered mi-nor injuries after being shot in Raojan hours after Chowdhury’s burial, pri-vate television Channel 24 said. A lo-cal police chief told AFP officers were checking if the incident was connect-ed to the executions.

The 67-year-old Mujahid, Jamaat’s official number two, was sentenced for war crimes such as the killing of top intellectuals.

Chowdhury, 66, was convicted of atrocities including genocide dur-ing the 1971 war when the then-East Pakistan split from Islamabad. He served six terms as a member of par-liament and was one of Zia’s top aides.

Although international rights groups have criticized the trials as unfair, the government says they are vital for Bangladesh to confront its traumatic birth.

Despite having long been accused of leading massacres of pro-indepen-dence figures and minorities, both Chowdhury and Mujahid held cabi-net posts a little over a decade ago when the BNP was in power.

The relatives of the war victims cel-ebrated the hangings.

“I’ve waited for this day for a long 44 years,” said Shawan Mahmud, daugh-ter of top musician Altaf Mahmud, who was killed by the notorious Al Badr militia that Mujahid was con-victed of leading. AFP

HONG KONG—Hong Kong went to the polls Sunday for the first time since huge pro-democracy protests gripped the city, in a key test of public sentiment.

The spotlight is on the district elections to gauge whether support for the democracy movement can translate into votes and bring change to the political landscape.

Hong Kong is semi-autonomous after being handed back by Britain to China in 1997, but there are fears that Beijing’s influence is growing.

Tens of thousands of protesters took to the streets for more than two months at the end of last year de-manding fully free elections for the city’s next leader, in what became known as the “Umbrella Movement”.

The rallies were sparked after Beijing insisted the candidates for the first public vote for Hong Kong’s leader in 2017 would first have to be vetted by a loy-alist committee.

Some voters said the democracy movement had motivated them to cast their ballot.

“It’s the little power we have,” said 28-year-old ad-ministrator Kris Fong, voting in the northern dis-trict of Yuen Long.

Fong said she had chosen a pro-democracy can-didate because she felt the city was being “manipu-

lated” by Beijing. She had missed previous elections but said voting this year was more important.

“After last year’s umbrella revolution I feel that, however insignificant our vote might be, it’s our only legitimate way to tell the people... up north what we are thinking,” said Fong, referring to pow-ers in Beijing.

Student leader Joshua Wong, 19, the teenage face of the democracy movement, was eligible to vote for the first time.

“I finally cast the first vote of my life,” he said in a Tweet.

“Feeling exhilarated.” Just over 3.1 million residents are registered, with

a 21 percent turnout by early afternoon.The figure was slightly higher than at the same

stage four years ago. Turnout at the end of the 2011 vote totalled 41 percent.

Polls close at 10:30 pm (1430 GMT) and results are expected in the early hours of the morning.

Despite galvanizing widespread support at the beginning of the mass street protests, democracy activists were unable to win concessions on politi-cal reform from the authorities in China or Hong Kong. AFP

DHAKA—Bangladesh Sunday hanged two top opposition leaders for war crimes during the independence conflict with Pakistan and strengthened security nationwide over fears the executions could spark fresh unrest.

M O N D AY : N O V E M B E R 2 3 , 2 0 1 5

B8 CESAR BARRIOQUINTOE D I T O R

[email protected]

Trauma 14years apartlinks Paris,New York

Second-day lockdown for Brussels

In attendance. Beyonce Knowles looks on before Miguel Cotto takes on Canelo Alvarez in their middleweight fight at the Mandalay Bay Events Center in Las Vegas, Nevada. AFP

The exodus continues. A migrant walks past Macedonian police with his baby on November 21 while crossing the Greek-Macedonian border near Serbia. AFP

WORLDMali starts huntinghotel siege suspects

BAMAKO—Mali was hunting Saturday for the suspects wanted over the jihadist siege at a luxury hotel that left 19 people dead, mostly foreigners, as the president warned that no one in the world could hide from terrorism.

The government declared a state of emergen-cy after the bloody nine-hour hostage-taking at the Radisson Blu hotel in the capital Bamako on Friday, exactly a week after the Paris attacks.

The Al-Murabitoun group, an Al-Qaeda affili-ate led by the notorious one-eyed Algerian militant Mokhtar Belmokhtar, nicknamed the “Uncatchable” or “Mr Marlboro”, claimed the attack.

Gunmen went on the rampage from the early morning, shooting in the corridors and taking 170 guests and staff hostage.

The assault, which ended when Malian and in-ternational troops stormed the hotel, left 19 peo-ple dead as well as two attackers, Mali’s President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita said.

The victims included six Russians, three Chinese, two Belgians, an American, an Israeli, a Senegalese and a member of the Malian special forces.

Authorities are now “actively pursuing” at least three people over the attack in the former French colony, one security source told AFP.

Keita, who vowed in a televised address on the day of the siege that “terror will not win”, visited the site Saturday.

“Nowhere in the world is one safe from these bar-barians from another era,” he said, adding that the at-tackers had “decided to break with humanity”.

Senegalese President Macky Sall, who heads the regional Economic Community of West African States, will travel to Bamako on Sunday to offer his condolences, his office said.

Mali will begin three days of national mourning Monday.

“It’s very scary. It’s as if Bamako has become a war zone,” said local teacher Oumar Keita. “How were they able to get here, how did they get the weapons?”

Security remained tight around the Radisson and other hotels in Bamako and was also boosted discreetly at public buildings and banks.

The attack came as fears mount over jihadist threats a week after 130 people died in the Paris attacks claimed by the Islamic State group, which also said it had downed a Russian passenger jet in Egypt on October 31. AFP

NEW YORK—United by the trau-ma of terrorism, 14 years apart, New York and Paris have exhibited the same fortitude and determi-nation to overcome the tears and fears with love, life and laughter.

Experts say this is the best pos-sible response to such horrors.

Psychologists who have studied the effects of the 9/11 attacks on New York say that most people, including those directly exposed, will be okay and few experience prolonged symptoms of trauma.

But in the very short term, the vast majority of people “directly exposed to this kind of event will show considerable distress,” said George Bonanno, clinical psychol-ogy professor at Teachers College, Columbia University who heads the Loss, Trauma and Emotion Lab.

The co-author of a study on the psychological effects of the 2001 attacks over a decade, he said this first response is healthy and natu-ral.

“It means that your stress re-sponse is working,” he told AFP.

Trouble sleeping, bursting into tears, anxiety, feeling low and be-ing sensitive to particular noises and memories are typical symp-toms.

“The stress response is wonder-fully adapted, it is conserved by evolution,” said Bonanno, explain-ing that it allows people to move onto the second stage of recovery and adapting to a new reality.

“It doesn’t mean the person has gone crazy or even has a dis-order or has PTSD,” said Douglas Mennin of Hunter College.

Trauma normally dissipates in a couple of weeks or months. For only a small percentage of people—fewer than 10 percent—difficulties are more serious and last longer.

On the bright, pristine morning of September 11, 2001, some 2,700 people were killed when Al-Qaeda hijackers flew two passenger jets into the Twin Towers in Manhattan, de-stroying the buildings.

Hundreds more were killed when planes were hijacked and crashed at the Pentagon just outside Washington and in Pennsylvania. AFP

BRUSELS—The Belgian capital was locked-down for a second day Sunday with police and troops on the streets as the authorities said they were searching for “several sus-pects” linked to the bloody attacks in Paris.

Interior Minister Jan Jambon said the au-thorities were looking not just for Belgian-born Salah Abdeslam who managed to slip past French security forces after the carnage in Pais, and his capture would not end the threat on its own.

“It involves several suspects and that is why we have put in place such exceptional mea-sures,” the Belga news agency cited Jambon as telling Flemish television.

“We are following the situation minute by minute. There is no reason to hide that. There

is a real threat but we are doing everything possible day and night to face up to this situ-ation,” Jambon said.

Ministers and security officials were due to meet later Sunday to decide whether to extend the lockdown in Brussels, imposed amid fears jihadists were plotting similar at-tacks to those in Paris which left 130 people dead.

The authorities closed the city’s metro sys-tem and public buildings on Saturday, with shops and restaurants following suit after the terror threat was raised to 4 its highest level, and officials spoke of an “imminent threat.”

As a result, central Brussels, usually bus-tling on a Saturday evening, was virtually de-serted, with police and troops on patrol. AFP

C1M O N D AY : N O V E M B E R 2 3 , 2 0 1 5

E AT, DRINK , T R AV EL

TATUM ANCHETAE D I T O RBING PARELA S S O C I AT E E D I T O RBERNADETTE LUNASW R I T E R

l i f e @ t h e s t a n d a r d . c o m . p h @ L I F E a t S t a n d a r d @ L I F E a t S t a n d a r d @ L I F E a t S t a n d a r d

LIFE

Like anything craft, there’s a certain fascination about artisan-bottled whiskies. You can get commercial bottles in liquor stores and SNRs and savor

the likes of Macallan, Glenlivet, Yamazaki, Glenfiddich, Lagavulin and many more, but there’s nothing like a unique bottle of whisky bottled in small quantities and tastes that are more diverse than some commercial options.

Over the years, global whisky bottling companies have been popping up, producing the best tasting independent bottles of whisky in the market. These companies buy casks from different distilleries and get these casks filled, stored and bottled at a certain age before releasing them to the market.

Hunter Laing & Co. is one of the newest bottlers in the industry. It is a family operated company of blenders and bottlers of fine Scotch Whisky run by Stewart Laing and his sons Scott and Andrew. Though fairly new, the company has vast stocks of some of the most sought after whiskies in Scotland including the rare and old Port Ellen, which is blended to some of their blended whiskies.

In the Philippines, Vom Fass – vintage wines, premium vinegars, oils and spirits store – carries the artisan-bottled whiskies of Hunter Laing & Co. Available bottles and cask whiskies range from different regions of Scotland like The Highlands, Islay, Lowlands, and Speyside. In a recent Manila leg whisky tasting with Hunter Laing’s blender and bottler Andrew Laing, he presented the FassZination bottle collection, perfect for your holiday gifting ideas or use for your celebrations.

Vom Fass hosted the whisky pairing dinner at Masseto Restaurant and Wine Bar and six bottles were paired with delectable dishes that compliment the whiskies. There are arguments on what whisky is best paired with what food, but more often than not, it really just depends on the palate of the person. Like Andrew mentioned, there is no right or wrong pairing because whisky food pairing

is new to the industry and culinary experts are still on the experimenting stage. For the appetizer, Citrus Salad with Blue Cheese Emulsion is paired with Auchentoshan 12 years old. The sweet, citrusy and fruity taste of the whisky compliments the dish. The next whisky is Isle of Jura 9 years old paired with Bottarga Tagliolini – the saltiness of the fish roe highlights the smoky notes of the whisky and balances it with the chocolate and toffee notes. The third pairing is Grilled Calamari, Charred Eggplant and Warm Chorizo paired with the delicate red-colored spicy and sweet notes of Great Glen 8 years old. The main entrée is the Smoked Beef Baby Rib, Macerated Chick Peas and Whiskey Glaze paired with the peaty Bowmore 14 years old. The menu finished with the last tasting from the FassZination collection, Auchroisk 21 years old, perfect for the sweet dessert of Chocolate Hazelnut Tart.

“We continually prepare new things for Vom Fass. The store should always be changing its collection of very exclusive whiskies,” says Andrew. And because sometimes the casks are prepared in small batches for Vom Fass, the next bottles might have slight nuance than the last and it just adds to the uniqueness of the whisky.

Vom Fass currently offers holiday packages of 40 ml bottle flights in a wooden box. You may opt to personalize the flights depending on the personality of the person you are gifting it to; you may choose from a wide array of alcohol and liqueurs or from their extensive whisky casks.

VOM FASS FassZination Bottles are available at EDSA Shangri-La, LG East Wing Shangri-La Plaza, Mandaluyong City; SM Aura Premier, Level 2 SM Aura Premier, Taguig City; Powerplant Mall, P1 Level Powerplant Mall Center, Makati City.

Artisan-bottlers and the FassZination Collection

Bottarga Tagliolini

Smoked Beef Baby Rib, Macerated Chick Peas and Whiskey Glaze paired with the peaty Bowmore 14 years old

Grilled Calamari, Charred Eggplant and Warm Chorizo

Citrus Salad with Blue Cheese Emulsion

The whiskies of Hunter Laing are not dyed artificially, the colors vary from the cask and ageing

Vom Fass FassZination whisky tasting

Auchentoshan 12 years old and Bowmore 14 years old

Auchentoshan Distillery 12 years, Single Cask Bottling

C2MONDAY : NOVEMBER 23, 2015

LIFE l i f e @ t h e s t a n d a r d . c o m . p h @ L I F E a t S t a n d a r d @ L I F E a t S t a n d a r d @ L I F E a t S t a n d a r d

Australian social entrepreneur and responsible and sustainable chocolate farming advocateAlyssa

Jade “Lyss” McDonald-Bärtl will be fying in to Manila to conduct special lectures at the Philippines’ top culinary school, the Center for Culinary Arts (CCA), Manila.

The founder of BLYSS Chocolate, which sells single bean virgin chocolate that food critics and chocolatiers define as the “purest chocolate in the world,” Lyss comes armed with the advocacy of responsible agriculture or agro-ecology that she learned from her family. BLYSS Chocolate harvests pure arriba nacionale cacao from 450 farmer families in Ecuador.

Chocolate and cacao bean lovers have the opportunity to become chocolate experts and start their own chocolate business through the special lectures on cacao beans mastery with McDonald-Bärtl, with CCA’s top patissier-masters, Chefs

Christine Paredes and Anne Atanacio, accompanying her in preparing dishes and desserts using locally-sourced cacao and chocolate.

On November 30 and December 1, Lyss will be conducting “How to Put up a Profitable Chocolate Business” where she will lecture on the possibilities of a chocolate-based enterprise coming from her very own experiences with BLYSS Chocolate (which she started and which currently produces the highly valued single bean virgin chocolate), with Wicked’s top patissier Chef Christine Paredes conducting the demo.

On December 1 and 2, Lyss will be at the helm on the topic of “Use of Local Cacao” where she will discuss the exploration and use of locally grown cacao beans in the preparation of innovative dishes and desserts, and earning top profits in the process. Lyss will partner with CCA’s desserts expert and seasoned instructor Anne Atanacio who will conduct the accompanying demo.

Classes will be conducted from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. at the CCA, Manila campus at 287 Katipunan Avenue, Loyola Heights, Quezon City. The fee for the two-day class is P10,000. For inquiries, call (02) 218-5266 or email [email protected].

Several thousand years ago, this fungus was not only regarded as the primary component in soups, but a revered traditional

Chinese herbal medicine.However, that fact has been somehow

forgotten, because in modern times, most mushroom varieties are popular not for their health benefits, but as versatile ingredients in many cuisines. Fortunately, people are rediscovering the power of mushrooms, thanks to recent scientific studies that reveal the vast amounts of health-boosting properties these fungi contain.

Leading institutions that initiated the research found that we can greatly benefit from mushrooms’ Vitamins B, C, and D content; chitin and beta-glucan (fibers that lower cholesterol, improve cardiovascular health, and

boost the body’s immune system); and minerals like germanium and selenium (which prevent the damaging effects of free radicals), iron, niacin, potassium and phosphorus.

Most importantly, mushrooms are found to have the powerful antioxidant L-Ergothioneine. Through the years, scientists have underscored the importance of antioxidants as these protect the cells from within, thus boosting one’s immune system and helping prevent future diseases such as cancer.

“L-Ergothioneine is found in very few vegetables or fruit. In fact, our body is not capable of producing ergothioneine so it can only be obtained from the diet,” said Prof. Luchie Callanta, RND, MSN, who is also a culinary arts instructor and book author specializing in nutrition.

Thankfully, getting these valuable health benefits from mushrooms is easy as they now come in cans. Here in the Philippines, leading canned mushroom brand Jolly leads the way towards healthier eating habits and balanced diets.

Jolly Mushroom is composed of choice quality, fresh mushrooms sealed via advanced canning processes and controlled standards. Jolly Mushroom does not contain artificial preservatives

as its contents are just mushrooms, water, salt and citric acid.

According to tests of SGS, a leading inspection, verification, testing and certification company, “Jolly Mushrooms contain an impressive 14 mg of L-ergothioneine per 400g can. It is available in the following variants: Whole Mushrooms, Pieces and Stems, Premium Sliced Mushrooms, and Shiitake Mushrooms.

With the mushroom earning back its historically-renowned esteem as the world’s new “superfood,” Jolly commits to elevate this simple ingredient by ensuring top-grade quality canned mushroom products to Filipino consumers.

“It’s high time that Filipinos start making the wise nutritional choice, which is to incorporate mushrooms in their daily diet. Mushrooms deserve a place in our table not only because they make our dishes more flavorful. People should eat more mushrooms because of the many benefits they offer, besides being a very versatile, low-calorie and low-fat food,” Prof. Callanta pointed out.

To know more ways on how to incorporate mushrooms in your daily menu, recipes are available at Jolly’s official website www.jolly.com.ph and on its Facebook page Jolly Eats.

Bean Queen Lyss McDonald-Bärtl to conduct exclusive classes at CCA Manila

Lyss McDonald-Bärtl conducting one of her classes

Chocolate Queen Alyssa Jade “Lyss” McDonald-Bärtl

REDISCOVERING THE POWER OF MUSHROOM

Our country’s tourism industry has been on the upswing for the past decade and many issues related to it have been and will always be discussed by those who are part of it, and even by those who are on the outside looking in. But we in the Industry feel the need for a periodic forum to discuss any and all issues related to this highly competitive and financially rewarding occupation.

Vic Alcuaz, president of Narra Hospitality Inc.; Anabelle Ochoa-Moreno, chairperson of the Tourism Industry Board Foundation Inc. (TIBFI); Adolf Aran, chief executive officer of Dine Philippines and a few other kindred spirits and I decided to put together a monthly “Meet The Tourism Press Forum” and invite leading industry personalities to talk about burning issues that may make for interesting discussion among members of the industry.

The first edition reeled off not too long ago and, with recent news that Filipino cuisine has made its mark in the US East Coast by landing in the pages of the New York Times, Alcuaz, who is chairman of the forum, thought it best to tackle the issue on the future of Filipino cuisine as a tourism draw.

Hosted by the Midas Hotel, the luncheon get-together, participated in by print and TV media and leading food bloggers, had as guests four of the leading chefs in the country today: Cebuano Chef Myke Tatung Sarthou who runs his own highly successful restaurant in Quezon City called ALAB; Center for Culinary Arts’ executive director Chef Sau del Rosario who, having had extensive training in Paris, is known for his exquisite “Filipino cuisine with a French accent”; long-time New York restaurateur Chef Amy Besa is known for her fascination with and love for ube, which is why she put up her Purple Yam restaurant in New York, a branch of which she opened this year in her family’s ancestral house in Malate;

and Just Jonesing Blog owner Chef JJ Yulo, known for his advocacy on “educational, entertaining, slightly irreverent and always fun” appreciation of culinary fare.

These experts deftly tackled the barrage of questions from the media representatives. The first big question on the table was – “What is Filipino food?” Chef Amy says it is epitomized by adobo and Cordillera heirloom rice, while Chef Tatung says whatever is indigenous to the region is Filipino food. Chef Sau says it is a multidimensional cuisine that could often lead to an identity crisis, and Chef JJ claims that, to come up with “real Filipino food,” we must first unify the cuisine of the different regions in the country and come up with a single taste.

Having heard such diverse replies from these experts, I realized that, indeed, the complex nature of Filipino cuisine, coming from different regions with varying cultural influences, makes it difficult for anyone to put a singular tag or label to it. In fact, the late Doreen Fernandez who has written many books on Filipino cuisine cites “indigenization” as a common practice, i.e., borrowing recipes from other countries but using our indigenous ingredients, with these recipes eventually passed on as Filipino.

Chef Amy pointed out some interesting peculiarities that further highlighted our uniqueness as a people. Our countrymen are very visual with their food; they want to see everything they’re going to eat. That’s why when they go to a buffet restaurant, they take back to their tables the soup, main

course and dessert at the same time because they want to plan for space for all of it in their stomach. Another thing that is peculiar to our “compatriots” – they love to share food from each other’s plates, something that foreigners find repulsive.

We are an archipelago and have a very long coastline, which should mean easy access to fresh seafood. However, that is not the case. Fresh seafood is hard to come by and is expensive for the average Filipino. Chef Amy ended her “dissertation” with a significant disclosure: the common denominator of typical culinary fare from all regions in the country is “in your face” sourness. Notice that most recipes of traditional viands from all regions in the country include vinegar, kalamansi and pineapple.

There were many other interesting questions raised by the audience but the wrap-up question was the most significant: “How do we market Filipino cuisine?” Chef Tatung says our government must extend support to our farmers, specifically the distribution system the way Thailand gave support to their agriculture industry. Chef Sau has a more romantic approach –”Love our food and promote it with our hearts.”

Chef JJ wants it simple: “Cook typical Filipino dishes and make the foreigners try them.” Chef Amy wants our cuisine to be part of the culinary school curriculum so that the younger generation will have a deeper understanding of what Filipino food really is, and will be easier for them to influence their foreign contacts to try it.

We, in the audience, agreed that the government should have a national business plan to promote Filipino cuisine, the first item of which should be to improve the lives of our farmers. Then, our countrymen should embrace our true identity as a people. Only after that can we effectively promote this complex grouping of diverse culinary delights that we collectively know as Filipino food.

As if in sync with the discussion at the forum, the City Garden Hotel Makati recently announced its new menu, courtesy of executive chef Mario Bassig. This was introduced during a food tasting event at its Le Jardin restaurant, hosted by director of Sales and Marketing Shyline Bernardo.

For feedback, I’m at [email protected]

C3LIFEMONDAY : NOVEMBER 23, 2015


MERCURY RISINGBY BOB ZOZOBRADO

YOUR MONDAY CHUCKLE:

What’s the difference between a bachelor and a married man? A bachelor comes home, sees what’s in the fridge and goes to bed. A married man comes home, sees what’s on the bed and goes to the fridge.

QUO VADIS, FILIPINO CUISINE?

(L-R) Chef Myke Tatung Sarthou, Chef Sau del Rosario, Chef Amy Besa, and Chef JJ Yulo

The event’s hosts, Cory Quirino and Adolf AranCity Garden Hotel Makati’s Shyline Bernardo (center) and Chef Mario Bassig (second from right) together with their F&B team

Vic Alcuaz

Anabelle Ochoa Moreno

This column coincides with the day turkeys dread: Thanksgiving. A day of expressing gratitude (though I think that being thankful shouldn’t be confined to just one day a year, much like showing our love and appreciation for our partners should not be condensed into a day), it is also a day of eating and, of course, drinking. While this American holiday (a sort of “booze bridge”

between the “party holidays” of Halloween and New Year’s Eve) is known more in these parts for the turkey-stuffing-cranberry sauce-family feasts we see on TV shows and movies, Thanksgiving is definitely one of the booziest holidays of the year. (During the first celebrations, people not only stuffed themselves to celebrate the harvest, they also drank a whole lot of cider and beer, because the Pilgrims considered beer to be safer to drink than water.) Now, since people don’t have to go to work as it is a national holiday in the US, the night before Thanksgiving is like an alcohol free-for-all dubbed “Blackout Wednesday.” For people who have always wanted to go on a bender on “hump day,” now is their chance (not that I encourage people to drink until they black out).

Along the lines of the tradition of being thankful and this being a column about booze, these are some alcohol-related things I’m thankful for.

Well, first and foremost, I am grateful for booze itself. I’m not sure if it’s obvious to you guys by now, but I do like to drink (for various reasons, some of which I’ve already discussed in previous columns). I am grateful for the existence of alcohol. In the best ways, it brings people together, generally makes you feel good, and tastes good (of course depending on your preference and quality of cocktail). Also, when I am lucky enough to get that perfect drink, the drink that hits the sweet spot (the sweet spot differs for everyone and it depends on what itch needs to be scratched at that particular time), it sort of reminds me to be grateful. It gives a warm, fuzzy feeling that makes me sigh with relief.

Alcohol makes hanging out with friends more colorful and pleasant or boring gatherings bearable. It helps us gather up the courage to do something brave, like go up to a stranger you find attractive to get his/her/their number or dance on a ledge.

It isn’t called “liquid courage” for nothing. It allows us to let loose and helps us (or deludes us into thinking we can) dance like no one’s watching.

Speaking of which, I am grateful that I grew up and partied hard at a time before camera phones were a necessity and social media was immediate and encompassing. I was able to party without the threat of always having a “wasak’”moment captured on camera and posted for friends and family to see before I was even able to nurse my hangover. I think we’re all grateful for the near-misses we’ve had this year, the times we had maybe a tad too much merrymaking (wasted does not look good on anyone) though I have admit, there are people – me included, lol! – who know how to carry themselves well, and were lucky enough to dodge the bullet, so to speak, and be forever immortalized on Instagram (after all, the internet is forever).

So, dear imbibers, what are you thankful for this year?

Add me on IG @sanvicentegirl or drop me a line at [email protected] or visit me at my bar for a drink or two.

C4 LIFEM O N D AY : N O V E M B E R 2 3 , 2 0 1 5


TIPPLE TALESBY ICY MARIÑAS

SOME THINGS TO BE THANKFUL FOR

SHOWBITZi s a h r e d @ g m a i l . c o m

C5ISAH V. REDE D I T O R

M ONDAY : NOV EMBER 23, 2015

It will be a star-studded show when the world’s biggest mu-sic stars converge at the 2015 American Music Awards®.

Set to perform on the Microsoft Theater stage in Los Angeles are Jennifer Lopez who will also host the show; the world’s biggest boy band One Direction, Meghan Trainor, Demi Lovato, Selena Gomez, Carrie Underwood, Nick Jonas, 5 Seconds of Summer, Pen-tatonix, Luke Bryan, Karen Fair-child and Walk The Moon.

The American Music Awards® airs LIVE via satellite on RTL CBS Entertainment HD first and ex-clusive today, 9 a.m. (Nov. 23).

Global music superstars One Direction perform their new single “Perfect” while Luke Bry-an, Karen Fairchild of Little Big Town, Charlie Puth and Meghan Trainor their duets.

Meghan Trainor teams up with Charlie Puth to perform his sin-gle “Marvin Gaye.” Trainor will delight the AMA audience to a

rendition of her hit song “Like I’m Gonna Lose You,” from her hit debut album Title. Luke Bryan, a three-time winner of the favorite male artist – country category, performs the world premiere of “Home Alone Tonight” featuring Karen Fairchild, in what will be her first time on the AMA stage without her band mates.

Pentatonix, the very popular a cappella group, performs the leg-endary Star Wars score.

Taylor Swift leads the 2015

American Music Award with six nominations. Ed Sheeran and The Weeknd tie with five nominations each, while Sam Hunt, Nicki Mi-naj, Sam Smith, Meghan Trainor and Walk the Moon earn three nominations each. Additionally, Jason Aldean, Chris Brown, Luke Bryan, Drake, FettyWap, Florida Georgia Line, Ariana Grande, Maroon 5, Bruno Mars, One Di-rection, Charlie Puth, Rihanna, Mark Ronson and Wiz Khalifaeach receives two nominations.

The Song of The Year nominees are Wiz Khalifa Featuring Charlie Puth “See You Again,” Mark Ron-son Featuring Bruno Mars “Up-town Funk!,” Ed Sheeran “Think-ing Out Loud,” Taylor Swift “Blank Space” and The Weeknd “Can’t Feel My Face.”

The Artist of the Year nominees are Luke Bryan, Ariana Grande, Maroon 5, Nicki Minaj, One Di-rection, Ed Sheeran, Sam Smith, Taylor Swift, Meghan Trainor and The Weeknd.

Star-Studded ‘2015 amerIcan muSIc awardS®’

1 Selena Gomez 2 Jennifer Lopez 3 Karen Fairchild 4 Carrie Underwood 5 Meghan Trainor 6 5 Seconds of Summer 7 Walk the Moon 8 Pentatonix 9 One Direction 10 Charlie Puth 11 Nick Jonas 12 Luke Bryan 13 Demi Lovato and Kris Allen

1 2 3 4 5

6 7 8

9 10 11

12 13

SHOWBITZC6i s a h r e d @ g m a i l . c o m


ACROSS 1 — kebab 6 Repair 10 Mongol ruler 14 Grinding machine 15 Actor Sharif 16 Festive log 17 “— — You Knocking” 18 Big wheels 19 Bauxite et al. 20 It’s often served with salt 22 Dark ale

A N S W E R F O R P R E V I O U S P U Z Z L E

CROSSWORD PUZZLE MONDAY,

NOVEMBER 23, 2015

23 Unbounded joy 24 Air-mass boundaries 25 Whitewater 28 Chieftain’s plaid 30 Ram constellation 31 Whale, old-style 36 Med. plans 37 Hanker after 38 Quasimodo’s creator 39 Analysis opposite 41 Heaped up

42 TV genie portrayer 43 Pinball palace 44 Stuffed corn husk 48 Jedi ally 49 Flat-tasting 50 The other way round (2 wds.) 55 Put — — in one’s ear 56 Granary, often 57 Unsuitable 58 Painter — Magritte 59 Like some orders 60 Sturdy fabric 61 Ice floe dweller 62 “Anything —?” 63 Proofreads

DOWN 1 Willowy 2 Big laugh (hyph.) 3 Anatomical passage 4 Most hairy 5 Ushers in 6 Multiplex offering 7 Discharge 8 Auto-supplies store 9 Rx givers 10 Temple city of Japan 11 Erie neighbor 12 Kayak owner, maybe 13 Twiggy abodes 21 Home tel.

22 Sp. miss 24 Dart about 25 Stadium noise 26 Ant horde 27 Subatomic particle 28 Kline or Costner 29 Currier’s partner 31 Get trounced 32 Set 33 Luau number 34 Made cheddar better 35 Leaf juncture 37 Yield by treaty 40 Cuddled 41 Supply 43 Blow away 44 Ski lifts (hyph.) 45 “Tiny Alice” playwright 46 Hawaii’s — Loa 47 Venezuela falls 48 Quebec school 50 Perfume bottle 51 Woes 52 Sari sporter 53 Hiss 54 24-hr. tellers 56 Sault — Marie

Based on the gripping real-life survival story that captivated the world’s attention, The 33 fol-lows the never-before-told per-sonal journeys and miraculous events surrounding the collapse of the Chilean gold and copper mine and the subsequent re-trieval and rescue of all 33 min-ers after being buried alive 700 meters below the earth’s surface for 69 days under a megaton boulder twice the size of the Empire State Building.

Filmed with the cooperation of the miners, their families and their rescuers, The 33 is about the courage of those who did not give up -- above and be-low the surface of the earth -- during their ordeal, ultimately emerging as heroes.

More than a billion people around the world sat transfixed in front of their televisions as the now famous 33 Chilean miners were finally transported to free-dom after 69 days trapped in the darkness thousands of feet be-neath the unforgiving surface of the Atacama Desert -- a world record for the longest under-ground survival.

As the world watched, Chil-ean President Sebastian Piñeradeclared that the miners would not be abandoned. Engineers worked for days and nights on end to drill their way to the miners. Finally, the world was caught in awe as the miners were miraculously drawn, one-by-one, from the ground in an unprecedented televised rescue.

The 33 evokes the grand tra-dition of films depicting men trapped and isolated – pushed to their physical and mental limits by environmental forces

beyond their control. Recent examples of the genre include such films such as Gravity, Apollo 13 and 127 Hours.

During the 2010 Copiapó mining accident, while still trapped in the mine, the 33 min-ers agreed to collectively con-tract with just a single author to write their official history so that none of the 33 could individu-ally profit from the experiences of the others. The miners chose Pulitzer prize winning journalist Héctor Tobar to have exclusive access to the miners’ stories. His official account – published after filming was completed - titled Deep Down Dark: The Untold Stories of 33 Men Buried in a Chilean Mine, and the Miracle That Set Them Free became a critically acclaimed, New York Times bestseller and a finalist for the 2014 National Book Critics Circle Award. The filmmakers developed the screenplay from Tobar’s book with the coopera-tion of the miners, their families and their rescuers.

The award-winning multi-national cast features Anto-nio Banderas, Rodrigo San-toro, Juliette Binoche, James Brolin, Lou Diamond Phil-lips, Naomi Scott and Gabriel Byrne among others.

The 33 opens Nov. 25 in cine-mas from Pioneer Films.

Check out the film’s trail-er here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xc5tsrVsp9A

MiraCulous true story of ‘the 33’ Miners

LiZa SObERanO REaDy tO bE PaiRED With OthER aCtORS

In spite of the success her love team with Enrique Gil, Liza Soberano is open to the possibility that they might be paired individually with other stars in the coming days. “That’s right!” she says. This is showbiz. Any-thing can happen, right? We know that our love team is not permanent. If the management de-cides to separate us mo-mentarily, we would fol-low their direction.

In the first place, they know what’s best for me and Quen. I believe that pairing us with other stars will actually do us good. For one, the public won’t get tired of us eas-ily. Seeing us on screen with other actors once in a while will help break the monotony and make them miss us. Secondly, it’s also important for our growth as thespians.

Of course, if I have it my way, I like to always be paired with Quen. I’m comfortable with him. But we perfectly know

that it won’t contribute to our development both as actors and individuals. Along the way, we should experience working with our fellow stars. That’s why we are very open to the idea. We don’t tie ourselves to each other.”

Their second major movie titled Everyday I Love You made a big killing at the tills. It also has successful interna-tional screenings.

“Yes! We’re so thankful that the viewers patron-ized our next offering af-ter Just the Way You Are. It’s simply overwhelm-ing. At first, Quen and I were hesitant of what the public’s reception would be since Everyday I Love You is more mature and we had a love triangle in the person of Gerald Anderson. We’re grate-ful that we were able to achieve the goal of mak-ing it a hit despite its be-ing a different material.

It’s heartwarming, too that the film is doing well in its international screenings. Quen and I flew to various inter-national key cities be-fore the showing of the movie. We pitched it in to our fellow Filipi-nos there. During that

time, they were already excited to see it. We’re simply happy that they supported our latest sil-ver screen offering!”

In Everyday I Love You, fans were thrilled to witness their tender moments but with no kissing scene still. This is understandable since she’s only seventeen. By the time she’s already prepared to have a lip-locking scene in the future, would she prefer that it’s with Enrique?

“I don’t have an on screen kiss yet because I’m still young. But if you ask me if I want it to be with Quen when the right time comes, my answer is yes. Of course,” ends Liza.

HHHHH

Asked about the present status of her friendship with Andre Paras, YassiPressman avers, “Well, let’s put it this way: we’re happy with what we have at present. We’re very close. Compared to our Diary ng Panget days, the level of our closeness is far deeper at this point. I can say that apart from my dad, he’s the closest guy to me!”

The pretty Viva star points out that she’s

very much comfort-able with her perennial screen partner.

“With Andre, I don’t need to pretend whatso-ever. I can be myself and not be that conscious. It’s like we can read each oth-er’s mind with just one look. We enjoy each oth-er’s company so much.

“As I’ve mentioned earlier, we’re happy with what we are now. I believe that it will just be com-plicated if we will hasten things like romance. An-dre and I won’t force to put ourselves in another place. We’re very happy with what we share at present so, let’s leave it that way. Let’s see what happens in the future.”

It’s amazing that she and Andre were able to maintain their friend-ship with Nadine Lus-tre and James Reid, their Diary ng Pangetco-stars who are con-sidered as one of the top love teams nowadays.

“Oh yes! Their success is also our success. We’re happy and supportive of them and vice-versa. There’s no competition or insecurity whatsoev-er. We will always keep our friendship no matter what,” Yassi states.

JOSEPh PEtER GOnZaLES

Yassi Pressman and Andre Paras are simmering on screen

Enrique Gil and Liza Soberano don't mind to be paired with other stars

At the entrance of the mine in The 33

A miner trapped in the mines

SHOWBITZ C7i s a h r e d @ g m a i l . c o m


For the 17-year-old rising star Hannah Nolas-co, getting to record an album is like a fairy tale come true. And winning an award for her al-bum Peksman is more than a validation of her talents in singing and composing. At the recent PMPC Star Awards for Music, Hannah tied with Morissette for the “Best New Female Re-cording Artist of the Year.”

Hannah, who studies at San Beda Alabang, is the daughter of Col. Ricardo L. Nolasco,Jr., PAF (Ret), owner of Hannah’s Beach Resort & Convention Center, which for the second time in a row received from Gawad Amerika Foun-dation the “2015 Most Outstanding Tourist Destination in the Philippines.”

Hannah exemplifies the typical teenage Filipi-na - gentle yet strong, fun loving but knows what she wants. What sets her apart are her free spir-it, talent and gift to narrate her personal expe-riences through songs. She shares, “I wanted to capture these years of my life on an album while they still represented what I was going through.” Hannah describes her own music as fun and youthful. “I never choose a song that I can’t relate to in some way, shape, or form. My music will always reflect who I am and what I believe in.”

Her father recalls that he saw the spark of Hannah’s career with a simple hum and her passion to play the piano at the tender age of 3. As she grew, her interests flourished to include swimming, basketball, gymnastics and ballet lessons. “I believe Hannah took up her skills to play piano from me. I remember she would al-ways sit on my lap as I play my favorite pieces on the piano at dinner time.”

When asked about her musical influenc-es, Hannah responded, “Aside from my Papa, I look up to Ariana Grande, One Direction, Katy Perry, Vanessa Hudgens, Beyonce, Ri-hanna, Taylor Swift, and a lot more.”

Hannah is constantly inspired and motivated by her Papa, whom she considers the best father in the whole world but could also be her harsh-est critic some times. Hannah shares, “Papa is in-comparable in every way. He is very loving and caring and is my constant source of inspiration and constructive criticism in all areas.”

It is Hannah’s hope that her music will pro-vide a means for her to give back to her family (especially now that her father is running for Congress under Partylist CONSLA (Confedera-tionof Savings & Loan Association of the Phils.); to the community and become a role model for the youth in her own humble way. “I would like to give back to my family and school for teaching me all that I know and for moulding me to be the person who I am today,” she says, in addition to wanting to give back to other charitable organi-zations close to her heart.

Hannah also knows that, with her family, friends, relatives and God on her side, and with her sheer determination, anything is possible for her to achieve her goals and make her dreams come true. “Everyone has dreams,” she states. “This is not just a dream of mine, this is a goal that I am determined to achieve and I won’t give up!”

HannaH nolasCo wins first

musiC award

Inspired by the 1991 hit movie of the same title starring Patrick Swayze and Keanu Reeves, 2015’s Point Breakpushes the boundaries in the action genre with its most daring athleticism ever done in a motion picture.

Directed by Ericson Core the film stars Luke Braceywho plays young FBI agent Johnny Utah who infiltrates a cunning team of thrill-seeking elite athletes – led by the charismatic Bodhi (Edgar Ramirez). The athletes are sus-pected of carrying out a spate of crimes in extremely un-usual ways. Deep undercover, and with his life in immi-nent danger, Utah strives to prove they are the architects of this string of inconceivable crimes

Core brings forth a unique first-of-its-kind thrilling edge with its action adventure feats that are performed by elite athletes representing the world’s best in class in big-wave surfing, wing-suit flying, sheer-face snowboarding, free rock climbing, and high-speed motorcycling.

Joining the actors in the movie are renowned extreme athletes performing stunts in the film include surfers Laird Hamilton, Sebastian Zietz, Makua Rothman, Billy Kemper, Brian Keaulana, Ahanu Tson-dru, Ian Walsh, Laurie Towner, Dylan Longbottom, Albee Lay-er, Bruce Irons, Tikanui Smith and Tuhiti Humani; snowboarders Xavier De Le Rue, Louis Vito, Christian

Haller, Lucas DeBari and Ralph Backstrom; skateboard-ers Bob Burnquist and Eric Koston; motorcyclists Riley Harper and Oakley Lehman; wingsuit stunt pilots Jon Devore, Julian Boulle, Noah Bahnson, Jhonathan Flo-rez and Mike Swanson, and consultant Jeb Corliss; and free climber Chris Sharma, among others.

Extreme action explodes when Point Break opens in cine-mas nationwide Dec. 3, Thursday from Pioneer Films.

Check out the film’s trailer here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sax7QeOoKog

never-before-seen extreme aCtion stunts in ‘Point break’

Piolo Pascual Presenter at 43rd int’l emmy awards

aBS-CBN President, Chief Content Officer, and CEO Charo Santos-Concio will open the 43rd Inter-

national Emmy Awards today in New York City as part of her duties as the Gala Chair this year. In an interview with TV Pa-trol, Charo expressed how over-whelmed she is to have been giv-en by the iEmmys board the rare opportunity to host the biggest gathering of creative, production people, and talents from different parts of the world. “I didn’t expect that I would be given this chance to be really of service to our Kapamilya, to our kababayans---to be able to repre-sent our country and my company with pride and honor,” Charo said. She also shared how much confi-dence she has in Filipino talent, es-pecially in the field of broadcasting. “A lot of Filipinos have great sto-ries to tell about our Filipino spirit of strength and resilience. And I re-ally hope more of our shows would be recognized by the international community. I’m sure five to ten years from now Filipino content will be as big as content from other parts of the world,” she explained. Joining Charo in New York is Pi-olo Pascual, who was invited by the

iEmmy’s as presenter. Piolo joins the ranks of international stars such as Michael Douglas, Tovah Feld-shuh of The Walking Dead, Patina Miller of The Hunger Games, and Lea DeLaria of Orange is the New Black who were also named as pre-senters in this year’s gala. “It’s really overwhelming. This is something new for me and I’m just excited to be there and repre-sent the country with Tita Charo. I’m really excited because we’re carrying the flag of the Philip-pines,” said Piolo. The 43rd International Emmy Awards, to be hosted by Egyptian satirist Bassem Youssef, will be held at the New York Hilton Hotel.

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Juan tamad season 2 After saving her lady love Marie (Max Collins), new adventures await Juan (Sef Cadayona) in the second season of the hit comedy show Juan Tamad, Sunday after-noons on GMA-7. Along with his blooming love life, Juan is set to face new adven-tures as he decides to go back to school. And serving as a special motivation for Juan is having Ma-rie as one of his teachers. Juan Tamad’s second season premiered 4:45 p.m. yesterday.

Piolo Pascual will join other Hollywood stars at the International Emmys Charo Santos-Concio chairs the gala of International Emmys in New York

Juan Tamad is now on its second season

Sef Cadayona and Max Collins play Juan and Marie in Juan Tamad

Morissette and Hannan Nolasco

Luke Bracey stars in the re-imagining of Point Break

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SHOWBITZ


‘MaGMahalan Tayo nGayonGPasko’ in ToP sPoTon iTunes Ph

krisToffer MarTin’s birThday surPriseOn Nov. 20, Kristoffer Martincelebrated his birthday, but the biggest surprise he got was some-thing that his parents gave him. He couldn’t thank them any less.

Zoren leGasPi’s MessaGe To wifeIt has been three years since Zoren Legaspi and Carmina Vil-larroel got married. The Marimar star, of course, didn’t forget. So he greeted her via Instagram with this message, “In papers it’s our 3rd year An-niversary but in truth, we have been together for 17 years and going stronger every day. Meron Forever!”

MeGan younG wanTsMikael daeZ in a love TeaMMikael Daez admitted he enjoyed working with Megan Young in Dangwa. The feeling is mutual, according to Megan. In the years that they have been friends, that was the only time they were giv-en the chance to be together in one show. The two are hoping that wasn’t the first and neither the last.

Gardo versoZa in The half sisTersGardo Versoza is now in The Half Sisters as Dr. Santi, the psy-chiatrist of Rina (Jean Garcia)who will eventually fall for her. ‘But Dr. Santi has a secret that could spell trouble in the family.

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Days after it was released on the online digital media store iTunes, GMA’s Christ-mas station ID theme song titled “MaG-MAhalan Tayo Ngayong Pasko” became no.1 among iTunes PH top singles.

Sung by the Pambansang Bae Alden Richards, it is also reached no. 27 on iTunes Singapore and no. 58 on iTunes Macau.

The single, released by GMA Records, is available for download and streaming worldwide. Proceeds go to GMA Kapuso Foundation’s Typhoon Lando relief efforts.

The song generated buzz on social me-dia for its upbeat and catchy tune, as well as its positive and uplifting message.

Twitter user Amy Zulueta shared, “Great job! Short but meaningful! Listen to the lyrics and understand its message.”

With each download turning into a donation, Kapuso netizens all over the world also expressed gratitude to GMA for the chance to help marginalized Fil-ipinos. “Thank you for giving us the op-portunity to help others thru this!” says Instagram user janeybuena.

A certified hit whether on screen or on radio airwaves with his solo album under GMA Records titled Wish I May recently reaching Platinum status, netizens also commended Alden for his rendition of the Christmas station ID theme song. Facebook user Juliet Regulto posted, “Ang ganda ng pagkakanta. May puso ta-laga, nakakaiyak. God bless Alden. More blessings to come. Stay humble.”

The 2015 GMA Christmas station ID continues to touch hearts worldwide as it reminds viewers of the true meaning of the Christmas season – to love one another.

To download a copy of the single, “MaGMAhalan Tayo Ngayong Pasko,” visit www.iTunes.com.

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and Then There was eiGhT After Kevin Sagra, Analyn Barro bade Star-Struck goodbye last Friday. It was an emotion-al end of her journey in the artista search.

Those saved in last Friday’s elimination were Arra San Agustin, Elyson de Dios, Jay Arcilla, Liezel Lopez, Ayra Mariano, Klea

Pineda, Migo Adecer, and Avery Paraiso. This week they are into method acting. Their

immersion will be in a marketplace and a land-fill. Now, we will see who will pull it through un-der the tutorship of actress Jean Garcia.

I just hope the public votes for the candidate who they think will make it in the business and go the way of those we hardly see now on screen.

Alden Richards

01 Jay Arcilla 02 Elyson de Dios03 Ayra Mariano 04 Arra San Agustin05 Liezel Lopez 06 Avery Paraiso07 Migo Adecer 08 Klea Pineda

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➜ Continued on C7

i s a h r e d @ g m a i l . c o m