MBC “Outraged” at Court of Appeals for Doing Its Job
The Makati Business Club issued a statement on Wednesday expressing their “outrage” over the recent decision of the Court of Appeals overruling the BSP’s closure of Banco Filipino. And why is the MBC outraged ?
“The decision appears to reward defiance of the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas, encourage undisciplined business practice, and, worst, permit abuse of depositors’ trust and misuse of the people’s money,” the MBC said.
And of course, since we all know the MBC is the go-to source for lessons in Constitutional law, they helpfully added
“…the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas was meant by the Constiitution to be independent and the sole authority in such matters, free from court interference, except only in the case of grave abuse of discretion amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction.”
There are two parts to this story. One part is relevant, and one is not. Read the rest of this entry
Presidential Spokesman Ed Lacierda Reassures Worried Investors about the New Mining Policy
Treading water amidst a firestorm of criticism and near-panic among investors over a proposed mining policy EO that the Joint Foreign Chambers in a letter to President B.S. Aquino blasted as “profoundly disturbing”, Presidential Spokesman Ed Lacierda sought to allay concerns by clarifying the original draft was not the one the Palace is now considering, and that the new draft
“[Is] something that would be workable. I have not seen the final draft so that’s something that I can very well assure you—that the concerns will be addressed.”
Say what? Did he just say he can assure everyone the new policy would be “workable” because he hasn’t seen the final draft?
That’s great news. I’m sure that investors whose stocks in the mining & oil sector, which judging from the last two days’ performance at the PSE seem to be on an elevator straight to hell, will be very reassured by that.
Pathetic Desperation: N/A Pleads for Foreign Rescue of His Lost Cause
In what may be a tacit admission of the imminent failure of his drive to oust Chief Justice Renato Corona from office, the President made a thinly-disguised plea for international pressure to compel the release of Corona’s bank records on Friday, saying that “…there might be sanctions from the world financial community that we are not following the treaty obligations,” related to the Philippines’ cooperation in international money laundering agreements. N/A was apparently taking his cue from an “in-depth” report by ABS-CBN a day earlier which cited several leaked US Embassy cables to make the case that the Philippines’ banking secrecy laws were “under fire” from US criticism. While the quotes taken from the four cables are accurate, the ABS-CBN report places them far outside their original context, and conveniently overlooks a number of other points that tend to assess the Philippines’ efforts favorably Read the rest of this entry
The National Consciousness is on Another Call, Please Hold
Italy, a nation which has elected porn actresses to Parliament, was so offended by their national leader's public skeeviness they ran him out of office. Just saying.
Another natural disaster, and another no-show by President N/A: In the aftermath of Monday’s heavy earthquake in the Visayas, Mouth of Sauron Abigail Valte assured the public that the Chief Executive’s invisibility was because “At the moment, the President is concentrating on making sure that the concerned agencies are giving the right responses that is needed, that is required,” which apparently involved spending three hours on the phone with new “girlfriend” Grace Lee.
N/A, who has already made his distaste for public suffering clear by his reluctance to visit areas struck by Typhoon Pedring in Luzon and Typhoon Sendong in Mindanao, is scheduled to make a pro forma appearance in Dumaguete today, again playing the Jerome to Jejomar Binay’s Morris Day. Binay flew to Negros Oriental on Tuesday morning, actually getting out of the car to distribute some disaster swag and give the local victims a pep talk, relatively small gestures of government concern that N/A has been informed over and over and over again are important and meaningful to people whose houses have just been washed away in a flood or gotten flattened by an earthquake. Read the rest of this entry
DOT Does Not Stand for “Department of Tact”
While the attention of the nation has been obsessively focused on the farcical and ultimately pointless impeachment drama and other sweaty trivialities, it seems that at least one government department is able to maintain the lunatic norm we’ve come to expect from them. In news that apparently was only reported by TV-5 among the conventional media, the Department of Tourism blamed two European tourists for their own kidnapping last week in Mindanao. Dutch citizen Elwold Horn and his Swiss companion Lorenzo Vinciguerra were captured as they returned from a bird-watching excursion in Tawi-Tawi last Wednesday. Read the rest of this entry
Fish Crisis?
As if the Philippines actually needed to create another problem for itself, news reports are circulating this week that the country is now importing galunggong, dilis, and sardines to make up for a rapid decline in domestic production.
The problem, according to the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources, is that 10 of the 13 fishing grounds in the country are “very heavily exploited,” with about 70 fishermen per square kilometer. The fact that 80 percent of the animal protein eaten by Filipinos comes from fish – which amounts to about 2.7 million metric tons per year – probably also has something to do with it.
An island nation that has to import fish. Wow. That kind of planning can’t be learned – it’s a gift. You should be proud of yourselves.
The Economy & The Corona Impeachment: A Trip Down the Rabbit Hole
A couple of months ago my colleague benign0 raised the interesting speculation that the entire point of the Aquino presidency, from the point of view of those who installed him in office, was to ensure that “the family crown jewel,” the Hacienda Luisita estate in Tarlac, remained in the hands of the Cojuangco clan until at least 2014 and preferably forever. That hypothesis seemed plausible at the time, and even more so after the hasty filing of the impeachment case against Chief Justice Renato Corona immediately following the Supreme Court’s unanimous ruling to finally distribute the plantation to its serfs. Read the rest of this entry
Manila Standard Today — No fun — 2012/january/10
Manila Standard Today — No fun — 2012/january/10.
Another excellent commentary from my buddy Jojo Robles.
