Palace returns supervision of SEC to DOF
Executive Secretary Paquito N. Ochoa Jr. said on Tuesday that the Palace had restored the administrative supervision of the Department of Finance (DoF) over the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in an effort to strengthen the country’s financial system amid the global economic crisis.
At present, the SEC is supervised by the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI), but Executive Order No. 37, which President Benigno Aquino III signed on April 19, placed the regulatory commission under the wings of the DoF to ensure better coordination and effective implementation of strong and stable financial policies, Ochoa said.
“Given the global economic crisis, the administration intends to attain an effective implementation of policies for a strong and stable financial system that will lead to a financial sector that will be able to further economic growth and development of the country,” the Executive Secretary said.
EO 37 revoked Executive Order No. 800 issued in 2009, which removed the DoF as overseer of the SEC and placed it under the DTI to facilitate the coordination of policies and programs in the field of trade, industry and investment.
SEC was originally supervised by the Office of the President (OP) in accordance with Presidential Decree No. 902-A, or the SEC Reorganization Act, which granted additional powers to and placed the regulatory body under the administrative supervision of Malacañang in 1976.
In the year 2000, however, Executive Order No. 192 transferred the administrative supervision of the SEC from the OP to the DoF.
Executive Secretary Paquito N. Ochoa Jr. said on Tuesday that the Palace had restored the administrative supervision of the Department of Finance (DoF) over the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in an effort to strengthen the country’s financial system amid the global economic crisis.
At present, the SEC is supervised by the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI), but Executive Order No. 37, which President Benigno Aquino III signed on April 19, placed the regulatory commission under the wings of the DoF to ensure better coordination and effective implementation of strong and stable financial policies, Ochoa said.
“Given the global economic crisis, the administration intends to attain an effective implementation of policies for a strong and stable financial system that will lead to a financial sector that will be able to further economic growth and development of the country,” the Executive Secretary said.
EO 37 revoked Executive Order No. 800 issued in 2009, which removed the DoF as overseer of the SEC and placed it under the DTI to facilitate the coordination of policies and programs in the field of trade, industry and investment.
SEC was originally supervised by the Office of the President (OP) in accordance with Presidential Decree No. 902-A, or the SEC Reorganization Act, which granted additional powers to and placed the regulatory body under the administrative supervision of Malacañang in 1976.
In the year 2000, however, Executive Order No. 192 transferred the administrative supervision of the SEC from the OP to the DoF.
“In order to achieve our goal, efficient coordination in the financial sector must be ensured, thus, it is necessary and right to reinstate the administrative supervision of SEC to the DoF,” Ochoa explained.
Ochoa said EO 37 shall take effect immediately upon publication in a newspaper of general circulation. (PCOO)
Palace seeks government-wide training in disaster preparedness
Executive Secretary Paquito N. Ochoa Jr. is pushing for a government-wide demonstration-training in disaster preparedness to ensure officials and employees respond appropriately to natural disasters and emergency situations.
Ochoa underscored the importance of getting people involved in preparing for disasters during a seminar conducted in the Office of the President last week, as he noted that the 9.0 temblor that jolted Japan in March should serve as a wake-up call to earthquake-prone countries like the Philippines.
“This means that we should be even more prepared. I know that in terms of resources and technology we’re still far behind Japan, but we should take steps and prepare. We cannot ignore these anymore,” Ochoa told the Palace staff during the Demonstration-Training on Natural Disaster Preparedness and Response System held at the Mabini Hall.
“The Office of the President aims to set an example for the rest of the bureaucracy that here we are preparing. We’re not taking things for granted,” Ochoa added.
At the same time, Ochoa called for strict and full compliance with building safety standards and regulations by all government offices to preserve lives and prevent any untoward incident.
This is in line with the separate memoranda issued on March 16 by the Executive Secretary following the powerful earthquake and tsunami in Japan to the Departments of Public Works and Highways, Transportation and Communications, the Interior and Local Government directing these agencies to conduct inspections in public buildings and government infrastructure projects, as well as assess the level of preparedness in the local government units in terms of disaster management.
“The window for us within which to act and react to any calamity or any disaster, man-made or natural, is too short,” Ochoa pointed out. “So therefore, we should bear in mind to be always ready. Preparedness for any disaster or situation must become our second nature.”
During the training, Palace officials and personnel were given lectures by experts from the Philippine Coast Guard, Balangay Voyage and Mt. Everest Expedition Teams, Rajah Sulaiman Fire Rescue Team, City Watch Bright Center, Tao Emergency Operation Center, UNTV Rescue, and Search and Rescue Unit Foundation.
He also called on the private sector to partner with the disaster-preparedness program of the government through the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council (NDRRMC). (PCOO)
Aquino receives American Christian evangelist at Palace
President Benigno S. Aquino III received religious mementos from an American Christian evangelist who also prayed and asked for divine intervention and guidance for the President.
During a courtesy call at the Yellow Room of the Premier Guest House of the Palace on Tuesday, Reverent William Graham IV presented to President Aquino spiritual souvenirs including a digital video disc, an ESV book, and the 56th million copy of the Bible from the Gideons International.
“Well this is my first time that I get to meet the President, he’s a very humble man… we had a good time just talking and got to pray with him and I’ve been very impressed with the man now that he has secured a lot of burns on his shoulders he has to make important decisions each and every day that affects so many people and I just wanted to have a time to pray with him and tell him how much I appreciate it,” Rev. Graham said who is the assistant director of the Billy Graham Training Center.
Accompanying the evangelical leader were Derek Forbes, president celebration director, Rev. Chad Hammond, associate director for Asian affairs and members of the National Advisory Council for the Bicol Celebration of Hope, that include Bishop Jonel Milan, National chairman of the Philippine Ministerial Fellowship Network; Bishop Efraim Tendero, National director of the Philippine Council of Evangelical Churches; and Jones Tioco, executive director of the Sowers of the World Ministries, Inc.
Also in attendance was Presidential Communications Development and Strategic Planning Office Secretary Ramon Carandang.
Rev. Graham arrived in the country to spearhead a four-day celebration of hope in Naga City, Camarines Sur starting on Thursday where he will talk about the Bible and how they can have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.
The celebration, Rev. Graham said, will also feature wonderful music and discussion on ways on how to have that spiritual intimacy with God that will lead to an experience of peace, happiness and joy in life.
“Not to be religious but talking about how they can have a personal knowledge of God and how they can know Him and walk with Him…” Graham said. (PCOO)
Gov’t hires technical personnel/consultants in a move to take PH aviation industry out of a ratings downgrade
The government has hired qualified technical personnel and consultants in a move to lift the ban on local airlines from expanding operations in the United States and Europe.
In a press conference in Malacanang on Tuesday, Presidential Spokesman Edwin Lacierda said the Department of Transportation and Communication (DOTC) and the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines (CAAP) are on top of the situation with respect to taking the country’s aviation industry out of a ratings downgrade by the Federal Aviation Authority (FAA) a few years ago.
The FAA downgraded the Philippines to Category 2 from Category 1 in 2008 after a safety audit conducted in November 2007 found that some policies of the local aviation sector to be below international standards. The downgrade prohibits local airlines from expanding flights to the US.
One of the primary issues was the lack of qualified technical personnel who will carry out procedures that ensure the safety of the Philippine air transport sector.
“The DOTC and the CAAP are on top of the situation with respect to taking us out of Category 2 and they have implemented some measures. In fact, the President just recently signed an EO authorizing the CAAP administrator to hire more people,” Lacierda said.
The government has hired more pilots because according to Lacierda the major concern is the lack of qualified personnel who will monitor the country’s airports.
The Palace spokesman also said the CAAP has assured the President that there will be an upgrade to Category 1 by the end of the year or maybe much earlier.
“They [CAAP] are committed that it will be done one year or less,” he stressed.
Lacierda also brushed off reports about the possible sale of the Ninoy Aquino International Airport Terminal 3 noting that what the President wants is to make sure that the terminal is functioning properly. (PCOO)
Aquino gov’t starts distributing emergency shelter assistance to landslide victims in Compostela Valley
The Aquino government started distributing emergency shelter assistance (ESA) to the families affected by a landslide in a remote gold mining area in southern Philippines' Compostela Valley.
In a news briefing at Malacanang, Presidential Spokesperson Edwin Lacierda announced on Tuesday that the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) started distributing ESA in the amount of P5,000 each to victims of the landslide that buried shanties last week.
Lacierda said the government started undertaking measures to extend assistance to victims of the landslide by providing them ESA as well as food packs.
“The DSWD will continue to distribute food packs in the coming days,” Lacierda said.
The government, Lacierda stressed, will also implement a self-employment assistance program through the DSWD for the qualified local residents who were affected by the tragedy.
“For a more long-term assistance, the DSWD will assess if those who have been affected by the landslide are eligible for the self-employment assistance program of the DSWD,” he said.
Relocation efforts in the affected areas were intensified with the local government working at the forefront. “With respect to the relocation efforts in these areas, the local government will be taking care of that,” he said.
The landslide caused by heavy rains buried shanties in a mining area at Compostela Valley before dawn on Good Friday, killing several people and leaving scores of residents missing. (PCOO)
Aquino cites DBM employees for selfless public service and dedication
President Benigno S. Aquino III lauded the awardees of the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) for their 25 years of selfless service and sacrifice.
“Your hard work and dedication were instrumental in the gains we have so far achieved. May you continue the good work you have been doing, more so now that the country is well on its way in realizing the promise of a better life for Filipinos,” the Chief Executive said before the men and women of the DBM during its 75th anniversary of the DBM on Monday at the at the Reception Hall of the Philippine International Convention Center (PICC) in Pasay City.
During the program, the President awarded the commemorative rings to 29 DBM employees who have rendered 25 years of service for their “hard work and dedication to duty.”
The President noted that 75 years ago, when the DBM was first established, “our founding fathers were all dreaming of building a Philippines that would be competitive and well-respected in the global milieu.”
The President said the improvements that the country are experiencing are really just a “result of our revival of a long forgotten concept that public funds are not for public officials. They belong to the Filipino people, and must therefore be spent for the Filipino people.”
The President said that “if all government agencies can consistently put this into practice in the next five years and 3 months, then it will become part of the norm rather than the exception, such that the next president, the next batch of elected public servants, and our people will merely continue the good we have already begun.”
The President stressed that the biggest challenge faced by his administration was to start the budgetary process afresh, to do away with outmoded or irrelevant budgetary assumptions. He was referring to the implementation of a zero-based budget which, he said, was “no easy task.”
According to the President, the concept of “zero-based budgeting is simple: using performance-based guidelines, you take the people’s money out of projects that don’t work and put it into projects that do.” He added that this is reflected in the 2011 budget.
He expressed high hopes that the efforts of the DBM to trim the fat from the bureaucracy will be reinforced by the appointments of Grace Tan and Heidi Mendoza at the Commission on Audit (COA).
The President said that under the 2011 national budget, over P21 billion was allocated for the conditional cash transfer program to improve the health, nutrition, and education of extremely poor families.
As of April 22, the Department of Health had already deployed almost 9,950 nurses to provide essential health services to poor communities in the country.
The project, billed RN HEALS or Registered Nurses for Health Enhancement and Local Service, seeks to address the shortage of skilled and experienced nurses in more than 1,200 rural and unserved or underserved communities by training and deploying 10,000 unemployed nurses.
The President likewise said that members of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) and the Philippine National Police (PNP) are also reaping the benefits as well after the government was able to allocate resources for the construction of 20,000 housing units for police and military this year and increased their salaries.
The budget for the Witness Protection Program was also increased from P84 million in 2010 to P151 million in 2011, he said.
The President noted that the DBM also signed a memorandum of agreement with four judges associations to provide P108 million to augment the gap in the pay of judges, which will allow their salary levels to catch up with salary increases under the Salary Standardization Law III,“
“In short, the government is finally giving the Filipino people what they deserve—a government that truly serves them and provides them with the services they urgently need,” the President said. (PCOO)
Appointments of new 17 career foreign service ambassadors is for national interest – Palace
President Benigno S. Aquino III’s appointment of 17 new ambassadors who are all career diplomats is intended to serve the national interest well, a Palace spokesman said.
“The promise of President Aquino and the commitment of Secretary Albert del Rosario [Foreign Affairs] is really to use the career foreign service officials,” Presidential Spokesman Edwin Lacierda said in a press conference at the Palace on Tuesday.
“So, it is a clear indication the President intends to use the professional career foreign service officials in the foreign service,” he stressed.
Lacierda said that the career officials are the most competent in their field noting that the organization composed of career service officials welcomed the President’s recent appointments.
And while it’s the prerogative of the President to appoint those officials, Lacierda said, the Chief Executive wants the ratio provided by law observed in designating career and political appointees in the foreign services.
Republic Act 7157 or the "Philippine Foreign Service Act of 1991" provides for the President’s appointments of ambassadors and career foreign service officers.
Among President Aquino’s political appointees include former Manila Electric Co. president Manolo Lopez who was named ambassador to Japan, and former Central Bank Gov. Jose L. Cuisia Jr. as ambassador to the United States.
His latest appointees included Jose Eduardo Malaya III, spokesperson of the Department of Foreign Affairs who was designated ambassador to Malaysia.
Other appointees include Belen Anota (Australia), Victoria Bataclan (Belgium), Leslie Gatan (Canada), Wilfredo Maximo (Cuba), Cristina Ortega (France), Ma. Cleofe Natividad (Germany), Menardo Montealegre (Greece), Eleanor Jaucian (Hungary), Generoso Calonge (Israel), George Reyes (Mexico), Lourdes Morales (Netherlands), Virginia Benavidez (New Zealand), Bayani Mercado (Norway), Eduardo Manuel (Poland), Leslie Baja (Switzerland) and Enrique Manalo (United Kingdom). (PCOO)
Government’s public-private partnership initiative to bid out projects
As part of the Aquino government’s public-private partnership (PPP) initiative, the Palace announced that it will bid out projects geared toward the development of the entire country before he delivers his State of the Nation Address (SONA) in July 2011.
In a regular news briefing at Malacanang on Tuesday, Presidential Spokesman Edwin Lacierda said President Aquino issued an order not to limit the development to Luzon but the entire country.
“Ang idea nga ng Presidente is not to limit ourselves to Luzon, as he wants the entire country developed,” Lacierda told reporters.
In PPP projects, the state and the private sector collaborate to build a road, hospital, or airport, with the private company usually given the rights to run it for a certain period.
Meanwhile, the economic managers are now firming up its recommendations to the President to improve the situation of the economy as well as to alleviate poverty.
“It will take us some time to rebuild the house again,” Lacierda said, adding that the Aquino government wants to make sure to rebuild the foundations, especially the governmental institutions that were damaged during the previous administration.
“And then we move forward to make sure the people’s economic situation will be improved. That’s why our slogan is always poverty reduction and the anti-graft crusade... Kung walang kurapt walang mahirap, that’s our position talaga and from there we can extrapolate the measures that we are doing that are all in consonant with those two main thrusts,” he said.
While the government is working on the long-term action plans, Lacierda said, the administration is also implementing programs to immediately unburden the public. (PCOO)
Aquino welcomes international philanthropic groups to Malacañang
President Benigno S. Aquino III welcomed the chairman and executive director of two international philanthropic groups who called on the Chief Executive in Malacañang.
Yohei Sasakawa, chairman of The Nippon Foundation and Carson Harle, Executive Director of the Cambodia Trust visited Malacañang on Tuesday to inform the President about their group’s partnership in addressing physical disabilities by developing affordable but well-made prosthetics.
In an interview, Sasakawa, through the help of his interpreter said they also called on the President to personally extend his and his nation’s profound gratitude “for the sympathies and warm thoughts” the President and the Filipino nation expressed when Japan was struck by a magnitude 9.0 earthquake last March 11.
Sasakawa also informed the President that a school to develop and train specialists in the development of prosthetics has been put up in Manila recently.
Harle said the school, which was put up in cooperation with the University of the East-Ramon Magsaysay (UERM) Memorial Medical Center campus, is now accepting students willing to study their curriculum.
He added that aside from producing “patient management experts,” the school will also mold excellent “bench technicians” who will be trained to develop and construct prosthetics.
“It’s a 10-year plan to develop the school, the students and faculty…in order to leave behind a sustainable Filipino institute with no need for foreign teachers,” Harle said.
Harle noted that the President was very “positive” about their group’s advocacy and pledged support by tasking the Commission on Higher Education to expeditiously work towards granting their school’s accreditation.
“He’s (President Aquino) is very positive about it. He’s been well-briefed and understands the need to raise the level (of prosthetics manufacturing in the Philippines) to a more sustainable service deliverer (through) the strengthened integration of the service into the healthcare system,” Harle said.
The Nippon Foundation, which was established in 1962, is a non-profit philanthropic organization that aims to bolster the domestic development of Japan through the development of the maritime and shipping fields as well as in the areas of education, social welfare and public health, both within Japan and in more than one hundred countries to date.
Cambodia Trust, meanwhile, is a United Kingdom-based charity that works with disadvantaged disabled people to enable them to participate as equals in education, employment and community life.
The Trust aims to reduce poverty and increase self-sufficiency, through rehabilitation, community work, training and advocacy. (PCOO)
‘Building Bridges Leadership Journey’ participants call on President Aquino in Malacañang
President Benigno S. Aquino III welcomed the officials and participants to the Building Bridges Leadership Journey program who called on him in Malacañang Tuesday.
The group was led by Peggy Dulany, founder and chair of The Synergos Institute and Rina Lopez-Bautista, president and founder of the Knowledge Channel Foundation, Incorporated, the main proponents of the BBLJ.
Joining the President in welcoming the guests were Social Welfare and Development Secretary Corazon Soliman and Trade Undersecretary Zenaida Maglaya.
Maglaya said in an interview that aside from paying a courtesy call on the President, the group asked for government support for the leadership program.
The BBLJ brings together youth leaders aged 21-35 from the country’s prominent political and business families in order to deepen their knowledge of society’s needs and inspire them to respond accordingly.
The effort is organized in cooperation with Synergos Senior Fellows in the Philippines, a subsidiary of The Synergos Institute which has brought together a network of philanthropic families called the Global Philanthropists Circle which aimed at addressing global poverty and social injustice by bringing together government, business, civil society and poor and marginalized communities to create sustainable systems change. (PCOO)
