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Using the telephone to sell

Getting The Edge In Professional Selling
Terence A. Hockenhull

THE TELEPHONE can be effectively used to support a sale; but its effectiveness in conducting a “full sale” is debatable. If the product is a well-known brand, sold at a very low price, or the customer is simply ordering or reordering a consumable, it can save an enormous amount of time and energy, negating the need for a face-to-face sales meeting. In all other cases, the salesperson will have to discuss the product (or service) in detail and this will almost certainly entail a sales presentation or meeting.

Where the phone really comes into its own is in setting appointments and perhaps providing the briefest of introductions to self, company, and products. However, clients have the opportunity of rejecting a telephone call. With today’s cellular phones and networks, unsolicited calls will show up as “caller unknown”; when the caller is known, the customer can always decline the call. But, providing you have the right number, it has the advantage of contacting the customer directly without passing through a secretary or underling.

As I say, the phone is an ineffective tool when it comes to conducting the sale. But it does allow useful information to be gathered prior to a sales meeting. It allows for better preparation, the right sales collaterals to be brought to the meeting, and, perhaps most importantly, allows the sales executive to find out what his customer is interested in discussing.

To sell effectively, a salesperson relies on both verbal and nonverbal skills. When the telephone is used, expressions, gestures, diagrams, samples, and demonstrations cannot be used. The salesperson is also denied many of his client’s nonverbal cues which are normally used to determine selling strategy. In a face-to-face meeting, expressions and gestures will tell the salesman a great deal about the customer’s intentions, likes, and dislikes and appropriate behavior can be determined accordingly. On the telephone, the salesman has little more than responses to question and his customer’s tone of voice.

To put this in perspective, the results of research conducted in the US showed that salespeople who were proficient when meeting with customers often performed poorly when selling over the phone. Initially, the researchers believed that the verbal skills required in face-to-face selling were different from those used over the telephone. Subsequently, they established that the verbal skills (asking questions and determining needs) were exactly the same. They found that whereas a proficient salesperson would ask plenty of questions in a face-to-face meeting, he would tend to make statements and push his products over the phone.

Whether the sale is conducted at a sales meeting or over the phone, the salesperson should strive to uncover problems and needs. It is worth considering that an unsolicited call from a faceless salesperson will spark little, if any, interest or enthusiasm. However, customers are less likely to become bored and disinterested if they are actively involved in the conversation. A conversation, by definition, means that both parties converse. Hardly the case if the salesperson is enthusiastically gushing about his product!

One of the most common mistakes made on the phone is sounding pushy. Allowing his enthusiasm to get the better him, the salesperson ends up raving about his product without considering the application or use to which his client will put it. Rarely will the sale result in anything other than the client making polite platitudes and making every effort to curtail the call as soon as possible.

Just to put this in perspective, I am constantly being badgered by hotels and banks offering “membership clubs,” credit cards, and loans. I feel no obligation to be polite and, frankly, see no use for the proffered services or products. So I either curtail the call with “not interested” or just hang up the phone.

The phone is an important business tool and, provided it is used well, can save both you and your customers a lot of time. However, there is no substitute for getting out and meeting your clients. Use the telephone to set appointments, maintain contact, clear up minor issues, arrange the logistics of delivery and payment, and research your client. But remember, if you are going to use it to sell, don’t drop the important behaviors of asking questions and listening carefully to what the client says they want.

Terence A. Hockenhull is a long term resident of the Philippines. He is an accomplished sales consultant and currently holds an executive sales position with an Italian geotechnical company.

hockenhull@gmail.com.

Q2 growth brings 2017 goal within reach

By Jochebed B. Gonzales
Researcher
and Melissa Luz T. Lopez
Senior Reporter

THE PHILIPPINE economy grew by 6.5% last quarter on the back of increased household and government spending, putting the lower end of the government’s full-year target within reach, the Philippine Statistics Authority reported yesterday.

The latest growth reading for gross domestic product (GDP) — the value of all finished goods and services produced in the country — marked the eighth consecutive quarter that the pace exceeded 6.0%.

The 6.5% turnout was up a notch from the first quarter’s 6.4%, but was slower than the year-ago 7.1% that benefited from an additional lift from expenditures related to the May 2016 general elections.

Second-quarter growth matched the 6.5% median estimate of economists in BusinessWorld’s poll last week, while the first half’s 6.45% average compared to the government’s 6.5-7.5% full-year target range for 2017 and eased from 7.0% logged in 2016’s comparative six months.

“With our country growing by 6.5% in the second quarter of 2017, I am pleased to inform you that we remain one of the best-performing economies in Asia,” Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Ernesto M. Pernia said in a briefing yesterday.

Mr. Pernia, who is director-general of the National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA), said the Philippines is “either the second or third fastest-growing major Asian economy” next to China (6.9%), overtaking Vietnam (6.2%) and Indonesia (5.0%).

On the demand side, household consumption, which accounted for two-thirds of total expenditures in the economy, remained a key driver of growth, picking up to 5.9% from 5.8% in the preceding quarter, though slower than the year-ago 7.5%.

Q2 growth brings 2017 goal within reach

Government spending accelerated to 7.1% from a near-flat 0.1% in the first quarter. This was, however, slower than the 13.5% notched a year earlier.

Private investment in the form of capital formation eased to 8.7% last quarter from January-March’s 10.6% and from the past year’s 30.3%. The second-quarter pace was the slowest since the 5.1% recorded in 2014’s fourth quarter.

Total exports — both goods and services — grew 19.7%, slower than the first quarter’s 20.3% albeit faster than the year-ago 10.6%. Total imports, meanwhile, grew by 18.7%, slightly faster than the previous quarter’s 18.6% but lower than the past year’s 25.4%.

On the supply side, the industry sector grew the fastest among the three major sectors last quarter, gaining 7.3% that was nevertheless a deceleration from 7.6% in the past year. In this category, mining and quarrying lead the way with 13.7%, a reversal from the 18% and 4.0% declines posted in the first quarter and second quarter of 2016, respectively. Manufacturing followed suit as it picked up to 7.9%, faster than the readings in the first quarter (7.6%) and the same period last year (6.2%). Construction slowed down to 6.3% from last year’s 13.5%. Electricity, Gas and Water Supply’s 2.4% was also slower than the 10.3% the past year.

The services sector, which make up nearly 60% of the economy’s total output, grew by 6.1%, slower than the 8.2% in the 2016’s second quarter. Subsectors that grew above or matched the sector’s average were real estate, renting & business activities (7.9% from last year’s 8.8%); public administration & defense; compulsory social security (7.6% from 6.4%); trade and repair of motor vehicles, motorcycles, personal and household Goods (6.3% from 8.9%) as well as financial intermediation (6.1% from 6.9%).

Agriculture, hunting, forestry and fishing continued to help lift overall economic growth, expanding by 6.3% as the sector continued to recover from damage from a prolonged El Niño-induced dry spell that lasted until 2016’s second quarter, picking up from the first quarter’s 4.9% and the year-ago 2.0% contraction.

Economists look to sustained growth in household spending, which has been the backbone of the Philippine economy for years.

“Strong private consumption has been boosted by continued expansion in overseas worker remittances, which rose by 6.8% year-on-year in June, as well as rapid growth in household credit,” said Rajiv Biswas, Asia Pacific chief economist at IHS Markit.

For Security Bank economist Angelo B. Taningco, growth was partly driven by higher outlays for infrastructure. “The surge in government spending was propelled by an upswing in government’s disbursements for infrastructure and capital outlays,” he said.

Some economists also took note of the slowdown in investments last quarter after the last two years’ double-digit pace.

Gundy Cahyadi, economist at DBS Group Research, said that while private consumption had beaten forecasts, “investment growth actually did slightly worse than our expectations.”

“Inventory drawdown has continued, and this indicates that normalization in investment numbers is likely to remain a dominant theme ahead,” he said, citing “upward risks” ahead.

Mr. Cahyadi cited the “strong showing” of agriculture and manufacturing, noting that “[t]he manufacturing sector has continued to receive a boost from export demand, and this has proven to be a constant positive in recent years.”

For Ruben Carlo O. Asuncion, chief economist at Union Bank of the Philippines, investment growth could have been better if the government had been more aggressive in its outlays. “Government spending has been the missing link in… GDP growth… slower capital formation growth might have come from the softer government expenditure in [the first quarter],” Mr. Asuncion said.

Finance Secretary Carlos G. Dominguez III described in a separate statement yesterday the GDP turnout as “solid proof” of the current administration’s pursuit of “high and inclusive growth.” “With the upturn in state spending beginning in the year’s second quarter, President [Rodrigo R.]Duterte’s unparalleled investment strategy anchored on the ‘Build, Build, Build’ program has started to pick up steam,” Mr. Dominguez said.

The government’s “Build, Build, Build” program will see about P8.44 trillion spent on infrastructure projects until 2022, when this segment’s contribution to GDP should have risen to 7.45% (P1.899 trillion) from this year’s planned 5.32% of GDP (P847.22 billion).

THE ROAD AHEAD
Increased government spending, Mr. Asuncion said, “only spells well for economic expansion in the next coming quarters”, adding that “more robust investment growth” is expected this quarter. “If government spending continues to grow and with government’s absorptive capacity improving, our GDP growth [forecast] for 2017 of 6.5% should be revised higher,” he said.

In remarks sent to reporters via mobile phone message, Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) Governor Nestor A. Espenilla, Jr. said that growth momentum can be sustained. “The 2Q GDP growth of 6.5% confirms our view that the Philippine economic expansion remains robust… The firm economic momentum during the first half of the year alongside favorable business and consumer sentiment should augur well for the expansion of the economy over the near to medium term,” Mr. Espenilla said.

The Monetary Board kept policy rates unchanged at its rate-setting meeting last week, citing manageable inflation and firm economic activity that did not need fresh stimulus.

Mr. Espenilla said the central bank will remain watchful of economic and financial developments and “stands ready to adopt policies” that will ensure price and financial stability in the Philippines.

Economists said the rollout of public infrastructure projects would determine whether the full-year growth target can be achieved.

“More progress on infrastructure spending should also continue to crowd in private investment, while we expect household consumption to remain resilient,” Nomura analysts said in a market commentary released yesterday, as they held on to a 6.7% growth forecast.

IHS Markit’s Mr. Biswas said the growth story will be supported by “significant increases” in infrastructure spending, which will likewise rake in more foreign direct investments that would unlock more jobs and bring fresh capital for business expansions. “The ability of the Duterte administration to deliver such large increases in infrastructure spending has been helped by the tremendous progress made by successive Philippines governments since 2004 in the task of implementing fiscal consolidation, helped by the rapid pace of GDP growth and prudent fiscal management. Since 2004, the Philippines general government debt-to-GDP ratio has more than halved to a new record low of 34.6% in 2016,” he said.

On the other hand, ANZ Research said it was “increasingly cautious” on the growth story as it is fueled by real estate and construction, flagging that any excessive swings could warrant a BSP rate hike. ANZ sees a 25-basis-point increase in borrowing rates by yearend, while other observers say that the BSP has room to delay any policy tweaks until next year.

Mr. Espenilla has said that domestic inflation remains the biggest consideration for the monetary authority, reiterating that the BSP does not have to move in sync with policy tightening in the United States.

Mr. Dominguez is optimistic that accelerated state spending should “keep the Philippines in the club of Asia’s fastest-growing economies.”

“‘Build, Build, Build’ is seen to induce the multiplier effects on the domestic economy of more jobs, greater investments and improved connectivity across the regions.”

July ‘hot money’ net inflows biggest in six months — BSP

MORE foreign capital entered the Philippines in July to post the biggest net inflow in six months, the central bank reported yesterday.

dollar
An employee at a money changer counts USD 100 bills in Manila on October 25, 2012. AFP

Foreign portfolio investments, also called “hot money” given the ease by which these funds enter and leave markets, posted a $206.47-million net inflow last month, rising from the $72.56 million in net inbound capital logged in June, according to data released by the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP).

But the figure was only a fifth of the $1.067-billion net inflows recorded in a year ago, which came on the back of an initial public offering by the local unit of a Mexican cement giant Cemex.

In a statement, the BSP attributed the sustained fund inflows to positive investor sentiment towards the Philippines following President Rodrigo R. Duterte’s second Congressional address on July 24 alongside June’s 2.8% inflation rate reported that month that was softer than May’s 3.1%.

Foreigners invested $1.434 billion in the Philippines last month, which was partially offset by $1.228 billion which they took out of the country. The figures compare to the year-ago $2.269-billion gross placements and $1.203-billion outflows. Inflows last month peaked at $565.17 million between July 24 and 28 — the week of Mr. Duterte’s state of the nation address.

Strong net foreign buying also buoyed Philippine financial markets, the central bank said, as the Federal Reserve opted to maintain interest rates in the United States after a hike in June.

The peso hovered around P50 to the dollar last month, touching its weakest value then in over a decade at P50.94 on July 19. The central bank has since then not sounded alarm on the peso’s depreciation, saying that the local currency simply reflects market volatility and will not see a “free-fall”.

Last month also saw Congress approve the extension of military rule in Mindanao to yearend as government forces struggle to take Marawi City back from Islamic militants after more than two months of battle.

Some 90.5% of the flighty capital were invested in shares of listed firms, mainly to food, beverage, and tobacco companies; holding firms; banks; property firms; and utilities, which yielded $244 million in net inflows.

About a tenth went into government debt papers, resulting in an $18-million net outflow, the central bank said.

Despite two straight months of inflows, the year-to-date tally (including Aug. 1-4) still settled at a $202.24-million net outflow, a reversal from the $1.744-billion net inflow recorded in 2016’s comparative period.

Geopolitical threats and policy uncertainty continued to dampen investor appetite this year, the BSP said, citing the US air strike in Syria, political turmoil in the United States, as well as bets on the Fed’s next tightening moves. At home, the wide-ranging crackdown on miners earlier in the year spooked foreign investors.

The BSP expects hot money to post a $900-million net outflow this year due to external headwinds, a reversal from 2016’s $404.43-million net inflow.

More permanent inflows of foreign direct investments stood at a net amount of $3.006 billion as of end-May, down 23.8% from the previous year. — Melissa Luz T. Lopez

Global economy chugs forward as laggards look to become locomotives

WASHINGTON — The world economy looks well on its way to a year of faster, firmer growth after rising at its most rapid pace in two-and-a-half years in the second quarter.

The European Central Bank, is pictured in Frankfurt am Main, Germany, on April 27, 2017. / AFP PHOTO / Daniel ROLAND

Expansion is broad-based as long-time laggards Japan and the euro area perk up. Even more encouraging: the gains look sustainable since they’re not generating much in the way of inflation or other excesses that frequently presage a downturn, economists said.

“The global economy is in better shape than it has been in several years,” said Torsten Slok, chief international economist at Deutsche Bank AG in New York.

“We just don’t see what would be a trigger for a recession.”

He called it a “Goldilocks” scenario for stock market investors, with the economic recovery solid enough to generate higher corporate profits but not so fast as to lead to a rapid pickup in inflation and interest rates. The MSCI ACWI Index of stocks from emerging and advanced economies has risen in the past five quarters, its longest stretch of gains since the 2007-08 financial crisis.

Global gross domestic product is projected to increase by 3.4% in 2017 and 3.5% in 2018, according to the median forecast of economists surveyed by Bloomberg. While that would be a come down from an estimated 4%-plus pace in the second quarter, it would still represent a clear acceleration from last year’s 3.1% advance.

“Recent data point to the broadest synchronized upswing the world economy has experienced in the last decade,” International Monetary Fund chief economist Maurice Obstfeld wrote in a recent blog post.

“World trade growth has also picked up, with volumes projected to grow faster than global output in the next two years.”

The pick-up has been paced by budding rebounds in Europe and Japan, two economies that until now had been seen as drags on the global economy.

After years of lackluster growth, the euro-area economy is starting to build momentum. The expansion accelerated to 0.6% in the second quarter, and it’s more evenly spread across the 19-nation region than in the past. The Netherlands posted the strongest data in a decade and Italy, long an slouch in the region, may see the best performance since 2010 this year.

That’s good news for European Central Bank (ECB) President Mario Draghi, who wants to make sure the recovery is well established before reining in stimulus.

Inflation is still undershooting the ECB’s goal and there’s little sign of significant wage gains as yet.

That’s allowing Mr. Draghi to take his time in scaling back support for the region’s economy.

A four percent annualized surge in Japanese GDP in the second quarter put the nation in an unexpected spot: at the top of the growth table among the Group of Seven industrial economies.

The strongest domestic demand in years helped drive Japanese GDP to a sixth consecutive quarter of expansion, elevating hopes for a sustainable recovery in an economy that’s been better known in recent years for tepid inflation and a declining population than beating forecasts.

“We have just begun to see more convincing evidence that domestic demand is finally picking up,” Kathy Matsui, chief Japan strategist at Goldman Sachs Group Inc., said on Bloomberg Television.

POSITIVE OUTLOOKS
While the unexpected strength in Europe and Japan is providing fuel for the global upswing, the expansion’s fate ultimately rests on the performance of the world’s two biggest economies, the United States and China.

And there the omens are favorable.

JPMorgan Chase & Co. this week raised its forecast for US growth in the third quarter to an annualized 2.25% from 1.75%. The move followed news of an unexpectedly strong rise in retail sales in July. GDP rose 2.6% in the second quarter.

Shoppers splurged at Internet retailers, department stores, restaurants and auto dealerships last month, boosting sales by 0.6%, the most this year.

“For the first time during this eight-year expansion there are no serious impediments to growth,” Mark Zandi, chief economist for Moody’s Analytics, wrote in his monthly economic report.

Consumers are benefiting from a strong jobs market and healthy balance sheets while companies are enjoying a revival in profits and rock-bottom borrowing costs, he said. At the same time, the risks to the US from abroad have diminished as world growth has strengthened.

TAME INFLATION
Low inflation — it’s fallen short of forecasts for five straight months — means there’s little pressure on the Federal Reserve to act forcefully to rein in the recovery, even with unemployment at a 16-year low.

“The Fed has no reason in my view to act aggressively to tighten monetary policy,” William Dudley, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, told the Associated Press in an Aug. 14 interview.

In China, a multi-year slowdown has stabilized, with economists forecasting an expansion of 6.7% this year. The IMF increased its estimate for the nation’s average annual growth rate through 2020 — to 6.4% from 6% — while warning that it would come at the cost of rising debt that increases medium-term risks to growth.

Of course, there’s always the chance that something could happen to upset the worldwide expansion, from an outbreak of hostilities between North Korea and the US to a sudden swoon in financial markets as central banks scale back their support.

Yet for now at least, the global economy is on a “positive trajectory,” said Bloomberg Intelligence Chief Economist Michael McDonough.

“There’s a pretty good foundation to build on for the next year or so.” — Bloomberg

Assault on the future

Does anyone still believe that every government bureaucrat, or, for that matter, everyone in the private sector, or your average gossip-prone neighbor, can keep a secret — that they can keep in confidence information such as who has tested positive or has simply been tested for illegal drug use? Or that some, among them the clueless regime-paid trolls online whose solutions to everything including opposition to Neanderthal policies is assassination won’t take the opportunity offered by mandatory drug testing to get back at people they don’t like or violently hate for the most trivial reason?

Assault on the future

Most Filipinos probably don’t think so, but apparently both the Department of Education (DepEd) and the Commission on Higher Education (CHEd) do.

These agencies charged with the supervision, sustainability, and enhancement of Philippine basic and tertiary education, respectively, are requiring mandatory drug testing in secondary schools and higher education institutions (HEIs).

The DepEd’s Department Order No. 40 issued Aug. 8 lays down the guidelines that high schools should follow in implementing the order to conduct random drug tests among their students. It declares that the result of drug tests should be confidential, but that if it turns out to be positive, only the parents, the student concerned and a Department of Health-accredited physician would be apprised of it for the purpose of holding a conference among themselves to discuss issues of drug use and possible addiction dependency.

Should a student who tested positive be drug-dependent, he or she will be referred to the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD), although the family can instead send the student to a private rehabilitation center if it wishes.

The guidelines make it clear that testing is mandatory: neither students nor their parents can refuse the tests. A student chosen for testing but who refuses to be tested will be reported to the committee in charge of the process DepEd will constitute for the school concerned. Any school that refuses to hold the tests will be reported to the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) and the Dangerous Drugs Board (DDB).

The same guidelines declare that positive drug test results cannot be grounds for expulsion or disciplinary action and should not be included in the student’s academic record. Neither should the positive result be used as evidence against the student in any court case.

Assault on the future
AFP photos

But these seemingly liberal provisions are hardly at issue in the present context in which suspected, even merely rumored drug users are seldom brought to court or rehabilitated, but simply eliminated. The argument that high school students are legally children who shouldn’t be subjected to the by now standard police approach of State-sanctioned murder won’t matter much either. The entire country and the world by now know enough about the Davao Death Squad murder of, among others, children suspected of various crimes including drug use in Davao City to understand that being a child doesn’t protect anyone from being shot in the streets.

Not to be outdone, the Commission on Higher Education nevertheless issued on the same date Memorandum Order Number 64, which “allows” all higher education institutions, or colleges and universities, to conduct mandatory drug tests among their students as well as those applying for admission.

The memorandum declares that the drug tests should be confidential in addition to being approved by the school’s policy-making body, whether its board of trustees, directors, or regents. Only physicians and health facilities accredited by the Department of Health (DoH) may administer the tests. A positive result can lead to non-admission to the HEI of an applicant and the non-retention (expulsion) of an already enrolled student. A positive result requires the school to impose unspecified sanctions on, and/ or to “rehabilitate” the student.

Both issuances compel secondary and tertiary schools to hold the tests.

While the CHEd memo only “allows” HEIs to hold them, which school will not, its refusal being likely to be held against it as an indication that it has something to hide? While CHEd might not come to that conclusion itself, the police will most probably do so — and to focus their attention on the school concerned and its students. All schools are thus likely to administer the tests, the alternative being their being tagged as drug dens.

That should be disturbing enough. But what’s worse is the likelihood that the confidentiality urged by both documents will be so easily violated — and the chilling possibility that anyone who wants to get a student into trouble, even if his or her test result was negative, could spread rumors that his or her test results were otherwise. Information about someone’s being chosen for the random test could by itself also be spread as indicative of his or her being suspected of drug addiction — and that kind of suspicion in these perilous times could be a death sentence.

Assault on the future
AFP photos

The result could be the branding of high school as well as expelled college students and college applicants refused admission for whatever reason as targets, in much the same way that rumors of this or that individual’s being a drug user in the communities have led to their being similarly tagged — and added to the lengthening list of drug-related extrajudicial killings (EJKs).

In a country in which even such secrets as to who was absent from his official duties for days because he underwent a dialysis and where he had it becomes the stuff of daily gossip in hotel lobbies and coffee shops, it’s not unlikely that the DepEd and CHEd order and memo will result in the names of high school as well as of college students and applicants’ ending up in the many flawed lists of drug users and pushers, and alleged local government drug lords, that the Duterte regime has a peculiar obsession for, inclusion in which, as the entire country and the world has been witnessing, has led to being killed in a hail of bullets for supposedly “fighting back” or “resisting arrest.”

As human rights defenders, youth groups and the progressive members of the House of Representatives have pointed out, the result could be even worse bloodletting à la “Operation Tokhang.” But what should be of even more concern is that if indeed that happens — with both students who are drug users as well as those who aren’t being targeted — it would be an assault not only on the youth of the land and their families but on the country’s very future as well.

The Marcos terror regime murdered thousands of young men and women, among them some of the best and brightest sons and daughters of the Filipino people, during its bloody reign. The same could happen today. The country could once again lose potential and actual poets, engineers, economists, doctors, lawyers and others who could have contributed their talents and their knowledge, their vision and their patriotism to the betterment of a country and society that so desperately need them.

Unfortunately (and oddly, considering their mandate), that hasn’t figured in the calculations of DepEd or CHEd, much less in the limited imagination of the Duterte regime of unreason and its murderous and corrupt police force focused on the brutal, non-accountable and mindless use of State violence as the cure-all for the many complex afflictions of these troubled isles.

Luis V. Teodoro is on Facebook and Twitter (@luisteodoro). The views expressed in Vantage Point are his own and do not represent the views of the Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility.

www.luisteodoro.com

Constitutional amendments needed to boost FDI

THE GOVERNMENT needs to amend the constitution to open up industries currently restricted from foreign participation, to unleash the economy’s full growth potential, economists said.

Cielito Habito
2015 file photo of Cielito Habito — www.ateneo.edu

At a forum, former Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Cielito F. Habito said that efforts to open up new sectors for foreign direct investment (FDI) require comprehensive efforts to amend the charter, noting that current tweaks to redefine “public utilities” to allow more FDI will have only a temporary impact.

“The reason we continue we lag behind our neighbors, in spite of dramatic improvements already made, is still because of these legal constraints to more foreign participation in our industries,” Mr. Habito said during Ateneo de Manila University’s Mid-Year Economic Briefing 2017 in Makati City yesterday.

Asked whether the government’s efforts to remove sectors from the upcoming Foreign Investment Negative List (FINL) will boost the economy, Mr. Habito said: “It will only provide limited relief, in the sense that we will only be able to open it, or even just partially, just public utilities,” in an interview after the forum.

“Big foreign infrastructure companies have already been investing massively in India and Latin America, in railways which, in our law, is considered a public utility. So they can’t come in. They can only come in up to 40% but many of them said, when it’s only 40% why even bother?” Mr. Habito said.

Although the government seeks an aggressive overhaul of the FINL, Finance Secretary Carlos G. Dominguez III said earlier that they are limited to “what is legislated and what is in the constitution,” even noting that they will only review “those things that can be done administratively.”

The FINL defines areas where foreign investors are allowed to fully or partially participate, including those blocked by the 1987 constitution.

Economic managers said they are looking into amending the Public Service Act through House Bill No. 4389, authored by former president and now Deputy Speaker Rep. Gloria M. Arroyo (Pampanga, second district), to redefine what public utilities are, and open it up for external investors — especially in telecommunications sector.

“Public utilities” are defined in the Public Service Act, or Commonwealth Act No. 146.

The government has yet to release the 11th FINL.

Even as increasing investments has been fueling the robust economic growth in recent years, Mr. Habito said that amending the constitution for the entry of more foreign players would expand the country’s investment take, and push economic growth to as high as 9%.

“The hope is we will be willing to amend economic provisions of the constitution because that is what really is holding us back. It is outdated. Many of the restrictions in foreign advertising, mass media, education, are really out of date. Given the technology in recent years, those rationales don’t apply anymore to the information age,” he said.

“We have to sustain the seven to 8% growth for at least 10 years to reduce poverty significantly. But we really have to get to a new growth plane. Without a dramatic change in policy, we will still just be muddling through in the same level we have been in the six to 7% until now. Hopefully we can catapult ourselves to a higher plane of seven to 8% or even eight to 9%,” added Mr. Habito.

Other areas where foreign ownership is completely prohibited by the Constitution or laws are: the practice of all licensed professions; retail; cooperatives; private security agencies; small-scale mining; utilization of marine resources; ownership, operation and management of cockpits; and manufacture, repair, stockpiling and/or distribution of nuclear weapons.

The areas where foreigners can own stakes of up to 25% are: private recruitment for local or overseas employment and construction and repair of locally funded works like infrastructure and foreign-assisted projects. The areas where foreigners can own up to 30% include: advertising; exploration, development and utilization of natural resources; private land; public utilities; education; rice and corn administration; financing and investment companies; firms that supply state-owned corporations and agencies; public utility franchises; and private domestic and overseas construction contracts.

Industries allowing up to 40% foreign ownership include security; defense; those industries that pose a risk to health and morals, such as gambling, bath houses and massage clinics; and small-scale and medium-scale enterprises of a certain size.

Economist Alvin P. Ang said during the forum that the country needs to seek new sources of exports, and maximize the capacity of its food manufacturing sector.

“We are being limited. Electronics is still the largest export product, but still we have to find other export products,” said Mr. Ang.

“The global market is integrated you need to connect to the global value chain. In the region, we have to value that connection. In the Philippines, our food sector is big. How can URC (Universal Robina Corp.), Liwayway [Marketing Corp.] become players abroad? It’s because they have the capacity. We should take that advantage,” he said.

Mr. Ang also noted that the government’s infrastructure gap has capped the tourism sector’s growth, which may limit overall economic growth as he noted that some 12.7% of workers are in tourism-related jobs.

Mr. Ang also noted concerns for the tourism sector over the Marawi City crisis that led Mindanao to be placed under martial law.

“We can’t do anything about multiple travel advisories, but we do have to solve the crisis,” Mr. Ang said. — Elijah Joseph C. Tubayan

Software firm, Philippine banks in talks for cloud-based technology use

INTERNATIONAL software company Oradian is currently in talks with several Philippine banks for partnerships on the foreign firm’s cloud-based technology to be used in the lenders’ core banking business.

Julian Oehrlein
Oradian founder and Chief Operating Officer Julian Oehrlein

Oradian’s chief said they are in discussions with several banks that are interested to use the firm’s cloud technology.

The top executive, however, noted they will only make their digital platform available to financial institutions that seek to close the gap in financial inclusion and whose target sectors are the unbanked Filipinos and small and medium enterprises (SMEs), among others.

“We are in discussions with other institutions right now… It’s both rural banks as well as commercial banks who want to tap that market and are looking for efficient tools to actually serve that market as they’ve realized their existing tools, which they use for their commercial banking space, they’re not efficient enough to serve these SME segment,” Oradian Founder and Chief Operating Officer Julian Oehrlein told BusinessWorld in an interview.

Asked if they are looking at sealing the partnerships by end of the year, he said, “We’ll see what they decide, but yes, we are confident. If we just continue doing what we have been doing, then we’ll be very successful in the Philippines.”

Currently, the Croatian technology company has already been tapped by 13 companies in the Philippines ever since it entered the country a year ago. These firms have been using Oradian’s cloud-based system called Instafin for their core business activities.

instafin
A customer uses Oradian’s Instafin on a tablet device

Under Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) Circular No. 808 or the Guidelines on Information Technology Risk Management for All Banks and Other BSP Supervised Institutions signed in 2013, the regulator mentioned of cloud computing as one of the emerging outsourcing models banks could use in their IT systems.

Cloud computing is a migration from owned resources to shared resources. Client users receive IT services, on demand, from third-party services providers or cloud service providers through the Internet “cloud.”

In July, Cantilan Bank, Inc., a rural bank, announced its partnership with Oradian, under which the lender will use the digital platform for its core banking operations, making it the first bank in the Philippines to use cloud-based technology.

The rural lender had said it sees a drop in its operational expenses as well as growth in its revenues by 2018 after it initially rolled out its cloud-based system in its operations.

Asked if they plan to encourage other banks to adopt cloud computing, Mr. Oehrlein said, “Yes… we’re continuing on the trajectory and continuing on the growth.”

However, he noted: “We’re not looking to work with the core business of Tier 1 banks… If they are planning to open microfinance operations — for example in rural spaces or for SME lending — then we’re open to partner with them for that specific space.” — Janine Marie D. Soliman

A fantastically fun title

By Alexander O. Cuaycong
and Anthony L. Cuaycong

Videogame Review
Prey
PlayStation 4

IN 2006, Human Head Studios released Prey, a run-and-gun shooter, for the PC and XBox 360. Similar in form to titles like Doom and Quake, Prey was praised for its outstanding gameplay and its beautiful graphics, portraying a dirty, mysterious and dangerous ship populated by thousands and thousands of aliens who would like nothing more than to grind your bones to dust. Amid the positive reception, it garnered and spawned a cult following, with fans eagerly awaiting the next release.

Fast forward 11 years later, and gamers get their wish. The rights to Prey have been passed off to Arkane Studios, and the development team responsible for the Dishonored series does not disappoint. The franchise is in good hands, with the latest iteration for the PC, PlayStation 4, and XBox One clearly a marked improvement. To be sure, the Prey of 2017 isn’t a true sequel to its 2006 namesake. As marketed, it’s a reimagining of its roots; it has very little to do with the original in either gameplay or plot. All the same, there can be no denying its inherent value. It may be confusing, even frustrating, at times, but it’s nonetheless a romp worth going through.

In Prey, you play as either a male or female Morgan Yu, starting the game by exploring your apartment. You go through books, listen to audio logs, and suit up for your first day of work, only to realize that something dreadfully wrong is happening. Your interviewer is killed, and after getting knocked out, you see yourself back in your apartment again. Things have changed. You’re trapped in your apartment unable to get out, and after discovering the desiccated corpse of a mechanic outside your door, your only way out is through the window of your flat. You smash it, and then find out that your life is a lie. You’re in a simulation run by scientists observing you – but why, and for what? Something happened in this place, and with no memories, no notion of what’s happening in the world around you, and no clear goal in sight, it’s up to you to piece together what exactly happened, and why.

This, arguably, is when Prey is at its best. As you wander and try to make sense of your situation, you cannot help but be overcome by a sense of wonderment and awe at the game’s gorgeous visuals. Each of the many levels has its own style and aesthetic, varying greatly from place to place – from the cold, metallic feel of Psychotronics to the warm, inviting colors of the Crew Quarters. It helps create a distinct feel to each location, segmenting each part of the map into places that are not just fun to explore but also easy to remember.

Couple that with the mystery that surrounds your character, and your exploration becomes utterly compelling. The answers to “What is this place?” “Who are these people?” and “What am I doing here?” are all found in the environment, by way of voice recordings or e-mail in computers you run across. And when you’re not exploring the many corridors and hallways Prey has to offer, you get to fight off aliens called the Typhon, who pose a great threat not only to you, but to the entire human race. The Typhon vary in size and in behavior, and each type requires a specific strategy to beat, by using either guns or their own powers against them.

That said, the combat does feel a bit barebones. The weapons in the game don’t pack a lot of oomph, and some enemy types feel like downright bullet sponges at times, taking upwards of 10 to 15 pistol shots before being neutralized. The same holds true for the Typhon powers, which, while enjoyable, can be absolutely broken at times compared to conventional weaponry.

It’s around this point near the end that Prey starts to fall apart. The game is truly at its best when you take your time, making sure to explore each room, running through places unknown, wondering what dangers await you next. Precisely because it’s open-ended, however, it can suffer greatly from back-tracking and tedium. A lot of the wonder that the game produces goes straight out the window when you are forced to explore the same area twice, maybe even three times, in one playthrough. And that’s saying nothing about the ending of the story, which feel more like sequel bait than anything else.

Make no mistake, though. In spite of its obvious flaws, Prey is a wellspring of enjoyment. It is a fantastically fun title, and is best taken slowly and enjoyed to its fullest. Players who rush ahead with no strategy and expect to brute-force their way through the game will miss most of what it has to offer. Meanwhile, those willing to take their time, consider each of its plentiful areas separately, and explore its every nook and cranny will find themselves at the edge of their seats more often than not.

Game Review

Prey
PlayStation 4

THE GOOD:

• Heavily atmospheric, with beautiful level designs accentuated by good voice acting and nice sound design.

• Exploration and player choice is heavily rewarded.

• Typhon powers are fun to use.

• Mimics are best due to their special ability.

THE BAD:

• Combat can feel frustrating until mastered.

• Running back and forth between areas can feel tedious.

• Audio tends to fade in and out abruptly.

• The ending is an acquired taste.

RATING: 8.5/10

Women on the verge of a nervous breakdown

Forgive the title. It’s just clickbait, borrowed from a Pedro Almodovar film that starred Carmen Maura and introduced to an international audience a young Antonio Banderas.

Women on the verge of a nervous breakdown

The article really is about the Google memo. Yes. That memo.

“Have you heard about the Google memo?” asks Bloomberg’s Megan McArdle.

“James Damore, an engineer at Google, wrote a memo suggesting that maybe there weren’t so many women at Google because women are less interested in sitting around and staring at code all day. The internet erupted.”

“Erupted” could actually be a euphemism because social media went nuts.

And the aforementioned Mr. Damore was fired by Google.

As The Federalist reported, people had their different takes on what Damore wrote:

“He said women may be genetically unsuited for tech jobs,” barked The Washington Post.

“That guy didn’t want any women near a computer,” proclaimed CNN.

When Google CEO Sundar Pichai finally addressed the controversy, he stated, “to suggest a group of our colleagues have traits that make them less biologically suited to that work is offensive and not okay.”

Only, that’s not what James Damore said.

Lee Jussim (professor of social psychology at Rutgers University and a Fellow at Stanford University, writing for Quillette Magazine, 07 August 2017) actually read the memo:

“The author of the Google essay on issues related to diversity gets nearly all of the science and its implications exactly right. Its main points are that: xxx 2. The social science evidence on implicit and explicit bias has been wildly oversold and is far weaker than most people seem to realize; 3. Google has, perhaps unintentionally, created an authoritarian atmosphere that has stifled discussion of these issues by stigmatizing anyone who disagrees as a bigot and instituted authoritarian policies of reverse discrimination.”

In short, Damore didn’t say that women are inferior to men.

What he said was that men and women have differences, and that each exhibit differing areas of strengths and weaknesses, and that women (frankly, rightly) prefer to avoid high stress jobs or jobs with high inanimate components.

Of course, the response would be is that there are perfectly good number of women who succeed in high stress corporate technology-oriented environments, of which Sheryl Sandberg is given as example. But such is a fallacy by exception (i.e., making a conclusion about a group based on information culled from an individual).

Consider the abovementioned Megan McArdle, having worked as a technology consultant, agreeing with Damore, particularly regarding preferences.

Women on the verge of a nervous breakdown

Remembering once coming to work on a Monday, a male colleague asked her what she did during the weekend and her reply was of being with a friend and going to a concert.

Her male colleague said he set up a fiber-channel network in his basement.

Upon hearing that, the other men in the room got excited and spent the next several minutes talking about the intricacies of fiber-channel technology.

As Ms. McArdle recounts, “No one told that guy to go home and build a fiber-channel network in his basement; no one told me I couldn’t. It’s just that I would never in a million years have chosen to waste a weekend that way.”

Psychiatrist Scott Alexander agrees: “This is exactly what the researchers cited above are saying about sex differences accentuating in more gender-equitable countries. If we were less gender-equitable now, women would take whatever they could get. Now that we’re more gender-equitable, they take things which correspond to their gender-specific interests, like veterinary medicine, and we observe larger sex differences.”

“If we continue to insist that, no, women really want to do tech, but stereotypes and sexists are pushing them out, we’ll end up with constantly increasing social engineering to prevent stereotypes (see Slate Star Codex, 07 August 2017).”

And so really: what actually constitutes a fair distribution between the sexes? Would forcing a 50-50 proportion be reasonably equitable?

Also, what about transgenders?

But, as Alexander points out, women dominate the following fields without accusations of discrimination: “men make up only 10% of nurses, only 20% of new veterinarians, only 25% of new psychologists, about 25% of new pediatricians, about 26% of forensic scientists, about 28% of medical managers, and 42% of new biologists.”

Medicine and (from my own experience) law are increasingly being dominated by women.

The hypocrisy of all this manufactured outrage is best exemplified by Google itself.

First, Susan Krashinsky reported in 2015 that: “Google’s policies allow advertisers to target ads by gender,” thereby acknowledging impliedly and implicitly that gender differences do exist.

Finally, the Daily Wire’s Amanda Prestigiacomo had this observation, “some women” from Google “stayed home … because the memo made them ‘uncomfortable going back to work.’”

This “women too upset to work” because of a science or evidence-backed memo, Ms. Prestigiacomo notes, ironically plays “into the worst gender stereotypes of all — the overly-emotional and irrational woman — and inadvertently proving what they are so fiercely attempting to deny: men and women are different.”

Jemy Gatdula is a Senior Fellow of the Philippine Council for Foreign Relations and a Philippine Judicial Academy law lecturer for constitutional philosophy and jurisprudence.

jemygatdula@yahoo.com

www.jemygatdula.blogspot.com

facebook.com/jemy.gatdula

Twitter @jemygatdula

Still relevant 60 years on

By Zsarlene B. Chua, Reporter

Theater
West Side Story
Ongoing until
Aug. 27
The Theatre, Solaire
Resort and Casino,
Parañaque City

SIX DECADES AGO, a musical opened on Broadway tackling the issues of racism and gang violence wrapped in a tragic romance and decorated with snappy dance moves. At the time it premiered in 1957, news of gang violence abounded as the US was still grappling with the changes brought about by WWII.

Sixty years later, West Side Story is as relevant as ever in light of one of the most divisive times in the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave.

“Maybe we haven’t learned any lessons,” mused Donald Chan, musical supervisor and principal conductor of the Manila leg of touring production during the media call shortly before the gala performance on Aug. 11.

This, he said, is what makes the musical relevant and a must-see, especially for the younger generation. He noted that one of the difficulties of mounting a half century-old musical is how it will interest the young as its lyricist Stephen Sondheim, and the estates of Jerome Robbins (book, director, and choreographer) and Leonard Bernstein (music) insist that everything from the music to the dances remain the same.

“People have flocked to this story and they see love in the show and they can see the hate in the show and they can see how people can get along, so it’s an idea that we hope is carried through,” he said.

A re-imagining of Shakespeare’s classic Romeo and Juliet where the fair town of Verona translated into the concrete jungle of New York – the story opens with the conflict between two gangs, the Jetts, a white gang with Polish roots headed by Riff, and the Sharks, a Puerto Rican gang headed by Bernardo.

Tensions rise as the Puerto Ricans arrived chasing the American Dream as the Jets saw the PRs (as they call them) as intruders. Along the way, the former Jets member Tony falls in love with Bernardo’s sister Maria, and tragedy ensues.

“The more I do the show, the more I realize [the character I’m playing]. If he didn’t start it, it would never have happened,” said Lance Hayes, who plays Riff. “If he just made time to really know the person, and I’m hit with the realization that this person (Bernardo) just got here and he (Riff) already hates him.”

While many might get distracted by the amazing dances that set this musical apart from others – the performers said they had to undergo months of intense dance classes – or the romance between Tony and Maria, what the audience is reminded of many times in the story, usually through the monologues of Lieutenant Schrank (played by Michael Scott), is that the entire issue here is racially motivated conflict.

In fact, “Somewhere” – the song which paints a dream paradise where everyone gets along set against the backdrop of the gang deaths – is more poignant in the light of the recent news of violence which erupted in Charlottesville, Virginia on the night of Aug. 11 when hundreds of white supremacists staged a rally protesting the removal of the statue of Confederate army icon Robert E. Lee from Emancipation Park. The violent rally, where the alt-right clashed with the anti-racist protesters, left a woman dead and dozens injured after a car rammed into a crowd of anti-protesters.

“This is one [show] that’s always going to be relevant… in the show, the message is you can handle the [differences] like the Jets and the Sharks do and let your fear of the unknown translate into violence or hatred, or do things the way Tony and Maria do and see the differences and embrace them,” said Jenna Burns who plays Maria.

“If we can touch a single person and the message gets passed on, then we’ve done our job,” she noted.

That alone makes West Side Story worth watching a few times over.

West Side Story’s ticket prices range from P1,500 to P7,000 and are available through TicketWorld (www.ticketworld.com.ph).

Mondelez calls P10/liter sugar tax ‘unfair’

SNACK COMPANY Mondelez has expressed “serious concerns” about the government’s proposed P10 per liter tax on sugar-sweetened beverages, calling the proposal premature and unfair.

cadbury
http://ph.mondelezinternational.com

“As Mondelez, and as an industry, we have serious concerns about the bill that the Senate is reviewing right now and we have real concerns about how that is structured on its taxation rate proposal, which is per volume liter,” said Shanahan Chua, head for corporate affairs and government affairs for the Philippines, Indonesia, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Singapore.

Mr. Chua was referring to the tax reform measure recently passed by the House of Representatives, which includes a provision that imposes a P10 excise tax on every liter of sugar-sweetened beverages containing locally made sugar, while others will be taxed P20 a liter.

 He made the statement when asked about the company’s stand on the tax proposal during the launch of a new product, Oreo Thins.

“As a member of BIAP (Beverage Industry Association of the Philippines), what we want is to urge the government to take a step back and have a dialogue and continue the dialogue with us to look at this, and to really take more time to have a fairer taxation system,” he added.

The group has a number of beverage lines like Tang but also owns brands like Cadbury’s, Nabisco and Toblerone

Senator Juan Edgardo M. Angara is looking into imposing excise tax depending on the sugar content of the beverage, instead of taxing at P10 per liter. He said a P10-excise tax might be too high, as this would raise the prices of some drinks by 50%.

“What we are looking at as an industry is to echo what Sen. Angara was saying,” Mr. Chua said.

Aishish N. Pisharodi, Mondelez country head for the Philippines, said the company is not against taxation but what it is against is the way the bill is currently drafted.

“There are ways to achieve objectives and still pay tax and that’s what we are discussing right now — how to make it constructive, how to make it sustainable and at the same time contribute to the goals of the government,” he said.

He said the company and the industry want to hold more “constructive talks” with the government because they feel that imposing the tax is premature.

“Not enough discussion and dialogue have happened to be able to implement the tax within the timeline that is currently proposed,” he said.

With the proposed measure a sachet of Tang at P9 would rise to P20, which makes budgeting a “nightmare” for homemakers who “may not even have any benefit from the changes from the tax reform package.”

He said the company is willing to pay its fair share of tax, but the proponents of the measure should also look into the problem they are trying to solve and the ill-effects they were trying to mitigate to make the measure sustainable.

“We want to continue to invest here, and it’s good for our consumers, so it’s good for the government and the people. And therefore our position is the current implementation timeline is very premature. There’s a lot of work that needs to be done,” he said.

He said the way the tax measure is structured “is not fair, it’s regressive and it’s unimplementable. There are ways to achieve objectives and still pay tax and that’s what we are discussing right now — how to make it constructive, how to make it sustainable and at the same time contribute to the goals of the government,” he said.

 Mondelez, which has been in the country for 54 years, enjoys market leadership in products such as powdered beverages and cheese.

Its parent, Mondelez International, Inc., is listed on the Nasdaq.

In the Philippines, Mondelez has a manufacturing facility in Parañaque City and employs about 400 people. — Victor V. Saulon

26 killed in Manila as drug war geared up

AT LEAST 26 people died overnight in police operations in the Philippine capital of Manila, police said on Thursday, a second night of heavy bloodshed this week in an intensification of President Rodrigo R. Duterte’s fierce war on drugs and crime.

The killings across Manila followed 32 deaths in near-simultaneous police raids on Monday night in Bulacan province, which borders the capital.

Together, they mark the deadliest period of a drugs-focused crackdown that has killed thousands of Filipinos, and caused international alarm, since Mr. Duterte took office over a year ago.

Col. Erwin Margarejo, spokesman for the Manila police, described the raids that started late Wednesday in Manila as “one-time, big-time” operations, the same term used by police in Bulacan who said the victims died because they put up a fight.

“This is ‘one-time, big-time’ operations, so it is not focused only on drugs, we are operating also against other street crimes, like robbery, but these people could also be under the influence of drugs,” Mr. Margarejo said. “If they resisted violently, our police have to defend themselves.”

Mr. Duterte unleashed his crackdown the day he took office on June 30 last year after a convincing win in an election in which he campaigned heavily on a promise to use deadly force to wipe out crime and drugs.

It was not immediately clear what was behind the step-up in the number of coordinated police operations this week, but Mr. Duterte gave a clear indication on Wednesday that it had his blessing.

He said it was good that 32 criminals had been killed in Bulacan, then added: “Let’s kill another 32 every day. Maybe we can reduce what ails this country.”

MYSTERIOUS MURDERS
Mr. Duterte also chided human rights groups for getting in the way of his anti-drugs campaign and said police should shoot them if they obstructed justice, a remark the New York-based Human Rights Watch said puts activists “in grave danger.”

Its deputy Asia director, Phelim Kine, described the comments as “like painting a target on the backs of courageous people working to protect the rights and upholding the dignity of all Filipinos.”

The exact number of people killed during the war on drugs is difficult to quantify, with no independent statistics available and police providing comprehensive data only for deaths during anti-drugs operations, where official accounts typically say suspects resisted arrest.

From the start of the drugs war to the end of July, police said over 3,400 people were killed in their operations. Police said about 2,100 deaths among some 13,500 murders over the same period were drugs-related, attributed to turf wars, informants being silenced, or vigilantes killing drug users.

A total of 65 policemen have been killed on the job in this time. Critics maintain that members of the Philippine National Police (PNP) are executing suspects and say it is likely they have a hand in thousands of unsolved murders of drug users by mysterious vigilantes. The PNP and government reject that.

Although the violence has been criticized by much of the international community, Filipinos largely support the campaign and domestic opposition to it has been muted.

Several Senate hearings into allegations that Mr. Duterte operated a death squad when he was a city mayor and was now using the same approach on a national scale have been inconclusive, while an impeachment complaint filed earlier this year was dismissed by Congress.

Meanwhile, his spokesman said of the Bulacan operations there will be “a fair and impartial investigation.”

“The Bulacan raids, we have to underscore, are not the result of a single action, but a wide-ranging simultaneous police operations against illegal drug offenders conducted in the whole province of Bulacan. Local authorities were met with violent resistance as evidenced by the recovery of firearms, grenades and live ammunitions,” Presidential Spokesperson Ernesto C. Abella also said.

PHL ‘NOW NARCO-STATE’
Speaking to cops in a Mindanao city where a mayor allegedly involved in the narcotics trade was killed in a deadly raid, Mr. Duterte on Thursday said the country is now a narcotics state despite the violence in the course of his drug war.

“Now, mag-tanong kayo (If you would ask), ang Pilipinas, are we or are we not a narcotic country? Yes, we are,” Mr. Duterte told cops stationed in Ozamiz City, contrary to his previous warnings that the Philippines is “on the brink” of becoming a narco-state.

The firebrand leader said the critics of his drug war were right for criticizing his six-month deadline in eradicating the narcotics trade, adding that he was not aware of the depth of the nation’s drug problem until he became president.

He then explained that his anti-drug campaign in Davao City, where he was mayor for more than two decades, was his “template” when he took the bloody crackdown on a national level.

“Eh Davao, makita naman. Nakapunta na kayo lahat doon. May droga. Pero sabi ko sa’yo, maglaro ka doon patay ka talaga,” he said.

(If you’ve been to Davao, yes, there were drugs there. But I tell you, if you play with drugs there, you will be killed.)

Mr. Duterte earlier admitted that it was a “miscalculation” on his part when he promised during the election campaign to end the drug scourge in three to six months.

Just recently, he said the Philippines cannot control the narcotics trade and that the problem would not be solved by a chief executive in just one term.

In the same speech in Ozamiz, Mr. Duterte, after showing his thick list of suspected drug personalities, assured the police force that while narco-politics in the city would “stay for a while,” he would free the country from illegal drugs before his term ends.

He added, apparently in jest, that there was no need for him to shoot all the people in his drug list when he could just ship them to the South Pole and drown them there.

“Dahan dahanin ko lang naman sila (I will slowly kill them),” he said.

Reynaldo O. Parojinog, Sr., mayor of Ozamiz City whose name was among those in Mr. Duterte’s drug list, was shot dead at his home last month along with his wife, his brother and nine others in a dawn raid, police said.

Following the raid, police arrested Mr. Parojinog’s daughter, Nova Princess Parojinog-Echavez, the city’s vice-mayor, and said she would face charges. Several others were also arrested.

Mr. Duterte had offered a P2-million reward for each policeman caught and proven to be involved in the burying of bodies in a compound in Ozamiz City that was allegedly used as dumping ground for the remains of rivals of the Parojinog family in the narcotics business. — Reuters, with Ian Nicolas P. Cigaral

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