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Regional Updates (02/03/21)

P11B worth of infra projects delivered in Eastern Visayas

THE Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) completed P11 billion worth of infrastructure projects in the Eastern Visayas Region last year, including roads, bridges, and flood-control structures. In a statement on Wednesday, the department said it delivered P6.5 billion worth of national road projects covering 311.5 kilometers, 12 bridges at a cost of P1.2 billion, and 99 flood-control structures  worth P3.3 billion. The funds were sourced from the 2020 national budget. “I would like to commend our Regional and District Engineering Offices nationwide for the timely delivery of these infrastructure projects that will be the main player in our country’s economic recovery from COVID-19,” said DPWH Secretary Mark A. Villar, noting that the construction works were undertaken amid the pandemic-related restrictions. DPWH also reported that it assisted in the completion of 328 local infrastructure projects amounting to P3.9 billion, including multi-purpose and school buildings, and water systems, among others. DPWH also finished several projects under partnership programs with other departments such as roads for tourism sites, industrial corridors, and farm-to-market access.

Tourism dep’t appeals for responsible travel after another case of fake COVID test results

THE Tourism department has reiterated its call for local travelers to abide by requirements and health protocols to help the battered industry recover without compromising public health. The department issued the appeal Wednesday after another group of six visitors in Boracay presented fake RT-PCR test results, three of whom turned out positive for the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). The agency also reminded tourists that non-compliance to protocols would mean penalties, including possible imprisonment. “The Department of Tourism (DoT) appeals to travelers to stop forging and faking travel documents, or else face fines and proper criminal charges from the local government units (LGUs), which may include the penalty of imprisonment,” it said. To boost the industry and encourage more domestic tourists, the DoT has launched a program for subsidized RT-PCR tests, available at the University of the Philippines–Philippine General Hospital (UP-PGH) and the Philippine Children’s Medical Hospital (PCMC), at cash-out rates of P900 and Php750, respectively. The DoT also assured that its Boracay unit is working closely with the municipal government of Malay for contact tracing and monitoring of the violators who are currently quarantined at the Aklan Training Center.

Laguna prepares ‘green corridor’ for tourists

THE SAMPALOC Lake, one of seven and the widest crater lake in San Pablo City, is among the sites in the Laguna green corridor where visitors can walk, cycle, or simply enjoy the view. — DENR-CALABARZON

LAGUNA province will launch a “green corridor” for tourists in April, featuring nature and cultural destinations in different towns. “The creation of travel corridors has been a key component in the resumption of tourism in some of the country’s destinations. We are confident that the same principle can be applied in Laguna,” Tourism Secretary Bernadette Romulo-Puyat said during a stakeholders’ meeting on Feb. 2. The planned corridor covers Dona Leonila Park at Sampaloc Lake and Casa San Pablo in San Pablo City, TANAW Park in Rizal, the Underground Cemetery in Nagcarlan, and the town of Liliw known for its slippers industry. “Laguna is blessed to have many open-air, nature and culture-based tourism products that Filipinos would like to experience when traveling amidst the pandemic. And best of all, Laguna can be accessed quickly and conveniently from Metro Manila through land travel, which is the most ideal way for Filipinos to travel in the current situation. There is great potential for the tourism sector in this province to rebound and recover,” Ms. Puyat said.

TECH IN TOURISM
The program will use digital applications to monitor and inform visitors on the availability of each site based on carrying capacity as well as provide QR-coded cards to tourists for registration and cashless transactions. “This flagship domestic tourism program aims to spur the recovery and transition of the Laguna Tourism Cluster into the new normal,” the tourism chief said. The Laguna corridor is part of the Department of Tourism-Region 4A’s GREEN Corridor Initiative that is intended to spur the local industry with focus on farm tourism, food, nature, and outdoor activities. — MSJ

Responsible investment and financial inclusion

The words “sustainability,” “responsibility,” and “social reform” have been thrown around carelessly since the issue was brought to wider attention — for most scholars, the specific moment in time was the report from the Brundtland Commission, entitled “Our Common Future” in 1987 which finally created urgency on climate issues, provided a generally accepted definition of Sustainable Development, and set the agenda for the next decades. What many understood to be a starting point for change and action was not a truly proactive mission but simply the culmination of a myriad of crises and events which made political actors finally react. Prior to this, the Vietnam War, apartheid in South Africa, rallies to allow black people and women to vote, and environmental disasters like the Three Mile nuclear powerplant disaster in the United States in 1971 and the Chernobyl catastrophe in 1986 — were already causing social unrest and movements to rise all over the world against governments who had put such issues on the back burner.

And yet here we are today, nearly 24 years later into executing that agenda, knee-deep in a health crisis whose solution lies in laboratories of only the wealthiest of nations, with increasing poverty levels in areas which had previously progressed in eliminating hunger, in an isolated and digitized world benefiting a handful of technology companies while micro and small enterprises are forced to shut down. In these trying times, the hyped-up agenda of a shift to cleaner energy losses urgency as we search for short-term solutions merely to survive a human catastrophe, the moral and ethical forms of governance in corporations becomes a mere nice-to-have, and fiscal plans to address climate issues have gotten derailed as developing countries focus on a consumption-driven recovery.

While every decision-maker is clamoring for short-term solutions, I urge the public to maintain a long-term and holistic view of our role in this economic society. The reader of this column is by self-selection, interested in the Business World (pun intended) which encompasses by necessity the world of investments, simplified here as Finance, but more importantly, reads this to understand how she or he may figure in the future economy; an economy which is market-driven, global, dynamic, but, most importantly, socially constructed. The latter meaning, we are economic actors; we have the agency to create (academic term “perform”) the markets, we and not just the governments who regulate, we and not just the corporations and funds handling the trillions of wealth. We change society by nuancing the changes which occur in the economic systems whose logics control it, and we change those logics by an intellectual exercise of perusing alternative perspectives. I call this exercise: Rethinking Finance.

I begin my weekly Thursday column with a couple of simple questions. First, why was the economy created? The economy — this exchange of goods and services — was created to promote some level of fairness, to provide opportunities so that people with different skills can add value in different ways. In a functioning economy, the sum of the parts is greater than the whole; if we harness our potential as cooperative human beings, we are able in theory to create a lifestyle which benefits and elevates us all. Thus, the economy was created to serve society to improve human life conditions. But has the economy fulfilled that role? The short answer is “No.” There are too many sources to cite the not-so anecdotal truth that more than 70% of the world’s population own less than P500,000 in assets whereas close to 90% of the wealth is concentrated in less than 10% of the global population. While this is a bleak reality, the bleaker issue lies in the fact that this has been a worsening trend, with millionaires set to grow five times more than the rate in which the poor are expected to shrink. The COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated this situation further with a “new” set of poor who were not previously poor, about to fall into this prison. Imagine… from nouveau riche to nouveau pauvre! We have more resources than ever, yet we are consuming resources at an alarming pace to the point where we literally may have no earth in which to exist. We are working more than ever, with high levels of stress. The economy is not serving us. Rather, we are slaves of the economy.

And why was Finance created? These days we associate Finance with Wall Street, but Italians like to credit themselves with having established the disciplines of both Finance and Accounting. The first formal bank was established in 1397 by the Medicis in Florence. A little later on in the 1400s, Luca Pacioli, a Franciscan friar and collaborator of Leonardo da Vinci, was said to have invented double-entry bookkeeping. The idea back then was to create systems and institutions that would make transactions efficient but safe and transparent, with the ultimate objective of allowing a person to save for future purchases. Debit in Latin means “he owes” and Credit means “he trusts.” A far cry from us making our daily credit card purchases feeling that banks use our scoring to decide on what interest rate would be most beneficial for their profit margins. Calculation was created to make things less complex, to simplify economic assets into numbers and ratios that allow us to communicate with transparency and focus our attention on preventing future deviations and errors. And yet, has Finance fulfilled its role? The short answer is again, a resounding “No.” From bankruptcy cases like Parmalat whose books had faked assets over a 15-year period, to Madoff-esque Ponzi schemes, to the use of derivatives to package bad loans leading to a loss of 9 million jobs in the United States during the mortgage crisis of 2008-2009, to speculative bubbles that have benefitted techpreneurs.

Close to a decade ago in my Doctoral dissertation of the same title, I had argued that it is mainly during situations of a colossal system breakdown that we are prompted to question extant models, which have failed, and then scrutinize received wisdom. The institutional theory literatures have said over and over that markets in crisis are susceptible to transformation, actors begin to pursue interests they value highly, resulting in field-level change. Why the non-transformation, then? Why are the shared beliefs not enough to create and trigger systemic change?

I do not have the answers, but I don’t believe that all is lost. I am a social constructivist. It means that I believe that there is no fixed reality; but instead, people construct reality. And in our everyday interactions, we construct the kind of finance we want. How can finance and society intersect (again)? As a pragmatist, I focus this discussion on two pillars: Responsible Investment which deals with the formal financial sector, and Financial Inclusion, which addresses the informal economy. In responsible investment, we question where exactly our money goes to, understanding the externalities that come with putting every peso into a bank account. Understanding that each centavo put into the market economy, whether as a passive or active investor by necessity, already puts us in a position of agency and influence, no matter how minute. In Financial inclusion, we nitpick the barriers faced by the people with no agency and influence. Interestingly, the non-transformation of society seems to be correlated with the lack of democratization of finance — and therein lies my ultimate hunch: first, we democratize finance, then we socially re-construct it, then we use it for a wider social agenda.

 

Daniela “Danie” Laurel is a business journalist and anchor-producer of BusinessWorld Live on One News, formerly Bloomberg TV Philippines. Prior to this, she was a permanent professor of Finance at IESEG School of Management in Paris and maintains teaching affiliations at IESEG and the Ateneo School of Government. She has also worked as an investment banker in The Netherlands. Ms. Laurel holds a Ph.D. in Management Engineering with concentrations in Finance and Accounting from the Politecnico di Milano in Italy and an MBA from the Universidad Carlos III de Madrid.

Creative measures for tough times

RACOOL STUDIO/FREEPIK

A couple of weeks ago, I opined that any constitutional review should be done only after the May 2022 elections, which are just about 15 months away. This is on the premise that the timing of such an initiative will always be politically suspect if done on or before a presidential election year. So, the argument was not against the need for charter change, but more on when to do it.

But, after hearing recent reports on the state of the Philippine economy, on how a more contagious — and possibly deadlier — variant of the COVID-19 has been spreading worldwide, and on the ballooning government debt, I am now acknowledging the urgency of revising the 1987 Constitution’s “economic” provisions.

We need foreign money, now more than ever. Economic recovery is far from reach. Desperate times call for desperate measures. All economies worldwide are in trouble, resulting in stiff competition for foreign capital. But we are unlikely to get the volume of foreign direct investments (FDIs) we require unless we finally allow 100% foreign ownership of businesses.

This is my only motivation for now supporting charter change. However, this support is on the condition that only “economic” provisions will be revised; that Filipino businesses will continue to be protected; that any amendment must be approved by both the Senate and the House voting separately; and, that any amendment must be ratified through a plebiscite to be held also during the May 2022 national and local elections.

The House leadership says charter change aims to allow Congress to pass bills that can “free up the economy to foreign investors.” I believe, however, that we should go beyond simply empowering Congress to do that. Otherwise, we might just find ourselves amending the charter now but still getting bogged down in the future by the need for several enabling laws from Congress.

By clearly stating in the Constitution that full foreign ownership of investments can be allowed — or by simply removing the provisions that restrict foreign investments — and considering meantime the proposal of the Finance department for long-term 99-year leases on land by foreigners rather than allowing foreign ownership, then maybe we can move quickly on urgently needed changes to the charter’s economic provisions.

We have a full-year in 2021 to focus on specific provisions to amend and to debate all their pros and cons. The substance can be settled eventually, but we first need to agree on the mode or process for change. This, to me, is the more important consideration now. Lawmakers should immediately agree on how they can best expedite constitutional changes.

I had lunch recently with former Finance Secretary Margarito Teves to talk about this. I have always known Gary, as well as his late father Herminio “Meniong” Teves, to be straight-shooters. I also reckoned Gary has authority to speak on the matter considering that he was an elected delegate to the 1971 Constitutional Convention. He was also a three-term congressman, a former president of the Land Bank of the Philippines, and was Finance Secretary in 2005-2010.

Having been part of the group that tackled changes to the 1935 Constitution, having been in Congress for three terms, having tackled land ownership and agrarian reform issues while at Land Bank, and having been Finance Secretary when the country had to deal with the 2007-2008 Financial Crisis as well as the destruction brought about in 2009 by typhoons Ondoy and Pepeng, and being the economist that he is, it is not surprising that Gary is in favor of charter change.

He notes that the Philippines is the only country in ASEAN where restrictions in foreign ownership are embodied in the Constitution; that we are also the most restrictive country in ASEAN as measured by the OECD FDI Regulatory Restrictiveness Index; and, that we were 6th out of seven countries — beating only Cambodia — in terms of FDIs in 2019, based on the UNCTAD World Investment Report.

By removing foreign equity restrictions in the Constitution, he said, we will “send a positive signal to investors and improve the country’s investment climate.” And this, he said, can result in more FDIs, “generate jobs, and provide a more sustainable economic growth.” The Philippines’ competitiveness ranking might also go up, he added.

The target, he said, is to delete provisions in the 1987 Constitution that “restrict or limit foreign equity participation in the use of land and natural resources; operation of public utilities, educational institutions, mass media and advertising; and allow subsequent Congresses, through ordinary legislation, the power to regulate, limit, or even restore the restrictions in the future due to changing circumstances and/or conditions.”

Deleting these specific provisions, and ratifying the amendments by May 2022, will immediately open the country to more FDIs by next year. Foreign investors will need not wait for enabling laws to open up certain industries to their investments. Deletion will be a quick response to the economy’s emergency situation. Land issues can also be set aside, meantime, considering the proposal for long-term 99-year leases rather than foreign ownership.

Instead of Congress becoming a constituent assembly, or convening a constitutional convention to amend the Constitution, Gary proposes that both the House of Representatives and the Senate start by approving a joint resolution that will focus solely on removing restrictive economic provisions in the 1987 Constitution.

Then, the Senate President and the Speaker of the House of Representatives recommend to the President to convene the Legislative Executive Development Advisory Council (LEDAC) to discuss and agree on the substance and the process of the change initiative. LEDAC can also set the timetable for the process, to ensure that proposed amendments are ratified by May 2022.

It will be a piece-meal effort, not like what we did in 1971 and in 1986 in overhauling the 1935 and 1973 constitutions wholesale. The need of the times is not for a complete revision or the drafting of a “new” constitution, but rather a “revision” of the existing basic law to allow for greater flexibility in managing the troubled economy particularly during the pandemic. Why rewrite the entire 100-page book when we need to edit only one page?

Whether Gary’s proposal is actually feasible, legally, is another question altogether. However, the process starts with the Executive and the Legislative convening the LEDAC and coming together to agree on what specifically needs to be revised and how to do it quickly. The approach is unprecedented, so legal minds should chime in on it. If the process will require an additional amendment on the “process” or modes of revising the charter, then this can be part of the initiative as well.

In the US, constitutional amendments may be proposed and sent to the states for ratification by either the US Congress, whenever a two-thirds majority in both the Senate and the House of Representatives deem it necessary; or a national convention, called by Congress for this purpose. To date, this convention option has never been used.

An amendment must be also ratified by three-fourths of the states by either the legislatures of three-fourths of the states or state ratifying conventions in three-fourths of the states. To date, only one amendment has been ratified through the state convention method. All others were ratified through votes of state legislatures.

This is a process that we can consider, if our laws will allow it. The House and the Senate can propose specific amendments to certain provisions of the Constitution, vote on them separately, and then submit them for ratification through a national plebiscite. No need for a constituent assembly or a constitutional convention with elected delegates. If the present constitution will not allow this, then we can precondition the approval of the “economic” amendments to the plebiscite’s requisite approval of the amendment “process.” We can put both proposals to a vote at the same time.

The US Constitution has been amended 27 times since 1789. There have been 33 proposed amendments to it, with 27 passed so far. The US Constitution has never been rewritten or redrafted in whole, but only amended in parts in the last 232 years. The Philippines, on the other hand, has had three constitutions since 1935 or the last 86 years. We don’t need a new Constitution. We just have to revise the present one to make it more attuned to desperate times.

 

Marvin Tort is a former managing editor of BusinessWorld, and a former chairman of the Philippines Press Council

matort@yahoo.com

What businesses can learn from marriages during the pandemic

There is something romantic, even spiritual, about marriage during the pandemic. A couple exchanging permanent vows set against a backdrop of extreme uncertainty… what could be a more enduring image of romantic love?

The pandemic has changed how we celebrate marriages. When I got engaged in 2018, my fiancée and I planned a grand event. Then, the pandemic happened. Forced to rethink, we agreed to hold an intimate wedding in July 2020. It was a stripped version of what my wife and I had wanted, but we had no regrets. After all, the essence of marriage is celebrating love and committing before God and our closest loved ones as witnesses.

In a world of temporary transactions, instant gratification, and ever-changing environment, can anything still remain relatively permanent?

My experience and witnessing my peers also get married during the pandemic gave me a deeper appreciation of marriage as a covenant of love. Against all odds in history, from ancient plagues to the COVID-19 pandemic, perhaps what has allowed our society to survive and thrive is how we treasure authentic human relationships.

Perhaps as businesses and other organizations struggle to survive the pandemic, we can learn from marriages in pandemic times.

At its core, marriage goes beyond win-win negotiations and transactions. It goes beyond contractual obligations to comply with the demands of the other. Rather, a marriage is a permanent covenant in which a couple commits to serve each other and allow each other to flourish. It is also a commitment to start a family with offspring nourished with love.

Businesses and organizations cannot anymore just rely on transactions to survive because these are short-term and anchored on convenience. Instead, they should cultivate authentic human relationships that are anchored on trust and commitment.

Consider the case of Gravity Payments, a US-based credit card processing and financial services company, whose founder, Dan Price, gave up millions in executive compensation to raise his employees’ compensation to about $70,000 annually. Mainstream business managers criticized this move, given the implications on minimum revenues needed to sustain it. When the pandemic hit, the mainstream business managers were almost proven correct — Gravity Payments was on the brink of bankruptcy. However, going against classical assumptions of maximizing self-interest without regard to others, the employees of Gravity Payments volunteered to give up their salaries, and went beyond their job descriptions to help their clients and the company recover. This created a virtuous domino effect in which Gravity Payments and its clients were able to withstand the initial shocks of the pandemic long enough to continue operating. Because of this sacrifice, the clients of Gravity Payments were able to survive.

Afterwards, this newfound stability allowed the employees to regain their salaries. This is a true win-win for everyone.

My takeaway from this case is that when businesses put a premium on cultivating authentic human relationships, people go beyond transactions and short-term contracts. We go beyond selfish self-preservation and harness altruism (and should I say, “love”?) for each other that is truly interdependent and mutually flourishing.

In a world where the only permanent thing is change, we need a sobering level of authenticity to cultivate a kind of love that aspires only to change for the better. Under the old normal, perhaps it was much easier to succumb to short-term convenient transactions. However, perhaps the pandemic forces us to put more faith in humanity. Perhaps it is time to retire a myopic view of transactions. What we need to survive, and even thrive, is a covenant that vows to be in authentic service of each other.

 

Patrick Adriel H. Aure is an Assistant Professor at the Management and Organization Department, Ramon V. del Rosario College of Business. As head of the Social Enterprise Research Network of the Center for Business Research and Development (CBRD-SERN) and as co-chair for strategic directions of the Lasallian Social Enterprise for Economic Development (LSEED) committee at De La Salle University, he advocates for social entrepreneurship.

patrick.aure@dlsu.edu.ph

Don’t mention it

IN INFORMAL CONVERSATIONS, it is easy to forget who you’re talking to, and what topics are safe. The freewheeling nature of the exchange may lead to a subject best left unmentioned, at least with this particular person. Virtual chats are specifically perilous as one tends to overlook who are in the conversation, especially those with videos turned off.

Certain topics need to be studiously avoided. Politics and religion are on top of this list. They can also cover money, like how much someone makes in his job or how heavily another is abusing her credit card. Entangled relationships of other people are dicey in any conversation. A subject can loom up like a sprinting bicycle in the next intersection, if conversation were a street. A slight swerve is needed to avoid a collision, maybe a detour to a side street is where this one leads to. Harmless topics are not exempt from the taboo. A casual mention of a movie seen together can prove to be a speed bump too — maybe you took somebody else to that one… I haven’t seen that movie.

(It is clear here that people with simple lives have less topics to avoid, if any at all.)

In the corporate setting, there are taboo topics too, especially when bumping into the boss. Unless it is specifically in the agenda during a performance rating discussion, the matter of compensation and how much more you deserve (and how someone less worthy is getting a better car) is not a topic to bring up when riding the elevator with the CEO. (This is not a subject for an “elevator presentation.”)

Short and enforced intimacy such as random moments in the elevator or escalator for that matter, require no conversation at all. A bow of recognition or deference is all that is appropriate. (Can I see you at the office?)

Bumping into a former partner with whom one had a long liaison ending in a noisy door-slamming (I want to burn down your house and I will always hate you with a smoldering rage.) can sometimes be a case of bad timing. (You thought she was in another time zone.) Not even a nod of recognition to acknowledge previous intimacy, including the location of a tattoo (a vineyard of grapes, fermenting), is allowed. It is best to avoid even a casual greeting — so, is your wedding taking place in October, after the vaccine? No eye contact, please.

Skirting certain issues apply even to those one is currently in good terms with. Maybe, some relational typhoon in the past had almost caused the partnership to be blown off with the roof. It is foolhardy to bring up such a memory over coffee — how did you really feel that time? Even a movie being watched together over Netflix portraying a somewhat similar situation relating perhaps to a gambling addiction, infidelity, or the shabby treatment of relatives can bring out a past subject that has already been stored in the most inaccessible memory attic, along with clothes that no longer fit.

Certain irritations and elbow-digs at the most unexpected moments can be traced to a taboo topic still rattling around in the mind. Psychologists and counsellors may advise you to confront any subject head-on, rather than studiously avoiding discussing it at all. Still, summoning a radioactive topic can only lead to a chain reaction leading to critical mass.

As in Pandora’s box, which was really a jar, opening a topic already closed by mutual consent, can release evils that cannot be controlled: rage, pain, and vengeance. In the myth of Pandora’s jar, the one at the bottom was hope. But this last item never got to be released and had no chance to work its magic.

Taboo subjects that can only cause hurt and pain are best left unsaid. When it is clear one refuses to discuss a certain topic, the best course of action is keeping the lid on. Even just another day of peace seems worth the effort of avoiding taboos. There are so many safe topics to talk about like leftover food, climate change, and the future of the performing arts after the pandemic.

After all, even an expression of gratitude “Thank You” is routinely met with the plea for moving on — Don’t mention it.

 

Tony Samson is Chairman and CEO, TOUCH xda

ar.samson@yahoo.com

Kremlin critic Navalny jailed, declares Putin as ‘the Underwear Poisoner’

MOSCOW — A Russian court jailed Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny on Tuesday, ignoring the West in a ruling the opposition politician blamed on President Vladimir Putin’s personal hatred and fear of him.

The Moscow court handed Mr. Navalny a three-and-a-half-year sentence, but his lawyer said the anti-corruption blogger would actually serve two years and eight months in jail because of time already spent under house arrest.

His lawyers said they would appeal.

The decision, which followed nationwide protests calling for Navalny’s release, will further strain relations with the West, which is considering imposing sanctions on Russia over its handling of the case.

The United States, Britain, Germany and the EU (European Union) urged Moscow to immediately free Mr. Navalny, with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken saying Washington would coordinate closely with allies to hold Russia accountable.

Russia is already under numerous Western sanctions however, and analysts say the West’s options for more pressure are limited. A Navalny ally had urged the West before the hearing to hit Mr. Putin’s inner circle with personal sanctions.

Russia has suggested that Mr. Navalny is a CIA asset, a charge he rejects, and has told the West to stay out of its domestic affairs.

Mr. Navalny, one of Putin’s most prominent critics, was arrested on Jan. 17 for alleged parole violations after returning from Germany where he had been recovering from being poisoned with a military-grade nerve agent.

Mr. Navalny said Russian state security agents had put the poison in his underpants, something the Kremlin denied. He used Tuesday’s hearing to try to frame Mr. Putin’s place in history.

“(Putin’s) only method is killing people. However much he pretends to be a great geo-politician, he’ll go down in history as a poisoner. There was Alexander the Liberator, Yaroslav the Wise, and Putin the Underwear Poisoner,” said Mr. Navalny.

His supporters, on hearing the ruling, encouraged people to gather in central Moscow though riot police had already taken up position. The Moscow metro shut down three central stations.

Reuters reporters saw hundreds of protesters and the police detain some of them. Some of them chanted, “Putin is a thief!” and “Putin is a poisoner!”

Outside the court earlier on Tuesday, Reuters reporters saw riot police detain around 70 of Mr. Navalny’s supporters. The OVD-Info monitoring group later reported 503 arrests across Moscow.

After his arrest, Mr. Navalny released a YouTube video making allegations about Mr. Putin’s wealth that was viewed over 100 million times. The Kremlin said it was false.

Tuesday’s hearing focused on Mr. Navalny’s alleged parole violations over a suspended sentence in a 2014 embezzlement case Mr. Navalny says was trumped up.

POLITICAL RIVAL
Mr. Navalny, in a fiery speech to the court, alleged he was going to be jailed because of Putin’s concerns about him as a political rival, a suggestion the Kremlin has laughed off, referring to Mr. Navalny as a marginal figure without wide popular support.

Putin, 68, has dominated Russian politics since 2000 and could rule until 2036 under constitutional changes approved in a referendum last year.

“Someone did not want me to take a single step on my country’s territory as a free man. And we know who and we know why — the hatred and fear of one man, living in a bunker, whom I offended by surviving when he tried to have me killed,” Mr. Navalny, 44, told the court from inside a glass cage.

After the verdict was read out, Yulia, his wife, removed the mask she was wearing because of the coronavirus pandemic and waved to her husband before giving him a shrug. Mr. Navalny shouted: “Don’t worry. Everything will be ok.”

Mr. Putin, who the Kremlin said was not following the Navalny hearing because he was busy with affairs of state, said in December that reports the Russian state had poisoned Mr. Navalny were part of a US-backed plot to try to discredit him.

Mr. Putin said Moscow would have finished the job if it had wanted Mr. Navalny dead.

Tuesday’s hearing was the result of a request from Moscow’s state prison authority which has accused Mr. Navalny of violating the terms of a suspended three-and-a-half-year prison sentence for embezzlement.

Mr. Navalny said the conviction, which was criticized by the European Court of Human Rights at the time, was politically motivated.

A prison service representative told the court that Mr. Navalny violated public order many times since being handed the suspended sentence and had systematically failed to report in.

Mr. Navalny told the court he had been unable to report to the prison service at the end of last year because he was recovering in Germany from being poisoned. The prison service said its complaints pre-dated his poisoning and that Mr. Navalny had in any case been well enough to meet journalists after being discharged from a Berlin hospital in September.

Mr. Navalny, already serving a 30-day detention sentence in connection with the same case, told the court: “On what grounds are you saying you didn’t know where I was? You’re misleading the court.”

Supporters have staged two straight weekends of nationwide protests demanding he be freed, despite a massive show of police force, the threat of arrest, bitter cold and the pandemic.

While the trigger for those protests was Mr. Navalny’s arrest, some protesters say they have also taken to the streets to vent their frustration over declining living standards. — Reuters

Two Chinese vaccines remained active vs S.Africa variant but effect reduced

BEIJING — Two COVID-19 vaccines from Chinese companies including Sinopharm triggered immunity against a highly transmissible coronavirus variant first found in South Africa, but their effect appeared weaker, a small-sample lab study released on Tuesday showed.

Variants of the virus have stirred concern that they might weaken effects of vaccines and treatments developed prior to their emergence.

Twelve serum samples each taken from recipients of two vaccines developed by a subsidiary of China National Pharmaceutical Group (Sinopharm) and a unit of Chongqing Zhifei Biological Products retained neutralizing activity against the South African variant, their researchers said in a paper.

The paper was written by researchers from Sinopharm-affiliated Beijing Institute of Biological Products, the Institute of Microbiology of Chinese Academy of Sciences, which is co-developing a candidate with Zhifei unit, and two other Chinese agencies.

However, the samples’ activity against the variant was weaker than against the original virus and another variant currently spreading globally, according to the paper published on website BioRxiv ahead its peer-review.

The activity reduction “should be taken into account for its impact for the clinical efficacy of these vaccines,” they said.

The Sinopharm vaccine is approved in China for general public use and is also used in several other countries including the United Arab Emirates (UAE). The Zhifei shot is in late-stage clinical trials in China and overseas. 

Preliminary clinical trial data on vaccines from Novavax Inc and Johnson & Johnson also showed they were significantly less effective at preventing COVID-19 in trial participants in South Africa, where the potent new variant is widespread. — Reuters

Record number of Hong Kong residents relocate to Taiwan

A RECORD number of Hong Kong residents have relocated to Taiwan following China’s crackdown on the city’s protest movement and the implementation of a controversial new national security law.

Newly released figures from Taiwan’s Immigration Agency show that more than 10,800 Hong Kongers received local resident permits in 2020, nearly double the amount who relocated to the democratic island the prior year.

The number of Hong Kongers relocating to Taiwan in 2020 is the highest in at least three decades, according to agency data that goes back to 1991.

The figures underscore the desire among some Hong Kong residents to seek a new home and more stable political environment outside of Asia’s main financial hub after months long protests and China’s crackdown on dissent. It also comes as the UK launches a new visa program and path to citizenship for British National (Overseas) passport holders in Hong Kong.

Following China’s move on June 30 to impose the security law on Hong Kong with no local government debate, many prominent activists have been arrested, charged or fled into exile in the UK and elsewhere. In August, China’s coast guard also apprehended 12 Hong Kong activists fleeing to Taiwan by boat. 

The security law prohibits subversion, terrorism, secession and “collusion” with foreign forces. While China has said the law is necessary to restore stability after the protests in 2019, foreign governments said the legislation has been used to target democracy activists and is eroding freedoms Beijing pledged to maintain after the 1997 handover.

Taiwan shares similar aspects of Chinese culture and has a government that cheered on the city’s pro-democracy movement. It has been a favored destination for Hong Kongers looking to leave their home city. — Bloomberg

Recovered COVID patients likely protected for at least six months, study finds

LONDON — Almost all people previously infected with coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) have high levels of antibodies for at least six months that are likely to protect them from reinfection with the disease, results of a major UK study showed on Wednesday.

Scientists said the study, which measured levels of previous COVID-19 infection in populations across Britain, as well as how long antibodies persisted in those infected, should provide some reassurance that swift cases of reinfection will be rare.

“The vast majority of people retain detectable antibodies for at least six months after infection with the coronavirus,” said Naomi Allen, a professor and chief scientist at the UK Biobank, where the study was carried out.

Among participants who had tested positive for previous COVID-19 infection, 99% retained antibodies to SARS-CoV-2 for three months, the results showed. After the full six months of follow-up in the study, 88% still had them.

“Although we cannot be certain how this relates to immunity, the results suggest that people may be protected against subsequent infection for at least six months following natural infection,” Allen said.

She said the findings were also consistent with results of other studies in the United Kingdom and Iceland which found that antibodies to the coronavirus tended to persist for several months in those who have had the disease and recovered.

A study of UK healthcare workers published last month found that people who have had COVID-19 were likely to be protected for at least five months, but noted that those with antibodies may still be able to carry and spread the virus.

The UK Biobank study also found that the proportion of the UK population with COVID-19 antibodies – a measure known as seroprevalence – rose from 6.6% at the start of the study period in May/June 2020 to 8.8% by November/December 2020.

SARS-CoV-2 seroprevalence was most common in London, at 12.4%, and least common in Scotland at 5.5%, it found. — Reuters

Gilas to go for sweep of FIBA Asia Cup Qualifiers assignments

By Michael Angelo S. Murillo, Senior Reporter

A WIN by Gilas Pilipinas in the third window of the International Basketball Association (FIBA) Asia Cup Qualifiers (ACQ) this month pretty much secures for it a spot in the continental tournament, but the Samahang Basketbol ng Pilipinas (SBP) wants the team to go for a sweep of its assignments if possible.

Currently leading Group A in the qualifiers with a 3-0 record, the Philippines has put itself in solid position to advance to the FIBA Asia Cup happening in Indonesia later this year.

The Philippine national men’s basketball team will try to secure the win that propels it to the Asia Cup in its scheduled three matches — two versus Korea (2-0) and one against Indonesia (1-2) — in the relocated window in Doha, Qatar, this month.

Thailand (0-4) is the other team in Group A.

For SBP President Al Panlilio, Gilas Pilipinas has always been out to get the best finish it can get every time it competes, and the ongoing qualifiers are no different.

“Of course, we want to win all those three games against Korea and one against Indonesia. We are still out there to win,” said Mr. Panlilio during the online Philippine Sportswriters Association Forum on Tuesday.

“It’s one game (needed to advance), but we will try to win every game. We want to make sure that we are competitive in all of them,” he added.

Mr. Panlilio, also an executive of Smart Communications and PLDT, shared that preparations of Gilas have been going well on the lead of SBP program director Tab Baldwin and head coach Jong Uichico.

“They are planning their strategies and assessing the competition. It’s very important that we prepare our players very well,” said the SBP head, whose organization is also in the process of gathering all the requirements of the team to be able to fly to Doha and compete.

In the third window, Gilas will parade a team composed of a mix of Philippine Basketball Association players and cadet members, who are currently gathered at the INSPIRE Sports Academy in Laguna in a training “bubble.”

Included in the pool players are PBA players Kiefer Ravena and Raul Soyud (NLEX), Troy Rosario and Roger Pogoy (TNT), Justin Chua (Phoenix Super LPG), and CJ Perez (San Miguel).

They are joined by PBA Gilas draftees Isaac Go, Rey Suerte and Matt and Mike Nieto, and cadets Juan and Javi Gomez de Liaño, Will Navarro, Calvin Oftana, Kemark Carino, Dave Ildefonso, Angelo Kouame (naturalized player candidate), Justine Baltazar, and Dwight Ramos.

Also set to join the pool is National Basketball Association G League player Kai Sotto, who returned from the United States on Tuesday night. He will undergo necessary quarantine and tests before joining the team in training.

In the training bubble, too, are assistant coaches Norman Black, Caloy Garcia, and Sandy Arespacochaga.

The Philippines was supposed to host Groups A and C in the third window of the FIBA ACQ, but the SBP had to pull the plug on it because of the country’s ongoing travel ban on incoming foreigners from countries with known cases of the new variants of the coronavirus.

Group C has New Zealand, Australia, Guam, and Hong Kong.

Doha agreed to accommodate Group A matches, along with those in Group B and E.

Golf authorities turn focus to reining in power hitters

LONDON — Golf’s lawmakers are considering changes to equipment and the implementation of ‘local rules’ in an attempt to tame the power of the game’s massive hitters.

The Royal and Ancient (R&A), in conjunction with the United States Golf Association (USGA), said they are reengaging with the golf industry to achieve a more sustainable future for the game, fearing courses could become obsolete.

American Bryson DeChambeau, who won last year’s US Open, topped the 2020 PGA driving distance charts with a colossal 329-yard average, with 78 players averaging 300 yards or more.

He trialed a 48-inch driver for the tournament, the maximum permitted shaft length, at the US Open but new proposals could see the limit set at 46 inches.

One “area of interest” for the R&A and USGA is for the potential use of local rules that would specify the use of clubs and/or balls, resulting in shorter distances.

“This would enable committees conducting competitions to stipulate whether such equipment should be used,” a joint statement said. “It could be available at all levels of play and would also allow golfers playing outside of competition to choose for themselves.”

Stakeholders are being invited to participate in the process by sharing any data they might have on the topics by Nov. 2.

While dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic has been the priority of golf’s authorities or the past year, focus has now returned to the issue of controlling distance and acting on the Distance Insights Report published last February.

The report said increased hitting distances changed the strategic challenge of the game, altering the variety of skills needed to be successful and risked making courses obsolete.

The R&A and USGA are also seeking comment from manufacturers on proposed Equipment Standards changes, namely a reduction to 46 inches for maximum club length (not including putters), golf ball testing methods and changes to the testing tolerance in relation to a club’s “spring-like” effect.

Stakeholders, including manufacturers, have until March 4 to comment on the proposed club-length limits.

Mike Davis, Chief Executive Officer of the USGA, said hitting distances had to be addressed.

“Hitting distances have consistently increased through time and, if left unchecked, could threaten the long-term future of our game at every level and every golf course on which it is played,” he said in a statement.

“This is the first forward step in a journey and a responsibility the USGA and The R&A share with the worldwide golf community, to ensure that golf continues to thrive for the next hundred years and beyond.”

R&A Chief Executive Martin Slumbers said it was a “critical topic” and looked forward to insights from the golf industry.

“We remain fully committed to conducting this hugely important exercise for the sport thoroughly, efficiently, and collaboratively,” he said. — Reuters

LGUs focus on 2nd session of online PSC national summit

THE online national summit of the Philippine Sports Commission (PSC) resumes on Thursday, focusing on the local government units and their sports development programs.

Davao del Norte (DavNor) Sports and Youth Development head Giovanni Gulanes will be the resource speaker in the second session of the sport summit, dubbed “Sports Conversations,” and is expected to share their experience in DavNor under the session “Sports in Local Governments (A Model System).”

Mr. Gulanes will talk about DavNor and their hosting of local multisport festivals, like the Palarong Pambansa (National Games), Batang Pinoy (Philippine Youth Games), as well as share how their province has successfully and effectively implemented their sports program.

“We are excited to showcase DavNor as a model. Hopefully, it could inspire other leaders and coordinators from different LGUs to pursue their own sports development programs,” said PSC chairman William Ramirez in a statement.

Originally scheduled for February last year, the 2021 national sports summit has been readjusted as a three-phased project.

The summit has taken the form of a series of weekly conference-type online sessions hosted by the PSC via Zoom. It will run until May this year.

Sports Conversations is aimed at taking insights of different sports stakeholders and using those as foundations in crafting a sustainable and workable short to long-term plan for Philippine sports.

The PSC said all data gathered from the Sports Conversations series will be processed and studied to create a new set of resolutions to be presented to sports leaders for action.

The summit kicked off on Jan. 27 with President Rodrigo R. Duterte officially opening the online gathering.

The first speaker was United States Sports Academy (USSA) President T.J. Rosandich, who talked about “Sports Success from a First World Perspective.” — Michael Angelo S. Murillo

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