SAN MIGUEL president and COO Ramon Ang, who is on the Asian Wall Street Journal?s elite ?power list? of 10 business leaders worldwide, had a good idea?a $10-billion idea, at that!

The idea was the cash-strapped Aquino (Part II) administration could raise at least $10 billion by selling one government corporation: Pagcor.

It is the casino monopoly owned by the government, which reportedly raked in P30 billion a year during the previous administration.

That idea sparked interests from all over the world. It somehow brought the Philippines back on the radar of investors overseas.

Some in business even thought it was timely, considering that economic prospects in this country did not merit even a sentence in the inaugural speech and first Sona of President Benigno Simeon Aquino III.

Top executives of US-based Citibank flew into the country to meet with the San Miguel executive. Among them was Citibank Asia Pacific CEO Shirish Apte.

I also heard that executives of international banks called up Ang to offer their support for his group in bidding for Pagcor?if it ever would happen.

Reports said that an unnamed Hong Kong-based casino operator also contacted the Pagcor offices to express interest in any bidding. I guess the unknown caller could be Stanley Ho. Who else could it be?

The idea even made some local groups jump. ICTSI founder Enrique Razon went on record to express his interest in bidding for Pagcor. So did, according to Makati street talk, the SM group of Henry Sy.

It was an idea, in other words, whose time has come.

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HOW did the Aquino (Part II) administration react to it all? The administration boys tried their level best to mangle the idea.

While the President called it ?interesting,? his handpicked top banana in Pagcor, Celestino Naguiat, attacked the idea publicly like it was the plague.

For instance, after more than a month of criticizing, lambasting, and maligning in media the previous Pagcor management, particularly the expansion of casino operations, the Pagcor boys all of a sudden found wisdom in putting up more casino ?resorts,? similar to the Pagcor ?city? initiated by the previous management.

Naguiat also noted something wrong in the math presented by Ang, particularly the $10-billion tag price.

The Pagcor chair questioned the amount, which was just about P45 billion at current exchange rate because, since Pagcor was making about P30 billion a year, a 25-year franchise would mean that the price should be about P75 billion.

Hello! Quick, somebody please tell our hero about this thing called NPV, or net present value?a common tool in cash flow analysis, the standard of sorts in appraising long-term investments prospects, something that everybody in business uses.

You can even do it automatically with the software program ?Excel,? boss. It is there at the corner!

Such is the kind of management brilliance we can probably expect in the government casino monopoly. To think, the current management is saying it wants the monopoly to grow before the Aquino (Part II) administration sells it.

No, sir, the Aquino (Part II) administration is not giving any indication that it is willing to let go of Pagcor, including the perks and whatever benefits there may be in the cash rich monopoly.

It is just that leaders of the Catholic Church do not want the government operating casinos. Pagcor, in effect, has turned the government into what the guys down here in my barangay call, in gambling terms, bangka.

Ours is the only country in the world where the government is bangka in gambling.

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BASED on recent pronouncements by the Palace boys, we should be glad we had hired highly paid lawyers in a case involving Naia Terminal 3.

That is the controversial project, started during the time of Kuya Eddie (aka President Ramos) and still not fully operational under the new administration of BS (aka Benigno Simeon).

The Palace boys rejoiced that the government won the Naia-3 arbitration case, which project proponent Piatco had filed with the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) in Singapore.

Thanks to the victory, the government supposedly saved more than $1 billion, which Piatco demanded as payment for the terminal.

Huh? $1 billion? Just where did the figure come from, the Palace boys forgot to explain. Everyone thought Piatco was asking for about $560 million.

Anyway, from what I gathered, the lawyers hired by the government for the Piatco case were paid only?get ready for this?some P2 billion.

It was such a bargain, considering that the lawyers did not win even a single one of the 23 counts of counterclaim filed against Piatco in Singapore, in which we claimed some $900 million in damages.

And so the government saved $565 million (Piatco?s claim) but lost $900 million (our counterclaim). Nice!

Add that to the fantastic bargain price of P2 billion in lawyers? fees, and you have cause for hearty rejoicing. Somebody is laughing all the way to the bank.

We heard that our legal team was made up of at least 10?again 10?lawyers to attend each of the hearings in Singapore. No kidding.

The competent government lawyers even called in support from foreign law firm White and Case for the arbitration case, which provided the expertise in arbitration.

Just why we still needed the services of the battery of Filipino lawyers, despite the presence of foreign experts, was something the Palace boys forgot to explain. Basta, we won!