Biz Buzz: Family first
The Senate is set to resume its hearings on the supposedly anomalous Development Bank of the Philippines loan to former trade minister Roberto “Bobby” Ongpin on Tuesday, with no less than Senator Serge Osmeña III promising to nail the businessman and former DBP president Rey David this time around.
The hearing was originally scheduled for last week, November 29, but was reset to make way for the poll fraud investigation.
Sadly for all the spectators involved, Ongpin had scheduled to fly out last weekend to celebrate his golden wedding anniversary with his Chilean wife on December 8.
“As you know, this is a once-in-a-lifetime event,” he said in a letter to Senate committee chairman Sen. TG Guingona.
The businessman’s first grandson was also born a few days ago in London, compelling him and the rest of his wife’s relative—who flew in from Valparaiso, Chile—to hold the celebrations in the British capital.
“Additionally, it is my wife’s birthday on December 22 and my own 75th birthday will be on Jan. 6, 2012,” he said, adding that he will be back in Manila on January 8.
In the same letter, he made an “earnest appeal” to the senators to schedule the next hearing anytime after his return because he “very much wanted” to be in attendance to answer the lawmakers’ queries.
To no one’s surprise, his request for a rescheduling was denied, although we are told, he was excused from Tuesday’s proceedings.
Which is probably just as well for cable TV viewers who need their bloodlust satiated.
With Ongpin absent, senators will probably discard all the niceties they had during the last hearing and resume pounding on the ex-DBP president whose explanations about the complex transactions during his tenure were lost on the public with short attention spans.
Incidentally—just like the runup to previous hearings—anti-Ongpin materials have been circulated to various news organizations in recent days, all sent from e-mail accounts that were either anonymous or which used pseudonyms.—Daxim L. Lucas
To bid or not to bid
A newly hatched, big property joint-venture deal between a government corporation and a major property developer involving hundreds of hectares of land in a major economic zone is at risk of being rescinded, stalled or renegotiated as some parties are now questioning the lack of public bidding that led to the awarding.
These critics argued that under the P-Noy administration’s much-hyped “Matuwid na Daan” (righteous way) framework, bidding out a contract should be the norm rather than the exception especially for a massive project like this, to ensure transparency and a level playing field for all interested parties.
Industry sources said the proponents justified the privately negotiated deal by noting that there was such leeway in forging ventures within an economic zone. On the other hand, critics claimed such incentives applied only to foreign investors relocating in the ecozone. (Makes one wonder why the special favor for foreigners when local businessmen should also be treated the same.) Also, they said that the sheer size of the project called for such a competitive bid.
Related parties critical of the deal claimed that a bidding would assure the government of unlocking the best value out of its prime land bank, especially now that there were a lot of groups more than eager to do business in the Philippines (which recently improved its ranking in a global corruption perception index made annually by Transparency International).
Watch out for more fireworks unrelated to the seasonal revelry.—Doris C. Dumlao
Happy with Piolo
Actor Piolo Pascual may not have fulfilled KC Concepcion’s “basic needs” but there’s at least one party whose expectations he has exceeded.
At a yearend meeting with the business press on Friday, Sun Life of Canada Philippines chief executive officer Riza Mantaring was besieged with queries neither related to life protection nor insurance products.
Guests were more interested in her view on Piolo’s breakup with KC (who issued cryptic statements on the issue) and especially because the actor is one of the celebrity advocates of Sun Life’s financial literacy program.
Incidentally, Piolo had just visited Sun Life’s new headquarters in Fort Bonifacio last week and met with the local staff of the financial conglomerate.
“Judging by people’s reaction, I don’t think people care,” Mantaring said. “Beyond all of that, Piolo has been a good person to work with. He’s very professional. He comes very early [for appointments], plus he makes an effort to study everything, even the statistics about Sun Life,” she said.
More than just an eye candy, he said the actor was knowledgeable on things like assets under management and even key Sun Life data locally and globally without the company prodding him to learn so.
“We’re very happy with the relationship,” she said. So, there.—Doris C. Dumlao
Whatever happened to…
If people are wondering what former Bankers Association of the Philippines president Deogracias “Sonny” Vistan is doing now, the answer is that he is now a director of Lucio Tan-owned Philippine National Bank.
At PNB, the former Citibanker heads the board’s audit and compliance committee where he puts to good use his experience heading large financial institutions like Equitable-PCI Bank, Solid Banking Corp. and the state-run Land Bank of the Philippines.
He is joined on the bank’s board by fellow Citibank alumnus Flor Tarriela and former Landbank president Florido Casuela, among others, where the order of the day is to prepare the former government bank for the expected merger with another Lucio Tan-owned financial institution, Allied Banking Corp., in 2012.
Meanwhile, another banking industry name who recently made a move was former Monetary Board member Nelly Favis-Villafuerte.
From holding office at the Bangko Sentral compound along Roxas Boulevard, the bar topnotcher—and wife of Representative Luis Villafuerte—will now be holding office at the Ortigas headquarters of Petron Corp. as one of its directors.—Daxim L. Lucas
Mix of old and new
After last Friday’s election of officers of the Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry, veteran PCCI official Miguel Varela emerged as the president of the country’s biggest business umbrella group (with some 20,000 members nationwide).
For many observers, Varela was a surprise winner since he was not initially touted as a frontrunner in the hotly contested race, where there were some 18 businessmen vying for the 15 vacant slots at stake.
Asked about Varela’s largely unexpected victory as PCCI president, one veteran of the group told Biz Buzz simply: “Mike came up with the most number of proxies.”
Juice and airline magnate Aflredo Yao emerged as the group’s chairman, while one of PCCI’s promising “[relatively] young guns,” Philip Romualdez, was chosen as a board director for 2012.
Expect this year’s PCCI leadership to take a more proactive stance in promoting the causes of small and medium enterprises, as well as being more engaged in the political debate like its more highbrow cousin, the Makati Business Club.
Looks like interesting times ahead for the influential business lobby group.—Daxim L. Lucas
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