Good day. Here are the stories for The Manila Times for Monday, July 11, 2022.
READ: Experts draw road map to normalcy
TO help the country's transition towards normalcy, Go Negosyo founder Jose Maria "Joey" Concepcion 3rd and the Advisory Council of Experts (ACE) have drawn up a list of recommendations that they will submit to President Ferdinand "Bongbong" Marcos Jr. His sentiments were shared by the ACE, which is composed of some of the country's foremost authorities on public health, molecular biology, disaster resilience, data insight and analysis and economics, which reiterated the importance for the government to prepare a pandemic exit strategy. In the panel are former National Task Force Against Covid-19 special adviser Dr. Teddy Herbosa, Covid-19 Technical Working Group chairwoman Dr. Nina Gloriani, Vaccine Expert Panel member Dr. Rontgene Solante, infectious diseases expert Dr. Benjamin Co, Philippine College of Physicians President Dr. Maricar Limpin, health reform advocate Dr. Tony Leachon, OCTA Research fellows Dr. Michael Tee, Prof. Ranjit Rye, Dr. Guido David and Fr. Nic Austriaco, economist Romy Bernardo, and Go Negosyo Senior Adviser Josephine Romero. The list of Concepcion, the former presidential adviser for entrepreneurship, and ACE includes suggestions such as an alert level plan similar to the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council's color-coded system. The "traffic light" system uses colors to denote the different stages of readiness, their corresponding pre-requisite metrics using health care utilization rates (HCUR) and average daily attack rate (ADAR), and mask rules for each region.
READ: BBM better, working in isolation – Palace
President Ferdinand "Bongbong" Marcos Jr.'s condition continues to improve and "continues to work in isolation", giving out directives to members of his Cabinet, Malacañang said Sunday. The Chief Executive, who tested positive of Covid-19 in an antigen test Friday, July 8, as he experienced mild fever, nasal stuffiness, nasal itchiness, and mild occasional non-productive cough, underwent a confirmatory RT-PCR test, and was confirmed to have been infected by the coronavirus disease a second time. He first contracted the virus at the height of the pandemic in 2020.In a statement, Press Secretary Rose Beatrix "Trixie" Cruz-Angeles assured Marcos Jr. is "in the comfort of his home" and is now only exhibiting mild symptoms."No fever, no loss of taste and smell sensation,' Cruz-Angeles said, quoting Marcos Jr.'s lead physician, Dr. Samuel Zacate.
READ: Education is an investment – Cocopea
THE Coordinating Council of Private Education Associations of the Philippines (Cocopea) said private education must be considered not as a "commodity" but as an "investment" for the future of children. Guesting at the pilot episode of SMNI News' weekly current affairs show "Business and Politics,'' Joseph Noel Estrada, executive director of Cocopea, told The Manila Times chairman and CEO Dante "Klink" And 2nd parents and students alike should be more accountable for the education of their children. Estrada said that the country's private schools had been struggling because of the Covid-19 pandemic, with around 400 schools having zero enrollment and more students transferring to public schools. He said education must not be predicated on a single system that only favors public schools.
READ: Tesda eyes more foreign language courses
THE Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (Tesda) plans to add more foreign language training courses to improve the competitive edge of Filipino workers locally and abroad. The proposed languages include Arabic, Mandarin, Korean, Italian, and French. Tesda Officer-in-Charge Deputy Director General Rosanna Urdaneta said the new courses will boost the offerings the National Skills Language Center (NLSC). The center already has courses on English Proficiency for Customer Service Workers, Japanese Language and Culture, Japanese Language and Culture Level 2, and Spanish Language for Different Vocations. In 2021, the NLSC produced 1,148 graduates — 508 of which finished English Proficiency for Customer Service Workers; 450 in Japanese Language and Culture; and 190 in Spanish Language for Different Vocations.
READ: P159-M SEA Games funds unliquidated
Funds for the 2019 Southeast Asian Games totaling over P159 million were unliquidated as of the end of 2021, based on an audit report by the Commission on Audit (CoA). The Philippines hosted the 2019 Games and emerged the champion. The CoA's report on the Philippine Sports Commission (PSC) for 2021 noted that P159,929,194.74 of the unliquidated amount were for preparations for the event and the hosting itself. P17,627.51 were for the purchase of 400 min ANSI Lumnes multimedia projector and 15 4GB digital voice recorders. P9,765,000 of the P159,956,587.25 went to the training of 14 athletes from the Philippine Judo Federation in Tokyo, Japan. The report also showed detailed "unliquidated" fund transfers to Phisgoc (Philippine Southeast Asian Games Organizing Committee), 10 national sports associations (NSAs), and the Philippine Olympic Committee (PoC).Phisgoc's unsettled amount dropped to P811,362,476.83 after it made liquidations and refunds by December 31, 2021. P218,208.13 matured into a disallowance and was issued the Notice of Disallowance (ND) on February 22, 2022, the report read. The audit of the accounts of 10 NSAs amounting to P15,279,569.04 were suspended on September 6, 2021 "and already matured into disallowance," it added.
SPORTS: Magsayo fails to defend WBC belt
Sticking to sports, Filipino pug Mark Magsayo could not defend his World Boxing Council (WBC) featherweight belt, losing to Mexican Rey Vargas via split decision at the Alamodome in San Antonio, Texas on Sunday (Philippine time). Two judges scored 115-112 each for Vargas while only one judge had Magsayo winning, 113-112. Magsayo's failure to defend his belt meant that the Philippines was left with no world champion anymore. This is after Rene Cuarto and Nonito Donaire Jr., recently, also lost their International Boxing Federation (IBF) world minimumweight and WBC bantamweight belts, respectively. Defending his belt for the first time, Magsayo managed to slightly control the first two rounds before the more efficient Vargas dictated the pace.
BUSINESS: MUFG, Fitch Solutions see wider CAD
Topping business, the country's current account deficit (CAD) is anticipated to widen this year due to rising commodity prices and import demand, MUFG Bank Ltd. and Fitch Solutions said. The latest available data, which show that the net energy trade shortfall grew to $7.8 billion between January and April from $3.3 billion during the same period last year, were cited by Japan's largest bank to support its view that the current account will be pulled down by a bigger trade gap.
READ: Opinion and editorial
Rigoberto Tiglao and Fr. Ranhilio Aquino are today's front page columnists, as they both discuss the issues surrounding online news website Rappler and its chief, Maria Ressa.
Today's editorial discusses the ties between the Philippines and China under the Marcos administration. Read a full version on the paper's opinion section or listen to the Voice of the Times.
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For The Manila Times, this is Paulo Dimaapi.