CONSUMERS DEMAND!
Herman Tiu Laurel
8/8-14/2011
Our currency fluctuates in value simply because the value of the US dollar, which the peso follows, one way or another, also fluctuates.
But is that the case for all currencies or moneys?
Market Forces
Unfortunately, for many laymen, it somehow gets convoluted even when, actually, the answer is “No.” Not all currencies fluctuate just because the dollar fluctuates.
Some currencies, like the yuan of the People’s Republic of China and the ringgit of Malaysia, don’t fluctuate as wildly as our peso does. That’s because the governments of those two countries exercise currency controls to decide on how they want their currencies to be valued.
In contrast, monetary authorities in the Philippines depend on so-called “market forces” and intervene only by buying or selling dollars in our local market, to the detriment of many consumers.
Mainstream newspapers reported a few months ago, “Aquino: Strong peso sign of improving economy.”
If it were only that simple, then we wouldn’t have heard the clamor of an overwhelming majority of our country’s economic sectors -- from exporters, OFW families, business process outsourcing (BPO) firms, among many others -- for government to do something about the appreciating peso.
Imports can be Cheaper
Does P-Noy know that when the peso appreciated against the dollar as the US was theatrically locked in its “debt ceiling impasse,” Filipino OFW families, BPOs, and exporters lost P70 billion for each peso's rise?
That means, when our currency appreciated by two pesos the past week, all three sectors sustained a staggering loss of P140 billion.
No wonder our OpinYon colleague Liza Gaspar, who earns by helping Canadians and Americans fix their tax and finance chores via the Internet, claims to have lost half her income already.
The supposed benefit from an appreciating peso and a devaluing dollar is that imports would become cheaper.
But, as our regular e-mail correspondent Ferdie Pasion heatedly complains about, fuel, electricity, water, toll fees, transport, and other consumer basics, which have foreign exchange components, don’t go down at all.
And that’s the other half of the loss of purchasing power which the likes of Liza Gaspar complain about, too.
What’s Eating our Pockets?
Why is it that despite the appreciation of the peso, inflation continues to zoom to stratospheric heights, eating up Filipino consumers’ pockets?
Finance Secretary Cesar Purisima was heard explaining, “Old stocks (of fuel and oil) bought at the previous exchange rate” are to blame.
But then, when the exchange rate goes down in favor of lower imports, the international oil behemoths and speculators find a new way to raise prices either by using war or the latest shortage scare as an excuse (always manipulating the situation to their advantage).
Another problem with the fluctuating exchange rate, or the “floating currency exchange” rate (versus the controlled currency exchange rate), is that the speculators (bankers and investment managers alike) take advantage of or create the fluctuations themselves to earn windfall profits.
By the way, most of our monetary managers are themselves former bankers, fund managers, or executives of such speculating companies.
Paradise for Fund Managers
After the recent dive of the dollar, this report came out in the papers, “Peso declines after investors book profits… THE PESO took a breather from its northward trek against the dollar after investors took profits.
“The local currency shed 22.5 centavos to settle at P42.15 per dollar yesterday against its P41.925-per-dollar close last Monday.
“Traders yesterday said investors took profits from the peso, which surged to as high as the P41-per-dollar territory on Monday, after they flocked to emerging markets amid the euro zone and US debt problems.”
Right now, the Philippine economic and financial system is designed as a paradise for bankers and financial speculators, where these financial managers are a protected species.
Filipino First
The top honchos of the Department of Finance and the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) were with Gloria Arroyo then, but are now as much with P-Noy.
BSP Gov. Amando Tetangco has just gotten another six years despite the dismal performance of his institution in protecting Filipino citizens and consumers from the ravages of international financial scams, such as the 2008 crash and current currency gyrations.
For a sure answer to all these peso-dollar problems, Filipinos only need to look back at the “Filipino First Policy” of President Carlos P. Garcia.
Back then, he, along with Central Bank Gov. Mike Cuaderno, maintained “currency and capital controls” to maintain the value of the peso at a level consistent with the welfare of the economy, the people, and the national economic development plan.
Such policy of “currency and capital controls” was the same thing that saved Malaysia from the ravages of the 1997 Asian Financial Crisis caused by the attack of mega-speculator George Soros on the Thai baht and other Asian currencies.
Mahathir was Right
The IMF-WB, Time, Newsweek, Fortune magazine etc., and, locally, the late Max Soliven, Alex Magno, the Habitos and Paderangas, all lambasted Mohammad Mahathir, whom I probably was the only Filipino writer to defend.
Before long, Mahathir was proven right as his country sailed through the financial storm, safely docking as one of the premier economies of the ASEAN.
But, to institute currency and capital controls, one must have an enlightened, competent, and militantly nationalist political leadership alongside a banking system that is firmly under the control of that leadership.
If not, massive leakages (such as the capital flight instigated by the Makati-based banks during the time of Marcos) can only follow.
When Usury was a Crime
Unfortunately, mainstream media and the educational system in the Philippines have kept the Filipino public illiterate on matters of national finance by continuously conspiring to create the wrong impression that such matters are best left to “experts” (like Winnie Monsod and company).
They deliberately obfuscate the basic principles and issues to make the population blind and acquiescent even when the financial system and the economy adversely affect them.
Remember the term “usury” that was once taught in school as a “sin” and a “crime” against our national laws? Now that’s been forgotten.
We need to restore such an understanding as the basis of a productive, dynamic, and fair Philippine economic system.
A revolution of the mind is needed to provide the impetus -- leading to a nationalist leadership that will reinstitute “currency and capital controls” for the nation’s good.
Wednesday, August 10, 2011
Minus one lost cause
YESTERDAY, TODAY & TOMORROW
Linggoy Alcuaz
8/8-14/2011
In our accounting books of advocacies, causes as well as self-interests, we just transferred Koko Pimentel from the Lost Cause column to the Victory column.
I used the plural “our” because I am now referring to my two older brothers, Manuel “Mano”, 72, who died last July 24, and Francisco “Paco”, 68, retired, and I, Jose Luis “Linggoy”, 62, collectively. However, please don’t mistake us for the typical dynastic and nepotistic family.
Aranetas, Roxases
Our mother, Rosa Araneta y Zaragoza (April 7, 1906- May 1986) was the daughter of Philippine Commission (Taft) Secretary (1908-13) of Finance and Justice Gregorio Soriano Araneta (April 19, 1869-March 9, 1930). Her mother, Carmen Zaragoza y Roxas (June 29, 1876-June 29, 1943) caused us to be the second cousins of Jose Miguel “Mike and FG” Tuason Arroyo.
Her grandfather was the elder brother of Mar Roxas’ great great great grandfather.
Therefore, Senator Gerardo “Gerry” Roxas was my fourth cousin. Mar Roxas is the fifth cousin of my children. His mother , Judy Yulo Araneta Roxas is either my third, fourth or fifth cousin on both her father’s and mother’s sides.
No Dynasty
My grandfather was a Federalista (1900) and Democrata (1916).
These political parties were opposed to Manuel L. Quezon’s Nacionalistas who were for “immediate, complete and absolute independence”.
My maternal uncles Salvador (DANR Secretary), Antonio (BIR Commissioner), and Vicente (ACCFA Administrator) served in Ramon Magsaysay’s Administration.
Vicente was Manuel Manahan’s vice presidential running mate in 1957 in the Progressive Party of the Philippines. Two other uncles, Luis Maria (Greggy’s father) and Fr. Francisco Araneta, S. J. (Rector and President of Ateneo de Cagayan de Oro/Xavier University and Ateneo de Manila University) supported Christian Democracy/ Socialism and Raul S. Manglapus in the PPP (1957 and 1965) and Grand Alliance (1959).
However, none of them built a political dynasty.
Moreover, none of them or anyone in our generation, was ever guilty of nepotism.
Activists
Mano was the OIC of the Pag- Ibig Fund for a short time after EDSA I. I also served under Cory as Acting Assistant Director of the Butel, Deputy NTC Commissioner, and NTC Commissioner.
We did not work together when we were with or in the Administration, with the Incumbent President or in Power. We were together in EDSA’s I and II and against GMA.
Since I started out in formal activism earlier than my older brothers, I must have supported more lost causes and losing candidates in my past 57 years than either of my two elder brothers.
Paco and his wife, Glorie, not Gloria, were “Late Bloomers” as activists.
They are generally, anti-trapo while I’ve turned mestizo and have learned to accept, be friends of and work with politicians.
Mano was always uncompromising, straight, reformist and principled. Perhaps, his struggle to do business in the Philippine environment was a lifelong (1964 to 2011) Lost Cause.
My Own
As for me, let me enumerate some of my lost causes (including the support of do-gooders):
When I was almost five years old, my mother brought me to November 1953 NP Presidential candidate Ramon Magsaysay, Jr. in his Santa Mesa home. Even then, I was already more effective in the negative. My support for RM was in the form of lambasting President Elpidio Quirino and his urinola, giant bed, and the Tambobong Estate controversy.
His victory was a lost cause. The man of the masses turned out to be Uncle Sam’s and the CIA’s man. We will never know if he had decided to be for his people. His plane crashed in March 1957. Was it an accident or sabotage?
Then, in 1957, 1959 and 1965, we supported the PPP, the Grand Alliance and again the PPP. They lost at the national level every time. They did not have party inspectors at the precinct level. Under the 1935 Constitution, we had a Presidential form of government.
In 1961, we won by coalescing with the Liberal Party under the United Opposition Party with the Macapagal-Pelaez tandem. Manglapus and Manahan won the 1st and 2nd slots for Senator. However, Macapagal did not fulfil his commitments as set forth in the UOP platform.
In 1966, I was recruited into the moderate and Christian wing of what would in 1970 become a massive student and youth movement. At almost every stage, we were outwitted by the radical and Communist wing.
In 1970, we worked for a nonpartisan constitutional convention. By 1972, Marcos had manipulated it for his own purposes. With his Declaration of Martial Law, the ConCon became his means to “legalize” his stay in power beyond the two four year terms that the 1935 Constitution allowed.
In 1978, we supported the 21- man Laban NCR slate for assemblymen in the April 7 or 8, 1978 elections. On the night of April 6, we took over the entire NCR in the biggest, longest, widest and noisiest noise barrage ever. Still, KBL tail-ender and academician Professor Waldo Perfecto beat Ninoy for the 21st place.
On February 4, 1982, we organized the Pilipino Democratic Party at its founding Congress held in Cebu City. We tried to organize a different kind of political party. However, before we could depose Marcos and seize political power, my duties and responsibilities as the Deputy Secretary General for Luzon, placed me at odds with the Party Chairman, Nene Pimentel. And so, in 1987, I transferred to the Laban ng Demokratikong Pilipino as its Intelligence Officer.
In 1986, I was appointed as Deputy Commissioner of the NTC. In 1987, I was promoted to Commissioner. I did my best for the Telecom Industry. However, before I could complete my job, Cory fired me for publicly predicting the December 1, 1989 coup.
Meanwhile, I worked for five years in the LDP towards the 1992 elections and the succession to Cory. Three months before the elections, I transferred to the People’s Reform Party and ran for Congressman in the 3rd District of QC. I lost. Miriam was cheated. I stayed with her and her party for three and a half years. Six months after she won as Senator, I transferred to Erap as Special Operations under Robert Aventajado and Reli German.
In 1997, I transferred to GMA’s Kampi under her campaign manager for President in 1998, Jose “Peping” Sumulong Cojuangco, Jr. In December she slid to Vice Presidential running mate of Lakas’ Joe de Venecia. I ended up supporting Erap half half.
In March 2000, I was recruited into the Silent Protest Movement by Bert and Chit Pedrosa. We launched the slanted Exclamation Point sticker against Erap. By January 20, 2001, GMA had replaced Erap. In March, GMA appointed me as a Director of PCSO. Before the end of the year, I was privately at odds with our Chairman. By January 2, 2003, I was blowing the whistle and had come out with a Question Mark sticker on the day that GMA promised that she would not run for President. It would take her a year and half a month to fire me.
I did not mind that since I had been for FPJ for President for almost a year already. Then, we were cheated by GMA and Garci, double crossed by the ASOH and NOTED by Kiko Pangilinan.
After FPJ withdrew from public view, I made up with Erap and worked for him for five years from August 2004 to September 2009. However, in the 2007 mid elections, we were side tracked when Serge Osmeña, rather than Jinggoy Estrada, replaced Mayor J.V. Ejercito as GO UNO campaign manager.
From August 8, a week after Cory died until September, when Noynoy accepted the LP presidential nomination, I campaigned for Noynoy to run as the common Opposition Vice Presidential candidate. The day before Ondoy, I left Erap and supported Noynoy. However, on August 22, 2010. OpinYon was launched and I became a columnist as well as a critic of P-Noy and his Administration
A year and a quarter ago, Patrick Pantaleon, the organizer in September 2005 of La Salle, Ateneo at Ibapa, later changed to Lahat Na, met Nene Pimentel. He was endorsed by Governor Among Ed Panlilio, Patrick’s most Lost Cause. He became a true believer in Koko’s cause. He organized Justice for Koko, Justice for All. After a very brief period of media attention in July-August of 2010, Koko’s protest against Zubiri was all but forgotten. However, as veterans of Lost Causes, Patrick, Mano, I and a handful of others stuck it out. Mano and I had the same practical motives for attending Patrick’s meetings.
Tireless Mano
Then in late January or early February, we learned that Senator Sonny Trillanes would replace Ed Angara. That would change the vote in the nine-member SET from 6-3 in favor of Zubiri to just 5-4. One more vote and we would have a majority of 5-4 in favor of Koko.
With hope rekindled, we double-timed. Mano was tireless in writing letters and articles for Koko. We targeted the six Senators – Angara, Honasan, Lapid and Legarda – who were solidly for Zubiri. Pia and Kiko were for Koko.
We tried different approaches to Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile. We tried Erap three times. Many allies including me, got frustrated with Koko. But not Mano and Patrick.
To Victory!
The last few months, the Supreme Court reorganized. Justice Brion replaced Justice Velasco in the three-man Supreme Court delegation.
Now, it was possible for Koko to have five out of nine votes.
Before we could implement our plans, Zubiri resigned.
All that was left to do was to make a book entry-transfer Koko from the column “Lost Causes” to that for “Victory”!
Mano did not live long enough to watch Zubiri resign.
The Light
However, he had seen the Light at the End of the Tunnel. Twice last month, he saw that brightness when he left the covered tennis courts of his second home – the Manila Polo Club.
Twice, too, on Sunday, July 24, he left the MPC for his rendezvous with death at the Makati Medical Center.
The first time, he escaped. The second time, he resigned himself.
Condolences
Condolences to the family of former Huk, Davao City Mayor and Congressman, DILG Secretary and my boss in Kampi in Region XI, Luis Santos!
I have prayed for the past seven and a half years that he does not die when I don’t have enough money to buy a ticket to Davao City.
Death did not wait for me. Condolences to the family of Fe Misa Ayala, widow of Chito Ayala.
Linggoy Alcuaz
8/8-14/2011
In our accounting books of advocacies, causes as well as self-interests, we just transferred Koko Pimentel from the Lost Cause column to the Victory column.
I used the plural “our” because I am now referring to my two older brothers, Manuel “Mano”, 72, who died last July 24, and Francisco “Paco”, 68, retired, and I, Jose Luis “Linggoy”, 62, collectively. However, please don’t mistake us for the typical dynastic and nepotistic family.
Aranetas, Roxases
Our mother, Rosa Araneta y Zaragoza (April 7, 1906- May 1986) was the daughter of Philippine Commission (Taft) Secretary (1908-13) of Finance and Justice Gregorio Soriano Araneta (April 19, 1869-March 9, 1930). Her mother, Carmen Zaragoza y Roxas (June 29, 1876-June 29, 1943) caused us to be the second cousins of Jose Miguel “Mike and FG” Tuason Arroyo.
Her grandfather was the elder brother of Mar Roxas’ great great great grandfather.
Therefore, Senator Gerardo “Gerry” Roxas was my fourth cousin. Mar Roxas is the fifth cousin of my children. His mother , Judy Yulo Araneta Roxas is either my third, fourth or fifth cousin on both her father’s and mother’s sides.
No Dynasty
My grandfather was a Federalista (1900) and Democrata (1916).
These political parties were opposed to Manuel L. Quezon’s Nacionalistas who were for “immediate, complete and absolute independence”.
My maternal uncles Salvador (DANR Secretary), Antonio (BIR Commissioner), and Vicente (ACCFA Administrator) served in Ramon Magsaysay’s Administration.
Vicente was Manuel Manahan’s vice presidential running mate in 1957 in the Progressive Party of the Philippines. Two other uncles, Luis Maria (Greggy’s father) and Fr. Francisco Araneta, S. J. (Rector and President of Ateneo de Cagayan de Oro/Xavier University and Ateneo de Manila University) supported Christian Democracy/ Socialism and Raul S. Manglapus in the PPP (1957 and 1965) and Grand Alliance (1959).
However, none of them built a political dynasty.
Moreover, none of them or anyone in our generation, was ever guilty of nepotism.
Activists
Mano was the OIC of the Pag- Ibig Fund for a short time after EDSA I. I also served under Cory as Acting Assistant Director of the Butel, Deputy NTC Commissioner, and NTC Commissioner.
We did not work together when we were with or in the Administration, with the Incumbent President or in Power. We were together in EDSA’s I and II and against GMA.
Since I started out in formal activism earlier than my older brothers, I must have supported more lost causes and losing candidates in my past 57 years than either of my two elder brothers.
Paco and his wife, Glorie, not Gloria, were “Late Bloomers” as activists.
They are generally, anti-trapo while I’ve turned mestizo and have learned to accept, be friends of and work with politicians.
Mano was always uncompromising, straight, reformist and principled. Perhaps, his struggle to do business in the Philippine environment was a lifelong (1964 to 2011) Lost Cause.
My Own
As for me, let me enumerate some of my lost causes (including the support of do-gooders):
When I was almost five years old, my mother brought me to November 1953 NP Presidential candidate Ramon Magsaysay, Jr. in his Santa Mesa home. Even then, I was already more effective in the negative. My support for RM was in the form of lambasting President Elpidio Quirino and his urinola, giant bed, and the Tambobong Estate controversy.
His victory was a lost cause. The man of the masses turned out to be Uncle Sam’s and the CIA’s man. We will never know if he had decided to be for his people. His plane crashed in March 1957. Was it an accident or sabotage?
Then, in 1957, 1959 and 1965, we supported the PPP, the Grand Alliance and again the PPP. They lost at the national level every time. They did not have party inspectors at the precinct level. Under the 1935 Constitution, we had a Presidential form of government.
In 1961, we won by coalescing with the Liberal Party under the United Opposition Party with the Macapagal-Pelaez tandem. Manglapus and Manahan won the 1st and 2nd slots for Senator. However, Macapagal did not fulfil his commitments as set forth in the UOP platform.
In 1966, I was recruited into the moderate and Christian wing of what would in 1970 become a massive student and youth movement. At almost every stage, we were outwitted by the radical and Communist wing.
In 1970, we worked for a nonpartisan constitutional convention. By 1972, Marcos had manipulated it for his own purposes. With his Declaration of Martial Law, the ConCon became his means to “legalize” his stay in power beyond the two four year terms that the 1935 Constitution allowed.
In 1978, we supported the 21- man Laban NCR slate for assemblymen in the April 7 or 8, 1978 elections. On the night of April 6, we took over the entire NCR in the biggest, longest, widest and noisiest noise barrage ever. Still, KBL tail-ender and academician Professor Waldo Perfecto beat Ninoy for the 21st place.
On February 4, 1982, we organized the Pilipino Democratic Party at its founding Congress held in Cebu City. We tried to organize a different kind of political party. However, before we could depose Marcos and seize political power, my duties and responsibilities as the Deputy Secretary General for Luzon, placed me at odds with the Party Chairman, Nene Pimentel. And so, in 1987, I transferred to the Laban ng Demokratikong Pilipino as its Intelligence Officer.
In 1986, I was appointed as Deputy Commissioner of the NTC. In 1987, I was promoted to Commissioner. I did my best for the Telecom Industry. However, before I could complete my job, Cory fired me for publicly predicting the December 1, 1989 coup.
Meanwhile, I worked for five years in the LDP towards the 1992 elections and the succession to Cory. Three months before the elections, I transferred to the People’s Reform Party and ran for Congressman in the 3rd District of QC. I lost. Miriam was cheated. I stayed with her and her party for three and a half years. Six months after she won as Senator, I transferred to Erap as Special Operations under Robert Aventajado and Reli German.
In 1997, I transferred to GMA’s Kampi under her campaign manager for President in 1998, Jose “Peping” Sumulong Cojuangco, Jr. In December she slid to Vice Presidential running mate of Lakas’ Joe de Venecia. I ended up supporting Erap half half.
In March 2000, I was recruited into the Silent Protest Movement by Bert and Chit Pedrosa. We launched the slanted Exclamation Point sticker against Erap. By January 20, 2001, GMA had replaced Erap. In March, GMA appointed me as a Director of PCSO. Before the end of the year, I was privately at odds with our Chairman. By January 2, 2003, I was blowing the whistle and had come out with a Question Mark sticker on the day that GMA promised that she would not run for President. It would take her a year and half a month to fire me.
I did not mind that since I had been for FPJ for President for almost a year already. Then, we were cheated by GMA and Garci, double crossed by the ASOH and NOTED by Kiko Pangilinan.
After FPJ withdrew from public view, I made up with Erap and worked for him for five years from August 2004 to September 2009. However, in the 2007 mid elections, we were side tracked when Serge Osmeña, rather than Jinggoy Estrada, replaced Mayor J.V. Ejercito as GO UNO campaign manager.
From August 8, a week after Cory died until September, when Noynoy accepted the LP presidential nomination, I campaigned for Noynoy to run as the common Opposition Vice Presidential candidate. The day before Ondoy, I left Erap and supported Noynoy. However, on August 22, 2010. OpinYon was launched and I became a columnist as well as a critic of P-Noy and his Administration
A year and a quarter ago, Patrick Pantaleon, the organizer in September 2005 of La Salle, Ateneo at Ibapa, later changed to Lahat Na, met Nene Pimentel. He was endorsed by Governor Among Ed Panlilio, Patrick’s most Lost Cause. He became a true believer in Koko’s cause. He organized Justice for Koko, Justice for All. After a very brief period of media attention in July-August of 2010, Koko’s protest against Zubiri was all but forgotten. However, as veterans of Lost Causes, Patrick, Mano, I and a handful of others stuck it out. Mano and I had the same practical motives for attending Patrick’s meetings.
Tireless Mano
Then in late January or early February, we learned that Senator Sonny Trillanes would replace Ed Angara. That would change the vote in the nine-member SET from 6-3 in favor of Zubiri to just 5-4. One more vote and we would have a majority of 5-4 in favor of Koko.
With hope rekindled, we double-timed. Mano was tireless in writing letters and articles for Koko. We targeted the six Senators – Angara, Honasan, Lapid and Legarda – who were solidly for Zubiri. Pia and Kiko were for Koko.
We tried different approaches to Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile. We tried Erap three times. Many allies including me, got frustrated with Koko. But not Mano and Patrick.
To Victory!
The last few months, the Supreme Court reorganized. Justice Brion replaced Justice Velasco in the three-man Supreme Court delegation.
Now, it was possible for Koko to have five out of nine votes.
Before we could implement our plans, Zubiri resigned.
All that was left to do was to make a book entry-transfer Koko from the column “Lost Causes” to that for “Victory”!
Mano did not live long enough to watch Zubiri resign.
The Light
However, he had seen the Light at the End of the Tunnel. Twice last month, he saw that brightness when he left the covered tennis courts of his second home – the Manila Polo Club.
Twice, too, on Sunday, July 24, he left the MPC for his rendezvous with death at the Makati Medical Center.
The first time, he escaped. The second time, he resigned himself.
Condolences
Condolences to the family of former Huk, Davao City Mayor and Congressman, DILG Secretary and my boss in Kampi in Region XI, Luis Santos!
I have prayed for the past seven and a half years that he does not die when I don’t have enough money to buy a ticket to Davao City.
Death did not wait for me. Condolences to the family of Fe Misa Ayala, widow of Chito Ayala.
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