Category: Philippines Daily Inquirer

Sen. Ronald ‘Bato’ dela Rosa has yet to surrender most of his firearms registered under his name after his gun licenses and registrations were revoked, the Philippine National Police-Civil Security Group (PNP-CSG) said on Monday.

‘From 117, they have turned in 26, so we still have 91. We are continuing our coordination with his legal officer,’ PNP-CSG Director Maj. Gen. Aden Lagradante said in a press briefing.

The PNP-Firearms and Explosives Office (PNP-FEO) canceled Dela Rosa’s firearms licenses and registrations based on the order dated May 26 and signed by FEO chief Brig. Gen. Jose Manalad Jr.

‘By our rules, [the firearms] should be surrendered, but the latest information is that they are still in the process of accounting for the remaining [ones],’ Lagradante said, adding that Dela Rosa’s camp had sought a reconsideration of the revocation through a letter to the PNP-FEO.

The PNP-FEO previously said Dela Rosa holds a Type 5 License to Own and Possess Firearms, which was originally valid until March 10, 2034, with 117 assorted firearms registered in his name.

Following the revocation, the fugitive senator and his representatives are required to turn over all firearms registered under his name to the police.

According to Section 4(g) of Republic Act No. 10591, firearm holders should not be convicted or are currently accused in a pending criminal case for a crime with a penalty lasting more than two years.

ICC arrest warrant

The National Bureau of Investigation previously submitted a formal request to nullify Dela Rosa’s firearm license on May 25 following an arrest warrant issued by the International Criminal Court (ICC).

Dela Rosa was asked to surrender his firearms within a notice period or upon apprehension.

The senator is charged before the ICC with crimes against humanity of murder, in connection with his involvement in the drug war under former President Rodrigo Duterte, both during Duterte’s time as Davao City mayor and later as president.

The tribunal, which has Duterte in its custody in The Hague, the Netherlands, has named Dela Rosa a ‘co-perpetrator.’

El Niño has placed 106 cities and municipalities across the country under a state of calamity and affected more than 388,000 people, according to the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council (NDRRMC).

In its latest report as of Monday, the NDRRMC said 66 areas in Cagayan were under a state of calamity, along with 23 in the Caraga region, 12 in the Bicol region, four in Calabarzon and one in Soccsksargen.

The phenomenon has affected 388,375 individuals, or 104,149 families, the agency said.

Cagayan recorded the highest number of affected individuals at 47,587, followed by Caraga with 45,507 and Bicol with 11,055. Calabarzon reported 191 affected individuals.

The NDRRMC said the government has provided P39,058,681.06 in assistance to 24,618 of the 35,893 families identified as needing aid.

The Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration (Pagasa) earlier said El Niño could intensify into a ‘very strong’ phenomenon between September and December and persist until the first half of 2027.

Pagasa said the phenomenon could bring hotter temperatures and a significant drop in rainfall.

The Department of Agriculture (DA) reported on Sept. 26 that El Niño had affected 223,214 farmers in 14 regions, with agricultural damage reaching P6.87 billion.

The DA also reported damage to 249,028 hectares of agricultural land and agricultural production. [Verify source figure before publication: ‘163,812 million metric tons’ appears inconsistent and should be checked against the DA report.]

Meanwhile, Office of Civil Defense (OCD) Administrator Harold Cabreros said Monday that the agency was monitoring the implementation of the National Action Plan on El Niño.

He said the government was also watching for the cascading effects of the dry season, including a possible increase in forest fires.

‘Ang isa po, ang mino-monitor din natin na katatapos lang po ng ating tag-ulan, ngayon naman tag-init, ang tinitingnan natin iyong mga cascading effects nito, one of which, ang nakikita natin ay magkakaroon ng increase ng forest fires,’ Cabreros said.

(We are also monitoring the start of the dry season and its cascading effects, including a possible increase in forest fires.)

Cabreros said the government was also monitoring the impact of the dry conditions on forests and agriculture.

The share of bad loans on Philippine banks’ books held steady in August, as soured consumer loans stabilized despite a difficult environment for both lenders and borrowers.

Latest data from the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) showed nonperforming loans (NPLs), or debts that remain unpaid 90 days past the due date and at risk of default, accounted for 3.35 percent of lenders’ total loan portfolio.

That figure, also known as the gross NPL ratio, was unchanged from the June result.

In peso terms, P596 billion of the local banking industry’s P17.8-trillion loan book turned sour in August. That amount of NPLs was 8.4-percent higher than a year earlier.

Banks also maintained a sizable buffer against potential losses. They had set aside nearly P555.6 billion in provisions for credit losses, leaving the industry with a NPL coverage ratio of 93.17 percent, also unchanged from the previous month.

Within consumer lending, the NPL ratio was steady at 5.41 percent. The ratio for credit card receivables rose to 5.44 percent from 5.33 percent, while that for motor vehicle loans increased to 5.62 percent from 5.51 percent. The ratio for salary-based loans, by contrast, fell to 5.01 percent from 5.30 percent.

Tight conditions

The NPL ratio for business loans edged up to 3.30 percent, its highest level in three months.

The figures come as the central bank keeps monetary policy relatively tight to contain inflation. The BSP has raised its benchmark interest rate to 5 percent and has signaled that it will tighten policy further if needed to bring inflation back to its target.

Ruben Carlo Asuncion, chief economist at UnionBank of the Philippines, said the stable NPL ratio suggested that banks’ asset quality remained broadly intact despite a challenging operating environment.

For now, he said, bad loans were likely to remain manageable, supported by banks’ strong capital and provisioning buffers.

‘However, the outlook warrants caution as persistent inflation, the possibility of higher-for-longer interest rates, and signs of moderating economic activity could weigh on borrowers’ repayment capacity and lead to some deterioration in asset quality,’ he said.

Lead defense counsel Sheila Sison on Monday hit back at the prosecution panel for calling the defense ‘delatory’ after her camp sought an hour-long break during Vice President Sara Duterte’s impeachment trial.

Nearly eight hours into the trial, defense lawyer Mark Vinluan asked for an hour to prepare his next set of questions for the cross-examination of Anti-Money Laundering Council (AMLC) Secretariat Executive Director Ronel Buenaventura.

Private prosecutor Mae Divinagracia criticized the request as ‘delatory.’

Shortly after, Sison took the stand in defense of Vinluan.

‘When Atty. Vinluan asked for time to organize his notes so that he may intelligently examine this witness, and the prosecution insinuates that this is delatory, that’s not true, Your Honor,’ Sison said.

‘I don’t think there’s any doubt here that the prosecution took the entire day direct examining this witness. We have only examined this witness for an hour. We’re not asking for a long time,’ she added.

Sison also explained that the defense had only had the documents for a few days after they were resubmitted over the weekend.

‘We’re only asking for a fair and meaningful opportunity to examine on behalf of this respondent this witness. Because the prosecution took the entire day direct examining this witness. We cannot be rushed in cross-examining this witness,’ she added.

Divinagracia explained her remark, saying Vinluan had earlier made remarks about ‘calling it a day.’

She also criticized that the two camps were provided with the witness’ documents on the same day.

‘The time that they were given to review the documents is the exact same time that we were given… Just like the defense, the prosecution also received the summary from the AMLC on the same day. And yet, your honor, we took the pains of going over it over the weekend to prepare for today’s hearing,’ Divinagracia pointed out.

An ambush of a military convoy in Tipo-Tipo, Basilan, on Monday morning wounded four more soldiers from the 45th Infantry Battalion, as well as a member of the Civilian Armed Auxiliary (CAA), raising the number of injured to 11.

Joint Task Force Orion reported that troops from the 45th Infantry Battalion (45IB) were traversing the road in Barangay Badja at around 7:45 a.m. when the assailants opened fire on their vehicles.

Earlier this morning, authorities reported that only six soldiers were wounded in the ambush.

Brig. Gen. Frederick Sales, commander of the 1101st Infantry ‘Gagandilan’ Brigade, told the Inquirer that Lt. Col. Franco Baylon, 45IB commanding officer, led the convoy.

The group-comprising three KM450 military trucks and three civilian vehicles-was en route from Tipo-Tipo to the 1101st Brigade headquarters in Barangay Tabiawan, Isabela City, via Lamitan City when they were attacked at Sitio Bauno Dagao in Barangay Badja.

Of the wounded, three were reported in critical condition.

The wounded personnel were initially brought to a medical facility in neighboring Lamitan City for immediate care.

By 9 a.m., military authorities dispatched a Black Hawk helicopter to airlift the three critical patients to Camp Navarro General Hospital in Zamboanga City for further treatment.

A female third-year college student at the Biliran Province State University (BiPSU) in Naval was brought to the school’s guidance office on Monday after allegedly threatening to shoot one of her teachers, prompting a quick response from school officials and police.

The incident, reported around 10 a.m., was contained without anyone being hurt, according to BiPSU president Victor Cañezo.

Cañezo said the student allegedly sent a text message to one of her classmates threatening a teacher whom she reportedly described as ‘bad.’

The classmate then informed school authorities, leading officials to identify and immediately bring the student to the guidance office.

‘This is an isolated case. The (concerned) student is now with our guidance office,’ Cañezo said in a public message, adding that the student’s act was because of a ‘personal grudge’ against the teacher.

He assured students, faculty members, and the public that the situation was under control as classes were not generally disrupted.

Cañezo also clarified that no firearm was found in the student’s possession following the incident.

He thanked the local police for their immediate response, saying their prompt action helped ensure the safety of the university community.

However, Cañezo said the investigation was still ongoing and that he could not provide additional details while authorities were looking into the circumstances surrounding the reported threat.

The incident came amid heightened concern over threats and acts of violence in schools in the country, particularly following a series of incidents involving minors.

In Tacloban City, three students were killed, and 20 others were injured in a shooting at San Jose National High School on June 22. The incident involved minors aged 14 and 15.

The shooting prompted renewed calls for schools, parents, local governments and law enforcement agencies to strengthen security measures and address threats of violence involving young people.

Another school-related firearm incident was reported in Catarman, Northern Samar, on Oct. 1, when a 15-year-old Grade 10 student was found allegedly carrying a high-powered firearm inside a school with more than 5,000 students.

Unlike those incidents, however, Cañezo said no firearm was found in the possession of the BiPSU student involved in Monday’s reported threat.

The latest incident was the second reported threat to hit BiPSU in less than a month.

On Sept. 22, authorities found a threat letter inside the BiPSU Student Center, prompting an investigation.

University officials have not disclosed whether the latest incident was connected to the earlier threat.

On the 33rd day of the impeachment trial of Vice President Sara Duterte, the prosecution presented Anti-Money Laundering Council Executive Director Ronel Buenaventura as its witness for Article II, which covers allegations of unexplained wealth.

The Senate impeachment court denied a defense motion to exclude Buenaventura, with Presiding Officer Francis Escudero ruling that Republic Act No. 1405 separately and expressly permits inquiry into bank deposits in impeachment cases.

Buenaventura, who admitted he skipped lunch because he was too nervous to eat, told the court: ‘Kinakabahan po, Your Honor,’ drawing laughter from those in the session hall.

A tabular summary presented in court showed 666 covered transaction reports and 55 suspicious transaction reports involving Duterte and her husband, lawyer Manases Carpio, totaling P4.4 billion.

The AMLC official confirmed that inward financial transactions from mainland China and Hong Kong to Carpio’s CALE88 Foods Corp. amounted to P319,326,770.41, a figure close to what former Sen. Antonio Trillanes IV had earlier alleged.

He also testified that joint accounts of Duterte and her father, former president Rodrigo Duterte, recorded P193,705,615.88 in transactions in a single day on March 28, 2014.

Senator-Judge Imee Marcos objected to the presentation of foreign currency accounts, arguing such accounts are excluded under law and precedent. Escudero overruled the objection, noting that the Corona impeachment court had allowed testimony on foreign currency deposits under a comparable framework.

At the opening of the session, Escudero reminded all parties to observe civility and professionalism, acknowledging that emotions were running high, and urged participants not to stoop to retaliation over outbursts or expressions of animosity inside or outside the courtroom.

Separately, Senator-Judge Raffy Tulfo moved to have court spokesperson Reginald Tongol admonished after Tongol was quoted as suggesting the trial might conclude by December 16, which Tulfo characterized as preempting the tribunal. Tongol responded that he was grateful for the senator-judges’ guidance.

When leading scorer Allisha Gray went down with a left hand injury early in Game 1 of the WNBA semifinals, the Atlanta Dream needed someone to step up.

Playing in just her eighth game with the franchise, 39-year-old DeWanna Bonner provided everything the Dream needed. Bonner had 23 points, nine rebounds, two assists and two steals in over 30 minutes off the bench, helping Atlanta stabilize and eventually pull away in a 92-82 victory over the New York Liberty.

‘I’m still learning a lot,’ Bonner said. ‘My head is always spinning, because I’m learning new people, learning the plays, learning the city, but they just made it easy.’ Bonner, who has played in a WNBA record 101 playoff games, signed with Atlanta as an unrestricted free agent on Aug. 27. It was a rare late season addition for a team desperate to finally find playoff success after three consecutive first round exits, and the six-time All-Star and two-time WNBA champion felt like the final piece of the puzzle.

‘We tried to get her a couple times and it just never worked out,’ Dream head coach Karl Smesko said. ‘I just thought she was exactly what we needed. Not just because she is a veteran presence and all of those things, but because she still plays like she did tonight. That was a huge performance. When we needed a play, she made it.’

Heading into Sunday she was averaging 20 minutes and nine points per game in a sporadic role, but Gray’s injury shrunk the rotation and forced her into more action. She played every second of the fourth quarter and all but two minutes of the second half, making crucial plays at both ends of the floor and in the locker room after Atlanta went into the intermission trailing 40-37.

‘DB got into us,’ Jordin Canada said about the message at halftime. ‘We said coming out into the third quarter that we talk about a second half surge, and that the first three minutes of the game in the second half was going to be really important. We came out ready to go.’

Bonner opened the fourth quarter with an offensive rebound and score on a putback, and knocked down a 3-pointer to take the lead back into double-figures after New York had closed to within eight.

‘She played multiple positions,’ Smesko said. ‘She guarded people that were MVPs in this league. She moved positions in this game when she hasn’t even been practicing really in that position. But she adjusts and is able to flow in it just because she has so much basketball experience. She has a sense of what she should do on a play even if she never ran the play before, and she just knows where the ball should move and what the next action should be. She has a lot of enthusiasm about her, but she also has a calming presence about her.’

Atlanta is now 8-0 with Bonner, and moved two wins away from its first trip to the WNBA Finals since 2013.

The quality of living is a reflection of Filipino preferences for leadership. Oftentimes, it has been a practice that Filipinos have preferred the leaders they want more than they need, which led to their pitfall.

As this trend continues and as poverty hunts the marginalized sector, Filipinos turn ‘bright eyes and ears’ to religion and charismatic leaders. This even makes scholars turn an eye back to the precolonial Filipino leadership. For academics, ‘pamathalaan’ implies ‘kasama ni Bathala’ as an approach to redefine Filipino leadership and to reinforce unity based on ‘native Filipino philosophy’ and leadership practices.

Meanwhile, ‘pamathalaan’ as a systemic philosophy that is based on unity and nurtured by love of God, country, and fellow human citizens as well as respect for nature, serves as the core value of democracy and citizenship. Today’s ‘ministros’ or ‘supreme head’ are possibly reinforcers of ‘indigenous principle.’ Through the ideas of ‘pamathalaan,’ leaders are called to become ethical models by living with moral laws and respecting diversity and ethnicity.

Generally, any leaders today could now interchangeably be termed as charismatic leaders in a way that they are ‘charismatic, persevering, eloquent, persuasive in speech, approachable, sociable, and much more authoritarian but paternalistic’ to the extent that they are more personal to their members/followers.

The ‘Bagong Baylan’ leadership is totally a unique Filipino way of leadership, for this is culturally rooted in once-unadulterated precolonial Philippines. It must be emphasized that it was never a battle of ideologies, an issue of spiritual or secular dominance but of social welfare through public service.

‘Baylan’ leadership does not imply amalgamation of the Church and State but mere ‘cooperative church-state relations’ or cultural and bureaucratic harmony, especially since the two share common values of social justice, equity, and nationalism.

To restore the precolonial Filipino leadership, Filipinos should learn to examine their leaders when it comes to the following standards: enthusiasm to promote ‘national interest,’ priority of ‘public welfare,’ possession of ‘unquestionable integrity,’ commitment to fulfill the public task and ‘communicate with people’ through the common language that reflects people’s will.

In the end, it is now not a surprise to see a transformed ‘Baylan’ either seated in an elective position or in a delegate position, uniting and directing people to work for the achievement of a common set of goals and objectives.

Far Eastern came out of the halftime break with all guns cocked and firing on Sunday night, with a 16-2 run to open up the third period going on to result in a 90-79 conquest of University of the Philippines that now has the Tamaraws sharing top spot in Season 89 eliminations of the UAAP men’s basketball tournament.

Kirby Mongcopa had 24 points and nine rebounds in leading the Tamaraws to their third straight win and a 3-1 card like Ateneo, even as La Salle snapped a two-game slide earlier after a 112-87 rout of University of the East at PhilSports Arena in Pasig.

Five players finished in twin digits for Far Eastern, which already owns victories over National U and La Salle before drubbing the Maroons, the losing finalists to the Green Archers last season.

Jorick Bautista and Janrey Pasaol turned in 16 and 15 points, respectively, while Mo Konateh had 10 points and 11 rebounds for the Tamaraws.

Veejay Pre, the former Far Eastern star who served his residency requirement last season, top scored for the Maroons in the loss with 16 points. Francis Nnoruka scored 12 while Rey Remogat scattered 12 points in State U’s second loss of the season.

The Archers got 19 points from Mason Amos, the heady big man who played his finest game this season, as La Salle kept the Red Warriors winless in four games.

La Salle thus improved to 2-2, tied with the Maroons, the Bulldogs and the University of Santo Tomas Golden Tigers, making for a highly competitive middle of the pack.

‘This is going to make every game very interesting,’ said a giddy La Salle coach Topex Robinson. ‘We came from back-to-back losses which are big. But for us now, it’s more of focusing on our own selves.’

‘We just discussed how unpredictable this season will be, especially with the [results of the] games [on Saturday],’ Robinson said, referring to Ateneo’s stunning win over National U and Adamson’s 28-point rout of the Tigers on Saturday.

After sluggish starts in their games against the Tigers and Tamaraws, the Green Archers finally opened a game on the right foot, immediately establishing a double-digit lead over the Red Warriors after the first quarter, 31-19.

La Salle did not let up in the second period, continuing its offensive onslaught to stretch the lead to 19 at halftime, 61-42.