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CHANELLE AVARICIO wavered at the finish but proved as hungry as ever and fended off a pack of determined challengers to seize control of the International Container Terminal Services Inc. South Pacific Golf Classic with a four-under 68 on Tuesday in Davao.

Two late bogeys spoiled what could’ve been an explosive start to another title drive for the Apo Golf Classic champion, but a dazzling six-birdie spree in the first 10 holes was enough to keep her firmly in the driver’s seat against a field eager to knock her off her perch.

‘I played really well on the front nine, but I made two late bogeys, including a three-putt mistake. The greens are very hard to read,’ said Avaricio, whose effort still earned her a one-stroke edge over Sarah Ababa and Princess Superal, who matched 69s.

With 36 holes still to play, Avaricio remained grounded despite her strong start.

‘I don’t want to get ahead of myself,’ she said.

Picking up exactly where she left off after her emphatic seven-stroke triumph at Apo last week, Avaricio once again displayed the poise and precision of a player in complete command.

With her rhythm unbroken and her confidence surging, she turned the South Pacific Golf and Leisure Estate into her personal stage, storming ahead by two over Superal after 10 holes of the P1-million championship.

Avaricio birdied the opening two holes, setting the tone early, and then went on a tear with birdies on Nos. 5, 7 and 8 to close out the front nine with a scorching 31.

Even as the skies dimmed and hints of rain loomed, her focus never wavered.

‘I’m looking forward to playing good in the next two days,’ said Avaricio, whose calm exterior masked a relentless drive underneath. ‘It was about staying in the moment and taking it one shot at a time.’

Superal kept pace with four birdies on the front nine but lost momentum on the way home, settling for a three-under card after a closing bogey.

‘My driving and iron game clicked compared to last week,’ said Superal as she reflected on her round.

In contrast, Ababa drew motivation from the return of her father, Edgar, as caddie.

She turned a two-birdie, two-bogey front nine into a strong finish, stringing three birdies in a four-hole stretch from No. 11 for a 36-33 card-putting herself in contention for a second leg win this year after edging Avaricio in sudden death at Del Monte.

Homegrown ace Florence Bisera, who scored a Ladies Philippine Golf Tour breakthrough here in 2023, rallied late on the front nine with three straight birdies but also stalled at the back with bogeys on Nos. 14 and 16, finishing with a 71 for fourth, three strokes off the pace.

Daniella Uy and Harmie Constantino also turned in a pair of strong starts with the former birdying Nos. 8 and 9, only to reel back with three bogeys in the last five holes. She finished with a 73 for joint fifth with Chihiro Ikeda and Monica Mandario.

Constantino, searching for her old winning form after a four-title haul last season, birdied three of the first five holes but stumbled with costly errors and tumbled to joint eighth at 74 with Marvi Monsalve, Mafy Singson, Pamela Mariano, Gretchen Villacencio, Velinda Castil and Apple Fudolin.

Despite her windup, Avaricio remained unshaken-her every swing measured, her pace deliberate, her mindset unbreakable. Even under tough conditions, she played as though insulated from everything around her, in that rare, coveted state where every decision, every putt, seemed effortless.

AS the Philippines may not be able to escape its fate as the world’s most disaster-prone nation, good governance can turn the tide to resilience and growth, according to economists.

In a commentary by New York-based think tank GlobalSource Partners, economists Diwa Guinigundo and Wilhelmina Mañalac said the country’s vulnerability to natural hazards has long been compounded by weak institutions and corruption in public works.

Citing figures from the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council, the typhoons that battered the country in September alone have cost P822 million in infrastructure losses, while agricultural damages amounted to P916 million.

The Cebu earthquake also caused P6.8 billion in damage, which exposed the sorry fact that many of the public infrastructure were neither quake-resistant nor built to standard.

On top of this is the massive corruption in flood control projects, which cost the government P118.5 billion in economic losses from 2023 to 2025, according to the Department of Finance.

‘The moral indictment is clear: corruption kills growth, weakens resilience, and erodes trust,’ Guinigundo and Mañalac said.

For a developing country like the Philippines, they said, good governance is not a moral luxury, but an ‘economic necessity.’

‘When public works are marred by inefficiency and fraud, they not only waste resources but also weaken the very foundations of inclusive growth: connectivity, productivity, and resilience,’ they added.

To rebuild the ruins, the economists said that integrity, discipline and political will are needed.

‘The Philippines’ status as the world’s most disaster-prone nation is unlikely to change. What can-and must-change is how the country prepares, builds, and governs,’ they said.

What is inevitable, they said, is the result of choices made by institutions and leaders-not the recurring cycle of destruction and repair.

So far, the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) has taken bureaucratic restructuring to restore integrity and efficiency.

This includes digital transparency through an online project tracker, closer coordination with the Commission on Audit for on-site monitoring, rotation of engineers to disrupt local patronage networks and the creation of a Public Works Integrity Office to investigate anomalies and enforce discipline.

The Marcos administration has also established the Independent Commission for Infrastructure (ICI), a non-partisan body tasked to audit major projects, issue annual integrity reports and recommend the prosecution of erring officials and contractors.

‘These measures aim to institutionalize accountability and ensure that infrastructure spending contributes not only to physical capital but also to governance capital, the credibility and efficiency that sustain long-term economic growth,’ the economists said.

BETTER coordination, synchronicity and oversight of national agencies on local governments could fix inefficiencies and boost healthcare delivery to Filipinos, an expert said.

In a presentation last Monday, Maria Eufemia C. Yap said despite the expanded fiscal space for delivering health services due to reforms such as the Universal Healthcare Law and amendments to the National Tax Allotment (NTA), local governments still reported inefficiencies.

‘You go across the different provinces and municipalities in the country and they’re always saying [their funds for the health sector are insufficient],’ Yap, senior research fellow at the School of Government of the Ateneo de Manila University, said. ‘Spending lags appear where process owners are fragmented and off-budget or extra-budgetary flows are not synchronized with planning and this is a fiscal governance issue.’

According to Yap, these inefficiencies translate into unattained healthcare targets like maternal mortality and fluctuating vaccination rates.

‘It’s hard to translate [these inefficiencies] into pesos but, to say that if the country spends, like what they said in [a] PSA [Philippine Statistics Authority] study [in] 2024, that around P12,000 is being allocated to primary health care per person,’ she said.

However, Yap said that in the areas they studied, ‘although it’s not really apples to apples, [it was] only like P400, P500 per person, which is a very far cry from what the PSA said is the spending on primary health care.’

Yap’s research focused on areas in the cities of Quezon and Isabela, Antique province and the municipalities of Odiongan and Belison. The research found that municipalities relied on the NTA for up to 95 percent of health funds.

In terms of the flow of funds, they also found that local governments pour most of their health budget, about 80 percent, to personnel services, while the Department of Health (DOH) supplied inputs like commodities and facilities.

‘When it comes to meeting expected standards of care, especially at the primary healthcare and primary care level, we cannot yet say that availability and quality have been fully achieved and from a spending perspective, this indicates poor investments in primary healthcare and primary care,’ Yap said.

She highlighted misaligned tools, templates and calendars between local government units (LGUs) and national agencies as the ‘choke points’ that hindered effective healthcare delivery, while also citing the ‘learned dependency’ of the LGUs on the DOH through the Local Government Code.

”If your LGU cannot handle the services that you’re supposed to deliver, who you gonna call? [The] national government.’ It has created the learned dependency of the LGUs. because the LGUs will say, ‘we won’t anymore budget for new personnel or fill in this post, [the] DOH will give us,’ and so they don’t anymore think about really how they will handle the delivery of the health services,’ Yap added.

To combat the issue, Yap emphasized synchronicity in timing and templates between LGUs and national agencies like the DOH, the Department of Budget and Management and the Philippine Health Insurance Corp.

‘We’re hoping when we present to Secretary [Amenah F.] Pangandaman that we can really make a play for having a program convergence budgeting approach for the health, particularly for the special health fund, so that we can synchronize and rationalize resource flows by organizing a backbone for tagging, for downloads, creating predictable flows tied to service packages, interfacing with budget tagging, allotment, downloads, performance reporting,’ the academician said.

Yap is proposing an oversight and accounting group chaired by the Coordinating Committee on Decentralization to ensure transparency and proper coordination between the government players.

‘With one clock, one set of templates and a firm oversight accounting spine, pesos are easier to track, to release and to pay, which is the heart of fiscal integrity,’ she added.

THE annual WorkAbility Asia (WAsia) Conference, a premier gathering of regional leaders and advocates on disability inclusion to promote employment for persons with disabilities (PWDs) across the continent, was recently held in Manila. Guided by the theme Inclusion at Work: Transforming Perspectives, Creating Opportunities, the De La Salle-College of Saint Benilde (DLS-CSB) hosted the event through its School of Deaf Education and Applied Studies (SDEAS).

It was conducted in collaboration with the Nippon Foundation. After a colorful parade of national flags, Silent Steps, the official Deaf dance group of Benilde SDEAS, took the stage with an inspiring performance.

The conference served as a platform for government agencies, NGOs, businesses, and educators to exchange strategies and successful projects. Among the relevant issues tackled during the discussion were policy reform, leadership development, inclusive recruitment, livelihood pathways, assistive technology, and mental health.

The event was graced by DLS-CSB president Br. Edmundo Fernandez, FSC, and WAsia chairman Dipesh Sutariya. Susan Scott-Parker, OBE HonD, founder of Business Disability International, delivered a comprehensive keynote speech on employer engagement. Meanwhile Colin Allen AM, honorary president of the World Federation of the Deaf, imparted his insights about moving ‘From Tokenism to True Inclusion.’

Arch. Erico Abordo, Architects for Accessibility Philippines co-founder, inspired the group in his master class titled ‘Inclusive by Design: Rethinking Accessibility in the Workplace.’

Speaker representatives from global organizations such as Accenture Philippines, Enable India, Eden Social Welfare Foundation Taiwan, and WOWLEAP Philippines likewise shared best practices which redefine the future of work.

Leading the charge for the Filipino Deaf community were faculty, alumni, and staff from the Benilde SDEAS Center for Partnership and Development, who presented pioneering research and practical models for Deaf empowerment, including career development programs, inclusive workplace assessments, and industry partnerships.

Aside from the plenary sessions, the delegates immersed in various cultural exchanges and industry visits, which gave them glimpses of Philippine institutions and companies which champion diversity and accessibility. As part of their real-world learning experience, the delegations visited the National Vocational Rehabilitation Center of the Department of Social Welfare and Development, Quezon City Kabahagi Center, Accenture Philippines, and Shell Philippines.

WAsia, which was founded in 2004 as the regional arm of Workability International, has 50-member organizations that cover 13 countries and regions, such as Bangladesh, Hong Kong, India, Japan, Macau, Malaysia, Nepal, Pakistan, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, Taiwan, and Thailand.

After a successful staging of the WAsia Conference in the Philippines, Japan will host next year’s edition.

FORMER Ombudsman Samuel Martires has maintained that his appointment of more than 200 individuals to various positions in the agency prior to his retirement was necessary and cannot be considered as ‘midnight appointments.’

Martires stressed that the ban on midnight appointment under Section 5, Article VII of the 1987 Constitution, does not cover the Office of the Ombudsman since it is not a political office.

The said provision specifically states that: ‘Two months immediately before the next presidential elections and up to the end of his term, a President or Acting President shall not make appointments, except temporary appointments to executive positions when continued vacancies therein will prejudice public service or endanger public safety,’ Martires said in an interview over radio station dzBB.

‘I don’t have midnight appointees because we are not a political office,’ Martires stressed.

He added that some of the appointments were in line with his objective to fill-up existing vacancies for plantilla positions while the other appointments were for new positions which were approved by the Department of Budget and Management (DBM).

The former Ombudsman recounted that in August 2024 he asked the DBM to allow him to hire 60 lawyers following his decision to do away with the fact-finding investigation and merge its unit with the preliminary investigation unit of the agency in order to speed up the resolution of complaints.

The request was approved by the DBM in January 2025 and the hiring for the 60 lawyers was immediately published on the Civil Service Commission’s (CSC) website.

Aside from the 60 new posts, Martires said he also secured DBM approval for hiring of personnel for other plantilla positions in the Ombudsman.

‘These 204 positions are from drivers up to the lawyers,’ he pointed out.

Martires also stressed that the promotion of two personnel to Assistant Ombudsman was based on merit.

He added that the promotion was necessary following the retirement of two assistant Ombudsman.

Martires was responding to the claim of his successor, Ombudsman Jesus Crispin Remulla, that the said appointments may be considered as midnight appointees.

Thus, Remulla ordered the 204 newly-hired and newly-promoted employees to submit their courtesy resignations to show that they are in good faith.

Meanwhile, Assistant Ombudsman and spokesperson Jose Dominic Clavano IV has disclosed that some of the 204 employees have already tendered their courtesy resignations.

‘I am not aware of how many submitted but there’s a good number that have submitted already and have shown their good faith to the Ombudsman regarding their recent appointments or recent promotions,’ Clavano said.

Clavano also confirmed that there were those who are opposing the order and are gathering support against it.

‘The Ombudsman is aware of that. But, again, he is giving another chance to these individuals to file their courtesy resignations as a show of good faith. If they are not hiding anything in terms of procedures in which they were hired or promoted, then there’s really nothing to worry about,’ he added.

THE Government Service Insurance System (GSIS) saw its net income reach P112 billion as of the third quarter, beating its target for the period on higher revenues and lower expenses.

A statement issued by the GSIS last Tuesday read that the state pension fund manager’s net income grew to P112 billion as of end-September, up by P12 billion from P100 billion a month earlier. This figure exceeded the GSIS’s net income target of P76.6 billion for the period by P35.4 billion.

Total revenues for the first nine months reached P260 billion, which surpassed the goal of P241.8 billion by P18.2 billion.

The GSIS kept its total expenses at P148 billion, below the P165 billion budget for the nine-month period by P17 billion. Administrative costs were also maintained at 2.5 percent, which is within the 12-percent limit mandated by the GSIS Charter.

According to the GSIS, this low ratio ensures that the pension fund’s resources are primarily allocated to its core mission of serving its members.

The GSIS’s total assets also climbed to P1.93 trillion, up by 5.7 percent from its 2024 year-end level.

‘The numbers reflect the current state of our financial health. Our net income is a clear indicator of our consistent growth and stability,’ GSIS President and General Manager Jose Arnulfo A. Veloso was quoted as saying in the statement.

‘Our financial health is robust,’ Veloso added. ‘Our focus is on building a resilient institution that delivers for its members, and these results confirm we are on the right track.’

The GSIS is a social insurance institution that provides a defined benefit scheme, insuring its members against the occurrence of certain contingencies in exchange for their monthly premium contributions.

All government workers are covered by the GSIS except members of the Judiciary and Constitutional Commissions, who are covered by separate retirement laws, contractual employees who have no employee-employer relationship with their agencies and uniformed members of the Armed Forces of the Philippines and the Philippine National Police, including the Bureau of Jail Management and Penology and the Bureau of Fire Protection.

GSIS members are entitled to an array of social security benefits, such as life insurance, for separation or upon retirement and for disability.

THE National Fisheries Research and Development Institute (NFRDI) identified two fishery commodities as moderately vulnerable to the impacts of climate change.

The Climate Risk Vulnerability Assessment (CRVA) conducted by NFRDI revealed that sardine and anchovy fisheries in Fisheries Management Area (FMA) 9 are moderately climate-vulnerable.

The agency attached to the Department of Agriculture (DA) said the assessment showed that sardine fisheries in Cabadbaran City face high exposure to storm surges and sea level rise, exacerbated by low income and inadequate fisheries support that hamper adaptive capacity.

It added that anchovy fisheries in Sibutad, Zamboanga del Norte were found to be at risk owing to habitat degradation, heavy livelihood dependence, and weak adaptation measures.

The agency said these findings underscore the need for targeted strategies to strengthen the resilience of local fishing communities.

‘Through the CRVA, we aim to generate science-based data and insights that will guide our interventions, helping our fisherfolk adapt, build resilience, and secure their future in the face of changing climate,’ NFRDI Executive Director Maria Theresa Mutia said.

To support the assessment, the agency said it conducted a series of focus group discussions (FGDs) and cost-benefit analysis (CBA) surveys in Sibutad on October 14 to 17 and in Cabadbaran City on October 21 to 24, 2025.

The FGDs covered major local commodities, including milkfish, tilapia, and sardines.

The NFRDI said Sibutad’s participants also identified anchovy and several seashell species including plicate conch (aninikad) and blood clam (litob), as key local resources, alongside rabbitfish, eel (balakase), abalone, and seaweeds.

In Cabadbaran City, it added that sardines emerged as a priority commodity, together with red snapper (maya-maya), flying fish (iliw), skipjack tuna, squid, grouper, mangrove crab, and tiger prawn.

Implemented under the Philippine Fisheries and Coastal Resiliency (Fishcore) project, the NFRDIA said the CRVA aims to strengthen the adaptive capacity of the country’s fisheries sector.

By engaging local communities in FMAs 6 and 9, the agency said the initiative reinforces its commitment to supporting fisherfolk livelihoods and promoting the sustainable use of marine resources through research-based, climate-responsive strategies.

BASKETBALL has always been called by its two other names: ‘basketbrawl’ and ‘boxingball.’

‘Basketbrawl’ happens when both sides trade punches, either involving two opposing players or several players from both teams.

It has happened several times already, the most notables among them were the old Crispa-Toyota free-for-all in a 1975 Philippine Basketball Association (PBA) game, and the bench-clearing incident between Australia and Gilas Pilipinas in Manila just a while back.

In the Crispa-Toyota skirmish, several players were hauled off to Camp Vicente Lim in Laguna after the incident and were ordered to spend the night there to, in the words then of the Metrocom (Metropolitan Command) police, ‘teach them a lesson in anger management.’

In the Australia-Gilas brawl, June Mar Fajardo stood out gallantly for avoiding to join the fray.

‘My mother [bless her soul] taught me to avoid fights before I started playing basketball,’ said Fajardo, earning plaudits from adoring fans.

Now to ‘boxingball.’

It happens usually when one player each from both squads exchange punches or kicks. Or, only one player throws a punch and the victim fails to retaliate because he’s either down on the floor or the scuffle is immediately stopped by cooler heads-usually the calmer players or the referees themselves.

Twice this happened in the Maharlika Pilipinas Basketball League (MPBL), the most recent was when Arwind Santos punched Tonton Bringas last week.

Santos, a celebrated PBA retiree now playing for Basilan, hit GenSan’s Bringas with a closed fist in an MPBL game on October 20, causing an injury to the eye of Bringas.

Santos was suspended indefinitely and fined P100,000.

‘We condemn the incident and the MPBL will not tolerate such actions, especially during the playoffs,’ MPBL Commissioner Kenneth Duremdes said in a statement. ‘The league has the full authority to impose sanctions on this deplorable act and we hope that our measures help put these behaviors to an immediate end.’

There is a public clamor for the referees to be penalized, too, for negligence, citing their inability to warn Bringas for having allegedly hit Santos twice during the game.

Unfortunately, Bringas’s alleged rough play was not caught on camera while Santos’s punch to Bringas’s face was seen in full view of televiewers and venue spectators.

While Santos, who complained to the referees about Bringas’s alleged blatant aggression during the game to no avail, claimed he merely retaliated-still, that is no reason to justify on-court violence.

Showing remorse, Santos tried to personally apologize to Bringas. But Bringas balked, reportedly telling Santos: ‘Talk to my lawyer.

Sportsmanship has just absorbed a blackeye-again.

THAT’S IT It made sense when Chairman Pató Gregorio of the Philippine Sports Commission decided to send athletes to the Thailand SEA Games in December minus the bronze medal standard in previous SEA Games editions. Indeed, it’s time we dispatched promising aspirants to the SEA Games because it is a good training ground for our grassroots development program, which Pató is hell-bent to pursue. Cheers!

The stench of systemic corruption in government is undeniable. The blatant plundering of billions through ghost flood control projects, nonexistent farm-to-market roads, and similar scandals has not only depleted public funds but also severely eroded the foundation of any functioning democracy: public trust. At a time when confidence is running low, and cynicism looms large, a crucial step by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) brings a much-needed spark of hope. (Read the BusinessMirror story: ‘SEC wants registered firms to reveal beneficial owners,’ October 23, 2025).

The SEC’s draft Revised Guidelines on Beneficial Ownership Disclosure and Transparency are not merely bureaucratic tweaks; they represent a potentially powerful weapon in the fight against the shadowy financial networks that enable systemic corruption. By demanding the identification and disclosure of the true individuals who ultimately own or control corporations-the ‘beneficial owners’-the SEC is targeting a fundamental enabler of illicit wealth.

For too long, complex corporate structures, nominee arrangements, and bearer shares (now rightly prohibited) have provided impenetrable veils. Corrupt officials and their cronies have hidden behind layers of paperwork, funneling ill-gotten gains into seemingly legitimate businesses. The billions lost to ghost projects are symptomatic of a system where ownership opacity is the corrupt official’s best friend.

The SEC’s draft guidelines, meticulously crafted with international partners Open Ownership and the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, and aligned with Financial Action Task Force standards, aim to dismantle this secrecy.

It starts with comprehensive disclosure, requiring all entities under the SEC’s wing to identify and categorize their beneficial owners across nine specific control mechanisms, which leaves far fewer places to hide. By banning bearer shares and exposing nominees, these notorious anonymity tools are eliminated. The mandatory disclosure of nominee relationships addresses the core issue of deceptive ownership practices.

The SEC emphasizes the need for meaningful penalties for non-compliance or false declarations to deter evasion, while also highlighting the importance of broadening access to beneficial ownership information for effective oversight by authorities, financial institutions, and potentially journalists or civil society watchdogs.

As SEC Chairman Francis Lim rightly stated, this policy addresses ‘critical gaps that enable corruption and financial crime.’ It complements broader anti-corruption efforts by attacking the financial infrastructure that makes large-scale theft possible. It signals an ‘unwavering commitment to transparency and accountability’ and aligns the Philippines with vital global standards against money laundering and terrorist financing.

However, cautious optimism is warranted. Past reforms have often foundered on the rocks of weak enforcement, political interference, or the sheer ingenuity of those determined to evade scrutiny.

The SEC’s determination will face significant challenges as it seeks to implement new regulations across a diverse corporate landscape. This undertaking demands considerable capacity from the SEC and the establishment of robust verification mechanisms to ensure effectiveness.

Sustained political will is necessary to support these initiatives. High-level backing must remain steadfast, free from the influence of powerful interests that may be threatened by the disclosures. This unwavering commitment is critical for the success of the SEC’s efforts.

The ghost projects scandal serves as a powerful reminder of the price of corruption-stolen funds that could have built real infrastructure, improved lives, and fueled genuine economic development. The SEC’s push for beneficial ownership transparency is a direct response to this national hemorrhage. It is a necessary, long-overdue step.

This policy deserves strong public support. But the true measure of success will be found not just in the rules on paper, but in their vigorous enforcement and the tangible results they yield: recovered assets, prosecuted kleptocrats, and, ultimately, the slow, hard-earned restoration of public trust.

ECONOMIST Solita ‘Winnie’ Monsod and former Finance Secretary Jesus Estanislao urged the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) to strengthen fiscal integrity, transparency, and accountability in government spending.

Both are former chiefs of the National Economic and Development Authority (Neda).

Speaking at the Fiscal Policy Conference, Monsod said the country’s economic growth remains below its full potential due to persistent corruption and inefficiency in the use of public funds.

‘Corruption pushes the country’s production inside its potential frontier,’ she said, citing the economic principle that measures how efficiently a nation uses its resources.

Monsod warned that despite the government’s promise of fiscal discipline, wasteful and misallocated projects continue to burden taxpayers and distort national priorities.

She questioned the DBM’s oversight role in approving questionable infrastructure projects, particularly flood control works in unnecessary areas, saying the department must account for its monitoring failures.

‘If the DBM didn’t see that flood control projects were being conducted in unnecessary places, who would?’ Monsod asked.

The economist also raised alarm over the government’s ballooning Unprogrammed Appropriations, which she described as possibly ‘a modern and deadlier version’ of the abolished Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF).

She noted that while this is intended to be released only when government revenues exceed targets, it has expanded dramatically from below P200 million before 2023 to between P400 billion and P700 billion in recent budgets.

‘Is the DBM ensuring that the conditions for release are met?’ Monsod said.

‘Or has the system turned into a moral hazard, where revenue targets are deliberately set low to justify more spending?’ she added.

Monsod explained that while macroeconomic indicators may appear stable, fiscal integrity depends on more than numbers. It relies on governance, honesty, and a moral sense of responsibility in handling public funds.

‘The DBM must live up not just to the ‘budget’ in its name, but to the ‘management’ as well,’ she said.

‘Fiscal future depends on trust’

In the same event, Estanislao called for deeper reforms in fiscal governance and urged the DBM to institutionalize systems that promote transparency and accountability across all agencies.

‘Our fiscal future depends on restoring trust in public institutions,’ Estanislao said.

He emphasized that the national budget should not only serve as a financial instrument but as ‘a moral document’ that reflects the values and priorities of the government.

Estanislao also encouraged the DBM and other agencies to strengthen citizen participation and performance-based management, ensuring that every peso spent delivers measurable results.

He added that fiscal discipline must be linked to good governance and long-term development, rather than short-term political interests.

Both economists agreed that addressing fiscal challenges requires not only technical competence but moral courage to confront systemic corruption.

‘Before we can drive strategic and practical solutions for sustainable economic growth, we must first define the real problem,’ Monsod said.

‘And that problem is not merely technical, it is moral.’