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Coming into Tuesday’s game still licking the wounds of a narrow loss, Jose Rizal University (JRU) got back into its rhythm in Group A of the NCAA Season 102 men’s basketball tournament in an authoritative way after drubbing Lyceum, 94-69, at San Juan Arena on Tuesday.

The Heavy Bombers put a three-point loss to San Beda over the weekend behind, hiking their record to 3-1 and tying with the College of St. Benilde at the top of the group.

After holding a slim three-point lead at the end of the opening frame, Jose Rizal kept its foot on the gas pedal and churned out a 28-point second period that buried the Pirates in a deep hole they never came close to getting out of the rest of the way.

By halftime, the Bombers held a 53-35 lead, which later on ballooned to as big as 34 points.

Lawrence Mangubat starred for JRU with 23 points while Jamir Eligado held down the fort with a double-double of 22 points and 16 rebounds. Eligado was also a perfect 10-for-10 from the field.

Mangubata also didn’t miss in 10 free throw attempts, while Eligado also had seven points in the second quarter when the Heavy Bombers gained complete command.

‘I’m just thankful that coach Nani (Epondulan) gave me a chance,’ said Eligado. ‘He trusts me, my teammates trust me and that’s good because I work on my role. I really just do my job.’

Roger Ondoa was the only Pirate to score in double digits, dropping 21 points in Lyceum’s third loss in four games.

Earlier, Emilio Aguinaldo College slayed its fourth-quarter ghosts to post a 94-87 win over San Sebastian.

‘In all our [previous] games, we’re always in the game in the first to third quarters, and then we collapse in the fourth,’ Generals coach Jerson Cabiltes said. ‘That didn’t happen this time.

‘I’m very glad with the first win but with what I saw, it was very tough to get it.’

Wilmar Oftana and Jacob Shanoda turned in 18 points a piece in the Generals’ win, with MJ and Harvae Raymundo scattering 17 and 12 points, respectively.

Sen. Panfilo ‘Ping’ Lacson took a swipe on Wednesday at Senate Minority Leader Alan Peter Cayetano’s credibility after the latter described him as having influence over various government agencies amid the controversy over alleged ghost projects in Taguig City.

In a post on X, Lacson quoted Cayetano as saying that he had become ‘Chief Justice Lacson, Prosecutor Lacson, DOJ Lacson, persecutor Lacson’ and ‘Secretary Lacson,’ who was supposedly ‘calling the shots.’

Lacson said, ‘If this were coming from someone credible, I’d take it as a compliment.’

His statement came after Cayetano, in a Facebook livestream on Tuesday, questioned what he described as Lacson’s influence over Public Works Secretary Vince Dizon and other government agencies.

‘Si Senator Lacson kasi ano na eh, Chief Justice Lacson, Prosecutor Lacson, DOJ Lacson, persecutor Lacson, siya na lahat. Secretary Lacson, siya na nagdidikta eh,’ Cayetano said.

(Senator Lacson has become Chief Justice Lacson, the prosecutor Lacson, the DOJ Lacson, the persecutor Lacson, he’s everything now. Secretary Lacson, he’s the one calling the shots.)

Cayetano also alleged that Lacson was calling the shots at the Laguna Lake Development Authority, the Senate Blue Ribbon Committee, the Department of the Interior and Local Government, and the Philippine Reclamation Authority.

Cayetano’s remarks came amid the dispute over Dizon’s clarification of his statement that there were no ghost projects in Taguig.

Dizon had explained that while none of the 10 projects conclusively identified as ghost projects nationwide were in Taguig, the investigation into infrastructure projects in the city remained ongoing.

Lacson had earlier challenged Dizon’s initial statement that there were no ghost projects in Taguig, citing preliminary findings involving several projects, including a Taguig project whose geotagged billing photographs reportedly contained coordinates pointing to Leyte.

After Dizon clarified that the Taguig findings remained subject to validation, Lacson acknowledged the clarification.

Lacson said preliminary inspection findings did not automatically prove that a project was ‘ghosted,’ but that authorities also could not definitively conclude that no ghost projects existed.

The National Irrigation Administration (NIA) and other concerned agencies are continuously preparing to ease the effects of the looming super El Niño, including the maintenance of irrigation systems and clearing operations on irrigation canals, Malacañang said Wednesday.

Palace press officer Claire Castro made the assurance after the NIA outlined its mitigation action plan to address water scarcity and drought in the country.

For other sectors affected by El Niño, the Palace has yet to seek the Department of Education’s recommendation on shifting school schedules.The Climate Change Commission earlier called for the adjustment of classes, from 6 a.m. to 9:30 a.m. to avoid the extreme heat.

‘Hindi ko po ngayon nahingi ang opinyon at suggestion din ng DepEd patungkol po diyan. After this briefing, makikipag-ugnayan po tayo sa DepEd,’ she said.(I have not yet asked for the opinion and suggestions of the DepEd regarding that matter. After this briefing, we will coordinate with the DepEd.)The Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical, and Astronomical Services Administration on Sept. 23 warned that the El Niño will likely become ‘very strong’ in the remaining months of the year and persist through the first half of 2027.

Preserved in the British Library in London is a wonderful 18th-century map of Spanish Manila. It provides an extraordinarily detailed rendering of the area inside (Intra-) the walls (Muros). When I first saw a grainy reproduction of this map as a college student, I wondered: how was a bird’s-eye view possible in the time before drones and Google Earth?

The ‘Roxas Topographical Map of Manila’ is now accessible online from the collection of King George III. If you look to the left of Fort Santiago, near the mouth of the Pasig River, you can see Tondo, Binondo, Quiapo, and Santa Cruz. The Binondo River and major structures are clearly identified. Houses with thatched roofs fill grid lines, showing trees, and shrubs in backyards and people walking down narrow streets. Inside Fort Santiago, tiny lines represent soldiers in formation, marching through a narrow passage toward the cathedral where they regroup. An officer on horseback leads the troop. Outside the walls, along what is Bonifacio Drive today, are native houses. If your eyes travel right toward present-day Rizal Park, you will see an area brimming with homes labeled ‘Bagumbayan’-which makes sense, as it was the ‘new’ town compared to the ‘old’ city inside Intramuros.

In 2019, Tom Harper, the British Library’s Lead Curator of Maps, showed me the original Roxas map. He pointed out a handwritten inscription on the lower right near the Bastión de San Diego (close to where the Pamantasan ng Lungsod ng Manila stands today) and noted that it was likely penned by George III himself. This led me to imagine British East India Company officials briefing the King on the siege and occupation of Manila in October 1762. Two decades later, George would lose the American colonies-the very nation that would later acquire the Philippines from Spain and govern it from 1898 to 1946. Some scholars, however, argue that the handwritten inscription belongs not to the ‘Mad King’ George but to Alexander Dalrymple, a hydrographer for the East India Company.

Once, while lecturing on the Roxas map, a student interrupted with a question: ‘What would have happened if the British decided to stay in Manila instead of taking the ransom and sailing away?’ Before I could compose a reply, he followed up: ‘What if the Philippines had been colonized by the British rather than the Spanish? Were we colonized by the wrong country?’

In my long career as a teacher and public historian, I deploy counterfactuals to move a narrative forward. While I appreciated the student’s line of inquiry, it reminded me of a friendly scolding I once received from Teodoro A. Agoncillo, who did not share my taste for historical ‘what-ifs.’ He said, ‘Historians don’t have enough time to dig up and recreate all that actually happened in the past. Why waste your time chasing after what didn’t?’ I wanted to cite Agoncillo to wiggle out of the question, but the student’s query made a lot of sense.

First difference would be linguistic. Had the British not returned us to Spain in 1764, we would be speaking British rather than American English today. We would spell Manila with two ls, drive on the left side of the road, and favor tea over coffee. I am certain we would have indigenized English to make it distinctly our own, much as Singaporeans and Australians have done with their respective dialects. Curiously, we likely would have been categorized as ‘Malay’ or ‘East Indian’ rather than the Spanish ‘indio.’ And who knows if we would even be called ‘Filipinos’-or perhaps ‘Philippinos’-today?

Second difference would be religious and administrative. Spain’s primary driver in the colonial enterprise was the Catholic Church, with missionaries dispatched across the archipelago-even to places avoided by Spanish bureaucrats and military officers. The Church exercised immense control over land and local governance down to the parish level, giving rise to the concept of ‘bajo de las campanas’-living within earshot of the church bells. The British, by contrast, ran colonies for profit through trade, cash crops, and taxation. Their rule was exerted not directly through the Crown, but through a corporate enterprise: the British East India Company.

Third difference would be geopolitical. The Philippines likely would have been governed alongside British Malaya, Singapore, and North Borneo. Had that occurred, the modern dispute over Sabah (North Borneo) would not exist today. Being folded into this British sphere would have drawn Indian and Chinese laborers to the islands, dramatically shifting our demographics centuries earlier. Our civil service structure would be fundamentally altered, and we almost certainly would have been drawn into the 19th-century opium trade.

Looking back on the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, it is clear that-with the exception of Thailand-all were born from colonial rule: Brunei, Myanmar, Malaysia, and Singapore were British; Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam were French; Indonesia was Dutch; and the Philippines was occupied successively by the Spanish, the Americans, and the Japanese. Would we have been ‘better’ or ‘worse’ under Britain? We don’t know. It never happened. But had they stayed, our reality would be different.

The reported shooting incident at Isulan National High School in Sultan Kudarat province on Wednesday was a ‘false alarm,’ Education Secretary Sonny Angara confirmed.

Earlier, Governor Datu Pax Ali S. Mangudadatu said in a social media post that there was an alleged shooting incident at the school, but no confirmed reports of injuries or fatalities related to the incident.

In a brief media interview, Angara said that the circulating report was not true.

‘Hindi daw totoo. Mayroong attempt ‘yata, I think there was an attempt, ‘yun lang alam ko,’ he told reporters at The Manila Hotel.

(They said it wasn’t true. There was supposedly an attempt, I think there was an attempt-that’s all I know.)

‘Pero no injuries…Parang false alarm, false alarm ang report sa akin as of 1:30 kanina pero hindi naman nagbago. Sabi ko, kung ganon wag na natin ireport kasi alam mo naman baka sumikat pa eh, diba?,’ Angara added.

(But there were no injuries… It seemed like a false alarm. The report I got at around 1:30 earlier was that it was a false alarm, but that hasn’t changed. I said, if that’s the case, let’s not report it anymore because, you know, it might just get blown out of proportion, right?)

The principal of Isulan National High School likewise denied reports of a shooting or hostage-taking on campus, saying all students were safe.

‘There was no shooting incident, and there was no hostage-taking,’ school principal Lorna Lee Ann Valencia said.

Valencia said police arrived at the school within five minutes and helped contain the situation and ease concerns among students and school personnel.

Agriculture and health officials in several parts of the country are stepping up preparations as El Niño intensifies, with the weather phenomenon expected to reach a ‘very strong’ state before the end of 2026 and possibly persist into 2027.

The Department of Agriculture (DA) said Western Visayas, the Negros Island Region, Central Visayas, and Eastern Visayas were among 14 regions where field assessments found damage to rice, corn, cassava, high-value crops, livestock, and poultry.

Nationwide, agricultural damage and losses have reached P6.87 billion, affecting 223,214 farmers and 249,028 hectares of farmland, the DA Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Operations Center reported.

Estimated production losses reached 163,812 metric tons, although the figures remain subject to validation. Corn accounted for the largest share at P4.9 billion, affecting 170,605 hectares, while rice losses reached P1.53 billion across 74,953 hectares.

Declining rainfall

The DA reported that 192,766 ha, or 77.41 percent of the affected agricultural area, remained recoverable, while 56,262 ha had no chance of recovery.

The agency has installed 338 water pumps in affected areas and provided P10.96 billion in interventions, including production support and crop insurance indemnification.

In Oriental Mindoro, officials are preparing for below-normal rainfall, dry spells, and drought from late 2026 to early 2027.

Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration (Pagasa) forecasts indicated that rainfall in the province could decline significantly beginning December, with only about 50 millimeters expected through March 2027, according to weather bureau officer Edmundo Muning.

The Provincial Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Office will reinforce the Provincial El Niño Task Force to coordinate preparations, particularly for farmers and other sectors dependent on water.

Despite the projected dry spell, Pagasa estimates that three to five tropical cyclones could still enter the Philippine area of responsibility from October 2026 to March 2027.

In Zambales, the Provincial Health Office has ordered hospitals and local health units to prepare for possible health impacts, including extreme heat, water shortages, and water- and mosquito-borne diseases.

Provincial Health Officer II Dr. Noel Bueno directed health facilities to review water reserves, alternative water sources, backup power and fuel supplies, cooling systems and stocks of essential medicines and emergency supplies.

The office warned that prolonged dry conditions and high temperatures could increase the risk of dehydration, heat exhaustion and heat stroke, as well as diarrhea, dengue, respiratory illnesses, food poisoning and malnutrition.

Pagasa said a strong El Niño is present in the tropical Pacific, with most climate models indicating that the phenomenon could persist through the first half of 2027 and reach a very strong state before the end of 2026.

Every time a minimum wage is set, the public sees the final amount. It rarely sees how that amount was determined.

Workers want to know whether the increase will keep up with food, housing, transport, electricity, and other needs. Employers ask whether they can absorb the added cost. Public debate quickly focuses on the amount: Is P50 enough? Should it be P80? Why not P100 or P200?

But an earlier question deserves attention: How should the increase be determined? That may be the missing reform in the Philippine wage debate.

When the process becomes an issue. Recent events in Metro Manila show that wage disputes can involve not only the amount of an increase, but also how it was determined.

National Capital Region (NCR) Wage Order No. 27 granted an P85 daily minimum wage increase in two tranches: P60 beginning July 25 and another P25 in January 2027. Two construction companies challenged the order before a Pasig court, arguing that employers’ capacity to pay had not been properly considered. The court issued a temporary restraining order on July 30 and later a preliminary injunction on Aug. 13, suspending implementation while the case is pending.

The government and labor groups have challenged the injunction, including the court’s jurisdiction. The government has asked the court to lift the injunction. While Wage Order No. 27 remained under litigation, Regional Tripartite Wages and Productivity Board (RTWPB) -NCR issued Wage Order No. 28, granting a P60 increase effective Sept. 26.

The legal questions remain unresolved. But the dispute raises a broader issue for wage-setting: How can an RTWPB clearly show how it considered the factors required by law in arriving at a wage increase?

A related issue is when a wage review should begin. The rules already provide for regular wage reviews. RTWPBs must keep socioeconomic conditions under review and may start the wage-setting process earlier when there are ‘urgent and reasonable grounds.’ The rules do not define those grounds.

That becomes important when events outside the country quickly raise the cost of living. The recent conflict in the Middle East, for example, has pushed up oil prices and Philippine fuel costs. An RTWPB must then decide whether the impact is enough to justify starting a wage review earlier than usual.

No rule can anticipate every crisis. But clearer guidance on what may constitute urgent and reasonable grounds could reduce disagreement over when an earlier review is warranted. Predictability does not mean automatic wage increases or a fixed formula. It can also mean greater clarity about when wages will be reviewed and when circumstances justify acting earlier.

How do we arrive at the amount? Once a wage review begins, another question follows: Why P50, P80 or any other amount?

A wage review brings together evidence. But evidence alone does not tell us how to assess it. Which indicators are most appropriate for each criterion required by law? How should they be read together? What happens when they point in different directions? What if the available data cannot give a confident answer?

These are not just technical questions. They affect the wages workers receive and the costs employers bear.

Recent Philippine research on the employment effects of minimum wage increases illustrates the difficulty. Gaps in the available data make some effects hard to estimate with confidence. This does not mean wage increases never affect employment, or that they necessarily lead to job losses. It means wage policy should not ask the evidence to tell us more than it can.

The same principle should guide wage-setting.

Who decides is only part of the question. The issue is especially relevant because wage-setting itself is being debated. Regional boards continue to review wages, while proposals in Congress would change the system. One approach is a legislated wage increase. Another would replace regional wage setting with a national minimum wage system.

The Wage Rationalization Act already requires RTWPBs to consider a wide range of social and economic factors. The law therefore provides the criteria. What deserves closer attention is how to assess them more systematically and show how the evidence shaped the final decision.

Serving as a labor representative to an RTWPB has brought this issue into sharper focus for me. I support higher wages for workers. But determining an increase also requires weighing evidence that may point in different directions or have important limitations.

Workers should be able to see how their needs were considered. Employers should understand the basis of decisions affecting their labor costs. Policymakers should know what the evidence supports and where its limits lie.

The debate will inevitably return to the amount. But if that is all we talk about, we will leave an important question unanswered:

How should the Philippines determine the minimum wage?

Dom Tuvera is a labor representative to the Regional Tripartite Wages and Productivity Board for Region I. The views expressed are his own.

The Supreme Court’s swift dismissal of the petitions seeking to nullify the impeachment court’s Sept. 23 ruling on the 2/3 vote requirement needed to convict Vice President Sara Duterte proves that its interpretations and proceedings are ‘constitutionally bullet-proof.’

That’s according to Senate impeachment court spokesperson Reginald Tongol.

In a statement, Tongol said the impeachment court acknowledges the decisive action of the Supreme Court en banc.

‘The Supreme Court’s prompt dismissal of these cases on procedural grounds-specifically lack of standing and prematurity-effectively confirms the interpretations and proceedings of the Senate Impeachment Court are constitutionally bulletproof,’ he said.

‘By junking these challenges, the Highest Court has drawn a definitive firewall around the independence of the Senate as an Impeachment Court, confirming that its proceedings cannot be held hostage by premature judicial meddling or collateral litigation,’ Tongol stressed.

He added that the impeachment court’s ruling ‘stands undisturbed and shall continue to perform its constitutional mandate to solely try and decide the impeachment case before it without unnecessary stalling or external distractions.’

Top seed Alex Eala passed her first test to secure at least a bronze medal in the Asian Games 2026 women’s tennis singles event on Wednesday.

Eala, the heavy favorite to win it all, shook off a slow start to fend off a gutsy Joanna Garland of Chinese Taipei, 7-5, 6-0, in their quarterfinal duel at Higashiyama Park Tennis Center in Nagoya.

Playing at Center Court for the first time after weather disruptions over the past few days, Eala put on a show in front of a predominantly Filipino crowd.

Eala rallied from 4-5 down in the opener before stepping on the gas to take the next nine games.

She broke Garland to love for a commanding 5-0 lead before scoring on back-to-back service winners to close out the 143rd-ranked Garland.

Struggling on her first serves in the second set, Garland had no answer for Eala’s blazing forehand returns.

Eala acknowledged the threat that Garland brought to the table in their showdown.

‘She’s a great player. Obviously, she has really good, high-quality shots,’ Eala said. ‘She has a lot of power, a great serve, many good qualities, and obviously is a fighter. You could see that in the energy she brought on court today.’

Eala, who won bronze at the Hangzhou Asian Games three years ago, advanced to the semifinals against Chinese Wang Xiyu.

Eala is also competing in women’s doubles with Shaira Rivera. The two play their round-of-16 match later in the evening.

The current world No. 18, who skipped the WTA 1000 China Open to represent the country in Aichi-Nagoya, opened her gold medal bid 6-1, 6-0 win over Thailand’s Patcharin Cheapchandej last Monday.

TikTok Korea has permanently removed the account of a former K-pop singer convicted of sex crimes against minors, just one day after he joined the platform.

The Korean unit of TikTok said Monday that it permanently suspended and removed the account of Go Young-wook, a former member of the coed group Roo’ra, after becoming aware of it Sunday.

Go had announced the launch of his TikTok account on X a day earlier, sharing a link to a video posted on the platform.

‘Under our community guidelines, when an account holder is confirmed to have committed a sexual offense against a young person, we permanently suspend all of their accounts, including associated accounts without exception,’ TikTok Korea said.

Go responded to the removal on X, saying the decision had made him ‘someone who can hardly be seen anywhere anymore.’

The TikTok removal is not the first time Go has been barred from a major online platform. He launched a personal YouTube channel in August 2024, but the channel was later terminated.

Go, who debuted in 1994, was convicted of sexually assaulting three minors in offenses committed over a period of about two years beginning in 2010.

In 2013, the Supreme Court sentenced him to two and a half years in prison and ordered the disclosure of his personal information for five years and the wearing of an electronic monitoring device for three years.