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By Luis Leoncio  The Senate is proposing the establishment of an “urban traffic management authority,” the sole function of which would be to streamline the management of traffic in urban areas. 

By Riza Lozada  The country’s business leaders appear to have been totally won over by the pithy 15-minute speech of President Duterte last Thursday that directly addressed red tape and the sanctity of contracts —the two greatest concerns of  the business sector during the past administration.

As a fitting prelude to the flag carrier’s 75th year, Philippine Airlines Inc. (PAL) achieved its most impressive financial performance yet with a P6.3-billion profit for last year or a six-fold increase over the previous year.

A Commission on Audit (CoA) report on the Light Rail Transit Authority (LRTA) last year said that, despite incidents of train faults and failures, no penalties were ever imposed on the maintenance contractor, hence, the train faults and failures continued unabated. 

By Luis Leoncio  The Department of Finance (DOF) will review the Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT) and the Personal Equity and Retirement Account (PERA) as part of the agency’s effort to connect with the people, Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez III said. 

By Luis Leoncio  Incoming Budget Secretary Benjamin E. Diokno is confident of finally completing his “unfinished business” of making the annual national budget as an anti-poverty tool, which he started during the short-lived presidency of Joseph Estrada. 

By Riza Lozada  There appears to be no immediate end in sight to the standoff between the country’s telecommunications giants and the newly formed regulator, the Philippine Competition Commission (PCC), over a P70-billion telecommunications megadeal. 

Two controversial measures that came out of the two-day Davao City summit among businessmen and the Duterte economic team were a proposal to raise the value added tax (VAT) from 12 percent to at most 15 percent, and to provide President-elect Rodrigo Duterte with emergency powers—for two years, at most— to address the traffic crisis in Metro Manila. 

By Riza Lozada To make up for the rise in the number of school dropouts amid the increase in school years through the Kindergarten-to-Grade 12 (K-to-12) system, incoming Education Secretary Leonor Magtolis-wBriones said the Alternative Learning System (ALS) will be boosted to allow more students to advance in their studies outside of a classroom.

By Luis Leoncio  The proposed income-tax cuts hijacked by President Aquino are expected to be realized under the incoming administration, but with a consequent increase in the sales tax or the valued-added tax (VAT), according to the policy agenda drafted by President-elect Rodrigo Duterte’s economic managers.