Top News

By Luis Leoncio Sen. Ralph Recto has warned the country of a possible “made-in-China food shortage,” as colleague Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. chided the government for limiting its options on the territorial dispute with China by closing the door to bilateral negotiations.

President Aquino’s economic managers have put a positive spin on an otherwise damning report of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) on the administration’s budgeting innovations that cited the lack of transparency in the use of public funds. A top official even went to the extent of saying the IMF report was an “indicator” of fiscal transparency under the Aquino administration.

By Riza Lozada The International Air Transport Association (Iata), the global regulator of the international airline industry, has urged the Philippines to promote the Diosdado Macapagal International Airport (DMIA) in Pampanga as “temporary support” and “interim solution” to relieve the growing demands of international travelers coming to the country.

Customs Commissioner Alberto Lina, former Customs Commissioner Guillermo Parayno Jr. and former Customs Deputy Commissioner Primo Aguas are facing plunder and graft charges before the Office of the Ombudsman in connection with an “unceremoniously cancelled” P650-million contract for a modern integrated customs processing system at the Bureau of Customs (BOC).

The 10 members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean), the United Kingdom and other industrialized nations were among the 50 countries that signed last Monday the Articles of Agreement of the China-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB).

The budgetary innovations of the Aquino administration, which had already earned a rebuke from the Supreme Court (SC), are the subject of a probing article by the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

By Luis Leoncio The sudden termination last Tuesday of negotiations for what had promised to be a blockbuster deal between GMA Network Inc. (GMA) and San Miguel Corp. President and Vice Chairman Ramon S. Ang has sparked a bitter word war between the two camps over who’s to blame for the turn of events.

The Asian Development Bank (ADB) estimates that at least P19 billion of this year’s P62.3-billion budget for the Aquino administration’s key anti-poverty program, called conditional cash transfer (CCT), did not go to intended beneficiaries—the poorest of the poor among the country’s 100 million population.

Puerto Princesa, Philippines—China is pressing ahead with the construction of artificial islands on at least two reefs that are also claimed by the Philippines in an increasingly tense territorial dispute, Filipino officials said.

By Katy Daigle / The Associated Press New Delhi—Global resolve to rescue impoverished children from lives of squalor, disease and hunger has fallen short, with economic development in many countries still leaving millions of the most vulnerable behind, according to a just-released report of the United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (Unicef, now simply translated as United Nations Children’s Fund).