WINNERS ALL: Mary Francine Padios (third from left) is flanked by the other winners in the tunggal event. With them at left is Philippine chief of mission and PSC Commissioner Ramon Fernandez.
HANOI. – An emotional victory by a pencak silat player for the country’s first gold medal fired up the Philippine campaign in the 31st Vietnam Southeast Asian Games here on Wednesday, a day before the biennial multi-sports festival gets going at the My Dinh National Stadium here.
Mary Francine Padios, 18, struck gold in the women’s pencak silat seni (artistic or form) tunggal single event at the Bac Tu Lien Gymnasium here, putting the Philippines on the medal table that Vietnam started to dominate.
Padios, a native of Kalibo, Aklan, improved on her silver medal finish in the 2019 Philippine Games, inspired by the misfortune that struck her dad, Jerome, just before Christmas.
“My dad has become my inspiration after he figured in a terrible car accident on her way home in Aklan just before Christmas,” said Padios, whose dad is in a coma. “He was so exhausted and drowsy from work that he slept at the wheel and met with an accident.
“He’s been motivating me ever since,” said Padios, whose score of 9.960 powered her past 2019 winner and favorite Arum Sari of Indonesia, who settled for the silver with 9.945 points.
Vietnam bolstered its bid to snatch the overall title from the Philippines, having amassed a front-running haul of six gold, five silver, and six bronze medals as of 3 p.m. (Hanoi time) on Wednesday.
Malaysia kept in step with a similar six-gold output but had less silver and bronze with one and four, respectively, followed by Indonesia (3-4-0 gold-silver-bronze), Singapore (1-3-3) and Thailand 1-2-3.
Outside of the hosts, the Malaysians and the Filipinos, no other country in the 11-member SEA Games has won gold so far.
Padios’s golden feat lit the Philippine campaign here that met some stiff winds in kurash, beach handball, football, and rowing.
Helen Aclopen accounted for a silver medal in the women’s minus 48kgs of kurash, which also came up with bronze medals courtesy of Charmea Quelino, George Baclagan and Renzo Cazeñas.
Filipino beach handball players gave Vietnam fits on Tuesday but eventually lost in a shootout 14-12, 18-12 (8-10) to settle for a silver medal that coach Joanna Franquelli said shone like gold.
Eruç arrives in Legaspi. (Photo from the Provincial Government of Albay)
What are Customs officials up to?
A TURKISH-AMERICAN adventurer who became the first person in history to complete a solo and entirely human-powered circumnavigation of the globe in 2012 arrived in the country last Thursday, completing a mission to reach Asia aboard his trusty rowboat from Crescent City, California.
Eruí§ arrives in Albay. (Photo from the Facebook page of Apa Ongpin)
Erden Eruí§ started his audacious trip on June 22, 2021 on his US-flagged vessel dubbed “Around-N-Up” and arrived in Legazpi City eight days ahead of his target date of April. He intends to stay in the country for a year before proceeding to the next stage of his mission — to reach Mt. Everest and try to reach the summit.
That plan, however, is about to be scuttled by two overzealous Bureau of Customs officials in Legazpi City —Amelia Garcia, acting chief of the Assessment Division, and Engr. Arthur Sevilla, Jr. acting district collector.
Malaya-Business Insight learned of the plight of Erden Eruí§ (pronounced ‘Air-den Air-rooch’) from a Facebook post of journalist and broadcaster Apa Ongpin.
In his post, Ongpin said the Bureau of Customs intends to put Eruí§’s boat “under guard” and “force him to transport it, at his expense, to a bonded warehouse, where it will remain locked up, again at his expense, and he will have no access to it, until he departs again, which is scheduled for January or February of 2023.”
Ongpin wrote that under Customs Administrative Order 14-2019, the maximum rate for storage at Customs Bonded Warehouses is ₱6.89 per kilogram a day. The dry weight of “Around-N-Up” is 500 kg.
“Thus, the base rate to store the boat there is ₱3,445 a DAY. Mr. Eruí§ originally planned to depart from the Philippines in 330 days. The warehouse would thus cost him… are you ready? ₱1,136,850. That is not inclusive of other fees,” Ongpin wrote.
Tongue in cheek, Ongpin called out the Department of Finance, Bureau of Customs Commissioner Rey Leonard Guerrero, and Department of Tourism Secretary Berna Puyat, telling them: “Is this how we want to say: Welcome to the Philippines, Mr. Eruí§!”
Ongpin said Ms. Garcia and Engr. Sevilla “are overstepping their authority.”
Ongpin said the two Customs officials “initially tried to treat it (Around-N-Up) as a commercial vessel engaged in foreign trade, because Customs regulations give them authority and control over such vessels. When the obvious absurdity of this was pointed out to them, Ms. Garcia insisted they still have the authority, and gave the following example: If a foreigner arrives in the Philippines wearing an expensive watch, Customs has the duty to inspect and register that watch and ensure that the foreigner brings it out again with him when he departs.”
Ongpin noted that “despite having traveled in and out of the Philippines hundreds of times, I have never actually witnessed this watch inspection being done. Furthermore, does she mean to say that the watch then has to be transported under guard and left in a bonded warehouse, at the owner’s expense and risk?”
Ongpin continued: “Common sense tells you the vessel should be treated as a ‘visiting yacht.’ The well-established and only procedure to grant entry to a visiting yacht is that it must undergo a Customs, Immigration and Quarantine inspection, which has already taken place.
“Since this is a foreign-flagged boat, by international (and Philippine) maritime law, the entry grants it the right of safe passage through Philippine territory. By the way, there is no written limit in Philippine law (on) how long a visiting yacht may stay. However, in order to be a visiting yacht, it must have a valid registration in another jurisdiction.
“Forcing the owner to surrender the boat to a bonded warehouse is tantamount to an arrest and temporary confiscation, which is without basis, since no violation was committed, and is in itself a violation of the right of safe passage.
“Ms. Garcia then responded that it cannot be a visiting yacht because (according to her) it did not enter the Philippines under its own power. This misinterpretation stems from the intent of the rule: if a yacht or any kind of boat, enters a country carried on another vessel, then yes, it is a commercial good, not a visiting yacht. For Ms. Garcia to insist that the rowboat did not enter the Philippines under its own power is almost inconceivably stupid, and it is why I wrote this post.
“But guess what, she said something even better. She keeps telling Mr. Eruí§ that Customs is not charging him any fees, and they only want to ASSIST him in complying with the law. Your government at work, people!”
Referring to the ₱1,136,850 that Mr. Eruí§ needs to shell out, and that is not inclusive of other fees, Ongpin said: “This is the value of the ASSISTANCE offered by our heroic Bureau of Customs personnel, Ms. Amelia Garcia and Engr. Arthur Sevilla.”
Malaya-Business Insight has sent e-mails to thru the BoC website to Ms. Garcia and Engr. Sevilla, asking for their reactions to Mr. Ongpin’s post.
Mr. Eruí§ had rowed solo all the way from Crescent City to Waikiki, Hawaii. From there, he proceeded to Guam, and then to the Philippines.
He aims to raise awareness about plastics problem in the Ocean in collaboration with Ocean Recovery Alliance, a registered non-profit organization in California and registered charitable organization in Hong Kong, with the aim to use new technologies, innovations, creativity and collaborations to solve issues that face the health of the ocean. He is also collecting ambient sound data for NOAA scientist Jay Barlow using a high-frequency hydrophone. The data will identify the range of Beaked Whales along his transect.
(Barlow is a scientist who has worked for 40 years with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. In November 2020, he and a team of scientists captured photographs, video recordings and the sounds of what is believed to be an entirely new beaked whale species north of Mexico’s San Benito Islands, a discovery that Barlow described as “sending chills up my spine.”)
Mr. Eruí§, born in Nicosia, Cyprus in 1961, is the leading ocean rower in the world today. He is the recipient of the 2013 Citation of Merit from the prestigious Explorers Club, one of the 2013 Adventurers of the Year — “nine individuals changing the face of global adventure” by Outside Magazine, and one of the 50 Most Adventurous Men by Men’s Journal.
Fifteen Guinness World Records are currently registered to his name. He is already listed in the 2009, 2012, 2014, 2017 and 2018 Guinness books of World Records for various accomplishments, among them being the first to complete a solo circumnavigation of the world by human power; first to row the three oceans: Atlantic, Pacific and Indian; and first to row across an ocean from the Southern to the Northern hemisphere.
Malaya-Business Insight will keep you posted about Mr. Eruí§’s plight. — with Raymond Tribdino
THERE was this interesting report yesterday that Pangasinan Gov. Amado Espino III has not joined 41 other governors who have signed a statement backing the vice-presidential bid of President Duterte.
What is the significance of this development to us in sports? Well, one of the direct beneficiaries of this move is Sen. Manny Pacquiao, who has severed ties with Duterte and seems to be dead set in running for a higher position in next year’s national polls.
There are other personalities who will also benefit, among them Senators Panfilo Lacson and Tito Sotto, and Manila Mayor Isko Moreno.
Moreno? The former scavenger-turned-actor-turned politician has been endorsed by former Transport Usec Thomas “Tim” Orbos to run for president in 2022. Orbos, a political ally of Espino, is the lead convenor of Ikaw Muna Pilipinas, a political movement backing Moreno’s possible presidential bid.
In the last presidential elections in 2016, Pangasinan — composed of 44 municipalities and four cities — delivered the third biggest number of votes among the country’s 81 provinces, next only to Cebu and Laguna. How many votes has Duterte lost?
We in sports love a good fight and, at the rate things are going, we will soon see a battle royale between the presidential bet of Duterte — Sara? — and the other contenders.
Moreno seems to have jumped the gun on the rest, however. Consider this: Political leaders of the Ikaw Muna Pilipinas movement in Cagayan Valley believe Moreno is the right guy to lead the country.
Orbos, in a series of consultations recently with Cagayan Valley leaders, painted Moreno as the leader needed by the country, saying in a virtual message: “It’s not about believing in him, although I believe in him. It’s more of how he made us believe in ourselves, how he made Manileños believe in themselves that they can overcome. That’s very important especially at this time when we do not know where the road will lead us.”
Orbos also underscored that Moreno has been effective and efficient in addressing the COVID-19 pandemic.
We would love to hear what Moreno and the rest have to say about sports. Do they have what it takes?
We in sports are a lucky lot because the guys manning the Philippine Sports Commission are, as they say in the vernacular, “malapit sa kusina.”
Otherwise, our athletes may be down there in the pits, in the company of, among others, our dear teachers and healthcare workers, forgotten and buried, as people appointed by the administration to sensitive positions raid the national coffers.
Thanks largely to PSC chief Butch Ramirez and Philippine Olympic Committee President Rep. Abraham “Bambol” Tolentino, our athletes, led by weightlifter Hidilyn Diaz and boxers Nesthy Petecio, Carlo Paalam, and Eumir Marcial, made us doubly proud in the Tokyo Olympics.
We can only hope that whoever gets to be appointed to the PSC in 2022 would continue the programs put in place by the agency to boost our chances of winning medals in the 2024 Paris Olympics.
Yeah, boost. The latest development in Pangasinan is a big boost to the contenders, except you know who.
THERE were rumors, some said nasty, swirling around when Phoenix joined the PBA in the 2015-16 season, the rumors dealing mostly with how long the new team would last in the pro league. But those rumors were quickly put to rest when the Fuel Masters showed they were here to stay, gamely battling on with rosters hastily formed from discards, free agents, and rookies that were passed over by the other teams.
In 12 conferences so far, the Fuel Masters have not finished lower than 11th. Their best finish so far was third, twice, the last coming last year when the league played in a bubble in Clark. They finished with an 11-6 record in the Philippine Cup, behind eventual runner-up Tropang Giga and champion Barangay Ginebra.
The Fuel Masters are, of course, owned by Davao-based businessman Dennis Uy, whose meteoric rise in the world of business is nothing short of phenomenal.
Just for kicks, I googled Dennis Uy and this came up: “Udenna Corp. posted a net profit of P3.39 billion in 2019 driven by the robust performance of its property development business. In a statement Monday, the holding company of businessman Dennis A. Uy said it reached record high revenues of P110.67 billion last year, higher by 17% from the previous year.”
Wow! For a company founded in March 2002, that was quite a big leap!
Another item that popped up piqued my interest, a very interesting piece about Uy’s latest business venture, Dito Telecommunity. For those who have been living in caves these past years, Dito is a consortium of Uy’s Udenna Corp. (through its subsidiary Dito Holdings Corp., and Chinese state-owned China Telecomunications Corp., a parent company of China Telecom.
The piece was datelined Canberra, with Queensland Sen. James McGrath warning that China was using Communist Party-controlled owned instrumentalities such as China Telecom and Dito Telecommunity as “Trojan Horses” to infiltrate the infrastructure of smaller nations in the Indo-China region.
McGrath was particularly concerned about China Telecom’s 40 percent share in Dito Telecommunity.
“Many are concerned that Dito Telecommunity is a Trojan horse for spying, including on the armed forces of the Philippines and its allies the United States and Australia,” the reported quoted McGrath as saying: “When we consider how many Australian companies house parts of their businesses in the Philippines, such as call centers, this should ring alarm bells with cybersecurity experts.
“We must be awake to the Philippines being one of the first dominoes at risk of falling to the nefarious influence of that evil regime in China,” said McGrath, pointing out that Asia-Pacific consulting firm Creator Tech recently released a study into the new telecommunications operator that raised serious concerns about China’s entry into the Philippines telecommunications industry and its control of the national power grid in that country.
“While China has continued with its wolf warrior diplomacy and while territorial concerns continue to be raised, including in seas off Japan, Vietnam and the Philippines, the Chinese Communist Party government and its military arm have been quietly making strategic acquisitions of another kind,” he said.
This, of course, refers to China’s incursions in the country’s exclusive economic zone in the West Philippine Sea and I immediately recalled Sen. Risa Hontiveros recently renewing calls for the National Security Council to conduct a security audit on Dito, pointing out that the US has already blacklisted Chinese firms, including China Telecom, due to suspicions that they supply or support China’s military and security apparatus.
Whew! As they say in the vernacular, ang bigat!
But back to Uy. He added P5 million to the kitty of weightlifter Hidilyn Diaz, who won the country’s breakthrough gold medal in the recent Tokyo Olympics. Diaz also got a brand-new car from Ayala Corporation and she will be driving that with unlimited fuel coming from Phoenix.
But now, some quarters are asking: Why didn’t the businessman from Davao City add to the incentives going to Nesthy Petecio, Carlo Paalam and Eumir Marcial?
As some wag told me: Another P3 million for a silver medal and P1 million for a bronze medal will not even be a drop in the bucket.
Well, that will have to be answered by Mr. Uy himself.
We sportswriters, because we know (or pretend to know) the law of averages, like surprises, like when Gilas Pilipinas stunned South Korea in 2013 and qualified for the World Cup in 2014.
But a Trojan horse in our midst? Yes, we like surprises, but not like this.
OLYMPIC-bound boxer Eumir Felix Marcial met with former GSIS president Clint Aranas last Wednesday in Makati to learn the quirks of the taxation process that he said will come in handy once he decides to turn pro.
Marcial, who has earned a ticket to the Tokyo Olympics that has been reset to next year, said he wants to avoid the plague that has hounded pro boxers — inability to understand the taxation process that often left them penniless after giving the country glory.
“Marami na po kasi ako nabalitaan, nabasa na mga stories ng mga professional boxing champions na sumikat, yumaman pero sa huli halos ubos ang pera nila. Madalas iisa ang dahilan, nag-kaproblema sa taxes nila,” Marcial, 24, said in explaining his meeting with Aranas, currently the president of the archery association and former deputy commissioner for legal affairs of the Bureau of Internal Revenue.
“‘Yun lang naman ang gusto kong iwasan at mapag-aralan, kung paano ang taxation kapag nag-professional na po ako. Habang maaga, maging pamilyar na ako para walang hassles sa mga obligasyon ko sa tax,” he added, further fuelling speculations that he intends to turn pro while keeping his bid for an Olympic gold medal burning.
He did not say when he intends to turn pro but there are reports that he has been approached by several boxing personalities offering him millions of pesos to shed his amateur status. Even if he turns pro, he can still represent the country in the Tokyo Games under new Olympics rules.
The Association of Boxing Alliances in the Philippines led by Ricky Vargas had appealed to “certain individuals and entities” that are luring Marcial to turn pro with amounts that are “too staggering,” with offers reaching “tens of millions of pesos before even landing a punch.”
Vargas had claimed that although it’s Marcial’s dream to become an Olympian, what’s being dangled to him has left the native of Zamboanga City “confused.”
“Marcial has always maintained that his singular focus is to honor a promise made to his father and realize a dream that both of them shared from his childhood, to fight and win for his country in the Olympics,” a statement released by ABAP last April said.
“Recently however, with mind-boggling amounts being floated around, Eumir has been constantly pressured to deviate from his avowed mission,” the statement added.
Marcial has repeatedly said that he intends to honor the promise that he made to his father but also wants to ensure his future.
“Recommended po si Atty. Clint at alam ko mas maiintindihan niya kalagayan ko kasi NSA (National Sports Association) leader po siya kaya may puso talaga para sa mga atleta na tulad ko,” Marcial said.
“Private dealings ko naman po ito at syempre, bilang isang matured na tao, mas maganda kung personal ko na po na alamin ang mga ganitong bagay sa buhay ko habang hindi pa huli ang lahat.
“Mas nagkaroon po ako ng confidence na magiging successful ako hindi lang as boxer kungdi as someone na magkakaroon ng business dealings dahil may isang lawyer po ako na makakasama at mapapagkatiwalaan,” he added.
Marcial, who has earned a ticket to the Tokyo Olympics that has been reset to next year, said he wants to avoid the plague that has hounded pro boxers — inability to understand the taxation process that often left them penniless after giving the country glory.