Sunday, March 26, 2023
manilastandard.net
ADVERTISEMENT
  • About
  • News
    • Top Stories
    • National
    • World News
    • Pinoy Abroad
    • Features
  • Opinion
    • Editorial
    • Columns
    • Soundbytes
  • LGUs
    • NCR
    • Luzon
    • Visayas
    • Mindanao
  • Business
    • Corporate
    • Economy & Trade
    • Stocks
    • Money
    • Agri & Mining
    • Power & Tech
    • IT & Telecom
  • Sports
    • Basketball
    • Volleyball
    • Fightsports
    • Active
    • Sports Plus
    • One Championship
    • Columns
  • Entertainment
    • TV & Movies
    • Celebrity Profiles
    • Music & Concerts
    • Digital Media
    • Columns
  • Lifestyle
    • Food
    • Culture & Media
    • Fashion
    • Health and Home
    • Leisure
    • Shopping
    • Columns
  • Others
    • Pets
    • Pop.Life
      • Newsmakers
      • Hangouts
      • A-Pop
      • Post Its
      • Performances
      • Malls & Bazaars
      • Hobbies & Collections
    • Technology
      • Gadgets
      • Computers
      • Business
      • Tech Plus
    • MS ON THE ROAD
      • Sedan
      • SUV
      • Truck
      • Bike
      • Accessories
      • Motoring Plus
      • Commuter’s Corner
    • Home & Design
      • Residential
      • Commercial
      • Construction
      • Interior
    • Spotlight
    • Gallery
      • Photos
      • Videos
    • Events
      • Seminars
      • Exhibits
      • Community
    • Biyahero
      • Travel Features
      • Travel Reels
      • Travel Logs
  • Advertise with Us
No Result
View All Result
  • About
  • News
    • Top Stories
    • National
    • World News
    • Pinoy Abroad
    • Features
  • Opinion
    • Editorial
    • Columns
    • Soundbytes
  • LGUs
    • NCR
    • Luzon
    • Visayas
    • Mindanao
  • Business
    • Corporate
    • Economy & Trade
    • Stocks
    • Money
    • Agri & Mining
    • Power & Tech
    • IT & Telecom
  • Sports
    • Basketball
    • Volleyball
    • Fightsports
    • Active
    • Sports Plus
    • One Championship
    • Columns
  • Entertainment
    • TV & Movies
    • Celebrity Profiles
    • Music & Concerts
    • Digital Media
    • Columns
  • Lifestyle
    • Food
    • Culture & Media
    • Fashion
    • Health and Home
    • Leisure
    • Shopping
    • Columns
  • Others
    • Pets
    • Pop.Life
      • Newsmakers
      • Hangouts
      • A-Pop
      • Post Its
      • Performances
      • Malls & Bazaars
      • Hobbies & Collections
    • Technology
      • Gadgets
      • Computers
      • Business
      • Tech Plus
    • MS ON THE ROAD
      • Sedan
      • SUV
      • Truck
      • Bike
      • Accessories
      • Motoring Plus
      • Commuter’s Corner
    • Home & Design
      • Residential
      • Commercial
      • Construction
      • Interior
    • Spotlight
    • Gallery
      • Photos
      • Videos
    • Events
      • Seminars
      • Exhibits
      • Community
    • Biyahero
      • Travel Features
      • Travel Reels
      • Travel Logs
  • Advertise with Us
No Result
View All Result
manilastandard.net
No Result
View All Result
Home Opinion Columns Formation by Gary Olivar

Lender bender

April 2, 2019, 12:30 am
in Formation by Gary Olivar
Reading Time: 5 mins read
A A
Share on FacebookShare on TwitterShare on Email

"Did the administration give the store away to the Chinese lenders in Chico River?"

 

Over the week-end, Senior Associate Justice Tony Carpio and Senior Columnist Scold Winnie Monsod ganged up on the administration for allegedly selling out the country’s patrimony to Chinese lenders.

To hear Carpio tell it, the Chinese can seize the country’s patrimonial as well as commercial assets anytime—including the oil and gas reserves under the Reed Bank—in order to satisfy an arbitral ruling in their favor.

ADVERTISEMENT

As evidence, he pointed to the newly signed Chico River project loan agreement, under which he claimed that any arbitration must be held in Beijing, any court cases have to be brought in China, and the governing law will be Chinese. It’s a dire, dire situation that Monsod dolefully described as “lutong macao—pun very much intended.”

As usual, with these guys, it’s a good idea to check the facts and the precedents for ourselves. What’s really going on?

* * *

Here’s the response from the boys at the Department of Finance:

Collateral is not mentioned in any of the country’s loan agreements, including the one for Chico River.

Instead, what’s provided for is an “arbitration clause” under which the Philippines, as borrower, agrees to participate in arbitration to settle any differences with China as lender.

In order to participate in arbitration, the Philippines has to waive its sovereign immunity “in connection with the arbitration or the enforcement of any arbitral award”, though NOT in connection with “any Philippine assets which are neither patrimonial nor commercial in nature”.

Note that our government has to affirmatively declare that a given asset is in fact patrimonial before it can be covered by arbitration. To his credit, Carpio unearthed a 1972 law declaring the Reed Bank to be, indeed, patrimonial. But let’s see below what other hoops the Chinese or any other lenders still have to jump through.

Whatever might happen, an arbitral award would still need to go through a Philippine court for validation before it can be enforced against us. The court will want to see that the arbitration was fair, there was no collusion, and the award is consistent with the country’s public policy.

* * *

So did the administration give the store away to the Chinese lenders in Chico River? Let’s do an actual comparison of the Chico River agreement with one from Japan (for the North-South commuter line) and Korea (new Cebu international container port), all three under Duterte; a fourth agreement with France (Cebu bus rapid transit-BRT) under Aquino; and another Chinese one (Angat dam) under Arroyo.

On choice of governing law: All five agreements are governed by the law of the lending country. This is a standard provision and will not surprise those familiar with such loan agreements.

On arbitration venue: Four agreements provide that arbitration will take place in the lending country (the fifth, with Korea, was either different or silent)

On immunity waiver: The Chico River agreement with China under Duterte and the Cebu BRT agreement with France under Aquino contain virtually identical language about waiving immunity only for arbitration purposes and maintaining immunity for our assets except those which are commercial or patrimonial.

It seems evident that what really galls many of us about these new Chinese loans is not the language in the agreements—which is fairly standard—but the plain fact that these are the same guys who’re happy to harass our fishermen as they go about building up their island-based defenses against the US 7th Fleet and its submarines.

As ever, the less emotion is involved, the better for us. We are neither as strong as Vietnam nor as far-away as Indonesia if it comes to an open clash. Better to stay pacific and build up our business and people-to-people ties with them while we get our military act together. And one good place to start with the latter is reviving ROTC—although, predictably, that’s being opposed by the same leftists who like to pillory Duterte for “selling us out” to China.

* * *

At last the European Union will investigate if the millions of dollars it has been sending to local NGO’s over decades have in fact found their way to the CPP-NPA, an organization that the EU (and the US) have both declared to be terrorist in nature.

The tie-up between violent guerrillas and leftist elements of civil society has got to be one of the country’s worst-kept secrets. If every leftist NGO that’s denied any ties to the NDF legal front of the communists were telling the truth, there wouldn’t be any NDF at all.

And yet, sadly enough, one generation after another of young idealists swallows the lie, hook line and sinker. Every year these kids provide fresh fodder for the delusions of the ageing malefactors who’re trapped in Utrecht by the alluring comfort of their petty-bourgeoiserie.

Come to think of it, why stop with EU funds?

There’s every reason to extend the probe and look into what the NDF front that calls itself the “Makabayan bloc” of legislators is doing with the public funds they get from Congress. How much of that money ends up with their NPA colleagues—together with confidential information on natural security that may routinely cross their desks?

* * *

Today’s Readings:

Water is an important theme in today’s readings. In Ezekiel 47: 1-9, the exiled prophet shares his visions of a stream flowing from under the Temple in Jerusalem that will bring the Lord’s abundant blessings to his fellow Judahites in Babylonian exile.

In the Gospel (John 5: 1-16), Jesus encounters a sick man lying beside the Bethesda healing pool, also in Jerusalem, who was not healed for thirty-eight years because no one would help him into the pool whenever the underwater spring bubbled up. But Jesus doesn’t need to lead him there. He simply tells the man to take up his mat and walk, and the healing miracle happens.

Jesus is the miraculous water who brings, not only God’s blessings, but also the manifest Divine presence into our lives. All He asks in return—as he did of the man in Bethesda—is for us to turn away from sin.

Readers can write me at gbolivar1952@yahoo.com.

Tags: Chico RiverDepartment of FinanceReed BankTony CarpioWinnie Monsod
ADVERTISEMENT

Related Posts

Time for LP to junk the Reds

June 29, 2021, 12:10 am
0
14
Time for LP to junk the Reds

"Stop the on-and-off flirtation."     Last Saturday was the inurnment of former President Benigno “PNoy” Aquino III. His former...

Read more

Rizal at 160

June 22, 2021, 12:15 am
0
41
Rizal at 160

"What would he think of us today?"     Last Saturday, unnoticed by too many people, marked the 160th birth...

Read more

One-two-three

June 15, 2021, 12:15 am
0
8
One-two-three

"What did Quezon know?"   Let me open with a commercial for my company CenSEI’s monthly webinar for June, on...

Read more

Biden to the rescue

June 8, 2021, 12:20 am
0
8
Biden to the rescue

"Still the world’s best salesmen."   Congratulations first of all to our wunderkind friend Dr. Karl Kendrick Chua, who breezed...

Read more

Neighbor, ally

June 1, 2021, 12:10 am
0
8
Neighbor, ally

"The key is not to become a pawn."   I’m happy to welcome the return to (online) print last March...

Read more

Changing the dream

May 25, 2021, 12:15 am
0
12
Changing the dream

"But first take violence off the table."     One of the industries I used to monitor for the country’s...

Read more

Print Edition

View More

Recent Posts

  • Quezon’s finest
  • Study of devolution to LGUs out in 2 months—DBM exec
  • Romualdez duo, DSWD hand out aid in Davao Oro to quake victims
  • STAR program to aid move of domestic flights to NAIA
  • Sen. Villar urges Soroptimist women to embark on urban gardening
  • SMC gives cash to Cavite fisherfolk
  • HIV patients urged to get treatments
  • Mangyans get S&T livelihood projects

Advertisement

Latest News

SMC gives cash to Cavite fisherfolk

byManila Standard
March 26, 2023, 10:50 pm
0
8
Thousands win in SMB promo

San Miguel Corporation (SMC) has extended monthly cash assistance to more fisherfolk families, bringing to close to 2,000 the beneficiaries...

Read more

HIV patients urged to get treatments

byManila Standard
March 26, 2023, 10:40 pm
0
8
PhilHealth expedites settling debts to hospitals by debit-credit scheme

The Philippine Health Insurance Corporation (PhilHealth) is urging patients infected with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) to avail of outpatient...

Read more

Mangyans get S&T livelihood projects

byButch Gunio
March 26, 2023, 10:30 pm
0
8
QC expands free testing program for COVID-19

Five Mangyan communities in Oriental Mindoro will soon enjoy improved socio-economic status through science and technology-based livelihood interventions. Mindoro State...

Read more

Orani mayor: Dialysis Center to rise in town

byButch Gunio
March 26, 2023, 10:20 pm
0
8
QC expands free testing program for COVID-19

Orani Mayor Bonjong Pascual announced that a dialysis treatment center will soon cater to patients with renal complications in the...

Read more

34 more students hospitalized after Cabuyao school fire drill

byWillie Casas
March 26, 2023, 10:10 pm
0
8
Kin of drug war victims ask ICC to resume probe

The City Disaster Risk Reduction and Management (CDRRMO) reported that 34 more students of Gulod National High School-Mamatid Extension in...

Read more

Advertisement

ADVERTISEMENT
Facebook Twitter Instagram Youtube

ABOUT US

Manila Standard

Manila Standard website (manilastandard.net), launched in August 2002, extends the newspaper’s reach beyond its traditional readers and makes its brand of Philippine news and opinion available to a much wider and geographically diverse readership here and overseas.

Digital Edition

In tone and content, the online edition mirrors the editorial thrust of the newspaper. While hewing to the traditional precepts of fairness and objectivity, MS believes the news of the day need not be staid, overly long or dry. Stories are succinct, readable and written in a lively style that has become a hallmark of the newspaper.

Download – Today’s Paper

Search

No Result
View All Result

6th Floor Universal Re Bldg., 106 Paseo De Roxas cor. Perea Street, Legaspi Village, 1226 Makati City Philippines

Trunklines: 832-5554, 832-5556, 832-5558

© 2021 Manila Standard - Designed and Developed by Neitiviti Studios.

No Result
View All Result
  • About
  • News
    • Top Stories
    • National
    • World News
    • Pinoy Abroad
    • Features
  • Opinion
    • Editorial
    • Columns
    • Soundbytes
  • LGUs
    • NCR
    • Luzon
    • Visayas
    • Mindanao
  • Business
    • Corporate
    • Economy & Trade
    • Stocks
    • Money
    • Agri & Mining
    • Power & Tech
    • IT & Telecom
  • Sports
    • Basketball
    • Volleyball
    • Fightsports
    • Active
    • Sports Plus
    • One Championship
    • Columns
  • Entertainment
    • TV & Movies
    • Celebrity Profiles
    • Music & Concerts
    • Digital Media
    • Columns
  • Lifestyle
    • Food
    • Culture & Media
    • Fashion
    • Health and Home
    • Leisure
    • Shopping
    • Columns
  • Pop.Life
    • Newsmakers
    • Hangouts
    • A-Pop
    • Post Its
    • Performances
    • Malls & Bazaars
    • Hobbies & Collections
  • Technology
    • Gadgets
    • Computers
    • Business
    • Tech Plus
  • MS ON THE ROAD
    • Sedan
    • SUV
    • Truck
    • Bike
    • Accessories
    • Motoring Plus
    • Commuter’s Corner
  • Home & Design
    • Residential
    • Commercial
    • Construction
    • Interior
  • Spotlight
  • Gallery
    • Photos
    • Videos
  • Events
    • Seminars
    • Exhibits
    • Community
  • Biyahero
    • Travel Features
    • Travel Reels
    • Travel Logs
  • Pets
  • Advertise with Us

© 2021 Manila Standard - Designed and Developed by Neitiviti Studios.

Welcome Back!

Login to your account below

Forgotten Password?

Retrieve your password

Please enter your username or email address to reset your password.

Log In

Install Manila Standard Web App

Install App