Lots of spirit in Boracay

Asian Spirit chairman Noel Oñate said Boracay had the most spectacular New Year happening with a fabulous fireworks display especially coming from the Waling-Waling Hotel in cooperation with Asian Spirit. Manila’s Who’s Who in high society - were all in Bora to celebrate the New Year with lots of glitz. Diplomats, some showbiz celebs and society-page regulars joined the beach New Year’s bash. For sure, lots of spirits were consumed, but as Spybiz informants reported, the "hard stuff" was also in abundance giving many "societs" a head. The Boracay-Caticlan route was ultra fully-booked with 1,800 daily seats which were not enough. Asian Spirit had 1,200 seats, SEAIR had 400 seats and Inter-island had 200 seats. Asian Spirit was fully-booked all the way starting from Dec. 29, to the 31st. Boracay is fast becoming the number one happening place in the Philippines today.

Strange bedfellows

Over the holidays, seen playing at the Camp John Hay Golf Club were Congressmen Rody Antonino of Nueva Ecija, Cavite’s Boying Remulla and First Son and Pampanga Rep. Mikey Arroyo. Rody Antonino is a rabid defender of President GMA while Remulla is still thought of as an Erap follower, having been the chief of staff of Sen. Loi Estrada. Observers surmised that perhaps Rody and Mikey are trying to win Boying over to their camp. After all, it is said that politics make for strange bedfellows.

The most recognizable person

>Also seen in Baguio during the Holidays whom everybody always took a second look was Press Secretary Toting Bunye. He’s easily the most recognizable person in the Philippines today – always seen on television – appearing 156 times at the very least on nationwide TV for the past year. A survey informally conducted by Spybiz shows the most well known personality in the country today, is no less than Mr. Press Secretary himself Toting Bunye.

Au contraire

College Assurance Plan (CAP) senior vice president Bobby Café dispelled news reports alleged by a group of planholders that the company breached its fiduciary obligations by using pre-need funds as a personal "piggy bank to bankroll directly or indirectly the operations of the Fil-Estate Group of Companies." Café said that on the contrary, the Fil-Estate Group had been funding the shortfall of CAP. Congress recently came out with House Resolution 1049 stating that the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) further burdened the pre-need industry when it arbitrarily adopted the USAID-funded Accelerating Growth Investment and Liberalization with Equity (AGILE) Actuarial Reserve Liability (ARL) requirement close to the 1997 Asian crisis, when all companies were barely recovering from the economic meltdown. As a result, pre-need insiders alleged that the SEC used the ARL to cancel their license to sell making impossible for the companies to infuse fresh monies to turn around the industry. The pre-need insiders further asserted that the SEC is in cahoots with a US insurance company and certain government officials to take over the P200-billion pre-need industry. Meanwhile, CAP had filed a case at the Office of the Ombudsman against Roberto G. Manabat, the SEC general accountant responsible for the implementation of the ARL on the pre-need industry. Manabat, who tendered his resignation effective Dec. 30, was charged for violating Republic Act 3019, otherwise known as the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act, when he granted a P100,000 monthly compensation for Mr. Mario Aguas as CAP comptroller. The complaint cited that the compensation is "grossly excessive, unreasonable, exorbitant, and disproportionately high" compared to the P50,000 standard pay for government appointees or even by CAP standards, where the chief finance officer received P55,000 per month. While a letter signed by Manabat to Romulo Cunanan of CAP stating the P100,000 monthly compensation served as the "smoking gun", the case was dismissed allegedly on a technicality. The case is pending on appeal.

Spybiz-mis

A top executive of a radio broadcast network reportedly left his second wife of many years for a younger, 23-year-old dish. Our Spy-Ring reported that a lot of situations like these have been happening lately. In fact, our Spybiz golfer reported a golfer from a prominent family known for their low handicap golf also left his wife and ran off with his regular lady caddie. Now this one – you can call playing "tree under."

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