Respecting the taxpayer

Because of the massive government bailouts of private sector financial institutions and car manufacturing companies, Corporate America is learning a new mode of behavior that respects the taxpayer. The widespread outrage over corporate bonuses and luxuries such as private jets has forced bailed out companies to revise their rule books on what are allowable corporate expenses.

Times have changed or so we hope. The Washington Post reports that the Treasury Department has required the boards of directors of companies receiving federal assistance to adopt company-wide policies on luxury expenditures — including entertainment, office renovations and air travel — and make them available online.

For example, Chrysler Financial has posted new rules that would prohibit employees traveling on business from reimbursing for lunch on trips that don’t require an overnight stay. If flying on business, they must travel coach if the flight is less than four hours. Tips to baggage handlers shouldn’t exceed $2 per bag. The $4 paid for the in-flight movie? Not reimbursable.

No longer can senior executives spend as lavishly as Merrill Lynch’s then-chief executive John Thain who spent $1.2 million to renovate his office, including $87,000 for an area rug, even as the investment bank faced billions in additional losses and was acquired by Bank of America. Citibank had to cancel an order for corporate jets and let it be known that its current CEO will no longer use private planes to get around.

The website of Chrysler Financial includes a 15-page policy with two appendixes, one listing “unallowable” expenses: country club fees, hotel frequent-guest programs, birthday cakes and cards, shoe shines, laundry/valet services except when traveling away from home five consecutive days or more and limits on tips (up to 20 percent of total bill, excluding tax, for room service, up to $2 for buffet dining, $5 for doorman, no tip for concierge).

The newly published policy also details what type of rental car employees should drive while on business trips (mid-size), how to calculate reimbursable gas mileage on trips combining business and personal purposes, and the circumstances under which it is permissible to use the phone in your hotel room.

Wow! That’s some respect for the taxpayer out there. I think we have similar rules for our public officials but our rules are honored only by the breach. Bureaucrats see the Chief Executive traveling abroad with no regard to the people’s money and do likewise. The Palace has admitted that they have exceeded the already generous travel budget by over a billion pesos.

The Commission on Audit should be stricter in enforcing its rules on travel, specially foreign travel. COA should make sure their cash advances are liquidated upon return to the country instead of several years after. The rules on permissible expenses should also be made public the way the government-aided American companies are now required to.

Our public officials should never forget that when they go abroad, they represent a country whose poverty rate is still embarrassingly high. It is not appropriate for them to even be seen in places where a glass of Coke can feed a barangay back home for a week.

Evita Peron and Imelda Marcos are hardly the role models to look up to. It is our luck that now Ate Glue has joined the club. I just read in the Los Angeles Times that a musical hatched in LA about Imelda featuring a keynote song called “3,000 Pairs of Shoes” is scheduled for a New York premiere Sept. 30 at the Pan Asian Repertory Theatre. 

 Respect the taxpayers or be ridiculed! But if I read Ate Glue and her gang right, we can ridicule them all we want and they will just laugh all the way to Le Cirque.

Yuchengco

The Yuchengco-PLDT story is nothing new to many of us covering business. We have heard these things a long time ago from the usually reliable coffee shop grapevine. Of course, no matter how seemingly credible, those stories remain in the realm of rumors. Hopefully, now that the stories are headline news again, truth will finally emerge. But then Jun Yasay came out with his more “detailed” story but still offered nothing solid to confirm it. Everything is still hearsay even if terribly juicy.

As far as I can remember, it was the controversial Mark Jimenez, the man Prez Erap once called his Corporate Genius, who was then rumored to have “brokered” the PLDT sale to Metro Pacific. For all we know, Mr Jimenez may have misrepresented himself about his relationship with Erap and all those grapevine stories about how he is Erap’s Corporate Genius.

It didn’t help that Erap surrounded himself with questionable characters like Mark. In fairness, Erap’s Cabinet is far superior to Ate Glue’s. But his Midnight Cabinet destroyed his credibility which eventually led to Edsa 2. In this particular case with Mr Yuchengco, it is possible that the taipan was made to believe something that was not true.

What makes the Yuchengco story credible, however, is the general knowledge among those covering business at that time that he didn’t want to sell out of PLDT. In fact, he wanted to buy control… even match Metro Pac’s offer. He was emotional about PLDT. The fact that he sold eventually, made people think he must have been pressured big. Now, he is saying he was.

Poor Manny Pangilinan. Whatever else happens, he is the victim here. Investors will see what happened to him and figure that this is no country to do business with. MVP was playing the game by the rules that prevailed at the time and now it blows up like this. If what the taipan is saying is true, MVP’s reputation of a no nonsense business manager, good enough to be president of this country, is up in smoke. He has used the services of an influence peddler claiming to speak for the highest official of the land.

In the context of the taipan’s accusation, it is easy to think MVP’s P25 million check to Erap’s Muslim Youth Foundation may have something to do with “help” in buying control of PLDT. Then again, given the amount of the transaction, that check seems too paltry. Whatever the truth may be, people will now look at MVP and wonder if something isn’t quite kosher with him.

In fact, because of all the buzz, the grapevine is now talking about the Meridian transaction. I wanted to be refreshed so I googled it and found this paragraph in the June 12, 2006 column of our late publisher Max Soliven:

“No doubt, MJ is awash in cash. Fe has just disposed of the family-owned Meridian Telecom to Manny Pangilinan’s (MVP) Smart Communications for an incredulous price of $45 million (P2.5 billion). As our STAR business writer Mary Ann Reyes wrote, the true value of Meridian was only P30 million. It’s said that the immense amount paid includes MJ’s commission for brokering MVP’s First Pacific Group’s takeover of Tonyboy Cojuangco’s Philippine Long Distance Telephone Company (PLDT). Smart’s purchase of Meridian raised many eyebrows in the industry…”

If only we can ask Mark Jimenez about all these transactions. But I am told he is incommunicado and not in a position to talk to newsmen. Oh well… this is political sh-t hitting the ceiling! That’s what Erap gets for being so KSP and craving for the limelight when he should be enjoying his twilight years as a king maker.

Political comedy

Rosan Cruz sent me the link to one hilarious website that provides comic relief in these political times: http://professionalheckler.wordpress.com/ Here are some choice quips.

Sen. Benigno Simeon “Noynoy” C. Aquino III after consulting with the Pink Sisters has officially declared that he is running for president in 2010. In announcing his bid, Noynoy vowed not to steal; vowed not to cheat; vowed not to lie, and vowed not to hire the services of Mar Roxas’ ad agency.

Erap vs. Lacson: Sen. Panfilo Lacson will reportedly drop a bombshell on deposed President Joseph Estrada. When Erap heard this, he said, “Gago ba siya? Hindi ako takot sa bombshell. Hindi ako takot sa kahit anong klaseng babae!”

BF for President: MMDA Chairman Bayani Fernando is reportedly keen on running for president in 2010. BF will officially announce his bid after consulting with the Pink Urinals.

Boo Chanco’s e-mail address is [email protected]. This and some past columns can also be viewed at www.boochanco.com