Cebu's future mass transit, soon a reality

Our special guest tonight on our talkshow on Straight from the Sky is a dear friend, Mr. Jerry Sta. Ana who for many decades ago has made Cebu his home working in one of the country’s top accounting firms. Jerry has since worked in many socio-civic clubs and became the President of the Cebu Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Inc. (CCCI). Today, Jerry wears a new hat; well not exactly new in the sense that he wore this hat in the year 2000. I’m referring to his becoming the Governor of the Board of Investments (BOI) that handles foreign investments into the country.

With the global crisis, we would like to hear from the BOI Governor what they are doing to bring in foreign investments to this country. BOI handles those who are investing into the country to sell their produce. While the Export Processing Zones are designed to handle direct foreign investments that would only use the Philippines as its manufacturing base for products that they sell abroad. Watch this very interesting show on SkyCable’s channel 15 at 8:00pm tonight.

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I read the news reports that Pres. Gloria Macapagal Arroyo (GMA) has approved the proposal brought forth by Cebu City Mayor Tomas Osmeña to set up the Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) system for Cebu City. This Presidential approval means a lot to us. Finally, since the American era, Cebu would have a bus system that will give Cebuanos a better future because this bus system can use LPG or even batteries.

We have been trying to sell the idea of a BRT since we went to the City of Curritiba when Frank Benedicto was Philippine Ambassador to Brazil. There we saw the “Stairless Bus” system. Buses were like Light Rail Transit (LRT) trains that have doors that would be kept shut until it arrives at its elevated platform so passengers can alight from them. In my interview with former Bogotá Mayor Enrique Peñalosa, he also placed this system in Colombia that he calls the Trans Millennio.

Cebu City will be the first country in Asia to adopt the BRT system which has already been adopted in a city in Australia, Brazil and Colombia. With this Presidential approval, we can see this system put in place all within three years. Of course, while it may be only for Cebu City right now, I have no doubt that this system can be expanded Metro Cebu-wide.

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Corruption in this country has become so widespread, it’s no longer a joke. Things have become so bad that my Nokia E90 Communicator cellphone suddenly conked out. So when I brought it to the Nokia Care center in Ayala, the technicians told me that my phone was “corrupted”! Heavens! Isn’t anything sacred anymore? Suddenly I lost many of my files and some phone numbers that I didn’t back up in my PC. When I got my phone back from Nokia Car, it actually became worse… call it from the frying pan to the fire! Now I have to get a new phone because this techno-gadget has become a necessary part of our daily lives.

I read a Wall Street Journal report last Friday that the leaders of the Group of 20 a.k.a. as G-20 will soon be meeting at the London summit on April 2. They would now focus on tax havens and bank secrecy. It’s about time that the world’s financial leaders did something about this. Look at the Philippines. When the conjugal Marcos dictatorship allegedly stole millions if not billions in pesos, they found a safe haven in many banks in Switzerland.

Today, the Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) has listed Liechtenstein as an uncooperative tax haven. That means crooks, swindlers, drug lords and corrupt government officials would definitely find a safe place to hide their illegally acquired money because they can never hide it in their respective countries. Aside from Switzerland, the OECD has also found problems in banking transparency in places like Hong Kong, Monaco, Singapore, Andorra, Austria and Luxembourg.

The global financial crisis has rattled the entire financial world. Hopefully, the G-20 would be able to stop worldwide money laundering because these are not done by the ordinary folk, not even the middle class. They are done by the rich and famous, the criminals and the corrupt government officials. Corrupt officials in often illegitimate government have pocketed monies that their countries received as aid from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) or the World Bank (WB) and siphoned it to their personal bank accounts in places that give them protection because of bank secrecy. It is time to put the brakes on these crooks that banks give protection!