Riding to Davao over the weekend

For tonight’s special presentation on our talkshow Straight from the Sky, we will focus on Creating Value through Good Governance & Strategy Execution and to explain what Good Governance is all about, allow me to present our good friend Mr. Jonathan Juan “J.J” Moreno, Practice Leader, Corporate Governance Palladium Executing Strategy and former President of the Institute of Corporate Governance (ICD).

 JJ is a Cebuano who moved out of Cebu to study in the Philippine Military Academy (PMA) and he later on joined the Philippine Navy. No doubt he was one of the bright boys in the Navy, but the lure of business had him moving to the Institute of Corporate Directors (ICD) as president, where I met him. He has since left this job and joined a consulting firm, Palladium Executing Strategy. Rex Drilon formerly of Cebu Holdings, Inc. has taken over his post in ICD. So let’s hear about Good Governance in SkyCable’s channel 15 at 8:00pm.

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 We were in Davao City over the weekend for the 17th Annual National Convention of the Federation of Motorcycle Clubs, (which is rotated between Luzon, the Visayas and Mindanao) held at the Matina Town Square, Davao City. We took the Cebu Ferries vessel last Thursday evening for Nasipit, Agusan del Norte and there were more than a hundred big bikes on the vessel’s hold. The other vessel that had big bikes was headed towards Cagayan de Oro, but all roads led to Davao City.

 We arrived in Nasipit early in the morning and rode our bikes first for a look see at Aboitiz Power’s Nasipit 100MW Power Barge, just off the Nasipit pier. This was an added bonus to our ride to Davao. After seeing the power barge, we rode to the Almont Hotel for breakfast.

 Then we rode the 278-kilometer trip to Davao via Prosperidad, San Francisco, Agusan del Sur, then to Monkayo, Compostela Valley and all the way to Tagum City in Davao del Norte then to Davao City, and stayed at the Apo View Hotel. To be honest, I was quite uncomfortable when we rode Compostela Valley, as I know for a fact that the New People’s Army (NPA) is very active there. But we breezed through without incident. Prosperidad was near the area where Undo Perez and his gang recently held school children hostage.

 The road that we took from Nasipit to Davao City was then called the Pan Philippine Highway or the RP-Japan Highway. I first passed there in the mid-70s when the road was new and there were few people who lived along the area, but I haven’t passed there in more than 15 years because the road is no longer as good as before. One of the reasons is that, the weights of the big trucks in the 70s were not as heavy as the huge trucks that are used today.

 One thing that I could not help but notice was that we met so many trucks loaded with logs. This brings me to wonder whether or not the people here heard that Pres. Benigno “PNoy” Aquino, III already signed a log ban throughout the country. Or perhaps the people in Mindanao really don’t care what the President signs, as it seems to be business as usual in Agusan and Compostela Valley.

 Finally, we reached Davao City and got stuck in bad traffic. You guys who complain about bad traffic in Metro Cebu have no reason to complain if you compared the bad traffic in Davao to the traffic in Cebu. Of course that’s due to the same excuses that we have in Cebu - few traffic enforcers and no master plan for Traffic Management. There is no doubt that the economy of Davao City has boomed despite how badly run the Philippine government is.

 I also haven’t been back to Davao City in the last 10 years and you can see evidence of their prosperity. In fact right across the Apo View Hotel, a Ducati and KTM dealership inaugurated its doors. I asked the store manager if they were planning to open stores in Cebu, and it seems that is not in their radar screen. Ducati is an Italian big bike manufacturer, while KTM is an Austrian dirt bike that ventured into street bikes. It’s official name is Kaftfahrzeug Trunienpolz Mattighofen, which we could not understand, hence it was called KTM.

 Early morning Saturday, we huffed over to Sibulan to see the Hedcor Sibulan, Inc. mini-hydro project also owned by Aboitiz Power (AP), but I will write about this in tomorrow’s column as I’m running out of space and time. Let me just say that this project was recently inaugurated by Pres. PNoy and it has a huge impact on solving the power crisis in Mindanao.

 As we arrived in Davao last Friday, I got two pieces of news, one good and one bad. The good news we got was that finally, Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez has resigned from her very controversial post, while the bad news was that Vice Gov. Greg Sanchez died from cancer. May we ask the pious reader to please pray for the repose of his soul.

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