The

Nation WEDNESday, MARCH 28, 2018

EDITORS MARIFI S. JARA, RICKY S. TORRE
EDITORs marifi s. jara, ricky s. torre

#nationataglance
n NATIONAL CAPITAL REGION
Coding scheme lifted by 10 a.m. Mar. 28;

d
Police ready for deployment
AS THE largely Catholic Philippines observes the Holy Week,
the vehicular number coding scheme will be suspended be-
ginning 10 a.m. on Wednesday, March 28, for private vehicles,
the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority announced
yesterday. For city and provincial buses, the suspension of
ring the Unified Vehicular Volume Reduction Program (UVVRP)
the takes effect by 12 midnight. The UVVRP resumes on April
y of 2. Meanwhile, National Capital Region Police Office Director
Oscar D. Albayalde said that some 11,801 policemen and 413
the) soldiers would be deployed around the capital to monitor
ting the peace and order situation as well as provide assistance at
air- multi-agency help desks. — Camille A. Aguinaldo
nt.
the P2P BUSES
upt Point-to-point (P2P) bus services are taking a break this Holy
the Week. Here’s the schedule per company:
ctly

eco
ecu- Just isolated rainshowers expected NATIONWIDE ROUND-UP
in coming days despite storm Caloy
ould TROPICAL No peace talks until NPA attacks stop,
the STORM Caloy says Palace
(international MALACAÑANG ON Tuesday reiterated its condi-
ited name: Jela- tions — primarily a cessation of hostilities — for
ocu- wat), located the resumption of peace talks with the Communist
eno- 1,045 kilome- Party of the Philippines (CPP) and its armed wing,
ich) ters east of the New People’s Army (NPA).--Arjay L. Balinbin
e, a Surigao City
ves- as of Tuesday
ude afternoon and Electoral tribunal ready
will remain in the Philippine area until Thursday afternoon, is for April 2 revision in VP protest case
(a) not expected to affect the country. Weather bureau PAGASA, in THE SUPREME Court (SC), acting as the Presi-
t to its forecast yesterday, said all parts of the country will just have dential Electoral Tribunal (PET), announced on
per- partly cloudy to cloudy skies with isolated rainshowers due to Tuesday that it had retrieved a total of 5,418 ballot
gica localized thunderstorms. boxes for the initial revision on Monday, April
2, in the protest case filed by losing candidate
Ferdinand “Bongbong” R. Marcos, Jr. against
Vice-President Maria Leonor “Leni” G. Robredo. —
WESTERN VISAYAS: BACOLOD CITY, Dane Angelo M. Enerio
NEGROS OCCIDENTAL
Negros Occidental peace council allocates NATIONWIDE ROUND-UP
P3-M reward for NPA informants, firearms
Read the full stories by scanning the QR code
THE PROVINCIAL Peace and Order Council (PPOC) with your smartphone or by typing the link
of Negros Occidental has approved a P3-million fund <https://goo.gl/LicqiU>
for surrendered high-powered firearms of the New
People’s Army (NPA), and rewards for information
on the communist armed group. Late last year, two
NPA informants got P200,000 for the arrest of two
top officials of the CPP-NPA in Kabankalan City,
Negros Occidental. PPOC action officer Maria Lina
Sanogal said the P3 million has already been ear-
marked for the reward program, but the PPOC will
still seek the opinion of the Commission of Audit on
this matter before any disbursement is made. The
reward fund is on top of the P50-million peace and
order budget for 2018, as approved earlier by the
PPOC and concurred by the Provincial Board.
Of the P50 million, P15 million is allocated
for intelligence data gathering, while the
rest will be spent on various peace and
order projects in the province. —
The Freeman

SOCCSKSARGEN:
GENERAL SANTOS CITY
Pimentel vows to resolve
GenSan RROW scam
SENATE PRESIDENT Aquilino
L. Pimentel III vowed that the
Senate would resolve the road
right-of-way (RROW) scam in
General Santos City (GenSan).
“We will solve this. Senator
(Emmanuel D.) Pacquiao,
Senator (Richard J.) Gordon
and myself, we are confident
that we will get to the bot-
tom of this,” he said. The DAVAO: DAVAO CITY
Senate held public hearings Grab unperturbed by competition from local app Hirna, expands driver network
last week in GenSan to inves- GRAB PHILIPPINES (MyTaxi.ph, Inc.) is not worried by the launch of local taxi hailing app
tigate a group of individuals Hirna in Davao City. “All over the country, we see competitions come along and we have seen
who submit fake land titles the likes of our international competitors who are active in other cities and we have competi-
to secure RROW payments tors in Cebu but at the end of the day, as long as passengers are able to see what we are
from government projects. able to give such as the convenience and safety that we’re able to deliver to them, then we
Mr. Pimentel said it was clear are comfortable in our position in the market,” said Raenald de Jesus, Grab deputy country
that there was an existing marketing head, in an interview during the recent awarding event for local Grab drivers. Mr.
syndicate profiting “by the De Jesus said they currently have more than 1,000 partner drivers in Davao City, and they
billions” from the scam. He continue to expand this network. “We were able to serve about 90% to 95% of our demand,
also urged the Department of but there’s always that 5% or 10% that will be lacking, that is why there’s a continuous acqui-
Public Works and Highways sition and increasing our number of drivers.” The awarding event was to recognize drivers for
to tighten its rules on claims. their reliability and honesty. “This is to attract more drivers and also community building. If
— Camille A. Aguinaldo other drivers are able to see that this kind of actions are recognized, then they will be more
motivated to drive more. It’s more to attract drivers,” Mr. De Jesus said. — Maya M. Padillo

AUTONOMOUS REGION IN MUSLIM MINDANAO

29th (and last?) ARMM anniversary
PAKARADJAAN 2018, a year-long celebration of the 29th anniversary
of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM), kicked off on
March 26 with a street parade and a program featuring the culture of its
five provinces — Basilan, Tawi-Tawi, Sulu, Maguindanao, and Lanao del
Sur. ARMM Governor Mujiv S. Hataman, in a speech said he prepared
with the thought that this could be the last Pakaradjaan given the
strides of the proposed Bangsamoro Basic Law, stressed the need to
always remember the ARMM as the first recognition of the Bangsamoro
identity in the Philippines and to continue telling the story of the Moro.
ARMM-BPI

BUSINESSWORLD GRAPHICS: ERKA CAPILI INCIONG