Philippines president cracking the whip on corrupt officials to curb graft The former Georgian president is enjoying some downtime after almost 10 tumultuous years in office, during which he famously disbanded the hated traffic police to root out graft. If Saakashvili is hankering for a new challenge he might find it in Manila, where the…

The Philippine central bank is set to introduce a residential property-price index in the first half of the year as it intensifies monitoring of asset-bubble risks, Deputy Governor Diwa Guinigundo said.

Local firms anticipate employment opportunities to remain steady, albeit at a slightly lower level in the April-to-June period, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) said.

CEBU (Updated 12:06 p.m.) — The body of a miner who went missing after part of a coal mine in the mountain barangay of Dungga, Danao City collapsed on Saturday was retrieved Sunday morning.

A VISITING Fitch Ratings team flagged the sustainability of the country’s over 7% growth as a concern and left without a clear signal as to whether the latest annual review will yield another upgrade anytime soon, policy makers said over the weekend.

The country’s restrictions in foreign ownership and investment in key sectors of the economy are among the most stringent in Asia, the World Bank said.

Today we begin another month in 2014. Last week’s piece on “School trafficking” which discussed the merits and demerits of a 4-day school week elicited several thought-full reactions. Apparently, we did not have to look outside of the country for an example. UP Biology Professor Augustus Mamaril cited the 4-day school scheme of the University…

MANILA, Philippines – Mindanao will continue to experience two- to three-hour rotating blackouts because not all power plants are back online after the region suffered an island-wide power outage on Thursday, officials said yesterday.

I wake up. What time that is depends on what time I sleep or what appointments I have. If I sleep at 3 a.m., which is happening more and more lately, then maybe I will rise at around 9 a.m. If I have an appointment, I set the alarm on my cell phone and always…

MANILA, Philippines – Business confidence in the first quarter of 2014 fell to its lowest level in two and a half years, dampened by a weak peso and a slowdown in consumer demand.

MANILA, Philippines – A large number of Filipinos are generally happy and satisfied with their lives, a December 2013 survey by the Social Weather Stations (SWS) showed.

WASHINGTON: A standoff between the United States and Japan is holding up talks on a sweeping Pacific free trade pact and a lack of authority to push an eventual deal through the US Congress without amendment may be undercutting Washington’s hand.

A US government report criticizing the Philippines for failing to stamp out extra-judicial killings will help Manila improve human rights safeguards, a presidential spokeswoman said on Saturday.

The mechanism is the only one in the ILO for setting the basic wage for any industry.

Security forces continue to commit extrajudicial killings under President Benigno Aquino III’s administration although a few convictions of rights violations has sparked hope that change is underway, the US State Department said in an annual human rights report Friday.

It started, literally, with a billion-dollar question. The answer came with a scathing judge’s order saying attorneys from several national firms have “disappeared” evidence, misled courts and committed all sort of hijinks, setting the multi-billion-dollar asbestos litigation community aflutter.

Dentists, students and patients are being exposed to high levels of hazardous mercury vapors in dental schools and supply stores around the country, according to an environmentalist watchdog.

WASHINGTON – An explosion in the number of laws passed around the world aimed at confronting climate change in the last 20 years was hailed on Thursday as a step toward building support for a United Nations climate treaty to be negotiated in 2015.

WASHINGTON – From China’s crackdown on activists to flawed elections in Cambodia and widespread violence against Muslims in Myanmar, Asia’s human rights record in 2013 remained poor, US officials said Thursday.

MANILA, Philippines – A survey conducted by regional insurance and financial giant AIA Group showed 96 percent of Filipino are concerned over increasing medical costs but only 16 percent are actually financially prepared for it.

Correcting a wrong with a bigger wrong. That’s what the Comelec will do in selling its old unreliable voting machines, then buying costlier but equally unreliable ones.

MANILA, Philippines – The Commission on Elections (Comelec) has decided to open its local offices even on Sunday to encourage new voters to register for the 2016 elections.

Filipinos in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia who may encounter problems at work may now call a hotline run by the Saudi Ministry of Labor, the Philippine Embassy in Riyadh said. The labor call center is accessible through 92-000-1173, and provides information in Arabic and English, the Philippine Embassy said.

MANILA – The Philippines should create more investment opportunities in agriculture, tourism, manufacturing and mining to escape the curse of jobless economic growth, experts and businessmen said Wednesday.

MANILA, Philippines – The Civil Service Commission (CSC) said 67 government offices failed in the anti-red tape test it conducted in 2013. The offices of the Land Registration Authority (LRA), Land Transportation Office (LTO) and National Prosecution Service (NPS) of the Department of Justice (DOJ) are the worst when it comes to frontline service delivery,…

Much of the discussion about the Democratic proposal to raise the minimum wage to $10.10 an hour by 2016 has rightly focused on the workers who will clearly benefit from the move. But what about businesses? How would higher wages affect them?

EMPLOYEES of bus firms will soon be joined by truck drivers, helpers known as pahinante and related workers as the Labor department’s National Capital Region office implements the order of Labor and Employment Secretary Rosalinda D. Baldoz to expand the composition of the Bus Transport Industry Tripartite Council (ITC), the department said in a statement…

Not again. Not another formulaic diatribe ridiculing and prophesying the decline, obsolescence, and inevitable doom of the Philippine Left. The Left was supposed to have disintegrated many, many years ago after the fall of Berlin, the internal split in the 1990s, and the rise of neoliberal globalization as the supreme doctrine of our time. But…

MANILA, Philippines – Instead of sourcing funds from the pork barrel of lawmakers, eligible students will now get college scholarships from the Commission on Higher Education (CHED).

MANILA, Philippines – Despite progress on most recommendations of foreign businessmen for the economy to accelerate and attract investments, the government will have to undertake more reforms in the agriculture and mining sectors to spur growth and create jobs.