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AUG
02
2017

Statement on signing of laws extending validity of passports and driver’s licenses

Extending validity of licenses, passports shouldn’t make them more expensive I would like to thank President Duterte for signing into law the bills extending the period of validity of a passport to 10 years, and that of a driver’s license to five years. These are anti-red tape
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AUG
02
2017

Statement on the gov’t proposal to raise car registration fees

Government has a triple whammy tax proposal on vehicles. Already known are the proposed additional taxes on motor vehicles and on the fuels that run them. Not yet on the public radar is the third one, which seeks to double car registration fees, or what is officially known as the
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AUG
02
2017

RA 10929: Free Internet Access in Public Places Act

Republic of the Philippines Congress of the Philippines Metro Manila Seventeenth Congress First Regular Session Begun and held in Metro Manila, on Monday, the twenty-fiftth day of July, two thousand sixteen. [REPUBLIC ACT NO. 10929] AN ACT ESTABLISHING THE FREE INTERNET
AUG
02
2017

RA 10928: Extending the Validity of Philippine Passports

Republic of the Philippines Congress of the Philippines Metro Manila Seventeenth Congress First Regular Session Begun and held in Metro Manila, on Monday, the twenty-fifth day of July, two thousand sixteen. [REPUBLIC ACT NO. 10928] AN ACT EXTENDING THE VALIDITY OF PHILIPPINE
AUG
02
2017

Recto to Palace: Don’t just veto tuition bill, send your version

How can they convince the youth that 3-in-1 coffee tax is good for their future, but free college tuition is not? Should President Duterte follow his advisers’ recommendation to veto the free college tuition bill, “such a setback would be like losing the first round of a boxing
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AUG
02
2017

RA 10930: Extending the Validity Period of Driver’s License

Republic of the Philippines Congress of the Philippines Metro Manila Seventeenth Congress First Regular Session Begun and held in Metro Manila, on Monday, the twenty-fifth day of July, two thousand sixteen. [REPUBLIC ACT NO. 10930] AN ACT RATIONALIZING AND STRENGTHENING THE
JUL
31
2017

Senate Bill 1483: Fiscal and Monetary Report Act of 2017

Mr. President: To join the economic cluster of the Cabinet is to become a travelling salesman. Membership in that team means one must travel tens of thousands of miles a year to attract billions in investments, or to borrow money in the billions. A Finance secretary hawks bonds
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JUL
28
2017

Luzon’s ‘zero dark’ prospect in 2024 prompts need to resume WPH oil hunt

Senate President Pro Tempore Ralph Recto today backed moves by the country’s top diplomat to find “a constitutionally-compliant win-win arrangement” that will allow Manila and Beijing to jointly explore for oil in the West Philippine Sea. With the Malampaya field off Palawan
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JUL
27
2017

Recto: Cut red tape in the sending of disaster text alerts

If flood and storm text alerts have been few and infrequent, blame it on the circuitous way that proposed messages are “processed and approved before they are sent out,” Senate President Pro-Tempore Ralph Recto said today. “It is not the fault of telcos,” Recto said, “but the
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JUL
27
2017

Amid reports of underspending, senators to grill agencies on fund utilization

Senate President Pro Tempore Ralph Recto said senators would cross party lines in asking agencies during the 2018 national budget hearings if they are on track in spending their current year allocations to find out if underspending still plagues budget utilization as it had in
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