Easing lease accounting

 Economy
Jan 112015
 

(First of two parts) THE INTERNATIONAL Accounting Standards Board (IASB) and the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB), which we will collectively refer to as “the Boards,” are currently working on a new standard on leases (the “Leases Project”). The project aims to improve lease accounting under both International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) and United States Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (US GAAP), and at the same time is intended as a convergence effort to align lease accounting under the two accounting standards. A first Exposure Draft (ED) was issued in August 2010 which was followed by second version in May 2013 (the 2013 ED).

Top bands, comedians at K-Pub Fort, Trinoma

 General
Jan 112015
 
Top bands, comedians at K-Pub Fort, Trinoma

MANILA, Philippines – Yummy Korean food meets entertainment at K-Pub, the country’s largest Korean barbeque restaurant, as it presents its entertainment schedule for this month. At K-Pub The Fort, Tuesdays are for Rock-eoke featuring Zoo, former band of Journey vocalist Arnel Pineda; Wednesdays are Acoustic Nights with Foxglove; Thursdays are for Open Mic with Fat Session and Leah Patricio; while Comedy Fridays feature stand-up comics Orca and Osang. Saturdays at K-Pub The Fort feature musicians such as Freestyle and Side A back-to-back on Jan. 17; Zoo on Jan. 24 and Freestyle featuring Climax on Jan. 31. K-Pub Trinoma entertains diners in the North with Fat Session and Leah Patricio in Open Mic sessions every Tuesday; Elmer Jun Hilario of The Voice Philippines every Wednesday; the smooth grooves and relaxing tunes of Acoustic Nights with Foxglove on Thursdays and Comedy Nights on Fridays. K-Pub Trinoma is also sure to excite every Saturday with its list of weekly performers. Side A takes the stage on Jan. 24, while South Border on Jan. 17. K-Pub serves Korean barbeque dishes such as So Galbi, So Bulgogi, Samgyeopsal and Seafood Pajeon at reasonable prices. The restaurant also features a stage with professional sound system and lights set-up as well as the largest LED screen in the country for a restaurant. Entertainment ( Article MRec ), pagematch: 1, sectionmatch: 1 For details, call 847-1961 or 847-3098 for the Fort branch and 910-8858 or 0917-5558858 for the Trinoma branch.

Pammy Godoy launches book on girl empowerment

 Entertainment
Jan 112015
 
Pammy Godoy launches book on girl empowerment

MANILA, Philippines – “18 roses. 18 candles. Cotillion de honor. I have always dreamed of being a debutante. Walking into an elegant ballroom wearing a beautiful gown and surrounded by my loved ones and friends. It was supposed to be my ‘coming out party.’  Instead, I was in hiding. I was six months pregnant at 18.” Such riveting words are written at the back of the book Sex, Virginity and Relationships: What I Wish I Knew in College, written by author and women’s rights advocate Pammy Godoy. A fervent supporter of women and empowerment and gender equality, Godoy bares her soul in this book that serves both as a cautionary tale — with lessons gleaned from her own personal past — and a catalyst for change, as it encourages teen girls to unleash their potential.  The volume includes an intimate portrait of the writer, providing a work book and tool kit that will drive readers to reflect on sexuality, teenage pregnancy, motherhood, and the need for young people to form a strong sense of self in the face of society’s often unequal stance between women and men.  Godoy has long been in the forefront of the fight for greater awareness. A graduate of University of the Philippines, Los Baños, and a holder of a master’s degree in Communication from UP, Diliman, Pammy has taught Gender Studies and Women’s Studies at De La Salle University–Manila and St. Scholastica’s College, respectively. She has been working with a United Nations agency since 2008 addressing Read More …

VP Binay denies plan to use PAGIBIG ads for mileage

 News
Jan 112015
 
VP Binay denies plan to use PAGIBIG ads for mileage

Vice President Jejomar Binay on Sunday denied that he planned to use the advertisements of the Home Development Mutual Fund, better known as the PAGIBIG Fund, for media mileage, “24 Oras” reported. Senator Alan Peter Cayetano had accused the Vice President of planning to use the PAGIBIG advertisements for political gain in the upcoming 2016 general elections. Also, Senator Antonio Trillanes accused Binay of awarding PAGIBIG mass housing projects to favored contractors. Binay is the chairman of the PAGIBIG Fund. “Alam naman nila na nagsisinungaling lang sila. Ako pa nga ang nagsasabi roon sa PAGIBIG, huwag ninyong ilalabas ang mukha ko,” Binay said. These new allegations against Binay may be discussed in upcoming Senate blue ribbon committee hearings. The Vice President has been the subject of Senate blue ribbon committee hearings due to corruption allegations, among which are the allegation that the Makati City Hall Building II was overpriced and his alleged ownership of a property in Batangas which he failed to declare in his Statement of Assets, Liabilities and Net Worth. — Rouchelle R. Dinglasan, GMA News

Activists to welcome pope with postcards on plight of the poor

 News
Jan 112015
 
Activists to welcome pope with postcards on plight of the poor

Christian activists will welcome Pope Francis with postcards that they will deliver on Monday to the Apostolic Nunciature in Manila, where Pope Francis will be staying during his five-day visit to the Philippines. Promotion for Church People’s Response, a member of umbrella activist group Bagong Alyansang Makabayan, said it will deliver the postcards during a “Pilgrimage of Welcome.” In a statement, it said the so-called pilgrimage will start at St. Scholastica Archives-Museum in Manila and end at the Papal Nunciate. “Personal welcome messages and articulations of the cry of the poor are handwritten on the backs of postcards in six designs that combine relevant photographs with proclamations of Pope Francis,” it said. During the pilgrimage, participants will wave welcome pennants or flaglets and ask the pope to “hear the cry of the poor” and “stand with us for justice and peace.” A serenade and prayer will be held at the Papal Nunciate to “express our journey of solidarity with the poor as we deliver the postcards,” the group said. The group said that for the last 90 days, a “Giving a Voice to the Cry of the Poor Campaign” was initiated by the National Clergy Discernment Group, Religious Discernment Group, Task Force for Urban Conscientization-Association of Major Religious Superiors, Citizens Alliance for Just Peace, and the Promotion of Church People’s Response. The PCPR said the groups are hopeful the pope “will speak to the real situation of the toiling majority during his visit.” — Joel Locsin/JDS, GMA News

Comelec to Lagman: Show us PCOS results can be tampered with

 General
Jan 112015
 
Comelec to Lagman: Show us PCOS results can be tampered with

The Commission on Elections has invited former poll commissioner Gus Lagman to show how the results of the Precinct Count Optical Scan (PCOS) machines can be altered. Comelec Chairman Sixto Brillantes said he has sent Lagman a letter asking him to meet with the commission en banc. “I said: It is your duty as former Comelec commissioner that you should inform us on how it can be easily tampered. Turuan niya kami kako para mapag-preparahan namin yan for 2016 since we will be using the same machines. So we invited him na pumunta siya dito at pakita mo sa amin yan,” he said. Brillantes noted that Lagman did not raise the issue while he was a commissioner. “He was in the Comelec for 10 months. He never said this. He never mentioned PCOS machines being rigged, which could be easily rigged, that is the adjective there. He did say you can probably manipulate it but not easily. Now he is saying it is very easy and I dare him to show it to us,” the poll body chief added. Brillantes said that if Lagman fails to prove his allegations, the former poll official should refrain from criticizing the Comelec. Lagman was a Comelec commissioner from 2011 to 2012  when President Benigno Aquino III decided against reappointing him. He has since joined election watchdog groups in criticizing the use of the PCOS machines.  Lagman ready Lagman, for his part, said he is ready to prove that the PCOS machines can be Read More …

Rains threaten papal mass on storm-hit Philippine island

 General
Jan 112015
 
Rains threaten papal mass on storm-hit Philippine island

The Philippines was watching nervously on Sunday as a tropical storm threatened a typhoon-prone central island that Pope Francis will visit this week on his tour of the fervently Catholic nation. The country’s weather bureau said a low-pressure area currently over the Pacific Ocean was on course for Leyte Island, touted as one of the highlights of the pontiff’s four-day visit, and could develop into a storm by the time it enters Philippine waters on Thursday. Leyte was the province worst-hit by Super Typhoon Haiyan in November 2013, and suffered landslides and floods late last year wrought by tropical storm Jangmi. “Part of contingency planning are possible inclement scenarios…. options are being developed,” presidential spokesman Herminio Coloma from the papal visit organising committee told AFP. Asked if cancelling the events on Leyte island on January 17 was an option, Coloma said: “It’s best to wait until the (weather disturbance) enters the Philippines before making specific contingency plans.” In a best-case scenario, the low pressure area would turn northwards and spare the country, but there is also an equal chance it will intensify into a storm, state weather forecaster Alvin Pura told AFP. “This may hit the Eastern Visayas and bring rains to the pope’s events,” he said, referring to the island chain in which Leyte sits. Pura could not immediately say how much rain was possible on Leyte if the storm developed and hit the island. During the last week of 2014, the Eastern Visayas were caught offguard when a Read More …

Factbox: Catholicism in the Philippines

 General
Jan 102015
 
Factbox: Catholicism in the Philippines

Responding to the call of Pope Francis, Filipino Catholics on Sunday prayed for the persecuted Christians in Syria and Iraq during Masses nationwide in observance of the National Day of Prayer for Peace, as well as the Day for Charity for thousands of victims of atrocities committed by the terrorist group Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (Isis). PHOTO BY RICK ALBERTO/INQUIRER.net Manila, Philippines – Key facts about the Catholic religion in the Philippines, which Pope Francis will visit this week as part of his second trip to Asia: NUMBERS: Eight in 10 Filipinos are Catholic, making the nation of 100 million people Asia’s bastion of Christianity. Protestants, Muslims, and members of other Christian sects make up the rest. HISTORY: Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan claimed the islands for Spain in 1521 on a voyage to circumnavigate the globe. The archipelago was named after the Spanish monarch King Philip II. Spanish rulers and friars entrenched Catholicism, over what had been mainly polytheist, animist and Muslim populations, during nearly 400 years of colonial rule that ended when the Americans wrested control in 1898. UNIQUE WORSHIPPING: Filipino Catholics are known for enormous, colourful and in some cases extreme expressions of piety. Millions of barefoot devotees each January join a religious procession Manila hoping to touch a centuries-old icon of Jesus Christ, called the Black Nazarene, which is believed to have miraculous powers. At Easter devotees whip their backs bloody while others have their hands nailed to crosses in all-too-real imitations of Christ’s passion. Read More …

Feast of Santo Niňo at Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angeles Jan. 18

 Entertainment
Jan 102015
 
Feast of Santo Niňo at Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angeles Jan. 18

The Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels — entry courtyard with fountain, in Downtown Los Angeles, California. (photo courtesy of http://en.wikipedia.org/) On Sunday, January 18, 2015 at 3:30 pm, a mass sponsored by Santo Niño Cruzada USA with the participations of the Cathedral Knights of Columbus and a Sinulog Group will be held at the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels to celebrate its 28th year anniversary of the solemn Feast of Santo Niño, the Divine Infant Jesus. During the 16th century, the first Santo Niño statue was given by the Spaniards to the Queen of Cebu. Although the devotion to the Divine Infant has roots in Europe, Filipinos are known for their fervent devotion to the Infant Jesus, celebrating with religious and civic activities. As a result, Filipino immigrants brought their Santo Niño to the United States to be their spiritual recourse, assistance and protector. We celebrated the first Feast of Santo Niño on January 10, 1986 at then Saint Vibiana’s Cathedral in Los Angeles. It was in the summer of 1988 that the original group of Santo Niño devotees was formally organized under the name, Cruzada de Santo Niño, and had the election of officers

Pinoys’ faith caught Pope’s attention even before Yolanda, says Jesuit researcher

 Entertainment
Jan 102015
 
Pinoys’ faith caught Pope’s attention even before Yolanda, says Jesuit researcher

A vendor joins a crowd of churchgoers outside the Quiapo Church in Manila to sell calendars bearing the photo of Pope Francis on Friday (Jan. 2, 2015). The Pontiff is arriving in Manila on Jan. 15, 2015 for a four-day Apostolic and State Visit to the Philippines. (MNS photo) MANILA (Mabuhay) – The Filipinos’ Catholic faith may have drawn Pope Francis to visit the country even before the Bohol earthquake and super typhoon Yolanda, a seminarian researching on his life said Wednesday. Bro. Joseph Zaldivar of the San Jose Seminary in Ateneo de Manila University said the Philippines’ place as the center of Catholic faith in Asia may have been a consideration for the Pope, even before the natural disasters that cut across the Visayas in late 2013. “’Yung karanasan ng pananampalataya sa Pilipinas kumbaga nagno-nourish ng ibang bansa sa Asya at maging sa buong mundo, kaya mahalaga na ang pananampalataya dito sa Pilipinas ay talagang buong buo at kitang kita sa mundo,” Zaldivar said. He added: “’Yun ang gusto ni Pope Francis – na i-affirm tayo, na maganda ang inyong ginagawa, may malasakit sa inyong kapwa at malalim ang pananampalataya sa Diyos.” In a papal flight in July 2013, before the Bohol earthquake and super typhoon Yolanda, Pope Francis mentioned that he had received an invitation to come to the Philippines, as well as to Sri Lanka, the two countries in Asia that he will be visiting this month. “I have been invited to go to Sri Lanka and Read More …

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