President and Agriculture Secretary ELECTRICITY FOR BARRIOS Fernando Lopez. For this purpose, he said, the Development Bank of the A bill filed by Senator Emmanuel Philippines has programmed P240 mil­ Pelaez and fully endorsed by President lion. The measure is initiated by the Marcos plans to provide Rice and Com Production Coordinating electric power to the Council and is being undertaken with barrios all over the the cooperation of government and ru­ country through the co­ ral banks. operative way. The bill seeks to declare it a national policy that to­ CAR FACTORY IN ILIGAN _____ _, tal electrification be PELAEZ given the highest prio- The Fiat automobile manufacturing AID TO FISHERMEN rity in implementation and that dt concern of Italy is planning to put up should be given "continued support" by The government is constructing 17 an automobile plant in Iligan C:ity, the government. ice and cold storage plants in strategic together with a big Philippine company. fishing ports of the It is believed that such an ambitious country, according to project to manufacture cars locally ins­ BOI APPROVES MORE PROJECTS Vice President and Sec­ tead of importing knocked-down units retary of Agriculture and assembling them would have far As of April 30, the cut-off date for Fernando Lopez. With reaching effects on the Philippine in­ the first IPP, a total of 191 applica­ the establishment of dustrialization program. tions were received by the Board of these plants, some P50 Investments, 167 of which have been million worth of spoiled approved for registration. Of the re­ LP CANDIDATES LOPEz fish is expected to be maining 84 applications, 25 were either ·s llVed for the fishing industry each Senator Genaro Magsaysay has an­ withdrawn or abandoned by proponents year. nounced his bid for the LP nomination while the rest are in various stages as presidential candidate last May 21 of evaluation by the . BOI technical SSS DRIVE barely three days after he bolted the staff. The projects of the following N acionalista Party to join the Liberals. firms were approved in April: Philite The Social Security System plans to Magsaysay's announcement has finally Industrial Parts, Inc., Philex Mining undertake a massive drive to ferret out put an end to speculations on his poli­ Corporation, Matalin Coconut Co., Inc., employers whQ have been deliberately tical plans in the coming elections. The Fil-~astem Wood Industries, Inc., and withholding premium payments to the the Misamis Lumber Co., Inc. SSS. Reports said that out of some senator had earlier said that he was two million SSS members in the labor joining the Liberal Party "with no strings attached." force only about one million are pay­ PUYAT PREDICTS NP WIN ing their premium payments. The SSS management says that most employers DOLLARS FOR RP Senate President Gil J. Puyat pre­ are not remitting to the System the dicted that President Marcos and the premiums which they deduct from the The so-called Marcos dollar remit­ Nacionalista Party would win the na­ salaries of their employes. tance program has netted some $5 tional elections in November. Speaking million as of the week ending May 25. on his arrival in Hongkong this week­ SPECIAL SESSION The dollars remitted through the Phil­ end, Puyat said that his party (Na­ ippine National Bank represented the cionalista) is "predominantly in con­ The Congress is scheduled to go into dollar equivalent of peso requirements trol," with 17 senators out of 24 and another special session next week as of the American government in procur­ 36 governors out of 56. Judging from the opposition succeeded in sidetracking ing supplies and equipment in the coun­ average reactions, he said, the admi­ vital measures, includ­ try. PNB officials estimate that the nistration of President Marcos is doing ing the national budget. rate of dollar income from this specific quite well. Senator Dominador Ay­ source would be at the level of $5 tona, chairman of the million every two weeks. Senate committee on BILL FOR NEW VOTERS finance and sponsor of the budget, deplored LAND REFORM Senator Arturo Tolentino filed a bill what he called the Li- in Congress that seeks to remove the A Y.TONA berals' "filibustering" President Marcos has declared 64 time limit on the period of registra­ that prevented the passage of the bud­ municipalities in Central Luzon includ­ tion for new voters. The get and thereby forced the calling- of ing all towns in Tarlac as land reform bill will eliminate the a_n extra meet. Aytona also said that areas. The inclusion of disqualification of new this would mean an additional expendi-· the entire province of vot'ers from voting as a Tarlac is an answer to ture of Pl.5 million and "the Liberal result of their failure senators should be made ~ccountable to the demand of the farm­ ers of the province who to register within 60 the people for this wasteful expendi­ days after reaching the ture." threatened to march to Malacaiiang sometime age of 21. According TOLENTINO to Comelec Chairman FARM DEVELOPMENT ago. The President has MARCOS simultaneously directed Manuel Arranz the approval of the bill A new twist in farm development-­ the budget commission to release P30 will open the door for the registration the supervised credit--is being pursued million to buy up the lands for distrib­ of every qualified 21-year old citizen by the government, according to Vice ution to the farmers. for the coming November elections. THE PHILIPPINE MAGAZINE I MAY 31, 1969 I PAGE 11 .