CLARENCE PEN: On Maharlika Investment Fund

For more than five decades of my existence since birth and being an active media practitioner for almost thirty years, only now I have heard the formulation and creation of the Maharlika Investment Fund or MIF which many of us consider as the first in political and financial history of our country.

Not in my single perspective and personal outlook to discern that there is a President now in this country in the person of His Excellency Ferdinand Marcos, Jr. to tell the Filipino people the need to give way for our sovereign wealth fund into an investment scheme to pump prime our economy for reason that we could no longer afford and control the high inflation rate and also the diminution of our purchasing power brought about by the increase in basic and prime commodities.

For President Ferdinand Marcos, Jr., the demand of the time today is “INVESTMENT” since we have not explored yet this option which the economic managers proposed in the past.

That’s why, last couple of weeks ago Marcos certified the Maharlika Investment Fund Bill as urgent and there’s a need for its congressional approval. Following this urgency, the pros and cons of the bill were debated and argued in a joint plenary session and in a matter of just a week and days, it was duly passed and approved by the Senate with a stiff and flexible policy adopted.

I was updated and guided by this MIF because in passing this bill, what I want is enough safeguards and protection being a member of the Social Security System.

Candidly speaking, I was filled with hesitation at first, so to speak, because of insinuations that a pension fund will be touched for this MAHARLIKA investment. It was clarified later in the Senate version, that the state pension fund will not be affected as part of investment.

On reading the bill, I learned that the fund to source out in MIF will come from the 50 billion pesos fund of the national treasury, 50 billion pesos fromLandBank of the Philippines, and 25 billion pesos from the Development Bank of the Philippines. Furthermore, it was stipulated that there is a composition of nine board of directors to set a policy direction.

With my awareness now over the goal of the President, I am optimistic that if this initiative will work out, triple dividends or proceeds will go to government coffers.

Let us just be vigilant because the MIF is guided by a stiffer and transparent policy. Accountable officers managing this fund are held administratively and criminally liable and they cannot escape from the full force of the law.* (Clarence Locsin)