OFFBEAT MAIL

It is hardly incomprehensible as to why many overseas Filipinos, particularly those based in the U.S., are in quandary on how they could invest some of their hard-earned savings on fixed government securities like the T-Bills and Bonds. While the Bureau of the Treasury is hell bent on encouraging many Filipinos to part with a portion of their savings on these stable government securities, only a handful are convinced that it is better than to park their money in the bank, which is much safer to be. Accept it or not, it is a reality that ordinary workers could hardly make both ends meet in the Philippines, not to discount the fact that a large number of people are mired in poverty. If ever there are willing individuals, most of them are either above the medium threshold or rich, whose excess money are readily available for divsersification elsewhere. Rather than concentrate on the local investors, it is perhaps timely that the Department of Finance should intensify its campaign to allow

The recently concluded 40th ASEAN Ministerial Meeting, which Manila hosted, took stride in attaining the most ambitious plan that would eventually unify the Association of Southeast Asian Nations in so far as economic integration is concerned. This would, in effect, put into stream the European Union-style of economic governance, which will pave the way for the establishment of regional free trade zone by 2015. Although many analysts considered this move as too ambitious, knowing how advance countries would react to such a plan, whose rules are now being ironed out to make it once and for all, a reality. Another aspect that was brought to the table and discussed by the ASEAN ministers focused on creating a human rights body in the region, which the Myanmar generals didn't seem to agree. Records showed that Myanmar has remained a human rights violator, after it has failed to free Nobel Peace laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, a signal that is expected to restore democracy in that part of As