Philippine Business Magazine: Volume 8 No.1 - Editorial
Hail to The Chiefs
By Guillermo M. Luz, Publisher

Since Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo assumed the Presidency on 20 January, she has impressed quite a number of executives with her businesslike manner. She starts meetings on time, gets straight to the point, and remains focused on the substantive matter of the discussion - a far cry from the manner in which the last administration carried on business.

Visiting investment missions, in particular, have been encouraged by this turn of events. For those of us here, this does not come as a surprise. The President's educational background lends itself to the current situation. She has both a master's degree and doctorate degree in economics. After a ten-year teaching stint, she shifted careers and joined government, first as an Assistant Secretary of Trade and Industry and as Executive Director of the Garments and Textiles Board. She later rose to become Undersecretary of Trade and Industry before eventually running for a seat in the Senate in 1992. Though she won only a three-year term in her original run for the Senate when she placed in the bottom half of the 24-man Senate, she came back with a vengeance in the 1995 elections and topped the elections that year. Instead of completing the six-year term of a Senator, she opted to run for Vice President in 1998, easily winning that race and actually getting more votes than former President Joseph Estrada.

As the scandal surrounding Mr. Estrada began to unfold last year, then-Vice President Arroyo - who was concurrently the Secretary of Social Welfare and Development - resigned as DSWD Secretary. The rest, as they say, is now history.

Speaking of chiefs, I am also proud to say that beginning this issue, Philippine Business has a new Editor-in-Chief. Nonette Climaco, who has been running the magazine anyway as the Managing Editor, takes on a new and expanded role as the editor-in-chief. Nonette is not new to MBC. She's been with us since 1987, starting first as a senior research associate before moving up to become our manager for research and information and then our managing editor. Nonette plays mother to a staff of eight (analysts and artists) as well as four children of her own.

Nonette will now be assisted by Mau Macaraig as the new Managing Editor. Mau joined us out of ABS-CBN News in 1999 and has since taken over our CongressWatch Project as well as our PCs for Public Schools Project..

I'm sure Philippine Business will be in good hands under these women. As for me, I'm kicking myself upstairs to become publisher of the magazine.