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Villar: Government should waste no time in helping retrenched workers.*

Senator Manuel Villar yesterday stressed the need to create an immediate rescue package for displaced Filipino workers, including those in the sugar industry during the “dead season”, amid the continuous announcements of layoffs.

“Government should waste no time in helping retrenched workers through various safety nets, including access to credit for those who want to engage in entrepreneurship," said Villar, who held a press conference at the L ‘Fisher Hotel in  Bacolod City.

“We must do everything possible to save jobs and create new ones. The global economic slowdown is beginning to be felt in the form of factory closures and lay-offs of many workers,” he said.

Negros Occidental Gov. Isidro Zayco yesterday issued an executive order creating the Provincial Sugar Industry Task Force to address the effects on an expected early and long dead season in the sugar industry.

Named chairman of the task force is Board Member Enrique Miguel Lacson, Sangguniang Panlalawigan Committee on Food Security chairman, while vice chairman is Board Member Adolfo Mangao, SP Committee on Agriculture chairman.

Members of the task force are Board Members Nehemias de la Cruz and Patrick Lacson, Vivian Saratan of the Department of Labor and Employment, Raymund Montinola – Confederation of Sugar Producers Associations, Alfredo Reyes – United Sugar Producers Federation of the Philippines Inc.;

A Bacolod Regional Trial Court judge yesterday found a resident of Murcia, Negros Occidental, guilty of carnapping and robbery, and sentenced him to 33 years imprisonment.

Bacolod Branch 46 RTC Judge George Patriarca found Rodolfo Escaner Jalandoni Jr., alias Joan Jalandoni, of Hacienda Paz, Barangay Buenavista, Murcia, guilty beyond reasonable doubt in three criminal cases filed against him.

The prosecution told the court that in the evening of Oct. 9, 2001, Jalandoni and an unidentified companion boarded a Cimarron jeepney owned by Ignacio Belnas at Luzuriaga-Locsin streets in Bacolod City and ordered its driver, Rufino Armada, to proceed to Murcia.