BIZ BUZZ: Big business comes to the rescue
Filipino resilience has become a hackneyed idea during typhoons. How about bayanihan instead?
In the past days, as the successive Typhoon “Tino” and Supertyphoon “Uwan” left parts of the Philippines in a sorry state, some of the country’s biggest businesses showed up to help victims across Luzon and the Visayas.
The Lucio Tan Group extended help to families in Tino-hit Cebu and surrounding provinces through its firms, Philippine Airlines (PAL), Asia Brewery and Philippine National Bank.
The conglomerate said the flag carrier PAL was helping in airlift goods to Cebu and other typhoon-hit areas, adding it was “working with government agencies, humanitarian organizations, and private donors to move essential supplies as quickly as possible.”
Some 3,000 6-liter bottles of water have been distributed in Talisay, Cebu, with additional relief operations planned in Liloan and Consolacion.
Meanwhile, power distributor Meralco said it had restored power for about 203,000 customers as of Monday morning, down from 400,000 at midnight.
As the Philippines navigates through the ravages of Tino and Uwan, we can surely expect more of these acts of bayanihan not just from big businesses like these, but even among ordinary Filipinos.
