Official Gazette for January 8, 1970:
President Marcos again pressed efforts to boost the country’s export and tourist industries, as he met with various groups of government and private sector leaders. He conferred with tourist industry entrepreneurs at Malacañang in the morning, and at noontime he was guest speaker at the regular meeting of the Manila Rotary Club, held at the Manila Hotel.
The President also received a number of callers at his office in the Executive Building.
Among those he received were Prof. Francisco Ventura; Ambassador Modesto Farolan. Philippine envoy to Indonesia; and former Senator Manuel P. Manahan, chairman of the Philippine Rural Reconstruction Movement (PRRM).
At mid-morning, the President met behind closed doors: Secretary of National Defense Ernesto Mata; Gen. Manuel Yan, AFP Chief of Staff; Brig. Gen. Ismael Lapuz (ret.), Chief of the National Intelligence Coordinating Agency; Brig. Gen. Felizardo Tanabe, commanding general of the first PC zone; and Col. Fidel Ramos, chief of AFP intelligence. Later, the President met with Antonio Delgado, Mrs. Rebecca Panlilio, Rodolfo Cuenca, Jose 0. Cobarrubias, and Reneo A. Albano. Also attending were Roberto Benedicto, PNB president; and Cols. Gerardo Tamayo and James Barbers, Chief and Deputy Chief, respectively, of the Manila Police District. The President discussed with this group the plans for promoting tourism, and for encouraging foreign tourists to visit the Philippines.
Shortly after 12 noon, the President, accompanied by Antonio Roxas Chua, Manila Rotary Club president, motored to the Manila Hotel where he was guest speaker at the regular luncheon meeting of the club. In his speech, the President reaffirmed the determination of the government to press the development of the tourism industry with the move to adopt the open skies policy and to do away with visa requirements for foreign visitors. “We have to get involved more intensively with tourism.” the President told the Rotarians. As a start, he said, the directed the immediate study of the possibility of opening the country’s skies to all foreign airlines with no limit on frequencies. The President explained, however, that the open skies policy will be experimental, to take effect for only one year.
In the afternoon, the President worked mostly in his study. He remained at his desk through the evening. While working on state papers, the President:
1. Lifted the suspension of loans by government financing institutions and commercial banks primarily to meet the needs of export industries, as well as those of the mining and new and necessary industries. The suspension was scrapped in order to meet the credit needs of export-oriented industries, especially, those industries engaged in mining and the new and necessary industries needed by the economy.
2. Directed all government agencies to adopt a policy of not assigning field officials and other ranking government personnel to their respective home provinces. The President called for the adoption of this policy in order to preclude possible charges of favoritism that normally arise when government officials have to deal with their own relatives and friends in the performance of their duties.
3. Directed Commissioner Mama Sinsuat of National Integration to limit the number of Muslim pilgrims to Mecca to one shipload only, in follow-up of a decision arrived at during the Cabinet meeting yesterday.The President said that the pilgrims should be so selected that all Muslim provinces are represented.He emphasized that only one ship of Philippine registry preferably of the Compania Maritima, which has successfully transported pilgrims before, be utilized for this year’s pilgrimage.The President also imposed two conditions before any pilgrim is allowed to leave the country, namely:
1. That the mutawiff, the fee imposed by the Saudi Arabian government on every pilgrim, be paid by the pilgrim himself through the Philippine National Bank.
2. That the pilgrim should pay his fare direct to the shipping company before accommodation can be obtained for him aboard the ship.The President emphasized he had to impose these conditions to avoid recurrence of embarrassment suffered by the government in connection with the annual pilgrimage.
[p.19] I have ordered a study in depth of all our efforts of counter-insurgency, economic development, social reform as well as military action.
The civilian agents must be disbanded but the Barrio Home Defense Force should be strengthened to stop the expansion of the Huks and the New People’s Army.
Emergency plan by phases—compartmentalized, in the event of massive sabotage, terrorism and infiltration. Counter-action by pre-assigned units and officers and men.
Lifted the limitation of flights of foreign carriers from Japan for one year but Pan Am must spend $1 million to promote the route and build its own terminal.
No more need for transit visas.
Development of the Manila tourist belt. Central Bank—P200,000, police security for tourists including certification of taxicab companies, Tagaytay, Corregidor, Bataan, Pagsanjan—Navy hydrofoil to Corregidor and Bataan run.
Will ask the tourist and business community to talk to the publishers to tone down on crime.
As of today, loans will again be allowed for mining and new export industries.
Speaker [Jose B.] Laurel and Senate Pres. [Gil] Puyat ask for support for their respective candidates.
The Lopezes as I predicted are starting to plot against me. Iñing [Eugenio] Lopez [Sr.] has recovered enough from hypoglycemia to order their Manila Chronicle to attack me and the Marcos Foundation
Manila Chronicle 9 Jan.1970 front page report on FM Rotary speech where he criticized the Press for blaming government for all the ills in the country:
“When I was young my father always told me never to believe two sources of news: one, women and the other newspapers…that was in the past…now I follow women when they give the right advice. On second thought that sentence, I follow women, doesn’t sound very good ah, for the president anyway.” He gave as examples the leak on Laurel-Langley agreement reporting that US rejected special preferences but there has been no official word from Washington, and projection of P1billion deficit this fiscal year.