BOBONG EVEN ATTACKED AND PUNCHED ME WHILE I WAS EXPLAINING TO THE MAIN OFFICE STAFF. HE ACCUSED ME OF BRINGING GULO SA MAIN OFFICE AND THAT I WANTED TO TAKE OVER DAW?? WHY HE DO THIS? BECAUSE HE WANTS TO BE THE STAR IN THE OFFICE.
If you will recall and analyze the people whom I have unfortunately fought with, it’s all because of Papang’s style of putting “spirit horn” to the head of those persons thereby temporarily making their head swollen with ambitions. Of course I very much regret loosing them not only because I consider them assets to our operations but some were my own first cousins. From Mae, Lindamore, Jane, Maricor, Abeth, to Ely Castro the root cause and pattern is very clear. If Papang didn’t instigate them to go against me they would still be with us working harmoniously for the good of the company.
For the past two years I have suffered the ugly jealousy of a father. It is not easy to understand why fathers are like that especially to their eldest son. There is no need to cite the many examples because I know people knows, people are aware of it, you and even Papang knows this but I have come to accept people’s rebuttals to admit and talk about it because maybe of it’s ugliness. In my suffering and confusion, I even claimed that Papang to be “malpagador” because I believed that the reason why I’m having trouble with him or the reason why he hates me is because of my many success in my work.
I work my life and can proudly claim to be very successful in the responsibilities given to me as the eldest son. The other shipping companies in our city namely Sampaguita, SKT, Basilan Lines, Magnolia, Ever Transport, and Trans Asia and Cokaliong of Cebu, who were once bigger than our company, were not able to expand like we did. I have made our shipping company bigger than any of them, biggest in our city and with a very promising future. For a person to solely claim responsible by himself is not commendable. Papang in his usual character once wrote me with the help of a blood writer that it is not my right to crow of my achievements I did for the company much more claim ownership citing just like a manager has no right to collect for himself the wealth even if he himself created for the company. In the eye of my Papang, I am just his manager. He can’t even say “good job son”!
However, I find it also not acceptable for a father’s jealousy to malign a son’s success by claiming his need to come out of semi-retirement in his first Board Meetings, September 18, 2004 empowering himself to the “driver-seat” again and firing orders re-assigning company officers here and there. Out of the blue, without even consulting or even informing me, he designated an outsider, newly recruited, as OIC-Overall and to be in-charge of
departmentalization
of ourcompany’s man power!(October 9, 2004 Board Meeting). He further designated lindamore transfer of Jane Miranda and Maricor Gaynillo, transferring Abeth and empowering her to be in charge of the receivables. In his other board meetings he further empowered Clyde to be the overall in charge of our heavy equipments. Many more designations were followed, none of which make sense. All these appointments and designations were clear indications of Papang’s disrespect of my position in the company. It was a pattern where in he seems to enjoy putting people in firing line with me. As a father he should never do that. Not only did he but continues to do so until now. It still rings painfully in my ear his writing to me with the help of a blood writer that the situation I am in is my own doing. You remain dead silent on these, which makes it more hurtful for a son to digest. Saddam Hussein is being accused of crime to humanities. The prosecutors need not have to prove that he himself killed people. All they need to show is that he was aware of the crimes and did not do anything, and he shall be charge guilty. I know you have the power of persuasion to convince Papang to retire, the reason I am writing this letter to you instead to him. This was September 2004 when he declares to the world that he has to come out of his retirement. When I took charged of the company back in 1980s we had only MV Estrella del Mar, MV Aleson 0, MV Aleson 3, and MV Alexander. After them I can claim I not only made the decision to buy all our other vessels but alone prepared their importation document requirements as well as their successful deployment to their respective routes namely MV Aleson II, MV Nico Bryan, MV Aleson 1, MV Feliciano Jr., MV Nelson, MV Kristel Jane, MV Kristel Jane 2, MV Kristel Jane 3, MV Danica Joy 1, MV Danica Joy 2, MV Lady Mary Joy 1, MV Lady Mary Joy 2, all our Con Carrier vessels from 1 to 8, and its support heavy equipment forklifts, truck cranes, prime movers, trailers, fuel and water truck tankers, etc as well as building all our existing 1,500 plus 10 footer containers. I have inventories of these.
I alone decided to open up the side door opening of MV Lady Mary Joy 2 even with people saying it might break the vessel into half.I worked together with carpenters,
giving them designs for the wooden bed for it’s third class accommodations,
I went from store to stores in Sandakan to canvass the best price for beds for the cabin rooms. Even printing of the names for the cabin rooms I myself printed from my computer and personally pasted on each cabin room covering each with plastics. It became our flag ship which was our pride and joy. But what has happened to it now?
I don’t know how many number of times I drove the 3 &1/2 hours drive to Subic and other locations to bid and buy our 35-tonner truck cranes, heavy forklifts during that time we have to augment these support equipments for the success of our container operations.
I alone searched, compared, and decided contractors to built all our existing containers from container number 1 up to number 1500 plus.
I alone searched, cited, decided and negotiated with PPA for our Pier 6 container office and van spaces.
I remember very well bringing you to take a look to take pride of it, however, only to find myself wanting to cry after both of us saw how small our 10 footer office was, which was almost covered by the 20 & 40 footer containers of the other giant shipping lines and prompting you to comment “cosa ya kayot se si ambitioso Alexander”.
I remember as well the faces of Marina people faces turned funny in disbelief when they saw our container ship is just 199 gross tons! There never was a container ship as small as ours. Undoubted, I pursue to negotiate our basic cargoes of lime stones from Dipolog to Manila. I again alone went to Dipolog to look for and lease our existing container yard and deployed there in advance our first batch of MT 10-footer containers and 2 units 15-tonner Forklifts and one 35-tonner truck crane in time for the maiden voyage of our first Con Carrier 1 vessel which assured freight to support the fuel coast for its first voyage to Manila. There were many trucking companies who came to know of our container entry in Manila and once I was invited in a restaurant meeting in Ongpin presided by veteran elder Chinese trucking company owners who persuaded unsuccessfully to convince me to give them percentage fee for them to have their truck load cargoes to bring to us. I like to think that I made the right decision by not accepting any of their offers because eventually I was not only able to cut middlemen people but saved the problems of forever paying them even if consignees in Zamboanga, Bacolod, or Dipolog ordered their respective shippers to load on our vessels. I too alone searched, cited and leased all our other container yards in Cebu and Bacolod. Even the transfer to Pier 16, I alone decided and even went to measure the area with measuring tape meters and even the fences I drew the design and bought the materials and hired contractors to build each fences at our E. Rodriguez residence and hired trucks to deliver and install them. In short, everything that existed in our pier 16 office and container yard is my sweat, blood and creation!
I have hired many best employees, many cum laude graduates and even a magna cum laude graduate who loved working with me even being assigned to pier. They were the best that a small company like ours could ever hope to have. But none of them is with our company now.
But of course all these will collapse if we didn’t have our container tariff book, which I again myself designed from the 1st to our present 5th Edition and designing computerized system for our freight for all ports. Even the spacing of lines in our bill of ladings, the letters typed, their distance from each other I know because I designed them.
All these denominators were very important contributors to the success of our container entry operation here in Manila, subsequently sustaining our other entries in Bacolod and Dipolog.
Definitely I don’t need an ordinary seaman CAAY, who lords over my Manila Office or a Clyde (who claimed to have resigned from William Lines because he knew in advance that the WG&A coalition won’t survive!) whom Papang has designated as Manila Office OIC?!
We can’t blame people aspiring to be somebody they cannot be especially when they are given the “mandate”. We can only wait, see and compute the thickness of their face by the number of days they will try to stay.
I have tolerated enough of Papang’s gullibility of hiring him to be his assistant to go around our Zamboanga operations for a year, dismissing him as an anak-bulan, a pest running around our business premises. But sending the rat to my territory to be the OIC and preside a meeting over my own people saying among others that “hinde na to maayos, paalis na talaga si alex”.
Papang knows very well my temper that I won’t tolerate such situation and that I will physically remove him from my office but yet he has no concern. When I wanted to franchised Dunkin Donut in Zamboanga, one of main reason he didn’t allow me was because of the danger of going out at night if some trouble will occur in the store. He is different now. Maybe he has a good reason to do it because I anger him. Many times I too showed same no concern on him when I’m angry. This father’s jealousy on his eldest son in a family business is some kind of a disease and infectious that when together a father can’t help himself control his jealous character. Like an infectious disease, avoiding it is prevention. I believe if Papang is not in the company it will help cure this.
When I was new in the company, Papang always like to introduce me to his business associates that I am the President of the company and that he is retired. This was the time when I know nothing of the company and so people whom he said that obviously know that he is the one running the show. He even one time made and gave me a calling card with the position of President of the company. However, after I became very effective to the point that people were commending my ability to run the company, he stopped and never mentioned that anymore.
Once, during one of the visit of his friend, Col. Guerson to our Q.C. residence, the Col. asked me for my calling card and when he saw the designation in my card as VP-Operations, he jokingly said to me why I didn’t have the title of a company President, then turning more seriously to his comment. He reasons out that “siempre” it would have a good effect especially when I present my card to the Japanese business people whom I buy our ships. I can still visualize my father’s face in sour pain as he maintained silence during the Col.’s continuous explanation to his reasoning. I am not saying these to ridicule Papang. I am saying these to support my theory about a father’s hatred to his eldest son in a family corporation and the timely presence of Col. Guerson at our pier 16 office. I am a good friend of the Col. and times I heard him joked my father to retire and enjoy life. I will appeal to him this time to seriously ask his Kumpadre to retire.
If I am to value our company assets of 1980s, I would say it was around 150M pesos or an equivalent to 250M of year 2004 purchasing peso power. I think I can say that the estimated value of our company assets was around 1.2B pesos, September 2004 during the time Papang decided to force himself out of his semi-retirement with his personal claim to save our company and started designating unqualified office personnel to head sensitive departments.
With these figures, I would like to dream and claim that I am responsible to have increased my parents company to almost about a billion-peso.
Further, I would like to add that maybe Basilan Lines would be bigger shipping company in Zamboanga if I was born an Alano, Sampaguita if I was born a Que, and SKT if I was born the son of Sy. The reasons why I dream of saying these are supported by the following facts: