RP seen rebounding from makati blasts
RP seen rebounding from makati blasts
MANILA (Reuter): A grenade attack in the Philippines' main business area has intensified security fears and revived memories of past mayhem but the economy is robust enough to shrug it off, analysts said yesterday.
Police say the attack, which wounded four people and damaged the local headquarters of both Shell and Citibank, was probably a bank raid that went awry.
"Our investigation showed it was an attempted robbery," General Job Mayo, Manila's top policeman, said in a radio interview.
He said police believed the gunmen, armed with grenade launchers and M-16 assault rifles, had opened fire to cover their escape after bank guards thwarted a planned robbery.
At least four grenade blasts resounded through the bustling Makati business district at Wednesday lunchtime, pushing down both the stock index and the Philippine peso.
The markets had largely recovered 24 hours after the attack, with the stock index closing 9.68 points lower at 2,933, well off its day low of 2,913. Brokers said foreign buyers had led the recovery.
Aggressive Central Bank intervention, including a sharp hike in overnight interest rates, helped the peso recover to 26.13 to the dollar by mid-trade yesterday from its low of 26.225 on Wednesday afternoon.
Mayo's remarks contradicted comments by some politicians and in the media that the attack was the work of leftists angry at a recent oil price increase.
Manila flatly denied another suggestion that government agents themselves staged the attack to justify passage of a controversial anti-terrorism law pending before parliament.
Business leaders said who was responsible was of less concern to foreign investors than the fact that the attack could happen at all in the country's main commercial area in broad daylight.
"It's bad that this can happen in Makati," said Henry Schumacher, head of the European Chamber of Commerce of the Philippines.
"That someone is running loose with military arms in the corporate district of Manila Inc, that's what bothers me," Schumacher said in an interview with Reuters.
Urging the government to take clear action to address the law and order issue, Schumacher said the Philippines had been taking pains in recent years to attract foreign investment but this was threatened by incidents such as Wednesday's.
Financial analysts said the economy was now strong enough to rebound from the attack.
"The Philippine economy of today is significantly different from that of 1983 when the assassination of one politician can blow the house of cards down ... The economy has grown, developed and deepened," Noel Reyes, vice president for research of Dharmala Securities, said in a report.
The 1983 assassination of opposition leader Benigno Aquino ushered in a long period of political turmoil that left the economy in tumble.