Business and Economy
Purisima receives fifth ‘Finance Minister of the Year’ award
Finance Secretary Cesar V. Purisima. Photo courtesy of Purisima on Facebook.
MANILA — For the fifth time, the country’s Finance chief Cesar Purisima was recently awarded with the “finance minister of the year” citation by FinanceAsia.
The Department of Finance on Wednesday said that Purisima was awarded for “his leadership in driving the turnaround story of the Philippines.
”
Purisima, the head of President Benigno Aquino III’s pool of economic managers, outranked other finance ministers from Indonesia, South Korea and Taiwan.
“Purisima was lauded for steering the economy away from stagnation and towards broad-based growth, resulting in the Philippines reaching investment grade status from major credit rating agencies. Last quarter’s 6.9-percent GDP [gross domestic product] growth exceeded expectations and marked 12 straight quarters of above 5-percent GDP growth, comfortably putting the average quarterly growth rate under the Aquino administration at 6.02 percent,” according to the DOF.
Meanwhile, the finance chief offered the award to President Aquino and the cabinet members adding that the financial reforms were successfully crafted through team effort.
“The award truly belongs to President Aquino and my colleagues in the Philippine Cabinet because the economic growth and fiscal reforms are truly a team effort, proving that ‘good governance is good economics,” said Purisima during the awards ceremony last Feb. 4. “We have proven yet again that the Philippine miracle is not a one-hit wonder.
We’re here to stay, and we are ready to play big in the world stage.
”
“Reforms beget rewards. This award strengthens our resolve to double down on reforms: Rationalize fiscal incentives, modernize our revenue generating agencies, and engineer a competitive and equitable tax structure for all Filipinos,” said Purisima.
