Emerging markets guru Mobius says PH ‘has tremendous potential’

MANILA, Philippines – Emerging markets guru Mark Mobius hailed the Philippines for its recents move to secure a peace agreement with the country’s restive south, citing lucrative opportunities should peace prevail.

In an interview aired on October 15, Mobius told BBC’s Leisha Chi that he remains optimistic in the Philippines’s potential.

“In the Philippines, if — and this is a big if — they are really able to reach a peace agreement with Muslims in the south, it would be wonderful. It would be a great, great feather in the cap for the current administration,” he said.

“Philippines has a tremendous potential,” he stressed.

Mobius is a renowned investor and the executive chairman of California-based Templeton Asset Management Ltd., which has poured billions of dollars into developing countries.

Watch the rest of the BBC interview below.

Peace agreement

In a historic move, the Philippine government led by President Aquino and leaders of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), the country’s largest rebel group, signed a peace roadmap, called a Framework Agreement, on October 15.

The signing was lauded by the international community, including Malaysia, which hosted on-again, off-again peace talks between the MILF and the Philippine government since 2001.

Under the peace framework, the 12,000-strong MILF will drop its bid for independence in exchange for an autonomous region by 2016, where they will have power to levy their own taxes and get a share of profits from its resources.

Muslim rebel groups have been fighting for full independence or autonomy since the 1970s in Mindanao, which they claim as their ancestral homeland. The insurgency has left more than 150,000 people dead, with most of the lives lost at the height of the conflict in the early 1970s when an all-out war raged.

Mindanao is considered a key agricultural and mining investment destination, but peace and order issues have been a major challenge there. – Rappler.com