Makati Mayor Nemesio I. Yabut Nemesio I. Yabut was born on December 19, 1925 in Fort William McKinley, Makati. He was the fourth of five children that sprung out of the union of Fabian Yabut, a soldier in the Philippine Scouts, U.S. Army and Irene Isip, a comely lass who lived near the Fort. As the son of a soldier, “Mesio” had his early schooling at the Fort McKinley Elementary School, a school established by the Americans for U.S. Army dependents. When his father died, Mesio, who was then ten years old, moved to Guadalupe Elementary School and later to Pasig Catholic School for his high school. When the war broke out, Yabut helped the family by doing odd jobs, many of them involving manual labor. After the war, he wanted to resume his studies but he was too poor to pay for his education. Possed of a good athletic build, he joined the Makati Police force as sergeant and enrolled at the National University tuition-free, thanks to his proficiency in basketball and baseball. Working by day and studying at night presented no handicap to Yabuts police career, he rose to become a lieutenant and enetuall headed the Detective Bureau. He gained many citations, one of them for solving the Colgate Palmolive robbery in 1951 which initially baffled investigators for seeming lack of clues, leading police observers to tag it as the “perfect crime”. Although he had a promising career in the police force, Yabut resigned from the service in 1954 to stake out on his own business world. He had nothing but a Bachelor of Science in Commerce sheepskin and a lions heart. Yabut almost regretted his decision to leave the police force. His initial ventures ended in failure. But the cocky young man who brashly predicted that he would become a millionaire someday (“Im leaving the force to become a millionaire,” he told his fellow cops when he resigned) remained undaunted. Possessed of good looks, Yabut gave the movies a try and appeared in several films. One of them, “Lagrimas” became a heavy grosser at the box office. But, Eduardo Llanes – for this was Yabuts screen name, did not stay long in the celluloid business. Yabut admitted he never felt at ease doing love scenes before the Klieg lights. The ex-policeman, ex-movie actor now turned his attention to Manilas busy South Harbor. This was the time of the Import boom. He went into the brokerage business. It was catch and go until 1959 when he formed the Guaranteed Commercial Delivery Services, Inc. (Guacods, Inc.) Yabut started Guacods on the proverbial shoestring – a rented delivery van which he used to drive himself, and a small desk with a borrowed portable typewriter in a corner office in the pier zone. His matinee-idol face became a familiar figure in the South Harbor of Manila as he drove his own delivery van in and out of the waterfront to service his customers. Success, which eluded Yabut during his earlier business ventures, now started descending upon him with compounded interest. In 1960, Guacods won a bid for warehousing in the pier zone. Indicative of Yabuts driving determination was the fact that one of his chief competitors during the bidding was Harry Stonehill, an established business tycoon with far-flung business interests throughout the archipelago. Yabuts professional handling of Guacods earned for his firm a reputation of reliability. In 1962, a protracted waterfront strike all but paralyzed activity in the South Harbor. But Guacods continued to service its customers by delivering their merchandise without delay. It was the only brokerage firm to maintain normal activities during the strike. Yabut was able to do this by a happy combination of guts and good public relations, a trait which serves him in good stead to this day. In 1996, the Government, which was handling the Arrastre service in the South Harbor at a continuous loss, decided to turn it over to private management. In the bidding, Guacods won the right to service three of the piers. Yabuts star was definitely on the ascendancy. Barely a year after Guacods handled the Arrastre service, the shipping conference lifted the surcharge of five dollars per ton for demurrage which it had imposed earlier upon the Port of Manila due to the continuous strikes in the piers. The lifting was a great relief to the importers. Since then, the surcharge has not been reimposed. Since Guacods handled the Arrastre under Yabuts able direction there has not been a single waterfront strike. Industrial peace has reigned and Management Labor relations have been exemplary. Pilferage has been reduced to a negligible minimum. Furthermore, the government, which used to incur a loss of P70,000 pesos monthly when it operated the Arrastre, now receives an average monthly remittance of P150,000 from Guacods. As Yabuts own personal fortune began to skyrocket, he shifted his attention from making money to giving money. His philanthropic activities ranged far and wide, but the biggest beneficiaries were the poor people of Makati, of which he was one but a few years ago. Yabut also built in 1967 the Parish Church of Guadalupe Nuevo, his own barrio, at a cost of P 250,000. He also caused several chapels to be constructed in the different barrios of Makati. Moreover, he instituted a scholarship program for Makatis deserving but indigent students. In recognition, the government gave him an award in 1969 for being one of the Most Outstanding Philanthropists in the Philippines. During the late sixties, Yabut could easily have enjoyed a life of leisure. From the poor side of Makati in Guadalupe Nuevo, he had moved to a palatial residence in Forbes Park, the home of the elite. His business empire continued to expand. And, in the meantime, he had acquired a happy family. Corinne Siddons was a stunning Singapore beauty who came to Manila in 1957 for a visit. She had just participated in the contest for Miss Singapore in her homeland during which she was a finalist. As she felt lost in the pier zone where she wanted some information on the vessel that was to take her home, a man approached her and courteously offered his help. “My name is Yabut”, the man introduced himself. “I work here and maybe I can help you”. They became friends and Yabuts winning of Corinne Siddons is typical of his lifestyle of getting things done. As Corrine Siddons Yabut laughingly recalls, “He proposed ten days after we met”. Their marriage has been blessed with seven children, four boys and three girls. The latest addition was born twelve days before the last elections. Yabut unhesitatingly christened the baby girl “Victoria”, an appellation that came true during the elections. Yabuts political career bears a striking resemblance to his business career. He ran for congressman in 1969 and lost. Prior to that, he had been elected barrio captain but this post had been offered him on a silver platter and did not present much of a challenge. But in 1969, Yabut went after the congressional seat to represent the first district of Rizal, the countrys most populous and largest congressional district. The campaign was backbreaking and the results might have been heartbreaking to a lesser man. His political wounds had hardly been healed when Yabut decided to run this year for mayor of Makati . Learning from his mistakes in 1969, Yabut did away with his large campaign staff and retained just a handful. To this he added another handful of young, “Kennedy-style” strategies, and with this small and compact staff, he took to the campaign with zest and vigor. In the beginning he was an underdog. His two opponents were veteran politicians and had never lost an election. On the other hand, Yabut was a fresh “loser”. But as the campaign wore on, he steadily emerged as the favorite and by election day it was a foregone conclusion that he would be Makati s next mayor. The town of Makati, which has attracted the attention of the business and tourist world in the past, bears even closer watching in the days to come. For its helm will be Nemesio I. Yabut, a man who get things done.
Posted on: Tue, 25 Mar 2014 16:51:15 +0000
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