User:Alternativity/sandbox/Alan Ortiz

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Alan T. Ortiz (d. March 23, 2020) was a Filipino foreign policy and energy sector expert who was held key positions the Philippines' government, and business sectors, as well as civil society organizations such as the Bantayog ng mga Bayani. At different points in his career, he was assistant director-general of the Philippines' National Security Council, Undersecretary to the President for the build-operate-transfer projects, president and chief operating officer of the power company SMC Global Power Holdings Corporation (SMC Power), and president of the non-profit Philippine Council for Foreign Relations.

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Alan T. Ortiz

• a leading foreign policy expert who held prominent positions in the Philippine government and in business,
• a leader in finance, banking and industries such as water and power utilities.

Early life and education

• obtained his AB Economics from the Ateneo de Manila University
• University of the Philippines for his master’s.
• International Relations for his doctorate, specializing in Multinational Enterprise and Economic Development at Penn’s Wharton School.

• doctoral dissertation was titled: “The Political Economy of Ethnicity: A Case Study of Muslims in the Philippines”.
• 1981, he placed first in the Philippine Foreign Service Officer examinations.

• He earned his doctorate in international relations at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School, (résumé posted on the website of the Philippine Council for Foreign Relations)

Career

Early career

During the late 1980s, Ortiz worked as a journalist for the Manila Chronicle, where he was considered the chronicle's resident expert on international relations.

Government

Ortiz' career in government began with various roles under the administration of President Corazon Aquino, where he eventually became assistant director-general of the National Security Council. In the administration of President Fidel Ramos, he became undersecretary to the President for the build-operate-transfer projects (later renamed public private partnership projects).

Government-owned corporations and the private sector

Concurrent to his service as undersecretary to the President for the build-operate-transfer projects, he was assigned to be vice-chairman and chief operating officer of the government-owned Development Bank of the Philippines.

After this, he held key positions in various government-owned corporations within the energy sector, including the National Transmission Corporation, and the PNOC Energy Development Corporation.

Later entering the private sector, became an executive in the Manila Electric Company (MERALCO), and became president and chief operating officer of the power company SMC Global Power Holdings Corporation (SMC Power).

Later, he became president of the non-profit Philippine Council for Foreign Relations.

Civil society roles

Ortiz also active roles in the Board of Trustees of the Philippine Science High School, and of the Bantayog ng mga Bayani, which honors the martyrs and heroes of the struggle against the 21-year dictatorship of former President Ferdinand Marcos.

Death

• traveled to Paris in March to attend an international security conference.
• was exposed there to the coronavirus.
• was hospitalized in Paris.
• He died there on March 23, age 66.

• Leaving in early March
• an international security event in Paris
• on the invitation of the French government,

• Died on March 23 in a Paris hospital of complications from COVID-19.
• He is believed to be the first Filipino to die of the ailment abroad.

Public image

Ortiz was popular and well respected in government and corporate circles as well as by the media, who regularly came to him as a source of information and as a commentator on complex policy issues on the energy sector and in Philippine foreign policy.

John Forbes of the United States Chamber of Commerce in the Philippines described ortiz as “a game changer in both his public and private sector careers” and a “larger-than-life hero of our times,” while Ramos administration Finance Secretary Roberto de Ocampo remarked on his reliable "ability to make things happen, and happen well."

Among media practitioners

Media practitioners have turned to Ortiz over the course of the Corazon Aquino, Ramos, Estrada, Arroyo, Benigno Aquino Jr., and Duterte administrations, either as a key as a key news source explaining the details of government policy when he was serving in the administration, or as a knowledgeable commentator on issues ranging from national security to energy stability after he had moved on to the private sector. The Philippine media particularly relied on him during his time as a senior official of the National Security Council, when his explanations of government policy were typically anonymous, and he was typically cited only as "the source." Media practitioners of the time recall that they trusted Ortiz' explanations "because he didn’t have any political agenda.”

Personal life

• avid shooter, a rescue diver, a biking enthusiast, and an amateur photographer.
• “All the days of our lives, we will miss him, his laughter, his intelligence, and his sense of adventure,” - his daughter, Monica Ortiz,
• "Ortiz once described himself as an avid shooter, big biker, and amateur photographer.

• In an article he wrote for the Philippine Daily Inquirer in August 2014, Ortiz talked about looking back and the perks and muses of men into their senior years--as a shooter, biker and photographer.

• “Why do we ride?” he wrote. “Why are so many middle-aged professionals and senior executives buying big bikes, donning armored jackets, slipping into leather gloves and reinforced boots and riding off to Tagaytay, or Subic, or Tanay, or Gumaca at the crack of dawn every Sunday morning? The easy explanation dismisses it as merely the coming of our second childhood, the fulfillment of juvenile dreams, or simply the performance of male bonding rituals amidst the roar and the swoosh of high performance machines….”

References

• UP in Memoriam

• ABSCBN

• PSHS