Pacquiao to pay courtesy call on Aquino

Filipino boxing champ Manny Pacquiao will pay a courtesy call on President Benigno Aquino III when he returns to the Philippines on Saturday, Malacañang said Friday. Deputy presidential spokesperson Abigail Valte said Pacquiao, who beat Mexican boxer Antonio Margarito last Sunday (Manila time) in Texas, will visit Malacañang at 11 a.m. on Saturday. Valte could not say whether Malacañang will confer an honor on Pacquiao, who has received several honors during the previous administration of Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, including the Order of Lakandula – Champion for Life and Order of Sikatuna awards. "I understand that there has to be a nomination and there’s a committee that will go through it," Valte said. “Pero ang pagkakaalala ko po kasi medyo marami nang awards si Congressman Pacquiao… So titingnan po natin," she added. (But if I remember right, Congressman Pacquiao already has many awards… So we’ll have to see.) Pacquiao is currently serving as first-term congressman of Sarangani province in southern Mindanao, and has been exerting efforts to balance his first career as a world-class professional boxer and his second career as a first-time lawmaker. Asked for Malacañang’s response to calls for the government to make the boxer-congressman the Philippines' poster boy for tourism, Valte said Pacquiao is already a poster boy for the country because of his boxing achievements. "Whether… there is a formal designation or an informal designation, I think it’s a fact already na talagang [that truly] he represents the Philippines," she said. Emmanuel Dapidran Pacquiao, popularly known as Manny, Pacman, or Pambansang Kamao (National Fist), is an eight-division world champion, and the first boxer in history to win 10 world titles in eight different weight divisions. The Boxing Writers Association of America (BWAA) has named him "Fighter of the Decade" for the 2000s. He is rated as the world’s No. 1 pound-for-pound boxer by several sporting news and boxing websites, such as The Ring, Sports Illustrated, ESPN, NBC Sports, Yahoo! Sports and About.com, and is being mentioned among the all-time greats.—Jam L. Sisante/JV/HS, GMANews.TV