PAL names Lucio Tan’s wife as vice chair

The spouse of taipan and Philippine Airlines (PAL) owner Lucio Tan was named vice chair of the flag carrier, a stock exchange filing on Wednesday showed.

The filing from listed parent PAL Holdings Inc. showed that the board of the operating firm Philippine Airlines Inc. approved the appointment of Carmen K. Tan as vice chair.

The post was previously held by her son Lucio K. Tan Jr., who died last month.

PAL Inc.’s board also saw two recent high-profile resignations: former Solicitor General Estelito Mendoza and former Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas Governor Amando Tetangco Jr.

PAL Holdings on Wednesday said the board had accepted the resignation of Mendoza. Tetangco’s resignation is expected to be taken up in a board meeting next week.

The carrier also disclosed a copy of Mendoza’s resignation letter, which was dated Nov. 20 and contained no reason.

“I served as a member of the board through many crises, which PAL had undergone, many of which threatened its very existence, but I overcame all of them,” wrote Mendoza, who had been on PAL Inc.’s board “many decades ago.”

“With some amount of trepidation but reflecting on this carefully, I have decided to tender my resignation as I do so by this letter, with immediate effect,” he said as he thanked Lucio Tan, who is chair of PAL Inc.

The departures are the latest in PAL’S ongoing restructuring that has lasted for the better part of 2019.

PAL’S 15-member board will have 13 members when counting the two resignations.

These are Lucio Tan, Carmen Tan, Gilbert Santa Maria (PAL Inc. president), Vivienne Tan, Rowena Chua, Michael Tan, Florentino Herrera III, Cirilo P. Noel, Ryuhei Maeda, Johnip G. Cua, Manuel Lazaro, Samuel C. Uy and Gregorio T. Yu.

PAL is also seeking to turn its finances around after suffering steep losses this year, partly due to a change in accounting standards.

PAL Holdings earlier disclosed that losses from January to September this year hit P8.49 billion, up almost 116.6 percent year-on-year.

The steep fall in profits came despite revenues during the nine-month period increasing 5.6 percent to P117.9.

That was driven by the 5.7-percent growth in passenger revenues to P102.6 billion. Expenses were relatively stable at P117.14 billion, up 2.2 percent.

PAL’S results showed the biggest impact came from the company’s financing charges.