Finding the right footwear a constant challenge for offensive lineman Sewell

When Matt Sewell starts the season with a new pair of football cleats, he'll go to great lengths to make sure they last.
The McMaster Marauders hulking offensive lineman isn't superstitious or especially finicky about his footwear. It's just with size 17 feet, finding shoes that fit is a constant challenge.
So when the six-foot-eight, 340-pound Sewell gets his hands on a suitable pair of shoes, he goes the extra mile to ensure they stand the test of time.
"Shoes in general are hard to find but (football) cleats are probably the hardest," he said with a chuckle. "Once I find a pair I stick with them until they're completely gone.
"I just tape them up and hopefully they don't fall apart during the game because if I wanted a new pair of cleats it would be tough to find in mid-season.''
With size 17 shoes a rarity in the bargain bin, Sewell often surfs the net looking for footwear and orders them online. That will be put on hold shortly as Sewell will spend Christmas with his family in Mexico.
But only for a week. Then Sewell will resume his search ahead of what promises to be a very busy off-season.
Sewell is being considered to play in the 2013 East-West Shrine Game on Jan. 19 at Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg, Fla. If chosen to play, Sewell will receive pro level coaching during the week-long practices and work out under the watchful eye of scouts representing teams on both sides of the border.
CFL teams are very aware of Sewell, who earlier this month was ranked second among the top-15 ranked prospects for this year's Canadian draft by the league's scouting bureau. Not only will Sewell be put through his paces by CFL scouts at the league's annual evaluation camp in Toronto but he'll also spend a lot of time answering questions in head-to-head interviews.
NFL teams have also reportedly taken note of Sewell's size and quick, nimble feet, which could also result in further workouts and interviews.
Add to that regular training sessions and it's shaping up to be a hectic off-season for Sewell as he auditions for the next phase of his football career.
"I'm looking forward to it," he said. "It should be an exciting few months for me and I think things will work out.''
Growing up in Milton, Ont., Sewell said he was more a fan of the sport than a specific team and thus has no real preference as to where he might start his pro career.
Sewell was an all-Canadian in 2012 for a second straight year and helped lead McMaster to another Vanier Cup appearance. The Marauders beat Laval 41-38 in double overtime to win a thrilling 2011 Vanier Cup final at B.C. Place before the Rouge et Or exacted some revenge by downing the Marauders 37-14 in last month's rematch at Rogers Centre.
Sewell played left tackle at McMaster, given the important task of protecting Hec Crighton Trophy-winning quarterback Kyle Quinlan's blind side. It's a position he'd like to line up at in the pro ranks.
"I think I have the body shape more for a tackle," he said. "When I was growing up all the minor coaches would tell me, 'If you're going to play offensive line, play left tackle,' and I've always played that position through my entire career.''
Sewell said working under the guidance of McMaster offensive line coach Jason Riley — a former CFL player with Montreal, Saskatchewan and Hamilton, — he feels he's ready to move up to the next level.
"Coach Riley is a high school teacher by nature so he liked to teach us," Sewell said. "He certainly knows what he's talking about.''
Sewell has also shown he can overcome physical adversity.
During his high school career he suffered a knee injury that forced him to the sidelines. After completing his rehab, Sewell opted to attend a prep school in Massachusetts to not only play another year but make sure all was right with his knee.
Convinced it was, he returned to Ontario the following year looking to go to school near home and settled upon McMaster.
"I'm very proud of that (overcoming knee injury), I actually put a lot of work into it," he said. "Football has been great at Mac but most important for me was everything outside of football.
"I've been able to accomplish a lot (in football) but the biggest thing for me is I'm going to be able to graduate with a degree in commerce from one of the top business programs in the country. I think that's the greatest achievement from my university career.''

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AP Sources: Jets could trade QBs Sanchez, Tebow

FLORHAM PARK, N.J. (AP) — Mark Sanchez is no longer the face of the New York Jets. He could soon be a former member of the team.
And Tim Tebow might even beat him out the door.
A person with knowledge of the situation told The Associated Press on Thursday that the Jets will consider all of their options regarding the two quarterbacks during the offseason. That means both Sanchez and Tebow are in limbo and trades cannot be ruled out.
The person, who requested anonymity because the team's personnel plans are private, told the AP that the Jets have not made any determinations involving Sanchez or Tebow.
The Jets could be hard-pressed to trade or cut Sanchez, who is due $8.25 million in guarantees next season after having his contract extended last offseason.
But there are no such complications with Tebow, who will likely be traded or released after just one disappointing season in New York. Tebow has two years remaining on his contract, but would cost the Jets only a little more than $1 million against the salary cap if cut.
"Anything dealing with the future past Buffalo (the regular-season finale) will be handled after that," coach Rex Ryan said.
The futures of Ryan, general manager Mike Tannenbaum and offensive coordinator Tony Sparano also are uncertain.
Parting ways with Tebow, the immensely popular but little-used backup, appears a certainty, though, after he came to New York amid lots of hype but had little impact. The final indication that Tebow will not be part of the Jets' future came when Ryan went with Greg McElroy, the third-stringer, to start at quarterback instead of him against San Diego on Sunday.
"Sometimes, things just happen out of your control," Tebow said Wednesday. "Obviously, you might not be pleased with them or happy about it, but you just try to handle it as best you can."
There are several complications that could lead to Sanchez actually sticking around in New York — whether it's as a backup or starter. Sanchez, who received a contract extension in March, would cost the Jets a $17.1 million salary cap hit next season. They could, however, spread that amount over the next two seasons if he is cut after June 1.
New York could also find it difficult to find a trading partner to unload Sanchez, who isn't likely a very attractive option at the moment after turning the ball over 50 times since the start of last season. With Tannenbaum's status unclear, teams might not be willing to even talk to him about possible trades. Teams can't make deals or sign free agents until March.
If the Jets did wind up trading Sanchez, the salary cap hit for them would still be a costly $8.9 million.
"That didn't come from me or anything else," Ryan said of the trade rumors. "We have two games to play and that's where my focus is, so, that's news to me."
The Daily News reported Thursday, according to sources, that the Jets would be interested in Michael Vick and that the Eagles quarterback would come to New York if it was clear he would be the starter. The newspaper also said Ryan "loves" Vick.
"I'll just focus on the players we have on this roster instead of somebody else's players," Ryan said while laughing.
Sanchez, whom the Jets drafted fifth overall in 2009, was benched in favor of McElroy for at least the home finale Sunday against San Diego. Sanchez threw four interceptions and fumbled away the final offensive snap — and the Jets' playoff chances — in New York's 14-10 loss at Tennessee on Monday night.
He once drew comparisons to Joe Namath after helping the Jets to consecutive AFC title games in his first two seasons, but his lack of improvement the last two years have caused him to fall out of favor. Ryan was non-committal Thursday when asked about Sanchez's long-term future.
"Whether it's not a ringing endorsement or whatever, I have absolutely zero focus on that right now," he said. "Everybody knows I've been supportive of Mark Sanchez. I think he still has the skill set to be a good quarterback in this league and we've won a lot of games with him.
"Again, that's for another day."
Tebow was supposed to be the spark that got the offense going, but instead spent most of his time on the sideline. While he has been hampered the last month by two broken ribs, his numbers were far from special even before that. For the season, he has rushed for 102 yards on 32 carries and is 6 of 8 for 39 yards, and has a stunning zero touchdowns while participating in just 72 offensive snaps.
"I think anytime you look at those things, it's a combination of things, but I wouldn't use the words 'didn't work' at all," Sparano said. "We had a plan going into this thing, but obviously the plan always, at that particular time, was that Mark was the quarterback and Tim would have a role and to what degree the role was, if I remember correctly, it was one to 20 plays in a game. Some days it was eight, some days it was one, some days it was none."
But, many fans and media have said it appears Tebow never got a true opportunity to be the playmaker everyone expected.
"I'm not going to get into that fair shake, not fair shake, all of those kinds of things," Sparano said. "Tim played his role and has done his role as well as expected right now. In other words, he's done everything we've asked him to do so far."
Tebow repeatedly said he was "excited" to be a member of the Jets when he first came from Denver in a trade in March, and he reiterated that throughout the season. But he acknowledged that he was "a little bit disappointed" that Ryan chose McElroy to start over him — at least for Sunday.
Now, Tebow could be an ex-Jet less than a year after he came to New York with lots of expectations.
"I've always, since I was a young boy, believed in myself and the abilities that God has given me and I just look forward to having an opportunity to try to show those again," Tebow said. "I'm pretty positive and I look forward to the future and what's going to happen."
It won't be in New York, though. And the inability to consistently find a way to effectively use Tebow could end up costing Sparano his job, too.

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Thursday's Scoreboard

Thursday's Games
(All Times Eastern)
NBA
Minnesota 32 Oklahoma City 18 (in 2nd)
Miami at Dallas, 9:30 p.m.
Denver at Portland, 10 p.m.
--
AHL
Peoria at Charlotte
Houston at Lake Erie
--
U.S. College Football
Poinsettia Bowl at San Diego
Brigham Young vs San Diego State, 8 p.m.

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It's official, Andersen is new Wisconsin coach

MADISON, Wis. (AP) — Several schools tried to lure Gary Andersen away from Utah State.
Wisconsin finally got him.
Andersen was officially hired as the Badgers' new coach Thursday, and will be formally introduced at a news conference Friday morning. He replaces Bret Bielema, who left the Badgers for Arkansas this month.
"I don't know if I can really have a word for how excited I am to be at Wisconsin and have this opportunity," Andersen said in a video on Wisconsin's website. "I know I'm humbled, I know I'm blessed."
The 48-year-old Andersen just completed his fourth and best season at Utah State. The 18th-ranked Aggies finished 11-2 with a bowl victory against Toledo and won the Western Athletic Conference. One of those losses was at Wisconsin, where the Aggies missed a 37-yard field goal in the final seconds to allow the Badgers to escape with a 16-14 win.
It's been a remarkable rise for a program that had been near the bottom of major college football for years, and stuck in distant third in its own state behind BYU and Utah. The Aggies won nine games in the previous four seasons before Andersen took over. The last football coach to finish his tenure in Logan, Utah, with a winning record was Phil Krueger who went 21-12 from 1973-75.
Andersen drew interest from California, Colorado and Kentucky last month, but decided to pass on those opportunities and received a contract extension from Utah State.
When Wisconsin called, however, Andersen couldn't resist.
"It all came together," he said in a video on Wisconsin's website. "By no means was I sitting out there going, 'I've got to have a job, I've got to have a job.' But as soon as this one popped open, to me, this was a special, special place."
Before Andersen left Logan, Utah, however, he called his players — all 107 of them — so they would hear the news that he was leaving from him and not on TV or Twitter.
"I couldn't tell them yet that I had taken the job," Andersen told UWBadgers.com. "But I told them if I was offered the job I was going to take the job. There were a bunch of tears and hard conversations."
Andersen replaces Bielema, who left Wisconsin on Dec. 4, three days after the Badgers routed Nebraska to win the Big Ten title and a school-record third straight trip to the Rose Bowl. Athletic director Barry Alvarez has agreed to coach Wisconsin in the bowl at the request of the players.
Though the Badgers' 8-5 record going into the Rose Bowl is their worst since 2008, Andersen is inheriting a team loaded with talent through Wisconsin will lose Montee Ball, who set the major college record for career touchdowns this year and tied the single-season mark last year, along with linebacker Mike Taylor and standout defensive backs Marcus Cromartie and Devin Smith.
The Badgers still have James White or Melvin Gordon, who rushed for a total of almost 1,400 yards and 15 touchdowns. Jared Abbrederis has led the Badgers in receiving each of the last two seasons, and Joel Stave showed promise before the freshman broke his collarbone. Disruptive linebacker Chris Borland, who is second with 4 1/2 sacks and 95 tackles despite missing two games, also is expected back.
And while this will be Andersen's first job in the Midwest, one Big Ten opponent has no doubt he can succeed. When Alvarez was considering Andersen, he called Ohio State coach Urban Meyer, who had Andersen on his staff at Utah in 2004, when the Utes went 12-0 and won the Fiesta Bowl.
"(Meyer has) had some very good assistants," Alvarez said on UWBadgers.com. "Urban told me that Gary is in the top five of all of them; he's the real deal. I said, 'Would he fit here? Would he fit in the Big Ten?' He said, 'Absolutely.'"

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U.S. slaps duties on China wind towers, high-level talks begin

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States on Tuesday pressed forward with plans to slap steep punitive duties on wind turbine towers imported from China at prices deemed unfairly low, even as officials welcomed a high-level Chinese delegation for trade and economic talks.

The U.S. Commerce Department set final anti-dumping duties ranging from 44.99 to 70.63 percent on utility-scale towers manufactured in China and additional countervailing duties of 21.86 to 34.81 percent to combat Chinese government subsidies.

The department also slapped final anti-dumping duties of 51.40 to 58.49 percent on wind towers from Vietnam.

A U.S. trade panel has final approval over the duties and is expected to vote on the case in late January.

The action was the latest clash between the two countries over U.S. imports of green technology from China. It came as a Chinese delegation led by Vice Premier Wang Qishan was in Washington for the U.S.-China Joint Commission on Commerce and Trade meeting, a high-level bilateral forum to address barriers to trade and investment.

Wang will attend a dinner on Tuesday evening hosted by U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk and Acting Commerce Secretary Rebecca Blank and is expected to meet with U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner on Thursday morning.

CHINA EYES U.S. "FISCAL CLIFF"

The main meeting on Wednesday takes place as President Barack Obama and House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner try to negotiate a budget deal to avert the so-called "fiscal cliff" of automatic tax increases and spending cuts early next year.

The White House is also pushing for an increase in the nation's $16.4 trillion statutory debt cap as part of any deal. The U.S. Treasury expects to reach the debt ceiling by year-end and will likely run out of options to free up more borrowing capacity by sometime in February, risking a potential default.

China is the United States' largest creditor, giving it a deep interest in Washington's budget debate.

U.S. companies expect Wednesday's meeting to produce no sweeping new commitments, but hope for action on concerns ranging from Chinese barriers to U.S. farm products to policies pressuring U.S. companies seeking business in China to transfer valuable technology there.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce on Tuesday urged securities market regulators in both countries to resolve differences over sharing of confidential business information that China considers a state secret.

"Failure to reach an agreement will create regulatory dead-zones that harm investors and businesses. Furthermore, the threat of retaliatory actions by regulators, on both sides of the Pacific, may create a regulatory protectionism that will harm both economies," the business group said in a letter to the heads of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and the China Securities Regulatory Commission.

The United States has also slapped anti-dumping and countervailing duties on billions of dollars of solar panels from China, despite strong objections from Beijing.

In Geneva on Tuesday, China's Ambassador to the World Trade Organization Yi Xiaozhun, criticized what he called U.S. "abuse" of anti-dumping and countervailing laws and accused Washington of blocking some Chinese investment in the United States for "ideological reasons."

LOST MARKET SHARE

The United States imported $222 million of wind towers from China last year and about $79 million from Vietnam. The custom-built steel towers support turbines that generate electricity from wind.

Anti-dumping duties announced on Tuesday were higher for two Chinese companies, Chengxi Shipyard Co. and Titan Wind Energy (Suzhou), than the preliminary rates they received earlier this year in the range of 20 to 30 percent.

Three other Chinese exporters also faced higher duty rates of around 45 to 50 percent in the final decision, but the top rate of 70.63 percent for "all other" Chinese manufacturers and exporters was down slightly from the preliminary level.

Final countervailing duties on Chinese wind towers were higher than the preliminary rates of 13.74 to 26.00 percent.

Final anti-dumping duties on Vietnamese towers were only slightly changed from preliminary levels.

The U.S. International Trade Commission has the final decision on duties. In February, the panel made a preliminary vote of 5-0 that there was a reasonable indication Chinese and Vietnamese imports have harmed U.S. wind tower producers.

U.S. producers say low-priced towers from Asia have cut into their market share and forced plant closings.

"Over the last years, in a period of peak demand, the U.S. industry should have been profitable," said Alan Price, an attorney at Wiley Rein representing U.S. producers. "Instead, due to the surge in dumped and subsidized imports, the industry lost market share and saw its profits collapse."

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Republicans put squeeze on Obama in "fiscal cliff" talks

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Republicans tried to wring more tax-rate concessions out of the White House  on Tuesday as political maneuvering intensified over an agreement to keep the U.S. economy from tumbling off the "fiscal cliff" next year. Markets rallied on hopes for a deal.

After important concessions in recent days from both President Barack Obama and House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner, Republicans moved to increase pressure on the Democrats by vowing to vote in the House on a "Plan B" back-up measure that would largely disregard the progress made so far.

The Republican proposal was part of a political dance by both parties to try to spin the "fiscal cliff" narrative in their favor even as they edged closer together. The White House rejected the offer but remained confident of an agreement.

"The president has demonstrated an obvious willingness to compromise and move more than halfway toward the Republicans," White House spokesman Jay Carney told reporters, adding that Obama is making a "good faith" effort to reach a compromise.

House Republicans were still meeting to discuss the matter on Tuesday evening.

Global stocks advanced to their highest levels since September amid rare signs of compromise on Capitol Hill. Investors shifted funds to stocks and the euro and pulled away from safe-harbor assets such as bonds, gold and the U.S. dollar.

The benchmark Dow Jones industrial average of 30 industrial stocks closed at 13,232.4, up less than 1 percent on the day.

"They've still got a long way to go, but you can't help but say that the odds are better today than they were on Friday that we'll get some sort of agreement," said Republican Representative Tom Cole.

While a bipartisan bargain could still fall apart, hopes of an accord rose on Monday night after Obama made a concession to Republicans by offering to limit tax increases to incomes exceeding $400,000 per household. That is a higher threshold than the $250,000 that the president had sought earlier.

Boehner, the top Republican in Congress, had earlier conceded on Obama's insistence that tax rates rise on the wealthiest Americans, but the two have been unable to agree on what income levels should be included in that category.

Analysts said Obama and Boehner may strike a compromise at $500,000 or close to that, though time was running short.

Boehner told reporters that he planned to move a "Plan B" bill to the House floor, possibly this week, in a move that could spur forward his talks with Obama. The House is controlled by Republicans and the Senate by Democrats.

One House Republican aide, asked about prospects for "Plan B" on the House floor, said: "It wouldn't be surprising ... if a lot of conservatives balk at something like that."

'WE CAN DO BETTER'

If the back-up plan fails, Republicans supporting it could afterward tell constituents back home that at least they voted for it and, in doing so, did their best to try to block Obama's agenda.

Even as he presented the Plan B measure, Boehner said he would continue to negotiate with Obama on a broader agreement.

"Plan B is Plan B for a reason. It's a less-than-ideal outcome. I've always believed we can do better," Boehner said.

The expiration of low tax rates enacted under former President George W. Bush is a key component of the "fiscal cliff" that lawmakers are trying to prevent from taking hold next month, along with deep automatic government spending cuts.

Left unchecked, these fiscal jolts could trigger another recession, economists have warned.

Often challenged by the conservative wing of his caucus, Boehner held Republican lawmakers together in support of his efforts to forge a deal with Obama. The speaker emerged largely unscathed from a potentially tough meeting with his fellow House Republicans on Tuesday morning.

Representative Darrell Issa, a key committee chairman, said his fellow House Republicans "were supportive of the speaker. ... I saw no one there get up and say, 'I can't support the speaker.'"

With opinion polls showing broad support in the United States for raising taxes on the wealthiest Americans and Obama still buoyed by his re-election last month, the Republicans' traditional opposition to tax hikes has waned somewhat.

The Obama-Boehner talks have largely overcome stark ideological differences and are focused increasingly on narrower disagreements over numbers.

COST-OF-LIVING INCREASES

Still, Obama could face unrest from fellow Democrats. Liberals were likely to oppose a key compromise he has offered to permit shrinking cost-of-living increases for all but the most vulnerable beneficiaries of the Social Security retirement program. His proposal calls for using a different formula, known as "chained Consumer Price Index," to determine the regular cost-of-living increases, essentially reducing benefits.

"I am committed to standing against any benefit cuts to programs Americans rely on, and tying Social Security benefits to chained CPI is a benefit cut," Democratic Representative Keith Ellison said in a statement.

Obama also moved closer to Boehner on the proportion of a 10-year deficit reduction package that should come from increased revenue, as opposed to cuts in government spending. Obama is now willing to accept a revenue figure of $1.2 trillion, down from his previous $1.4 trillion proposal.

Boehner's latest proposal calls for $1 trillion in new tax revenue from higher tax rates and the curbing of some tax deductions taken by high-income Americans.

Missing from Obama's latest offer was any extension of the so-called "payroll tax holiday" that ends on January 1, bringing an immediate tax increase on wage earners.

Possible plans to produce cuts in spending for Medicare and Medicaid, the government health insurance programs for seniors and low-income Americans respectively, remained to be discussed.

Boehner and Obama have made headway on the politically explosive question of the president's ability to avoid constant battles over raising the nation's debt ceiling, which controls the level of borrowing by the government. Boehner is ready to give Obama a year of relative immunity from conservative strife over the debt ceiling, while Obama is pushing for two years.

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Insight: The booming Philippines' missing link - foreigner investors

MANILA (Reuters) - The gathering had the air of a post-mortem. About 100 executives and government officials listened quietly as Guillermo Luz poked holes in the Philippines' fairytale economic revival.

Luz, head of the Philippines' National Competitiveness Council, projected a deck of slides onto two pull-down screens that showed the fast-growing Philippine economy slipping in the World's Bank's "Ease of Doing Business" index to 138 out of 185 countries, near Tajikistan and Sudan.

"It's a lousy neighborhood," he said of the two-notch fall this year. "I do not want to live with that ranking."

As the Philippines gallops ahead with the strongest economic growth in Southeast Asia and one of the world's best-performing stock markets, its shortcomings are being laid bare, including stubborn problems that have already started to undermine its economic renaissance.

While foreign funds have poured into Philippine assets this year, driving the main stock index <.psi> up around 30 percent to a succession of record highs and lifting the peso currency about 7 percent, foreign direct investment (FDI) remains embarrassingly low.

Total FDI is on course to hit around $1.5 billion this year -- about half its level in 2007 and less than the average $1.7 billion received every month in remittances from Filipinos overseas.

That is only about 3 percent of the total that flowed last year to a group of five peer economies including the Philippines in the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).

In his presentation in Manila's Makati business district, Luz highlighted the Philippines' lowly ranking in a range of categories, from "paying taxes" (143rd), to "starting a business" (161st) and "resolving insolvency" (165th).

Since coming to power in 2010, President Benigno Aquino has made headway against long-standing problems of corruption, shaky public finances and low infrastructure investment that earned the country the unwanted sobriquet of the "sick man" of Asia.

But he has yet to show his government can translate the torrent of hot money and improved market confidence that is also fuelling a property boom into real gains such as an expansion of higher-paying jobs and better transport links.

Calls by congressional leaders to loosen constitutional restrictions on foreign ownership have met with a lukewarm response from Aquino, a scion of an elite family whose mother, democracy icon Corazon Aquino, passed the 1987 constitution as president.

"I do not believe that foreigners would be that foolish to come here and put their money in business," Juan Ponce Enrile, the Senate president who is calling for the constitution to be revised, told Reuters. "They are at the mercy of local people who are not quite familiar to them. That is to me the reason why we lag in investment attractiveness in Asia."

"SALESMAN IN CHIEF"

The absence of FDI is a missing link that raises doubts over how much has really changed in the nation of 96 million people, where many an investor has been stung by copious red tape, unpredictable policymaking and graft.

Aquino has vowed to change the country's tarnished reputation among foreign investors, billing himself as the country's "salesman in chief". But to do so he needs to tackle vested business interests who benefit from a protected domestic market. So far, there are few signs he is doing so.

The constitution and current rules allow foreign investors to own no more than 40 percent in most industries and bars foreigners entirely in areas such as media and the practice of licensed professions such as engineering, law and medicine.

From 2000 to 2011, net FDI to the Philippines totaled $18.9 billion, according to United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, less than a third of what Singapore attracted in 2011 alone. As a proportion of the economy, the Philippines' net FDI stood at 0.6 percent last year, compared with 2.2 percent in Indonesia and 6.2 percent in Vietnam.

Strong foreign investment has been a vital ingredient in the rise of better-off Asian neighbors like Malaysia and Thailand, boosting job creation and deepening technological capabilities.

Foreign executives here are quick to complain there has been little concrete improvement on the ground, despite a surge of money into financial markets and credit rating upgrades on the back of improving fiscal health and lower borrowing costs.

"For me it's extremely frustrating," said Hubert D'Aboville, former head of the European Chamber of Commerce.

"We should welcome foreign investment, giving them the majority of 51 percent or 100 percent. What is important is to create jobs. We are not creating jobs."

EXODUS OF WORKERS

The Philippines has among the highest jobless rates in Southeast Asia at around 7 percent, helping to fuel an exodus of about 10 million Filipino workers in total that has yet to reverse course or even slow significantly.

Officials close to Aquino say he recognizes the need to attract more foreign investment, but is wary of broaching a reform of the constitution that could open up a complex, messy and energy-sapping political process.

"I don't think it's going to be touched for now," Budget Secretary Florencio Abad, who is also vice president of Aquino's party and one of his close advisers, told Reuters.

"You create another uncertainty. Investments are coming in anyway, predominantly by local guys."

Combined investment by the public and private sector grew an annual 7.9 percent in the first nine months against just 1.1 percent a year earlier, with more than half made up of investments in machinery and equipment.

While policy transparency is widely seen as improving under Aquino, the Philippines' volatile political and legal systems regularly throw up unpleasant surprises for foreigners.

Aquino's government has halted new mining projects, stalling development of an estimated $850 billion in mineral reserves, until Congress approves a mining tax reform -- a vote that is unlikely to take place before May 2013 mid-term elections.

In October, Manila added to restrictions on ownership of real estate, lending firms and professions.

Meanwhile, the Securities and Exchange Commission is looking at expanding the 40 percent foreign ownership limit to apply to all classes of shares in a company, rather than just common or voting shares, following a Supreme Court ruling last year that telecoms firm PLDT had breached the cap.

"The Philippines will be shooting itself in the foot because it will severely restrict the available shares for foreigners," said Francis Ed Lim, managing partner of the Accra law firm and a former head of the stock exchange.

TWO PHILIPPINES

While service sectors such as call centers, retail and tourism are growing strongly, the manufacturing sector - an engine of development in countries like Vietnam and Thailand - struggles to compete with neighbors and attract investment.

Ford Motor Co announced in June it was closing its Philippine production factory, citing an inadequate supply network and a lack of economies of scale.

Foreign executives here tell a tale of two Philippines. One is the country's special export zones, where companies can set up wholly owned units easily and receive incentives and efficient services as long as they ship their output abroad.

Total investments by local and foreign firms in economic zones totaled nearly 660 billion pesos ($16 billion) by the end of 2011, more than doubling since Aquino took office in 2010.

The other Philippines is encountered when companies try to tap the domestic market, running a gauntlet of heavy bureaucracy, local government corruption and sometimes troublesome partnerships with Filipino firms.

Companies have to go through 16 separate procedures to start a business in the Philippines, compared with three in Singapore and nine in Indonesia, according to the World Bank report.

Japanese firms have rekindled their long-dormant interest in the Philippines this year, prompted by rising wages in China and Beijing's territorial dispute with Japan. Still, a potential flood of money has been slowed by ownership limits and other restrictions, said Takashi Ishigami, president of Japanese trading house Marubeni Corp in the Philippines.

Marubeni is teaming up with a local firm to bid for a $1 billion railway project, among at least eight major Public-Private Partnerships (PPPs) that make up Aquino's flagship plan to improve infrastructure.

But Ishigami said Marubeni was only supplying equipment as part of the bid, and had been deterred from taking an operational role by the government's refusal to guarantee rail fares. That shortcoming would likely deter Japanese firms from bidding for other PPPs, he said.

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