DAA is Dante Arevalo Ang, who until his death on May 5, 2026 was Chairman Emeritus of The Manila Times. This month ten years ago The Manila Times carried the first Maritime Page, a dedicated maritime section mainstreaming the archipelagic circumstance of the Philippines into the consciousness of the Filipino public at large. This was made possible through the unceasing commitment of DAA, the one person who believed the Filipino deserves to know what it means to be born in a country of more than 7,000 islands and to harness the opportunities and benefits generated from the sea.

The concept of the Maritime Page started as an off-the-cup dialogue between DAA and myself when we met by chance at the then Pan Pacific restaurant. I was having lunch with Atty. Manuel Collado while DAA was having lunch at another table with former Labor secretary Ruben Torres. As it happened, we were briefly introduced to each other and somehow DAA was intrigued by the mention of my being a maritime advocate and queried how he could be one as well — a favorable break to request him to host a maritime page at The Manila Times. DAA readily said yes to that random proposal. A week after that brief encounter with DAA he phoned and invited me for lunch at his office even as I was sorting out how to prompt him for the start up of the maritime page. Over lunch we discussed the format and frequency of the maritime page. One thing we agreed on was for the articles to focus on the Philippine maritime industry. And so it was — after two weeks from that lunch at DAA’s office the Maritime Page was born.