[1] Eulogy delivered by retired Chief Justice ARTEMIO V. PANGANIBAN on March 5, 2025, Ash Wednesday, after a Eucharistic Celebration at the St. Pope John Paul II Chapel, Aseana City, in memory of Alberto David Lina, who passed to the Eternal Kingdom on February 25, 2025
Alberto “Bert” David Lina (ADL) may have recently passed to the Eternal Kingdom, but his legacy of love will remain etched in my memory and will pervade this eulogy that his daughter Donna asked me to deliver. My theme will revolve on, first, his love for his family; second, his love for his work, his communities and our country; and third, his love for God.
From where I stand on the rostrum, I note that you, my sisters and brothers in Christ are so grim and so sad. While I agree that we must be sad to lose a loved one, we should really be happy for him who had just been born to eternal life. For, as our Church teaches, death is not the end but the beginning of eternal life with our Heavenly Father. Look at the picture of Bert on my left. Isn’t he smiling? Isn’t his smile the symbol of his happy disposition and the mark of his character? In fact, I believe his immortal soul is hovering above us, smiling with us? So, smile and be glad he is in heaven. There you are, my sisters and brothers. Let us smile always, smile like Bert. Let us celebrate his life like we celebrated the Eucharist on this Ash Wednesday.
Let me begin this eulogy with Bert’s love for his family, especially for his wonderful wife Sylvia. As I wrote in my Foreword to his book titled “Thoughts of a Filipino Entrepreneur,” Bert loved Sylvia endearingly, tenderly and eternally. She was the light of his life, and the apple and mango of his eyes. Though already in his 70s, he was always Sylvia’s swain of 20, singing ballads, composing poems and crafting love letters of undying affection.
Bert had given Sylvia unusual gifts on her birthdays, like a brand-new Jaguar car, brand new Bosendorfer piano, and a special gumamela flower variety which he asked the University of the Philippines in Los Banos to breed in pink, Sylvia’s favorite color. That’s why as you can see, under my blue jacket, I am wearing a pink tee shirt with a reddish shade that Sylvia wants. Isn’t it Sylvia? And why do I know? Because a few years ago when I was invited to hit the ceremonial ball at a golf tournament sponsored by Bert, this special golf shirt was given to me by Bert and Sylvia.
After that digression, let me continue with Bert’s unusual gifts to his wonderful Sylvia. Years ago, he constructed and donated the auditorium at the De La Salle Zobel in Alabang and called it the Sylvia P. Lina Theater. Let us guess what he, if still alive, would have given Sylvia on her next birthday. A helicopter? A spaceship to fly her to the moon? A new baby boy? Well, the difficult, Bert could do immediately. But the impossible would take him a little while.
Bert loved his four daughters, April Rose, Donna May, Lucia Jane or Sheila, and Bertha Ann. He sent them roses on Valentines and never forgot to profess aloud his love for them day and night, even if he prohibited them from having boyfriends till after finishing college.
Bert loved his four grandchildren, Andrea Rose or Andy, Alberto Wynn or Alwyn, Aurelia Joule, and Aurora Jane. He loved to play hide and seek with them. They were the only people in the world who could countermand his orders.
Now let me proceed to Bert’s second love – his work. He loved to create, to innovate, to reinvent, to think out of the box. He loved challenges. He worked his brain and brawn to solve them. He saw problems as opportunities, not obstacles, to success.
Bert loved all his 21 companies including those he recently sold to the Ayala Corporation. He wanted to make them grow, develop and attain his vision for them. They are involved in diverse fields, some of which were quite alien to this retired jurist including logistics, outsourcing, communications, connectivity, films, creative designs, sports, entertainment, land transportation, solar power and even businesses some of us may not delight being involved in. I refer to waste management, which is the polite name of basurero, or portalet system, and which – in more pedestrian language – is the kubeta business. His favorite buzz word was “back haul,” meaning, fill up the returning empty cargo trucks with agricultural products at cheap prices after they had delivered their regular cargo.
Bert loved his employees. He called them his partners and collaborators, not “alalays.” He loved all 2,800 of them scattered in all parts of the country and some abroad. Each one got a free meal every day, with especially selected healthy brown rice; and all – regardless of rank – participated in production bonuses and profit sharing.
Bert loved our country, warts and all, passionately, ardently and single-mindedly. He talked to his daughters all the time on how to rid it of corruption and misgovernance, and how to propel it to first world status. For this reason, against my advice, he accepted the tough job of being Commissioner of Customs twice, once under President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, and another, under President Benigno Aquino III.
Bert loved golf and golfers. He held tournaments during his companies’ anniversaries and his birthday celebrations; that is why he fed them breakfast and lunch and gifted them with tee-shirts, golf balls and towels.
Bert loved classical and popular music. That is why he was the indefatigable funder of the Manila Symphony Orchestra and was a logistics sponsor of the Philippine Philharmonic Orchestra and the Metro Manila Concert Orchestra, as well as a patron of concerts and musicales.
Though he finished his commerce degree with honors and passed the tough examination for certified public accountants (CPA), Bert credited the school of hard knocks, grit, patience, determination and the care of our loving God as the main sources of his bustling success.
Bert relied on three things he learned from common sense and observation: (1) “Pakikisama,” which he defined simply as the “value of having real personal relationships, based on caring and mutual respect,” (2) time discipline, and (3) the necessity of being “makulit” meaning, “following through consistently and repetitively” till work is finally done well.
Two threads bind and sew together his deepest thoughts. First, he always quoted relevant passages from the Holy Bible to reinforce his speeches and bring home his message. He found eternal truth in these timeless quotations which he applied in the seemingly agnostic world of business. And the second is “love, not just like, your work… have a deep passion and enjoyment in what you chose to do for a living.”
Let me now speak of Bert’s third love – the Almighty God. He credited the Lord with everything he was and everything he possessed. “The Lord owns everything,” he proclaimed. He was merely the steward of God in this world and had been ordered to use wealth prudently to spread the word and the reign of the Lord. That is why he donated the ultra-modern Carillons in the Manila Cathedral, the St. James Church in Alabang, as well as in Naga City, in Pila, Laguna and in Mandaue, Cebu, because they reminded him of his mortality and total dependence on God’s mercies and graces every time they chimed.
Bert loved the poor and the dispossessed. He never forgot his roots and his struggles against destitution and dispossession. That is why he held annual medical-surgical-dental missions for them and literally shed his blood during annual company bloodletting. He supported several charities, especially the little-known Guiding Light Ministries of Aklan and the Philippine National Red Cross.
Indeed, love permeated everything that Bert was, touched and did. I have known Bert since 1969 when he was a young member of the audit team of L. C. Diaz and Company that looked at the books of our family’s first business venture, the Baron Travel Corporation. He advanced our relationship by asking me to be his and Sylvia’s wedding sponsor. Since then, I considered Bert and Sylvia and their four lovely daughters as integral parts of my family. In fact, I call Donna May my “daughter by choice” and she calls me “Dad CJ.” She is one of my favorite dancing partners, be it in waltz or swing. She and Bert form a duet in singing and dancing during gatherings of my family.
And since those halcyon peso-and-centavo days when we first met, Bert – the poor boy born in Tondo, Manila with roots in Laguna – had risen to be a Filipino taipan with an authentic rags-to-riches story.
As I contemplate his grit, his inexhaustible energy, his exemplary rise in life’s ladder, I keep remembering the one word that unravels the secret of his gargantuan success. And that one word is LOVE, his enormous, googolplex love for his family, for his work and our country, and for our Almighty God.
To God be the glory! Maraming salamat po.
The Personal Website of Retired Chief Justice Panganiban 