THE two main protagonists in the faculty-management fight at the Asian Institute of Management have opted to retire amid the thicket of legal cases now threatening to swamp the region?s first management school.

According to the official line, AIM president Francis Estrada has decided not to have his three-year contract renewed when it expires on May 15.

On the other hand, the chairman of the AIM Faculty Association, Professor Victor Limlingan, has accepted a voluntary retirement offer from the management, leaving the business school at the end of last year after 33 years of service.

It is not immediately clear where Estrada, a former investment banker, would be headed to. Limlingan, on the other hand, was right away appointed as managing director by the Consunjis for their publicly-listed DMCI Holdings.

In addition to Limlingan, seven other AIM faculty members have decided to accept the management carrot, which offered the equivalent of 1.33 months of pay for every year of service, but only for faculty members 60 years and older.

According to the grapevine, the acceptance of the early retirement program is independent of the pending labor cases initiated by the faculty members against the school management.

AIM has already activated a search committee headed by the anti-GMA president of De La Salle University, Brother Armin Luistro, to find a successor to Estrada.

SC?s Christmas crunch

No real work was supposedly done in government offices last Dec. 24, with government and private offices succumbing to the Christmas celebrations, but the Supreme Court on that half-day?the last working day of the year?deliberated and released a stunning 18 decisions in all.

Six of those cases were even deliberated and decided en banc.

The day before, the high tribunal released, after each division having presumably spent considerable time on each case, a total of 19 decisions.

In contrast, the high court the year before released only two decisions, both from the Second Division chaired then and now by Justice Leonardo Quisumbing, on Dec. 21, 2007, before going into Christmas break.

As if to catch up on the holiday backlog, the Supreme Court then promulgated 11 decisions on Dec. 27, 2007.

Money-go-round

? The Singapore-based Renato ?Bing? de Guzman of ING, a.k.a. private banker for Manila?s rich, has sold his South Forbes house, reportedly to Elena Tanyu Coyiuto, and quietly moved to an Urdaneta Apartments unit which he had earlier acquired.

? The 25-year long inheritance dispute over the estate of Cebu copra trader Cayetano Ludo may finally be solved out of court, with the wife of the late businessman, Florame delos Reyes Ludo, tapping the services of Gokongwei son-in-law, corporate lawyer Perry Pe, to try to find an amicable settlement among the squabbling heirs.

Heard through the grapevine

Jill?s, the Fort bar that is to the yuppies as the neighboring Embassy is to the ??bagets,?? has closed down for renovation.

But when it reopens in two months, a much-enlarged Jill?s would have taken over not only the space of its sister coffee shop, Jack?s, but also that of the Spanish restaurant Minggoy?s .

(Web site: www.cocktales.ph; E-mail: cocktales_mst@pldtdsl.net)