By Joyce Pañares

PRESIDENT Arroyo yesterday ordered the conversion of the official presidential yacht BRP Ang Pangulo into a relief and rescue ship and renamed the vessel BRP Pag-asa to commemorate its commissioning 50 years ago.

“It was renamed Pag-asa [Hope] to signify optimism into the future. Through this ship, we’re having these positive hopes that we will grow into the kind of Navy that we all need,” Navy Flag-Officer-In-Command Ferdinand Golez said during the renaming ceremony at Pier 13 in the Port of Manila yesterday afternoon.

Golez said the ship was designed by Filipino naval engineers and was one of 15 vessels built by Japan as part of its war reparations to the country during the administration of President Carlos P. Garcia.

Garcia, through an executive order, commissioned the ship as RPS Lapu-Lapu with hull number PY-77 on March 7, 1959, and designated it as the Navy flagship and presidential yacht to replace the older vessel, RPS Santa Maria.

The first presidential engagement held aboard took place on April 7, 1959, and the ship’s first mission was a floating trade and cultural exposition that called on ports in Vietnam, Thailand, Singapore, Indonesia, Hong Kong, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan.

Many heads of state and distinguished personalities, including Gen. Douglas MacArthur on his return visit in 1961, have been aboard as official guests.

But the Lapu-Lapu’s flagship status was revoked on Dec. 31, 196,1 by President Diosdado Macapagal, who preferred to use the older Santa Maria which he renamed RPS Pag-asa, the name by which it was called during the administration of President Ramon Magsaysay. This ship was decommissioned in 1993.

The Lapu-Lapu was renamed RPS Roxas, and its hull number was changedto TP-71 on Oct. 9, 1962. It was the first time a naval ship was named after a Philippine president.

Former President Ferdinand Marcos renamed it RPS The President, with hull number TP-777, in 1967, and to BRP Ang Pangulo in 1971.

It was during Marcos’ administration that the yacht was restored to its status as a presidential yacht, and it was used for lavish birthday parties and receptions for Hollywood celebrities in the 1980s.

After Marcos’ ouster in 1986, former President Corazon Aquino changed its hull number to AT-25, but she never used the vessel. Neither did former President Fidel Ramos, who assigned it an auxiliary transport for the Presidential Security Group.

But the government refurbished the vessel, and allegedly at a cost of close to P100 million, under President Joseph Estrada.

Estrada’s estranged crony, former Ilocos Sur Gov. Luis Singson, later claimed it was turned into a floating casino where the deposed president played high-stakes mahjongg with the members of his so-called Midnight Cabinet.