Philippines, the laggard of Asia

SKETCHES

National pride

By Ana Marie Pamintuan

Until the late 1960s, South Koreans were still impoverished and trying to recover from the ravages of war, and receiving C-rations from the US government.

Several of our Southeast Asian neighbors, meanwhile, were struggling to make their post-war independence from colonial rule work.

In China, there was upheaval in all aspects of life, with its masses impoverished and most of its intellectual elite oppressed and humiliated.

At the time, the Philippines was a leader in Asia in many aspects. The country’s economic prospects were second only to Japan, which made a remarkable recovery from wartime defeat and the world’s first atomic bombing.

Asians came to the Philippines to study in our universities and research centers, to learn English and how to increase rice yields, and even, believe it or not, how to build and run a modern airport. Our flag carrier was Asia’s first and leading airline.

Where are we now, and where are our neighbors?

Last year, China officially dislodged Japan as the world’s second largest economy after the United States. South Korea currently ranks 12th.

Tiny Singapore has successfully positioned itself as a Southeast Asian financial hub. Shipping is a major industry. The Spaniards left us a major shipyard in Sangley Point in Cavite, but we failed to take over and develop our own shipbuilding industry after the revolution a century ago.

Neither did a local shipbuilding industry emerge from the massive US naval base in Subic after its shutdown in 1992, with the Americans taking with them their floating dry dock despite pleas from then President Corazon Aquino. Today the company building ships in the Philippines is South Korean giant Hanjin.

We are buying rice from Vietnam, which has overtaken us in tourism and foreign direct investment.

During the Spanish colonial period, Chinese migrants here cleaned Filipinos’ ears, sold water in pails and looked after Filipinos’ children.

Today, faced with a Chinese challenge to our territory, the best we can do is run to Uncle Sam for help.

Last Thursday, President Aquino said among the legacies he wanted to leave behind is a strong sense of national pride. This can be tough when we see our nation being left behind, dependent on others for many of its needs.

How did this happen?

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Development experts and expats who don’t want to be named have offered various explanations for this.

The most comforting explanation is that life is easy in our country; there is no compelling need to work hard for survival. The balmy climate is one of the best in the world. Stick a seed or sapling in the fertile soil and it grows quickly. Venture out into the sea, in lakes and streams and you find something wonderfully edible. No need to build large, sturdy ships that will survive a long sea voyage just to find food and raw materials. Minerals lie close to the surface, easy to extract.

On the other hand, one of the most depressing explanations offered is that competitiveness and any drive to excel in one’s chosen field is quickly blunted by a culture that rewards connections rather than capability.

The competitiveness is there during schooling, when there are no VIPs and there is a level playing field in the grading system. But once formal education is over, career advancement depends on connections.

The Philippines has world-class medical specialists as well as top-tier talents in boxing, theater, furniture design, and other fields where rising to the top cannot be influenced by personal connections. For the same reason, many Filipinos who were not born to wealth or political influence aspire to become entertainers and chefs.

But in many other fields, where career advancement or bagging a project contract depends on connections rather than the quality of goods and services, there is no drive to improve and become globally competitive.

The system of patronage, nurtured for centuries, is deeply ingrained and has worked perfectly for the tiny fraction of the population that controls power and wealth. Genuine, sweeping reforms are possible only in minute increments.

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Democracy, Philippine style, suffers from institutional weakness and simply perpetuates the system of patronage that thrives in keeping the masses poor and badly educated.

Local government units in this country are personal fiefdoms that feed the wealth of only a handful of families. From Metro Manila to remote provinces, those who hold political power also control wealth generation.

The clan that controls political power awards public contracts to relatives and friends. These include supply contracts for school feeding programs, metal pipes for railings, construction materials. In one city that has banned plastic bags, the mayor’s close relative reportedly set up a factory supplying paper bags.

Among the complaints of potential investors in this country are red tape and corruption at local government levels. Local executives and lawmakers block job-generating investments that endanger the businesses or monopolies of their families and cronies.

I have received copies of several complaints filed by concerned citizens with various government agencies, detailing connivance among government employees in pocketing funds for ghost projects, and overpricing of projects and supplies of even the smallest items.

The biggest commissions go to the political kingpins. They perpetuate themselves in power through dole-outs, making their constituents indebted to them and nurturing a culture of dependence. The most easily manipulated are the poor and undereducated, so there is no urgency among the political elite to provide quality education for all Filipinos.

Politics is not an opportunity for public service but one of the most lucrative family businesses in this country. It thrives on the status quo; it thrives on keeping people poor and illiterate. It thrives on population explosion.

Religious groups, which also thrive on a culture of indebtedness, have also become experts in power politics, lobbying for the appointment of their members to public office, and never mind the qualifications.

When you are confident of getting ahead of all the rest not on merit but because you are well connected or you belong to the right clan or religious group, where is the need to compete or excel?

The less fortunate, unable to rise even if they are better qualified than those who were born with proper pedigree, can always find work overseas.

This is where our nation stands today, the laggard of Asia.