Are we too comfortable in our poverty?

SHOOTING STRAIGHT

By Bobit S. Avila

Last Thursday The Philippine STAR headline blared, “Economy soars 7.1% in Q3”. To the top richest people in the Philippine population pyramid, this is great news… for the stock markets are busy buzzing with business enticing even foreign investments to come. But you ask… what kind of foreign money is coming in? For sure, they are not Foreign Direct Investors (FDI) because we already read that report some weeks back that in the past two years FDIs into the Philippines dropped by as much as 83%!

But this is only in Q3! FDIs under the Aquino Regime only came to around $1.3 million as compared to $2.1 million under the hated former President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo. Even the short term of discredited President Joseph “Erap” Estrada came up with US$1.7 million. These figures are available for all and sundry and as we know… figures don’t lie.

So you ask… where is this soaring economy coming from? My bet is that, the inflow of US dollars sent by our overseas Filipino workers (OFW) is a huge contributing factor. As of late, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) reports that cash remittances by OFW (which is coursed through banks) was at $1.838 billion up by 5.5 percent. This is happening at a time when we are seeing a financial crisis spreading all over Europe.

So if you think the economy is doing well, we are not disputing that. Cebu is a good example of this economy growth, which you can see by the numerous constructions of tall condominiums, sprouting everywhere. But ask yourself… is this economic growth trickling down to the poor farmer or fisherman? Two weeks ago, I hired a motorized banca to cross from Ubay to the island of Pitogo (now called Carlos P. Garcia) in Bohol and it was a good time for me to check out these marginalized people whom I have already known a couple of years ago that their lot haven’t really improved in the last two years. They haven’t tasted that so-called Conditional Cash Transfer (CCT) program because they live in small islands between Leyte and Bohol.

These are people in the Visayas who have been dirt poor for generations and if the policies of Imperial Manila doesn’t do anything to help alleviate their poverty… then something must be done. That something could be real and genuine reform in our constitution so we could effectively remove the political oligarchy that took over the reins of power from the one-man rule of the Marcos Dictatorship. Filipinos are undoubtedly a very resilient people that in a way, I fear we have become too comfortable in our poverty.

But there is a tipping point when Filipinos will no longer be tolerant and that happened 25 years ago when we removed the Marcos Dictatorship and put Cory Aquino a housewife as President. It was indeed a time of hope. However that hope soon vanished when her minions that created the 1987 Constitution removed the two-party system in favor of personal party politics which has totally ruined our political system and created a new political oligarchy that today is exemplified by our having a “Rubber Stamp” Congress, no different from the Batasan Pambansa that it replaced in EDSA.

To add to our political woes, the framers of the Constitution allowed for a Partylist system that has been totally abused by non-marginalized people claiming to represent the poor in whatever name they could think of. Then the last straw came when Tita Cory called for the Comprehensive Land Reform Law (CARL) minus her very own Hacienda Luisita. Instead of giving hope to our people, it vanished in a wave of hypocrisy!

Before the EDSA Revolution, the lines at the US Embassy of Filipinos cueing up to go to the United States was so long. 25 years later, those lines are still there despite the present realities of a United States having that “fiscal cliff”. A month ago, when we went to Rome for the canonization of San Pedro Calungsod, many Filipinos that went to Rome purportedly for the canonization never returned home. Yet Europe today is facing a financial crisis. I gathered that Albanians are crossing the Adriatic and getting jobs away from Filipino OFWs because they would accept half what Italians pay for a Filipino worker. But still Pinoys want to get out of our country…why?

Again, I dare say that we must come up with a genuine political reform and crush the ruling political elite that most people call “Political Dynasties.” But like it or not, they exist because we the people allowed them through this 1987 constitution, which I already believe was seriously flawed when it was ratified. So let’s have a con-con and change our course before it is too late. It is time for the Filipino people to taste what it means to have a good economy and this should include the poorest amongst us.

Call me lucky that I finally got my own copy of the book entitled “Why Nations Fail” by Daron Acemolgu and James Robinson who observed the two Koreas, North and South Korea. North Korea is amongst the worlds poorest, while South Korea an economic giant. Thanks to ugly politics. I say we are poor because of ugly politics. So let’s change our system now!

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For e-mail responses to this article, write to vsbobita@mo-pzcom.com or vsbobita@gmail.com. His columns can be accessed through www.philstar.com.