[Philippines] Population Policy Problems

Image via WikipediaFor the most part, the limited division between Church and State in the Philippines has always been more of a suggestion than an actual rule - much like our traffic laws, as a friend of my once quipped. While many will contest whether or not it's accurate to say that we are a predominantly Catholic country, what is highly evident that at least our government does seem to be very friendly to the Church and often lets major religious groups in the country clearly influence if not outright dictate national policy.

This has never been clearer than cases when President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo herself is caught pandering to the likes of the Catholic Bishops' Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) beyond just religious concerns in the public view. To have the Chief Executive herself allowing the Church's views to somehow curry more favor tells us how much their political favor is more important than the actual needs of the country from her trained economists' perspective. I think I can forgive most issues that aren't truly of consequence, but for something as sensitive as population control, I don't think I can forgive that.

As a third world country (and yes, that's what we are), very high population growth rates, especially considering the significant percentage of these gains to fall with families well below the poverty line, are definitely more bane than boon for the country's progress. All this does is increase the demand for all basic commodities without the needed growth in supporting industries to address the increasing demand. Thus in this setup, the poor get poorer as they try to support larger and larger families well beyond their means, thus further plunging them into the depths of poverty.

And all this being done to avoid issues that the CBCP and Catholics in general stereotypically frown against - artificial contraceptives and abortion. For the most part, I can't fault the Church for their views and opinions. As a religious organization following certain precepts and beliefs, they're well within their rights to be for or against certain things like these issues. However, it's not the government's place to take these views and use them as basis for national policy or whether or not laws should be crafted in support of such religious opinions. Former President Fidel V. Ramos has slammed President GMA's population policies at a recent forum for World Population Day given she has clearly taken in the Church's stand as her own.

As a way to side-step the issue, the President has pretty much copped out of making an Executive decision on this issue by passing the decision down to the level of the Local Government Units, claiming that there isn't a strong enough clamor for a change in national policy.

What is foul though is the Church going as far as trying to determine which politicians they deem to be "anti-life" in their perspective because of their support of legislation supporting artificial contraceptives and abortion practices in order to deem them unfit to receive communion. Now that's an unfair use of their religious influence to try and drive government action and national policy by playing the religion card in this manner.

As a nation, we seem to be very far away from coming to an actual solution in this matter. I doubt that our religious leaders are going to mature anytime soon and they will continue to be a driving political force in the country for years to come. At the same time, I doubt that we'll see significant changes from our political leaders either. While it can be argued whether or not they are truly concerned for their eternal salvation in making their decisions, it's more likely that they're perceived by their constituents in light of these issues and continued support of Church views is their way of ensuring their political futures.

And people wonder why I don't support organized religion anymore?

[Philippines] We Need to Learn to Trust Again

Feb. 15 Makati Anti-Arroyo Rally by Bikoy.

Filipinos no longer trust government.

That statement may seem both unfairly sweeping and terribly true at the same time. On my end, I'm not referring to just our present government under President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, but to the institution as a whole. Some might say that we never really got over the Marcos regime and the first People Power revolution didn't necessarily change things - it only marked the beginning of our ability to now freely express our distrust.

When the Marcoses left the country, our problems didn't go with them. In fact, new ones became added to the mix and as the years have passed, more and more we seem to be fueling these darker fires, using the cry of eternal vigilance to justify paranoia and increasing levels of fear and skepticism.

When I say that we don't trust out government as an institution, what I'm referring to is that we no longer believe in due process and allow the wheels of government to work anymore. Because of the extraordinary abuses we experienced at the hands of the Marcos regime, we are always thinking that we won't be able to resort to legal means of protecting our rights and thus the first instinct becomes to return to the streets and make our causes know there. Why can't people learn to trust again? Like in any relationship, I'll admit that trust has to be ultimately earned, but in the love-hate relationship of the Filipino with their government, we also need to learn to gamble some of that trust first and let the government prove itself.

We are now some of the harshest critics in existence. All it takes is the slightest mistake and we get into our professional rallying mode and create the placards, construct the effigies, have T-shirts made and create inventive chants and slogans to be shouted throughout the day.

We always claim that our government officials are corrupt or have hidden agendas and thus the official rulings on impeachment complaints are always touted as false or biased. We don't believe in the Office of the Ombudsman since we claim their just government flunkies who cannot make impartial decisions. More and more we claim increasing areas of government are corrupt, tainted or untrustworthy and where will that ultimately leave us?

At times I feel that from the view of the international community, we are a nation on the brink of anarchy. We seem to be trying to develop a habit of ousting our leaders whenever we feel displeased or not all political or social groups are satisfied by the decisions of those in power. That just reeks of political instability, which naturally rattles investor confidence and triggers travel alerts and official diplomatic warnings all saying the same thing - we're an uncertain and volatile country.

I'm not defending any of our past presidents / governments here, nor am I trying to make a statement about whether this allegation or that is true. What I am saying is that we need to start restoring the power derived from trusting our government as an institution. We might not always be satisfied by their decisions or their results but if we constantly seek extra-constitutional means to resolve our issues, then we'll never have a government that we can rely on. If we always choose not to trust, then the government will never be free to exercise its powers to make all of our lives better nor will it ever be given the chance to rise to the challenge we present.

We need to break the cycle before it's too late.

[Philippines] Monkey See, Monkey Do

Peso by donny27.

Hot on the heels of President Bush announcing his solution to the growing US economic crisis - a fairly hefty stimulus package, our own government seems to be attempting to position the merits of a similar measure.

An economic adviser to the President is now proposing P75 billion stimulus package of our own in order to combat the effects of continued downward spiral of the US economy at this time. Admittedly given our history for financial decisions motivated by less-then-ideal aims, I can't help but receive this proposal with and eyebrow raised and my doubts flying freely. Sure, it seems to make sense for the government to address the global effects of a possible US recession, but at the same time the added spending plans for the government always makes one think of extra income for our legislators and other spenders outside of what is officially declared.

Many see the US stimulus package as too little, too late, so why exactly should we be immediately following suit? There might be a need for a more calculated response to this issue and not simply following what the US is doing. Take for example the hedging facility for OFWs that has been recently launched by the President. Now that makes a bit more sense to me.

[Philippines] Glorietta: Now Just an Accident?

Oops! by loverfishy.

The on-going investigation of the Glorietta 2 bombing accident incident is enough to confound the best thinkers and news watchers among us. After the initial bold statement last Friday that the cause of the blast was a bomb, the investigation has moved more towards this being some sort of industrial accident, which brings the "blame" back on the Ayala Malls administration.

What's up with that?

Admittedly, I initially had my hesitations about the whole bomb thing. While the scene itself did make me think that it was too strong to be just some ordinary LPG fire, the lack of other concurrent events like a strong public statement from one of the local terrorist groups or perhaps other attacks / bombings at other place. Also, the date didn't make sense - even if it were targeting the barangay elections (and who the heck targets that on the national level?), it was pretty far from the actual event.

Investigators are currently looking at the fact that (1) the blast started from an underground tool room that contained septic tanks and diesel tanks, (2) there is no blast crater from a bombing perspective, (3) there are hardly any traces of nitrates in the area and (4) evidence of RDK alone isn't enough to indicate a bomb depsite some earlier reports. More and more this seems a lot less like some horrible terrorist attack and more and more like something you'd see featured on Seconds from Disaster.

The PNP is making a pretty good case for some sort of gas explosion, which theorizes a build-up of methane gas in the basement, a significant enough rise in temperature and so on and so forth.

Of course this is where the conspiracy theorists will enter and challenge that this is all a government plot to draw attention from the Administration's never ending issues, which while possible seems just a bit to contrived to be believed fully. While I don't totally discount the possibility that GMA is capable of invoking a sort of Swordfish scenario in using acts of terrorism to somehow "protect" the State, this just doesn't make 100% sense in that regard. GMA for all her faults is a lot smarter than that and if she were going to use terrorism as a tool for managing public opinion, then she would have used a more symbolic event, something that would strike a true chord with everyone. This incident is rather ineffective as a political tool since it lacked symbolic value, of course not discounting the loss of life, mind you.

Bombing or accident? Who can say really while the investigation is officially tagged as on-going. For now I'll try to remember to refer to this whole thing as just an "incident" for now until the investigation's findings are final. This is still a tragedy, don't get me wrong. However we need to know what kind of tragedy it is first.

[Philippines] Presidents Say the Darndest Things

As if keeping a lookout for what Dubya has to say wasn't funny enough, our own Philippine president Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo has her own unique brand of ridiculousness.

Case in point - just caught this article on Inquirer.net about a recent press conference held by the local Commander-in-Chief.

It turns out that over the weekend, five members of the Abu Sayyaf, a local terrorist group, were "neutralized" in a sea encounter along with an Indonesian Jemaah Islamiyah millitant. Good job right? Of course it is! I'm all for terrorists getting what they deserve and all that - what gets my dander up is to have the President take an amazingly stupid leap in logic to say that this single encounter was a "stunning victory" and they the terrorists were "doomed to annihilation."

Talk about hyperbole. I think she's been using Dubya as a model in life way too much.