It was then incoming Secretary of Finance Carlos Dominguez who set the administration’s 0-10 point socio-economic agenda which was basically the key performance indicators (KPIs) set by the administration for what it expected to achieve by the time its term ended. I tend to disagree to the scores Inquirer columnist Peter Wallace laid out in his piece “Duterte’s 10-point agenda” with respect to ease of doing business (given an 80 percent score) and human capital development (also scored 80 percent) because both the Anti Red Tape Authority (ARTA) and the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) have been working at a snail’s pace to minimize corruption and red tape in the bureaucracy.
With regard to ease of doing business, Wallace writes…
The Duterte administration approved the ease of doing business law, which created the effective Anti-Red Tape Authority responsible for spearheading reforms in doing business. The Arta, Department of Trade and Industry, and Department of Information and Communications Technology have partnered to streamline and digitize business registration procedures at the local government unit (LGU) level, and are working on digitization at the national level.
…and on human capital development:
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The administration approved the free tertiary education law, a measure that provides free tuition and miscellaneous fees in state universities and colleges across the country. The Universal Health Care Act was passed. It is working, albeit affected by the corruption in PhilHealth (now being addressed). The Department of Human Settlements and Urban Development was recently established. Being a new department, it’s currently reviewing all laws and issuances affecting the housing sector and what recommended measures for change are needed.
The implementation could have been better but the problem is still the bureaucracy itself. In terms of human capital development, our education system is faltering due to corruption and politics in the public education sector. Officials of the Department of Education (DepEd) and the teachers are going about their work by rote. Few innovations are being introduced and there is a lack of officials who are actually qualified. While they have the educational backgrounds, none of them have any vision at all with regard to workplace demand for Industry 4.0. The Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA) as a separate agency has been remiss in its function of upskilling and reskilling workers. It is again a chicken-and-egg problem; which comes first because the private sector also hasn’t done what it should in terms of digitization. This is one reason why the economy will take longer to recover as stated by National Economic Development Authority (NEDA) Secretary Karl Chua. This also takes into account the Duterte administration not having made substantial progress in food and energy security.
2022 will be worse than 2021 because of higher interest rates, supply chain disruptions leading to shortages and increasing oil prices. This means inflation will be higher. As it is now, real inflation is not what the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) is quoting. But the ever-resilient Pinoy still makes do. This is probably the reason why we’re seeing long lines in voter registration. Filipinos want to make their voices heard through the ballot. The truth of the matter is we need radical socio-political and socio-economic reforms which can only be achieved by charter change. So far, no candidate has made his or her position on this issue known.
What Duterte has shown is that political will counts if you want to get things done. His single biggest achievement is in infrastructure development. The rehabilitation of the rail system will benefit commuters and entrepreneurs and will stimulate the economy. Travel throughout the country will also improve because of the additional roads and bridges. But there is a lot more to be done. This is why the Opposition is not an option in the coming election.
Voters should be discerning enough to elect those who have platforms of action and not those who insult their intelligence with overused motherhood statements. The pandemic-is-endemic mindset should be adopted and mobility should be eased by the use of QR codes to separate the vaccinated from the unvaccinated. A unified contact-tracing system should be put in place. Businesses should spend for testing their employees. The digital infrastructure should be the priority of both government and the private sector. The same is true with regional development so that economic activities are not concentrated in the National Capital Region and its outskirts (NCR+) which results in paralysis should a lockdown be required again for future outbreaks. It’s easy to write about this but we all know how slow government is and that is still the main problem.
Cook wide reader political crackpot music afficionado old soul out-of-the box thinker aspiring writer tech geek gearhead
Lol
you continually (incorrectly) point at how change can only occur “charter change” (cha-cha)
That is wrong.
Change can easily occur with the enforcement of laws. In the Philippines very few agencies/individuals are enforcing said laws/policies so nothing ever changes.
If the various agencies started to get paid based on how much they accomplish things would start to change. There is no incentive for them to change. You have to create incentives.
Example:
If any agency started to pay 200-500 pesos per stray dog captured…. all of the sudden the dog problem on the streets would go away. There would be less crashes involving dogs, there would be less people going to hospitals and using the governmental services. Society would be more productive as a whole.
Instead…. in the current illogical setup… some government employee(s) (who probably got the job through favor) go around and will take some dogs randomly every once in a while to show their boss they are doing something. The problem will never end because that employee doesn’t want it to end. They want to keep their salary coming instead of fixing the problem.
When you solve the dog problem a new/different problem will arise and there will be new/different jobs, but there is a shortsightedness that is currently present in society, and if you are trying to solve socio-economic problems that needs to change before any cha-cha change.
That will change when people start to get “real” as this site suggests.
‘enforcing the law’ which is defective in the first place won’t change anything and the only way to move forward is to amend provisions that hold the country backward,
Government salary is not even that big to begin with. If you talk about incentives, there are already incentives. SSS employees for example receive millions of bonuses every year. Legislators receive pork barrels or whatever they have renamed it into. That is still separate to the 13th and 14th month pay, “excellence” bonuses, “loyalty” bonuses, “special” bonuses, “holiday” bonuses, “maternity” bonuses, et cetera.
I used to intern on various government offices so I am aware of those things.
If you talk about law enforcement, huwag ka nang umasa. Most law enforcers are ignorant of the law. All of them are trained just to follow orders. That is why policemen themselves commit crimes themselves and several are arrested on a daily basis, as recorded by news media.
Stop blaming the attitude of the people. They are just products of the flawed system that they have been accustomed to.
If you want change, change the constitution. That is easier (and more ethical) to do than to change a people’s erratic behavior.
“If you want change, change the constitution. That is easier (and more ethical) to do than to change a people’s erratic behavior.”
Aba, bago ‘yah ah!
All the while we thought Filipinos is to blame for their lot. That we have the Talangka mentality, hence, we keep on tearing each other down. That our political leaders are so corrupt to the bones making corruption business as usual. That we will never be like our successful neighbors because we are this and that. In other words, we all possess the worse in mankind that makes unity impossible to achieve.
But all of a sudden, boom! It’s not us pala, it’s the god damn constitution that’s making all the wrong things happened in the country. It’s the basic law of the land that is preventing this country to achieve what’s best for its people.
Genius! : )
@Juan Luna
If you’re saying that systems don’t matter then think about this one even for a second:
Well-Behaved Filipinos In First World Countries VS. Dysfunctional Filipinos In The Philippines – It’s All About Systems!
You better try and think as to why the systems really are failing or not failing. You think systems don’t matter? Well, take a look at how parliamentary countries are usually doing better than the presidential system.
Change and enforce the constitution. Make sure it is actually easy to follow and somehow realistic too. It should be translated to suit the different languages/dialects of this land as well. If it’s going to be changed, it has to be through the actual will of the people and not just the will of big businesses and other nefarious actors behind the scenes. It can’t be bias towards one group of people and favor the other. We have to accept the fact that we may need to open up this country for better investments as well so that we don’t have to suffer from brain drain. Simplifying the contents of the constitution to meet the standards of modern life that actually makes sense and by having that change means changes in the other offices of the government as well. Some may have to be shut down, some may have to be downsized but there are some that should be focused on. Maybe I am asking too much but if drastic change must happen, then it must and we can’t dilly-dally over this.
Kind of funny our current constitution states you should never block a private driveway and yet people are totally ignorant of it. I don’t even have to post a sign, it’s already in the constitution.
Name one priest accused of stealing from government coffer. Name one priest found guilty of extrajudicial killings. Name a priest who got convicted along Janet Napoles. Was there a priest indicted along Jinggoy, Revilla and Enrile for graft? Name one priest who ran and got elected for public office who later on committed graft and corruption and is now in jail? Any priest incriminated in the Pharmally PPE controversy?
I mean, priests are no angels but that does not mean we can just use them as scape goat or cover for what ails the country whenever we desire. To make them the fall guys in the shenanigans involving the government is simply wrong and evil.
They are all priests, those who pretend to stand for truth but actually only want to suck your cock..
Frankie drilon is a priest.manny packyaw is a priest.no dick gordon is a priest.cocksuckers all
Digong is the greatest president of all time, i dare say better than marcos..the drug war is brilliant ! you cant kill all the Dealers, its like hydra- kill one head, two heads grow in its place, it never works..for as long as there is a demand, the cocksuckers will never stop cooking up the stuff! Now scare the users with actual slow, gruesome, ugly death ! That is brilliant! Who would dare touch that crystal meth now? But you human rights idiots are too dumb to understand ! Its fucking unbelievable! Unless you human rights gays are the same cocksuckers who profit from the drugs!
It’s odd that these “human rights” are protecting criminals instead which kinda sus, I’m not going to assume but I have a feeling that they’re protecting someone in their inner circle who are probably connected to drug lords and not to mention it’s outsider allies just eat up whatever shenanigans that the yellow/opposition made..
There are priests, and cocksuckers, and cocksucking priests..that human rights gay gaston, who most probably died of aids, was a cocksucking priest as well.
The rule of 10.The masses decide for themselves in their own little way,but on average each 10 persons follow 1 leader or influencer and so on and so forth, and by consolidation eventually there will only be 10 masters, who correspond to the wishes of the people or simply are clever enough to recognize a movement and push themselves in front of the parade. So in the end only 10 people will decide our fate. Its always 10 .never more
Right now these 10 people are out there, trying to figure out their parades.lets just hope, for our sakes, that theyre not out there just sucking each others cocks.
(Bam and his group probably are )
@Sean Akizuki
This is the idea I responded to: “If you want change, change the constitution. That is easier (and more ethical) to do than to change a people’s erratic behavior.”
See the absence of ‘system’ there? The idea suggests that we change a document of laws and principles we called the constitution in order to change the people’s behavior. If you happened to agree with it, fine, but I don’t.
Yes, it’s a well known fact that Filipinos behave differently when they are in foreign lands. They follow the rules and abide the laws of their host country short of saying they are model citizens. But that does not mean the constitution or laws of those countries are superior or different from ours, far from it. In fact, people of other countries also behave better when they are in foreign lands. We’re no different.
It’s actually not about the system or the constitution, it’s about us. If we don’t apply the laws in the books on corruption, it will endlessly pester the system. If our leaders continue to demonstrate insulting and abusive behavior, followers will do the same. If we don’t respect our institutions our system of government is going to be in perpetual chaos no matter the system. If we keep on voting the same corrupt people in office, even if we change the constitution a hundred times, we’re still going to be a country of corrupt people.
Please let’s bark on the right tree: Us.
Red tagging, mismanaged response to the coronavirus pandemic, extrajudicial killings, arbitrary detentions and forced disappearances. That’s really “a lot” but I highly doubt it deserved CONTINUITY.
Here’s “a lot” more:
2017 – P6.4B meth smuggling – unresolved
2018 – P11B meth smuggling – unresolved
Freedom for sale in New Bilibid Prisons – unresolved
PhilHealth Plunder – unresolved
P40B ‘Pastillas’ human trafficking scheme – unresolved
When he was still campaigning in 2016 for the presidency, Duterte declared that if he was elected, he will get rid of crime and corruption. “Give me about three to six months,” he said adding that “If I fail, kill me”.
Well…… : (
It’s called overestimation and given to the filipinos being too politically divided. That’s a flaw that Duterte falls into and add that yellow/opposition media and it’s grifters that makes an exaggerated news to the local mass/outsiders.
The same old screeching voices that have ruled the roost for 30 years have been blocked out, set aside during this presidential term.
I wouldn’t mind six more years of blocking them out.
Rody Duterte spends his time, life and energy fixing this place up. Only a fool would let pinklawans undo all of that so soon.