EDITORIAL

Poverty and lip service

The government is sincerely addressing poverty, according to Press Secretary Ignacio Bunye who said the gains of the growing economy is cascading to marginalized sectors. Bunye said President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo has ordered the National Anti-Poverty Commission to take the lead in going to the grassroots and "serve as a receptacle for new strategies to defeat poverty."
Call it lip service, but in a statement, Bunye said the President directed the NAPC headed by Secretary Domingo Panganiban to keep a “tight watch over the implementation of grassroots projects and consolidate plans from government agencies on how best to defeat poverty.”

The President, according to him, would like to hear specific suggestions and creative ideas from the people on how a reinvigorated partnership for growth between the government and the citizenry could be achieved. She also called for broad and non-partisan public discourse on a national agenda for growth and development to reinvigorate the country's democracy, Bunye said.

Despite the gains made by the Arroyo administration's tough fiscal reforms, poverty remains a formidable hurdle, although NAPC Assistant Secretary Dolores Castillo said the country's financial stability, plus a combination of government social services, including subsidies for food and medicines, helped reduce the incidence of extreme poverty in the country.

If Bunye is saying the taxes of the people are being plowed back to them. Juan De La Cruz is taking it with a grain of salt. There could be some truth to those government television advertisements that some people are starting to feel prosperous, but for majority of the Filipinos, this is not the case.

Now, overseas Filipino workers are complaining against the so-called “strong” peso since the value of their dollars has gone down. Exporters are also feeling the pinch. People are still complaining of being strapped for money and not having enough to feed their families while government officials are enjoying the perks of power and taxpayers’ money.

People will say the country maybe becoming a Tiger Economy if the value of their money is higher and prices of goods and services go down. Until such time that people are not having a hard time making ends meet, then maybe, the Malacanang spinmasters may not have to try so hard selling the so-called accomplishments of this administration.