Why no outrage?

A reader of this column wrote to me wondering: “What is the boiling point for people to go to the streets? Journalists can write and the affluent can read ‘till we’re all blue in the face. The greed and plunder are a travesty. How can we all standby and do nothing? What is the last straw, a food emergency?”

Another reader wrote to ask why our country’s mindset has “developed so much callousness, unconcern and continuous corruption.” He then urged me and others to continue writing and “never mind expected opposition. Education is repetition. We all need this like the air we breathe every day.”

My fellow columnist, veteran journalist Tony Lopez made this observation: “Despite being incompetent and unable to provide food for at least 31 million Filipinos, our political dynasties prosper year after year, in predictable perpetuity. Alive and kicking, the political dynasties control 80 percent of Congress seats, the 82 provinces, 1,493 towns and 149 cities.

“Why is there no outrage at such a deplorable state of things? Simple answer: our people are stupid. They have no sense of outrage. They are barely aware that they are being screwed by the very politicians they elected to serve them. These politicians steal up to half of the P6-trillion-plus annual budget.”

Indeed, our situation today is downright depressing. The rosy praise releases of our economic managers, from Ralph Recto to Arsi Balisacan, claim we are doing very well. The truth is we are not yet back on our pre-pandemic track.  A UP economist said “to get back to the pre-pandemic track by 2028, the end of Marcos’ term, we need 11.4 percent growth annually from 2025-2028! Really quite impossible.”

Yet, there is no sense of crisis being shown by our politicians from the president, the vice president, senators and congressmen. It is monkey business as usual with our greedy politicians institutionalizing plunder in the National Budget. Hope is fading day by day. No sane foreign investor will touch us given our condition.

Self-defeating populist politics is always a problem. Congressmen want to increase the minimum wage by P200 a day. I am sure our workers can use that money to buy more food. But since about 90 percent of employers in this country are micro, small and medium scale who also live from payroll to payroll, affordability is a good question. Many will choose to close down. That will increase the number of unemployed and hungry Filipinos.

Indeed, employers who can afford it should not wait for a government order. Better to give the money to their workers now than to pay the income tax on the profits of the enterprise, because taxes paid to the government end up in the pockets of corrupt officials.

Workers constantly ask for a higher minimum wage because food is expensive. The high cost of food hits the poor the most since up to 70 percent of whatever money they get their hands on is spent on food. Increasing cost of labor makes us more uncompetitive in the region.

Food prices are high because our agricultural sector has failed miserably. Sadly, BBM has not shown any political will to address the problem by forcing the rice traders/importers to share the benefits of much lower rice import prices and the lower tariff.

There was a significant decline in world prices to only $399 to $480 per metric ton (MT) in the past three months, from $550 to $600 per MT early last year, for five-percent broken rice and a substantive reduction of the rice import tariff to 15 percent from 35 percent. Rice prices should have gone down to around P35 to P42 per kilo for regular milled rice (25 to 35 percent broken) and P45 to P50 for well-milled rice (five to 10 percent broken).

A former DA Usec did the math: Vietnam’s five percent rice has been at $399 per MT for a while now. $399 per MT x P59($ exchange rate) = P23,600 = P23.6 per kg + P12 (shipping and handling +tariffs + P4-5 per kg profit) = P35.6 per kg (importer price) + retail.

So, why did the government initially set a maximum selling retail price of P58 per kg which is clearly a bonanza for importers and wholesalers? It was reduced to P55 per kilo early this week which is still too high.

Calling it MSRP gives the impression it is a price cap, that rice is being price controlled. But it actually hides the huge profits the government is allowing the traders/importers to amass. Horrible!

Now the DA is accusing the lowly retailers of colluding to keep prices high. Are the more than 50,000 rice retailers in the country capable of colluding all at once in various parts of the country to keep prices high. This is ridiculous.

It seems, the moneyed importers and wholesalers have our politicians and bureaucrats in their back pockets. At best, BBM and Secretary Francis Tiu Laurel are being fooled. Tiu Laurel’s overstaffed dream team is sleeping on the job or colluding with the rice cartel. Traders and bureaucrats should be charged with economic sabotage or BBM will not be taken seriously.

Here’s… Former Finance Secretary Jess Estanislao warned that “we are once again hurtling into the deep black hole we fell into before 1983. Some politicians are spending public money as if it grew on trees. The President has lost control over the budget process. The public deficit is rising at an alarming rate. Certain public officials are raiding GOCCs and GFIs, scooping up funds because Congress has diverted public money to fuel their extravagant corruption…

“I refused to sign a letter circulated among former Finance Secretaries endorsing the DOF’s transfer of funds from PhilHealth, PDIC, and other GOCCs/GFIs—a desperate move to cover the extravagant corruption behind unprogrammed funds and other financial mismanagement.

“It is time to wake up. We must raise our voices in collective anger at the reckless, irresponsible and corrupt handling of our public finances…”

Boo Chanco’s email address is [email protected]. Follow him on X @boochanco