Let AY's message echo in the hearts of all

I have an impossible wish: To have Ambassador Alfonso T. Yuchengco as guest speaker in the almost countless graduation ceremonies going on at various colleges and universities in all parts of our country. For Ambassador Yuchengco carries a message that should be listened to, and echoed and re-echoed where young graduates are, to enable them to walk through life's pathways, and reach their goals.

The message of Don Alfonso was actually delivered in March 1999, at the commencement exercises of his alma mater, the Far Eastern University. Let me now recollect his message, as published in a Jaywalker column written in the summer of 1999. Before FEU's graduating students, Ambassador Yuchengco painted two contrasting pictures of Manila -- one of 1946, the other of modern times. He was able to paint such graphic pictures of Manila, because he was part of both generations.

In 1946, Don Alfonso had just obtained his accounting degree. Recalling the Manila of his youth, he said: "It was in a physically and spiritually devastated Manila that I began to make my living. The challenge before us then was how to build again from the ashes of war -- and how to preserve a poor nation's newly-won freedom in a world from between two warring blocs."

Don Alfonso's description of Manila as it looks now is thought-provoking. "Your Manila is a modern, metropolitan city; but, it too is devastated -- economically -- by East Asia's financial and currency crisis. Now, the challenge before us is how to restore the economy to growth; and how to strengthen our country's competitiveness in an increasingly independent globe," he told the graduates.

Ambassador Yuchengco painted a bleak picture of the world of work that today's graduates are entering. "It is a world of turbulence and uncertainty. Jobs will be extremely hard to find. If they hire at all, employers will be extremely choosy," he said. He underscored that intelligence, plus the fund of knowledge accumulated by the graduating students through their years in school, will make all the difference.

According to Don Alfonso, knowledge has become the key component of national power. The society of the future will be the Knowledge Society, he said. And its leading social groups will be "knowledge workers" -- people who put to work, not their muscles and not their hands, but their minds. "The leading actors will be people who carry knowledge in their heads -- and use this knowledge to make things work," he added.

In his speech, Ambassador Yuchengco divided today's world into two: the world of the skilled and the world of the unskilled. The world of the people "who know" and the world of the people who "don't know." and he explained that the difference between the two worlds is simple: "The world of the skilled and the knowledgeable is rich, while the world of the unskilled and ignorant is poor."

Don Alfonso pointed out that "knowledge industries" have become the characteristic industries of today's world. Thus, there is now less and less use for unskilled work people, and more and more need for skilled workers. For instance, jobs are declining in traditional industries like steel-making and car-manufacturing. At the same time, job demand for college graduates with high skills is rising in service and manufacturing industries like computer-engineering, robotics, and systems analysis.

"Inevitably, the countries of the unskilled will become the underclass of the future world. The countries of the skilled will control all the wealth -- and all the power -- making the countries of the unskilled dependent on their patronage," Ambassador Yuchengco predicted.

What does this mean for the young graduates? "It means that learning must become a life-long concern for everyone of you. Learning must not stop on Graduation Day. Learning must continue for as long as you live," Don Alfonso told the graduates.

Ambassador Yuchengco underscored the qualities that the graduates must possess in order to survive and proper in today's competitive world. Love of country and self-discipline are primordial, he said. "I have come to believe that the root of our problems is our general lack of a sense of civic duty -- our propensity to value self, family, clan, and language-group above country and people. Put differently, the root of all our problems is our lack of appreciation for our common destiny as a nation, our lack of national discipline," he stressed.

The Filipino attitudes of tayo-tayo and kanya-kanya were bewailed by Don Alfonso. "These prevent us from forging a shared vision for our country...from agreeing on an organizing framework for our collective endeavors as a people," he noted.

Ambassador Yuchengco recalled that for one brief moment in the 50's and 60's, the Philippines was the leading nation in East Asia insofar as the vigor of the economy was concerned. "But that distinction we were unable to sustain -- because of our inability to unite and to strive together as one national community," he said. Worse, he added, factionalism in our politics led to martial law and strongman rule.

Apparently, Ambassador Yuchengco is pained by what he saw in our country of 1999. "Despite the shining moment that was the EDSA Revolution, our lack of community reproaches us daily. Look at the near anarchy of the Metro Manila traffic -- and then consider the chaotic self-seeking of national politics. Government is unable to provide even the most basic social services. Garbage lies uncollected amid potholed streets -- our drinking water is polluted -- and corrupt officials steal money meant for school-children's textbooks," he said.

There are more illuminating gems of wisdom in Ambassador Yuchengco's commencement address:

* Discipline is what we need. Discipline is what will make us a great nation.

* We Filipinos ask much of government -- often unreasonably. But we almost never ask ourselves what we can do for our country.

* The citizen's engagement in public affairs must not focus on individual entitlements alone -- to the neglect of his or her duties and obligations to the civic community. We Filipinos must exercise our underdeveloped sense of civic responsibility to ensure that it at least keeps pace with our over-developed sense of civic entitlements.

* We Filipinos must learn to give -- and not just to take.

Our elite, in particular, must cultivate a stronger sense of national feeling. They must learn to pursue not just profit but social values that pay back investment in the satisfaction of a good conscience.

* Do not shirk your civic duty. Never forget that you owe an obligation to something higher than your family, your company, your success. And that higher responsibility is to the larger interests of the Filipino nation of which you are part, wherever in the world your work might take you.

Yuchengco's closing message to the graduates is worth remembering:

Graduation closes a phase in your lives -- but Commencement Day is also a beginning. Graduation is not the end of learning but its beginning.

The world of work you will enter is an even more demanding school that this one you are leaving. Nurture in your hearts the passion for learning which will make the difference between success and so-so failure in your lives. Put your intelligence and your knowledge at the service of your family, your community, and your country.

Do what you can to increase the sum of hope in our country. Do what you can to teach someone else the learning you have gathered for yourself.

And never forget this: However fortune treats you in adult life, the education your parents, your teachers, and your school have combined to give you is your most secure possession -- your most valuable capital. Adversity can strip you of everything you have -- except the learning you hold in your head. So use it wisely -- use it well -- to benefit not just yourself, but your people and your country.

Allow me to end my message with a prayer: I pray that, as future captains of industry and leaders of our nation, you shall always remember to instill in your families, your friends and our people the national discipline that is so necessary in these crucial times.

Art A. Borjal's e-mail address: <[email protected]>