What price peace? - Gotcha

What's eating the barangay head and police commander at Batasan Hills, Quezon City? Hundreds of thousands of motorists, commuters and residents there, and in Fairview and Lagro, have for years been petitioning them to drive away four dozen illegal vendors from Manggahan Talipapa who spill onto Commonwealth Avenue. Those vendors block traffic, pile garbage on the national road, seize public property for private gain. Yet the barangay head and police commander not only have ignored the pleas, but also have allowed a new batch of illegal vendors to grab the other side of the road. The traffic and garbage problem has doubled.

Mayor Mel Mathay and city police chief Gen. Victor Luga aren't working either. They're only abetting official negligence and showing taxpayers where their money is going -- to waste.

Sunday's scene struck the crowd and televiewers as surreal. There was long-absent Joseph Estrada, in combat camouflage with Commander in-Chief on the namecloth, telling his Zamboanga audience, "We should now put an end to the long-drawn battle" in Mindanao.

If he meant the Army pursuit of Abu Sayyaf kidnappers in Basilan, the battle can't end yet. They still have to free nine remaining hostages, mostly schoolchildren, then wipe out the terrorist band.

If he meant the abduction of foreigners by Sulu secessionists-turned-bandits, there was no fight to stop. They had negotiations to begin.

If he meant Lanao and Maguindanao skirmishes between soldiers and Moro Islamic Liberation Front rebels, the war was well within his power to stop. It was his troops who had launched a full-scale military offensive, with tanks, cannons and fighter jets, on two MILF bands that were mulcting commuters on Narciso Ramos Highway. If troops could attack just six hours after government and MILF negotiators agreed to resume three-year stalled peace talks, then he can order them back from what should really be a police matter.

Yet who doesn't want to end the fighting? Muslim political, religious and civic leaders themselves denounce how the Abu Sayyaf, in the name of Islam, beheaded male teachers, cut off female-hostages' breasts, plucked a priest's nails. Basilan folk want to go on with their lives, but only after troops run the last terrorist to the ground.

Sulu leaders, too, are condemning the separate kidnapping of foreigners. They want peace through government care for their health, education and jobs.

While they scoff at the MILF's ceasefire offer -- the last time it did so, it treacherously took over a town hall -- Muslims and Christians in Lanao and Maguindanao wish the government would restart peace talks. Their fight is not religious, but political-economic. They want more government attention and less systemic oppression.

War is costly, yet unproductive. Peace can usher in development and commerce. How Mindanaoans wish the fighters would learn from history.

At the height of Ferdinand Marcos' fight against the Moro National Liberation Front in the '70s, government spent P50 million a day on are materiel. Yet it didn't work. He had to forge a Tripoli Agreement by 1976.

Considering inflation, the government must be wasting at present more than P50 million a day. A cannon shell costs P190,000 -- enough to build a low-cost home. One bomb from an airplane costs P350,000 -- enough to build three schoolhouse, plus a clinic.

If P50 million a day can destroy so many lives and so much property, imagine what it could do in peacetime. Assuming, of course, that Malacañang uses it right and harnesses the people's energies to pull up Mindanao.

My series on the culprits of high medicine prices continues to draw reactions from pharmaceutical experts. Edward L. Isaac, Filipino Drug Association president, writes:

FIDA is composed of Filipino manufacturers and distributors. Prices of member-companies are 30-70 percent lower than multinational brands. We favor price control instead of parallel importation (from India). If government is serious about bringing down prices, why beat around the bush? Mar Roxas and several congressmen had filed a resolution for price control, but he reversed his stand when he became trade secretary. Government doesn't need to import. There are enough excellent Filipino toll manufacturers other than Interphil who can lower medicine costs. The only time government can go into parallel importation is when products involved cannot be manufactured in RP because of patent protection. Why help foreign firms at the expense of the locals who can provide drugs with high quality and competitive price?

Unlike the fuel industry, Filipino consumers have more than 200 companies to choose from, ranging from inexpensive generic to exorbitant, unethical pricing by multinationals. Problem is, government is not educating the public about their freedom of choice.

Sure, there are other toll manufacturers. But they're not as big as Interphil Labs, which makes 90 percent of all drugs sold by foreign and local firms in RP. Parallel imports may not force Zuellig Group, Interphil's 70-percent Swiss owner, to bring down prices; maybe it will. Point is, Zuellig must bare the books of publicly-listed Interphil. Minority owners are complaining about P300-million sweetheart deals that milk company resources into Swiss pockets.

INTERACTION: Aureo Endaya, Hanoi: While your piece on SSS money in Urban Bank hit the nail on the head (Gotcha, 6 May 2000), SSS losses hit us in the pocket, so I hope this hits legislators in the heart. I've been contributing to SSS for 25 years, but up to now I don't understand why it has to be run by Malacanang appointees. Members should elect their own board trustees. If SSS still owes the government money, then this can be repaid with liberal terms. But with SSS losing billions of pesos from mismanagement by Malacañang appointees, it's government that owes SSS.

Rene Moral, cnl.net: SSS should pay pensioners at least the equivalent of the daily minimum wage. Most retirees are no longer economically productive and depend on pension as sole income source. My father retired after working for 35 years as ophthalmologist of San Miguel Corp. His SSS pension is only P3,539.16 a month -- barely P120 per day, compared to the minimum P220-wage. Isn't it called minimum wage because it's the amount that can provide a worker his basic needs? How then can monthly pensions of SSS retirees be enough for daily needs if not at par with the minimum wage?

Joey Legarda, Makati: Thanks for the mind-boggling statistics about Moses' crossing the desert (Gotcha, 6 May 2000), especially the ending about God taking care of his people. While it's a good reminder, our turning to God is also a sign of desperation with what's going on with our government.

Name withheld upon request: Regarding the letter of Bernardo Cortes of Cagayan de Oro (Interaction, 8 May 2000), the problem is not that Smart charged him the price for full minute for 11 calls ranging from only 5.4 to 12.6 seconds. The problem is that he was charged at all for 11 uncompleted calls. I've been billed in the past for uncompleted calls -- but I haven't seen any such bill lately from Piltel or Globe here in Baguio.

Bing Ramos, Hayward, Ca.: I thought I'd give Erap the time he's asking for to prove his worth, and quietly observe what good he can do. But with the bank runs, Mindanao crisis, peso crash, I'm forced to ask: Where is the President?

He was in Zamboanga Sunday, in combat wear, hopefully not filming a new movie, Bing.

YOUR BODY. Two large studies published in the latest issue of New England Journal of Medicine show that high-fiber diets don't prevent polyps that lead to colon cancer.

OUR WORLD. Astronomers have detected tendrils of hydrogen in the vast dark between galaxies -- mysterious matter that accounts for five percent of the universe, NASA said. More on this in cnn.com/tech.

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