SONA: At the crossroads of history

Since we cannot yet comment on the President’s 5th State of the Nation Address (SONA) because of our deadlines and since President Benigno “P-Noy” Aquino III attended the Iglesia ni Cristo (INC) event last week and even read some Bible passages, allow me to also do a quote from the Book of Jeremiah 13:11,

“Then the message came to me from the LORD: Thus says the LORD: So also I will allow the pride of Judah to rot, the great pride of Jerusalem. This wicked people who refuse to obey my words, who walk in the stubbornness of their hearts, and follow strange gods to serve and adore them, shall be like this loincloth which is good for nothing. For, as close as the loincloth clings to a man’s loins, so had I made the whole house of Israel and the whole house of Judah cling to me, says the LORD; to be my people, my renown, my praise, my beauty. But they did not listen.”

I just hope that the President’s SONA would be more down to earth and not dabble on propaganda which was the hallmark of his SONA last year. For instance, a year ago, he boasted that for the first time in decades, rice production in the Philippines would be more than enough for us that there would be no more need to import rice and we are on the road to export our excess production. Well that did not happen and in fact last week, the NFA was going to import some 400,000 metric tons of rice. Yes, this was an example of a gov’t propaganda that was put in the mouth of P-Noy.

Meanwhile at this time, P-Noy is facing three impeachment complaints from various organizations and it is quite disturbing to me that all of them are allied front organizations of the underground Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) or the National Democratic Front (NDF) who are just as indignant against the pork barrel scam and the defense of the Disbursement Acceleration Program (DAP) as many of us are. Unfortunately there are no other organizations, except the Tanggulang Demokrasya that are showing its indignation to what is happening to our country today.

I have no doubt that filing those impeachment complaints by the friends of the CPP/NDF/NPA has a sinister purpose. They know too well that the political elite would protect each other’s backs just like what we saw last week during the Senate investigation on the DAP, where Sen. President Franklin Drilon sounded more like a Malacañang lawyer than the head of a fully independent Legislative Branch.

Thus they would be playing into the hands of the CPP/NDF/NPA when Congress would reject the impeachment complaint against President Aquino and further incense an already indignant Filipino nation. This SONA is indeed at the crossroads of our history.

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Last Sunday, the editorial from The Philippine STAR was entitled “100 Million and Counting” and it said, “New life is always cause for rejoicing, so Filipinos should celebrate the birth today that will officially place the nation’s population at 100 million. The challenge is providing a decent quality of life for every bundle of joy that arrives in this country.

The editorial continues, “Tackling that challenge has been an uphill battle. Despite sustained economic growth in recent years, approximately 40 million Filipinos live below the poverty line, accounting for a considerable chunk of the 2.2 billion people worldwide classified as “poor or near poor” by the United Nations Development Program. The UNDP reported that natural disasters, armed conflict and soaring food prices — problems Filipinos are familiar with — are threatening to exacerbate poverty around the world.”

Indeed the greatest challenge for the Filipino race is to bring our so-called economic prosperity down to the poorest of the poor, which the 2014 Human Development Report wants to bring poverty down to zero and I don’t believe that the United Nations (UN) can solve the world’s problems.

Perhaps the biggest question we owe to ask ourselves is, “Is having a hundred million Filipinos good or bad for our country?” Actually the answer to this question depends upon how a person looks at our current situation. It’s akin to looking a glass with a half full of water. Others look at it and say, it is half full, while others look at it and say that it is half empty. I have a positive look in life and say that the glass is half-full.

A hundred million Filipinos mean that the Philippines can have an internal economic growth by our own because we have become a huge market ourselves. If Filipinos are poor today, you already know the answer to this… and that’s because the money to fix our educational system has been stolen through the pork barrel scam where a majority of our politicians in Congress and the Senate are deeply involved. Let’s fix this problem first.

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