https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=okwaHbuW-Hc
“I'm
forever blowing bubbles
Pretty
bubbles in the air
They
fly so high, nearly reach the sky
Then
like my dreams they fade and die
Fortune's
always hiding
I've
looked everywhere
I'm
forever blowing bubbles
Pretty
bubbles in the air”
It seems the lyrics of this old song is appropriate to
describe the current state of our country.
Let me explain.
It is a fact that our media is considered tabloid journalism
and as such the hard-nosed high-level news is set aside. We are left with the
painful emotional consequences. In the
tabloids, voices of crooks, political opponents, leftists, and all malcontents
are actually joined together in a chorus to create an emotional high pitch of
discontent. Nobody is using his intellect anymore – at worse, those who are
still using their brains are not thinking straight.
The President’s honesty does not matter. His desire and work
for peace and a better life for Muslim Mindanao don’t matter. Keeping the economy
running at high gear does not matter. Even the progress in the campaign against
graft and corruption does not matter.
All these are in danger of being aborted because of the hype
on the unfortunate incident at Mamasapano.
We have a nation that is so emotionally needy that it is
determined to break the President. And thereby risk breaking the nation.
What P-Noy made possible with our economy, he may just take
back. You may not think much of P-Noy’s good governance mantra but there is no
doubt it helped transform the country’s reputation from the region’s sick man
to one of the most promising. Indeed, during the week when the country was
angry with P-Noy and his mishandling of the Maguindanao SAF44 massacre, the
economy was as bullish as ever. Positive sentiments arising from strong
Philippine GDP growth projections for 2015 plus low oil prices and inflows from
both from foreign and domestic institutions caused the stock market index to
surge 6.34 percent in January to a new record finish of 7,689 (intraday record
high of 7736). Then, the Philippine Statistics Authority came out with the good
news of stronger-than-expected 4Q14 GDP growth of 6.9 percent, pushing full
year average to 6.1 percent.
Economic Planning Secretary Arsi Balisacan puts that growth
rate in regional perspective: “on a full-year basis, our country ranked second
next to China with 7.4 percent and slightly higher than Vietnam with six
percent. With this upbeat year-end
performance, the economy is anticipated to gain further traction in 2015.”
Not only that… last week, while the Mamasapano crisis was
consuming the nation, the Philippine peso strengthened against the US dollar as
investors favored local assets amid optimism for the country’s economy. The
peso gained three centavos to end the week at Php44.08 per $.
So, what could still go wrong?
Unless P-Noy is able to win back the respect of the police
and possibly, the soldiers as well, political risk may become an important
factor for fresh investors to consider. This becomes a concern specially if it
turns out last week’s Mamasapano carnage caused a serious credibility problem
for P-Noy among the general population.
The change of administration through the 2016 elections is
unsettling enough. But a restive situation among our armed services is
definitely something to worry about. Many are angry because of the perceived
failure of their chain of command to look after the SAF44 in the heat of
battle.
“Fortune's
always hiding
I've
looked everywhere
I'm
forever blowing bubbles . . .”
It has happened before. Every time our economy is poised to
take off… something always happens to abort the take off. The coups during the
Cory years, for instance, nipped in the bud a fast growth rate for the economy
generated by a euphoric return to democracy.
It is good to know that international financial institutions
are still bullish about our economy’s growth. I hope we can live up to their
expectations and not shoot ourselves in the foot at moment of take off.
Our economy is still
dependent on expensive and unreliable electricity. The worldwide cheap oil will
provide more growth to the more industrialized countries in ASEAN like
Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and now Vietnam.
Why? In these countries media are closely watched by
government. They do not have free-wheeling tabloid-type media like ours. Our media are largely designed to appeal to a
mass readership and hence tend to sensationalize causing hysteria.
It is now too late for our current President to do something
about the situation. Our immediate concern should be the choice of our next
commander-in-chief who will be elected in 2016.
Now is the time for the academe, major networks ABS-CBN, GMA,
TV 5, all broadsheets and other media groups to work together to start developing
a culture of communications that is fertile to critical thinking. With the help
of social media, we can (hopefully) influence decisions based on the use of our
heads and not on our emotions.
Meanwhile the move to make President Benigno Aquino III step
down and replace him with a so-called National Transition Council fortunately suffered
another setback with the identification of former lawmaker Peping Cojuangco as
one of its supporters or instigators. The oust-P-Noy effort already suffered
credibility problems when Norberto Gonzales, national security adviser of the
Arroyo administration, came out as a supporter (or instigator). The effort is
doomed to fail just by the presence of these two characters.
Justice Secretary Leila de Lima called NTC’s strategy “pathetic
gutter politics” used by “disgraced pathological personalities to crawl their
way back to national relevance, at the expense of the people’s effort to come
to terms with the complex issue of peace in Mindanao in their search for
justice for the SAF44.”
She said these personalities are using the nation’s grief to
“pervert a national catharsis, serving only their own thirst and craving for
absolute power by imposing upon this nation a tyranny of religious and
political has-beens.”
It has been shown that the group is well-financed. PNoy has
touched the egos of financially well entrenched personalities, who will pay
anything to get off the hook. To nip
their subversive effort in the bud, the best bet is to follow the money. Paging
Kim Henares.
Otherwise we will forever be blowing bubbles in the air.
