In a statement printed in the
Philippine Star newspaper on September 21, Philippine
President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo urged her fellow
citizens to "suffer the pain now and experience the
gains two years hence [rather] than postpone the pain
and die a painful
economic death two years from
now".
The pain hapless, ordinary Filipinos are
told to suffer comes in the form of new tax measures to
the tune of P80 billion (about US$1.43 billion) a year
Arroyo has asked Congress to enact posthaste. The sum
amounts to 1.8% of the country's 2003 gross domestic
product (GDP). The promised gain is uncertain at best:
passage of the measures might forestall a threatened
sovereign credit downgrade from the country's present
rating, already two notches below investment grade.
Big bloody deal, say a large majority of
Filipinos. A mid-September survey by the Manila-based
Pulse Asia polling organization found that 78% of
respondents "see no need to impose new taxes as long as
the government strengthens its tax-collection efforts".
It's time to bell the cat. Who's to blame for
running up the country's massive public debt to more
than 70% of GDP, in spite of which abject poverty
continues to increase; in spite of which some 27 million
Filipinos (one-third of the population) have to subsist
on less than a dollar a day; in spite of which Filipinos
in ever-larger numbers are forced to leave the country
to make a living and support the relatives they leave
behind?
In an upcoming five-part series, Asia
Times Online's Pepe Escobar explores both the makings
and the makers behind the social catastrophe a once rich
and promising nation (called "the next Japan" 40 years
ago) has become. We won't preempt his findings but will
note some equally astonishing and disturbing, but
incontrovertible, facts.
Unsustainable demographics. The total population of
the Philippines will reach nearly 84 million by the end
of 2004. After slowing somewhat in the 1980s and '90s,
the population growth rate has once again accelerated to
2.36% per annum, or a doubling rate of just 30 years.
The total population could exceed 200 million well
before 2050. However, the Catholic Church, to which the
great majority of Filipinos belong, continues to
prohibit contraception.
Declining per capita income. High population and
mediocre GDP growth make for a noxious mix. In real
(inflation-adjusted) peso terms, GDP per capita has
remained virtually unchanged since 1980 (P12,619 vs
P13,139 in 2003). In US dollar terms, it peaked at
$1,180 in 1996, and in 2003 had declined to $953.
Growing poverty. Incidence of poverty - the
inability to provide for basic food (adequate caloric
intake) and shelter - increased from 36.8% of the
population in 1997 to more than 40% in 2002.
Thirty-eight percent of families do not have
solid-structure shelter. Access to safe drinking water
declined from 81.4% of families in 1999 to 80% in 2002.
Twenty-one percent of all families and 44% of families
in the lower 40% income group have no electricity.
Super-rich in undiminished control. The Philippines
boasts an unenviable Asian, perhaps global, record among
major nations. One family, the Ayalas, controls 18% of
total stock-market-listed corporate assets. Moreover,
the country's top 10 most powerful families control
56.2% of such assets. Just over 50% of total GDP is
controlled by the top 15 families. In sharp contrast,
only 2.8% of listed corporate assets are owned by the 15
top families in Japan.
These facts in
combination define socially, economically and
politically unsustainable circumstances and go a long
way in explaining the persistent political turbulence of
the past two decades. Time and again since the first
so-called People Power revolt of 1986 that swept away
the Ferdinand Marcos regime, the hopes and aspirations
of the large majority of impoverished Filipinos have
been thwarted. Neither Cory Aquino nor Fidel Ramos, who
lifted Aquino into the presidency before becoming
president himself, carried out the land-reform measures
they had promised. What land reform was enacted was
largely a sham. Aquino, who talked about it incessantly,
still owns the huge hacienda that should have been one
of the first reform targets. Most senators and
congressmen are rich landowners and members of or
hangers-on of the elite families that control the bulk
of the nation's wealth. No one else can afford to run
for office.
When the poor thought they had
elected a president who would champion their cause, he
was promptly overthrown by another People Power revolt
organized by the elite families and the Church on
charges of corruption, real or contrived. The person who
was installed as president, Arroyo, now has won an
election in her own right. A captive of the de facto
feudal powers that be, she'll prove every bit as
unwilling and unable to bring basic social and economic
change as Aquino.
The Filipinos are a capable,
well-educated, joyful people. Most who have settled
abroad, escaped the misery of semi-feudal rule, and been
given the opportunity to prosper have done so. But, of
course, they can't all emigrate or become overseas
workers. Ultimately, they will need to find the
political means to rid themselves of the oppressive
medieval structures that make their lives on Earth the
equivalent of purgatory.
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Sep 30, 2004
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economic death two years from
now". 
