Are you a Pro or Anti government??

"Think if our country is really going down, does the President don't deserve praise??"

A tribute to the sweet talk of our president Madam Gloria Macapagal Arroyo

The 2008 State of the Nation address was met with much criticism from the opposition, going further in calling it a “feel good speech” that failed to outline what she intends to do to solve the countries’ pressing problems. In reality, I really do think people are ignorant about things and fail to realize what is really happening to country and why.

She opened the SONA with economic numbers, championing the economic growth of the country today was an all-time high for many decades, but anti-government expresses sentiments that these are numbers that cannot be felt by the poor and the hungry.

Yes, I do believe that this is not a time to be bragging about this things, but can we blame her for this? In a country that only sees the worst and fails to see the good, who can blame her for giving her side of the story. Numbers don’t lie, and I believe that everyone have noticed the increasing power of the Peso, from P54+ that had gown down to P40, an all-time high for years now in spite of global economic pressures that has besiege the world. Inflation rates are in its lowest, Annual GDP growth rates that have risen far beyond any president had ever for generations. But people fail to see all of these things, reasoning that these numbers will not feed them and are not even felt at all.

I do believe that only reason why have not plummeted down into a recession is because of this numbers. People have not realized of the what ifs that might have happen to our country if not because of her. The economic worlds is crunching and were not the only one who is feeling the pressure, but given these situations, she has managed to sustain, if not even raise our economic level to a point that we have grown where all other countries have fallen. If people are not ignorant about these things, I do believe that people would not be too harsh on her.

She championed the eVAT and it’s important in sustaining our country’s economic activities and even goes further and immaculating it as our ticket to away from poverty, but the masses just frown taxes as pahirap sa bayan and burdens for them because they fail to realize that taxes is the lifeblood of our country. The funds that the country spend on its project comes from taxes, and generating additional taxes will more likely to generate additional funds for the government to spend to the people.

Self-suffiency on rice is also one of the points she have made, stating the even though are land is not as fertile as our neighboring countries are we have made innovations that has made our country not fully dependent on the rice exports of other countries. But the people doesn’t give much regards to that, stating the long lines in waiting for NFA rices are enough to prove that rice shortage is rampant in our country. The truth of the matter is that when we have sufficient rice available, no one bothered to buy NFA rice because of its quality compared to other commercial rice, so when prices skyrocketed people shifted to the much cheaper rice to eat. You don’t need to be a genius to see that instantaneous shifting of a great number of demand to a commodity that people in the past doesn’t buy will really exhaust the supply because of the pressure of the buyers.

I do agree that poverty is still the no. 1 problem in our country and her efforts are not enough to eradicate it, but I do thinks that’s why she is boosting her efforts on other problems that she can solve, like the Land Reforms she initiated and the Health Care programs that are not a priority but are also needed by the people. I honestly believe that erasing poverty from a third world country is not a menial task that should be taken lightly, its is a long and slow battle and she cannot defeat it all in 10 year term, I believe no one can in that span of time, but she’s trying and that’s what’s important.

But people crucify her as if she is the one possible for all the misfortunes that is happening to the country. If I was the one carrying the burden off all our country and the people I serve sees me bad no matter what I do, what would you think I would do? That’s why I admire her, because she makes all the tough decisions, risking her popularity in the process, stating that no matter what she does, she will still be unpopular anyway.

I do believe that crab mentality isn’t the real problem of our people anymore, its finger pointing and scape-goating. People see our President as the scapegoat for all the things that is happening to our country because it’s easier that way. They can vent out all their anger to her. But let us stop for a while and think, would blaming her for the problems, regardless if she did it or not, would solve the problem in the first place? Would blaming Gloria now rollback the prices of gasoline? Would blaming Gloria for all the crises that Filipinos are facing would solve them? I dont think so.

The President isn’t the who is earning for the family or studying college to get a brighter future, it US. No matter how hard life it might seems, if we struggle and work for it, we will see greener pastures eventually like in the old filipino saying “pagkatapos ng hirap ay sarap”. If we only open our eyes and to study carefully both sides of the stoy, the President and her Sona would be as bad as you think it was.

copyright Joy Fatima Arimas,
politcal standpoint