Just plain insensitive

What aggravates this administration’s lack of credibility is plain insensitivity. Some of its officials are just oblivious to the country’s and the people’s desperate conditions today. Take the reaction of that senior official of the coconut industry investment fund when he was confronted with the impropriety of his fabulous perks. His curt response: He was entitled to those perks. He just doesn’t get it, like most of those in Ate Glo’s team.

"Those perks" included P25,000 worth of gasoline a week, first class airline tickets anywhere in the world for himself and his wife and a brand new multi-million peso SUV among others. Given that he was really an employee of the thousands of practically destitute coconut farmers, it was just plain insensitive of that official to claim all those fabulous perks, even if we assume that a comparable position in the private sector is entitled to it.

Someone with good breeding would have been sensitive enough to decline those perks and try to get his job done with the minimum of expense and fuss. That is not difficult to do. A recent CEO in a similarly sequestered financial institution declined to buy a new car for his use and instead continued to use his own car or any car available from the car pool.

First class travel with his wife is also the height of insensitivity. And I can’t see how anyone can consume P25,000 worth of gasoline a week unless he is running a taxi service on the side. Banker Baby Perez who now runs UCPB clarified to me that the P25,000 did not just cover one car but several cars… an explanation to me that is neither here nor there. The executive did not dispute the nature of the perk the first time it was made public.

The worse part of that coconut industry scandal is that Ate Glo ended up defending the guy. She said the perks were justified because she wanted to compete with private sector pay scales. I have no problem with government competing with the private sector pay and perks but how many private sector companies pay a P100,000 monthly gasoline allowance?

Also, the private sector only pay top money to those who deserve it… have value added. This one here is a political appointee, plain and simple. Will Wash SyCip even remember him as a top performer in SGV, his claim to fame? And did he really have to make those foreign trips? His business is essentially selling a commodity that is traded pretty much as, well… a commodity. Traders in site take care of whatever may be needed to make a sale.

But the coconut industry official is not unique in this administration. Insensitivity is also the Secretary of DILG saying he has the right to violate traffic rules when he is in a hurry to attend a meeting. The problem of this country is lack of respect for laws, specially traffic laws and here is the man mandated to enforce the law insisting he is above it all. If they want to have more credibility, they should stop all the special treatment, stop wasting our tax money needlessly on police escorts with sirens blaring, as if they are some latter day majarajas.

The President has called for sacrifices in these times of hardship. But she loses credibility every time a citizen sees a high official living like kings off the fat of the land, as if there is no tomorrow. The call for sacrifices should cover everyone, most specially public officials and families of public officials. The fact that her officials hardly heed her call for austere living could also mean that she is not credible even to them. Only Budget Secretary Boncodin seems to have taken Ate Glo seriously with her austerity call.

Sensitivity is step one in the President’s long journey towards credibility. Next is humility. Unless she is able to muster these qualities among her officials, among the bureaucracy and among members of her family, she might as well forget being able to lead this nation anywhere but to perdition.

Red tape

Got his e-mail from Philippine STAR reader Grace S. Del Rosario.

Hi Boo, I read your article re. Cut Red Tape... I agree with your observations. One bad example is HDMF. After full payment of my loan in Pag-ibig, I was trying to get hold of my title. To my surprise, Pag-ibig (main office at Atrium) was requesting me for proof of my monthly contributions since 1998.

Imagine that! I have to prove to Pag-ibig Fund that I paid. When I asked them if it is not possible for them to ask their payment offices for certification, they told me that it is not part of their job to do so.

Oo nga naman. If Pag-ibig has a respectable IT-based records management system, it would be no problem assisting a client/citizen like Ms. Del Rosario. Maybe my good friend and colleague VP Noli de Castro can do something. When we were working together some years ago, ‘Kabayan’ Noli and I used to scream Hoy Gising! whenever we encountered public officials with no sense of public service. I’d hate to have to scream that to him now.

Asean

Sometimes I wonder if Asean is worth the saliva regularly invested in it by its leaders. Or maybe, our expectations of Asean are overblown. The fact that it has survived through all these years is accomplishment enough.

Two recent news items are making me wonder if Asean is worth a spit. The first news item I caught on BBC a few weeks ago was about the Nepalese workers imported by Malaysia to replace the Indonesian and Filipino workers deported in droves by Malaysia. The story focused on a Malaysian company now using the Nepalese workers and it seems the company is not too happy about the situation. The Nepalese workers not only didn’t speak the language, they also required some amount of costly training. The BBC report noted that Indonesian workers not only spoke the language but are familiar with the job required of them. But the Malaysian entrepreneur said he didn’t have a choice.

The question is… how come the Malaysian government would rather import workers from Nepal than work to legalize the deported Indonesian workers which made more economic sense? And the Indonesians come from a neighboring Asean country. Employing the Indonesians ease joblessness which in turn contributes to political stability in the region.

Nepal is further away and not a member of Asean. What happened to Asean brotherhood and cooperation? I wonder if the Indonesians (and our officials too) asked Malaysia to explain their Nepalese preference.

The second story involves the effort of Vietnam to build its own oil refinery. Economically, such a venture makes no sense, given the surplus refinery capacity in the Asean region. But maybe, the Vietnamese government wants it as a prestige project.

Anyway, PetroVietnam started building the US$2.5-billion refinery in 2000 but construction has been delayed. Foreign partners complained the location wasn’t economical because it was too far from the oil fields off the south coast and away from the main commercial hub of Ho Chi Minh City. Still, the Vietnamese expect to complete the refinery by 2009.

In the spirit of Asean cooperation, isn’t it possible for PetroVietnam to just sign a long term processing agreement with Petron and save itself the trouble and the cost of building and running an uneconomical refinery? With such an agreement, Petron can justify expanding its Bataan refinery, which is also conveniently located practically across Ho Chi Minh City. If the Vietnamese want equity in the Petron refinery, that shouldn’t be a problem.

I wonder what they discuss these days when the Asean Council on Petroleum (ASCOPE) meets. Or maybe, just like Asean, Ascope is a cocktail party organization… useless on the truly meaningful things.

Observant

Here’s Dr. Ernie E.

A young pretty female schoolteacher had been telling her class about the value of being observant and said, "Now children, look at the clock; what does the clock have that I have too?"

One little girl stood up and said, "It has a face."

Another girl raised her hand and said, "It has hands."

"Splendid," said the teacher, "now what has the clock that I haven’t got?"

After a long silence, Little Johnny rose and said, "You do not have a pendulum, Miss."

Boo Chanco’s e-mail address is [email protected]