2010 presidential hopefuls urged to tackle pressing issues

MANILA, Philippines - Civil society has called on all presidential aspirants in the May 2010 elections to commit to address pressing issues in the country that include corruption, climate change and poverty.

Over a hundred government and non-government organizations in the country crafted the “Citizen Reform Agenda 2010” to identify salient reform issues that will have to be addressed by the next president, including corruption, political and electoral reform, environment and sustainable development, local government and human development.

The Citizen Reform Agenda 2010 was developed after a series of roundtable discussions conducted since last year.

Vincent Lazatin, CReforms 2010 co-convenor, said the next leader must commit to end corruption.

“The 2009 Human Development Report states that quality bureaucracy and the low risk of corruption as initial conditions have a significant and positive correlation to improvements in service delivery in the health and education sectors,” said Lazatin, who is also the executive director of the Transparency and Accountability Network.

He said the next leader must help transform politics as power remained in the hands of a few.

The groups also pushed for a shift to federalism, granting more powers to the local government units.

“Overly centralized governance has brought us nowhere. We must decentralize,” Lazatin said.

He said the present administration’s lack of an environmental agenda despite eight long years of governance calls into focus the relevance of Philippine Agenda 21 (PA 21).

“A major paradigm shift on development models is found urgent at this point. This realization calls into focus the revisiting of Philippine Agenda 21 as the framework for sustainable development,” he said.

Meanwhile, media practitioners said Filipino voters are more issue-oriented now than in the previous years.

ABS-CBN News Channel chief operating officer Glenda Gloria said people are interested in watching presidential debates.

“If you discuss issues, involve candidates, people are very interested in watching these forums,” she said.

Meanwhile, public relations practitioners in the country yesterday joined the Parish Pastoral Council for Responsible Voting (PPCRV) in promoting voter’s education, especially among the youth in preparation for the May 2010 elections.

The Public Relations Society of the Philippines (PRSP) and the Kilos! Botante 2010, a newly formed movement that supports the PPCRV initiatives, signed yesterday an agreement for the promotion of various voter education programs of the PPCRV among public relations students and other youth organizations.

Kilos! Botante 2010 president Lito Bunag said responsible voting would be the main theme of this year’s PRSP Students’ Congress to be held at the University of Santo Tomas in Manila this weekend.

He said the Kilos! Botante 2010 would provide some P5 million for the scholarship program which would allow students to pursue studies on mass communications and political science in prestigious universities here and abroad.