History, very curiously, is the one that finds a way to repeat itself. That is why great national events, more than personal highlights, are carefully written in the pages of history books for future reference. As it normally happens though, it takes some great effort to realize that indeed history is being repeated.
Take the case of the reelection campaign of the late president Diosdado Macapagal. At that early teenage time of mine, every lover of music, like I was, could sing along a song popularized by Teddy Randazzo entitled “Teen-age Senorita”. For purposes of using it as a campaign jingle, someone corrupted the lyrics of that song to run like this: “Teen-age senorita, I love you so” with the choral background “Mahal bugas, Macapagal”. Well, if you knew the melody, you would be able to fit this corruption into the music.
If I maybe allowed to state the obvious, one big issue that caused the loss of Cong Dadong, as president Macapagal was addressed, was the spiraling rise of the prices of prime commodities, not the least of which was rice such that the reprise “Mahal bugas, Macapagal” was very relevant. His administration was marked by an unprecedented rise in the cost of living with the many whose income remained stagnant getting so infuriated as to register their indignation with a victory handed to the late Pres. Ferdinand E. Marcos.
Here is where history seems to repeat itself. Just days ago, Secretary Arthur Yap sounded an alarm in a rather very ingenious way. Claiming that the Filipino eating habit of having so much leftovers on our plates needed to be corrected, he admonished the food sellers in Metro Manila to serve rice in a smaller quantity that the usual. No, he did not say we were experiencing a shortage of rice although he surmised that if we continued with our wasteful practice, in the next quarter of the year (and we are here now) such short supply of rice would set in. Oh, what euphemism!
Her Excellency, President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, the daughter of Cong Dadong, always quick to the draw, nipped the alarm of Sec. Yap in the bud. In so many words, her trumpeters announced that we had enough stock of the staple.
Perhaps because I honestly feel that the president’s words no longer inspire belief, her assurances, in many aspects of her governance, look to me more like the complete reverse of the obtaining facts. This is more pronounced here in this issue. Thus, when the president claimed there was nothing to worry, I worried. The result was that rather than believing in the sufficiency of the available supply as Pres. Arroyo would want us to imagine, I feared that rice was getting unavailable even before I could blink my eyes.
True indeed, the continuing sight of people forming long cues to buy rice explicitly demonstrates the kind of undeclared crisis we are facing. What is more unsettling is the fact that when someone gets his turn, he can only buy so much which is, in truth, so little. A trisikad driver, desiring to purchase five kilos of rice, can actually only buy three! This is happening here in Cebu City’s Tabo-an as it is in Caloocan’s Dagat-dagatan.
To top it all, the price of rice is in its unimaginable level. You can, of course, charge it to the inevitable consequence of the law of supply and demand that the cost of rice per kilo is unbelievably prohibitive. The trisikad driver I spoke about above? Oh he has to shell out for his three kilos of rice and amount that would have bought him five kilos.
Pres. Arroyo should be most concerned. She must realize that while the “Hello Garci” tapes, the alleged 2004 electoral fraud, the fertilizer scam, the ZTE-NBN deal taxed the minds of many, an empty stomach is a fodder of violent mischief. She should find ways to bring to the stores enough supply of rice, in affordable prices, or history that is likely to repeat, takes a more lamentable form.