Don’t look now but the case of the missing wastebasket that pissed off President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo is clearly politically motivated!
It may be part of a political plan hatched by some scheming elements out to block MMDA Chairman Bayani Fernando from getting the Lakas nomination or it could be a second line effort to ruin DepEd Secretary Jesli Lapus after the “noodle soup” scandal.
Or it could be that the school janitor decided to stage his own protest for not being given a salary increase just like the teachers!
However you look at it, the case of the missing wastebasket is no laughing matter. At the very least, it shows us how decisions people make can ultimately impact lives. Whether you happen to be the Principal at the Geronimo Santiago elementary school or someone showing guests around Metro Manila, it all comes back to haunt you.
Imagine how you would feel if, after showing a foreign guest or an investor all the beautiful things of Metro Manila, the guest casually asks “why are there so many plastic bags hanging on electric posts, trees, or walls along the roads?”
Do you respond by saying: Hey! They’re having a barangay fiesta and they use recycled materials for their decorations. After that, all the garbage in the bags will be composted and used to grow their own vegetables!
How does one explain that those plastic bags of different shapes and sizes are actually the refuse of the urban populace? Do we lie through our teeth and tell them that we are so efficient that we have decided to do away with dumpsters, trash bins and trash receptacles?
In fact we are such a “green” and compassionate society that we recycle shopping bags into garbage bags thereby reducing the use of commercially produced garbage bags. This in turn places the refuse in handy take away bags so the garbage men don’t have to get their hands dirty.
The “hanging garbage” phenomena as well as “the case of the missing waste basket” are merely the after effects of failed government policies implemented by people who think mechanical but not social.
Many years back, we had “green” or ecologically conscious garbage receptacles all over the Philippines. Every barangay on every national highway had them practically in front of every house. They came in the form of green colored garbage receptacles made out of recycled truck tires complete with a heavy duty lid that was almost impossible to be opened by any ordinary Mutt or stray cat! The only ones who could open them were scavengers or diaryo-bote boys who were officially part of the recycling chain!
Then one day, there was a major problem involving the garbage collection companies who decided they wanted more money to do the dirty job. In order to get their way, they decided to do things their way by employing dirty tricks such as not collecting the dirt for several days.
Since Filipinos don’t believe in stinking up their own backyards, everybody decided to dump their garbage in the publicly displayed garbage receptacles, which quickly filled up and became evidence that who ever was in-charge was not taking charge.
That’s when they decided, that we should all keep our garbage inside our houses or in our pockets. If it’s your dirt, then deal with it!
Fortunately for the man who made the decision, he was not at the public school to tell that to the President. Otherwise, he would have suffered the same fate of Senator Dick Gordon who claims to have been booted out of his Subic post over the “butt” of a cigarette.
So instead of dealing with the problematic government contractors, we were given a mechanical solution.
As a result the good old green recycled trash bin became a thing of the past. Even the good old waste basket made out of “baldes” or tin drums and the “dust pan” made from rectangular paint thinner cans became obsolete. Major backyard industries died, major recycling model became extinct and even a poverty line source of income was marginalized further.
To make matters worse, the case of the missing waste basket is a sign that someone’s mechanical solution has caused a negative culture change in our value system particularly in cleanliness.
The President’s anger I would like to believe is not just about temper or impatience. It was the manifestation of generational conflict. The old world values shocked that in today’s schools the most basic, the most elementary rules of washing hands and using waste baskets are not incorporated or carried about as a given.
Perhaps the President should spend more time in public schools. Maybe then she will realize a thing or two. Like how a teacher living in “poverty” cannot be expected to teach prosperity. Maybe if she visits in the provinces, she will learn that her instructions, that uniforms must no longer be mandatory in public schools, was given mere “lip service” by her Secretary of Education.
Perhaps if the President sat down with people like former Senator Tessie Oreta, they could arrive at a priority CORE requirement for school children. Before any social studies, sciences etc. let us make sure that they have the ability to read, write, do math and at the very least speak English.
All the modern day ideas are good and well, but everyday, I meet children who cannot competently read or write or spell and their comprehension levels are dismal. They are mathematically challenged and they reach grade six unable to speak basic English. Add to all of that, they no longer have clean little hands or garbage cans.