Yes to salary increases for teachers!

School officially opened throughout the country yesterday amid scare that all pundits tried to throw at the Department of Education (DepEd) featured in an editorial cartoon in PDI yesterday that showed a giant mosquito which represented the dreaded dengue fever and a virus cloud representing the AN1H1 Swine flu virus that supposedly scared the wits out of the two school kids getting ready to go to school.

All that was nothing but a smokescreen to the annual excuses that the DepEd gives to parents - lack of classrooms, teachers or textbooks. If you look into the annual statistics of school kids dying every single year from all kinds of diseases or accidents, I’m sure that the official figure is scary enough. But the biggest thing that should worry all our parents is quality of education that their children will be getting this year and in the years to come!

Under the same policies promoted by our DepEd, we’d be cranking out millions of poorly educated children, thanks to one of the poorest standards in education that we are giving our children compared to our Asian neighbors. Whatever happened to the report of glaring errors in textbooks sent to the DepEd? I hope this has been replaced, otherwise, publications printing those error-filled books should never be allowed to participate in the bidding for textbooks next year!

Corruption has permeated in almost all agencies of the government, which is the principal reason why despite the fact that Education gets the biggest slice in the national budget, year-in and year-out, there’s still not enough money to go around to be spent for a better quality education for our children who are supposed to be our hope for the future. Indeed, if DepEd doesn’t give our school kids better education, what kind of future can we expect for this nation?

This is something that our DepEd officials starting with DepEd Secretary Jesli Lapus down to the lowest teacher ought to ponder. The gap between a government school and most private schools have actually narrowed, meaning, even the best private schools in this country fares very poorly compared with the best schools in Asia. Something must be done by our congressmen, most of who are already millionaires, thanks to unabated corruption!

Finally, I am one with the teachers in their demands to raise their salaries. The Philippine government wastes so much money on trips abroad for our senators and congressmen who do not bring home the bacon to make this a better country. That money is better used to improve the standard of living of our all teachers who in turn will plow that money back to the nation’s economy anyway, which should spur our economic growth.

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Just to show how misguided are our legislators, last week, the Philippine Senate conducted that “Investigation-in-Aid of Legislation” on what really happened inside the bedroom when Dr. Hayden Kho and Katrina Halili had their sexcapade in full color video. But when Cebuanos are paying higher fuel prices compared to the rest of the country, there is not a single howl from the Senate or Congress!

Years ago, when oil prices shoot up by a mere 50 centavos or a peso, you can immediately see militant jeepney drivers calling for a city-wide strike to paralyze the government and make them reduce those atrocious fuel costs. But now that the cat is out of the bag and Cebuanos have lately realized that we are paying an average of P5 more for every liter of gasoline, we do not even hear jeepney drivers complaining. As the saying goes, “For evil to flourish, it is enough that good men do nothing!”

Perhaps it is time for Cebuano to wake up to the reality that we are actually subsidizing the fuel cost of our neighboring provinces. Why is the price of fuel the same in Metro Manila and in Davao? The Big 3 Oil companies blame it on transportation cost. But it is the same fuel tankers that bring fuel to Bacolod and Iloilo City, which has lower gasoline costs, so what really is the reason?

If I’m writing about this problem again, it is to keep this issue alive. We know too well that whenever media is no longer interested in a raging controversy, it simply dies down. For as long as the injustice of our paying higher fuel cost than our fellow countrymen continues, I will keep this issue alive. Meanwhile, it is the month of June and June is always Cebu Business Month. Perhaps our businessmen should continue demanding from the Big 3 Oil companies why Cebuanos have to pay higher fuel prices?

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