Solving poverty and corruption

"Walang mahirap kung walang corrupt" undoubtedly did much to make Noynoy Aquino win the presidency. It was a two-prong stringer: Against poverty and against corruption. Taken rhetorically, its message taxes one's belief for who could say that a better life (for people) is the inevitable result of clean governance? Angels may run our government, but unless the poor do their part to lift themselves up through self-sacrifice, hard work and righteous living, deprivation would continue to be their lot.

Yet the implication of the slogan was powerful. For one, it impressed upon the voters that candidate Noynoy was very much aware of the poor who have proliferated into one-third of the 90 million Filipinos. For another, it assured them of his crusade against the very thing that has made this country an Asian basket case: Massive graft in the government.

Now P.Noy faces the challenge of making good his promise. If he fails history will judge him as it does many of his predecessors: Trapo most of them, good in blubber but miserable in performance. Of course, his failure will not be only his own nor of his gathering of bureaucrats. As always, it will also be the failure of the people themselves.

Perhaps aware of this, he made the half a million audience of his inauguration take their oath of commitment, right after he did his. Now that failure, if it happens, will be a collective one, not just of P.Noy. That oath, however, like all oaths, was only symbolic. For whether it was taken or not the fact remains that a successful administration is the outcome of two forces walking in tandem: The government and the governed.

Take poverty. To get rid of it the government can only do so much - like creating job opportunities, ensuring just compensation, providing for a healthy work milieu, and others. But the worker himself has to have a positive work ethic like regularity of attendance, commitment to productivity, a sense of institutional loyalty and the like.

Moreover, he has to have a healthy life style to ensure continued good health. Vices like smoking, excessive drinking, gambling and others should be avoided. Frugality should be practiced and most of all, an attachment to positive personal values, i.e., personal integrity, sense of humanity, and faith in God.

This seems to be asking the average Pinoy too much. But there's no other way if one wants to attain a better quality life and if the country is to move forward. A few examples: Taiwan is not even one-tenth in size compared to the Philippines but its productivity is much, much higher.

Vietnam is smaller than this country, but it exports rice while we do import this commodity. Why is this so? The answer is in the vast untilled hectarage in our countryside, tracks of land lying idle because the farm hands have flocked to the city to join the legions of urban poor.

Fighting corruption is like fighting poverty - it's a collaborative job. To curb it, the government may wield the stick, but the effect would only be tentative, its impact limited. It is a cat-and-mouse game. Behavior is okay if the disciplinary authority is looking. Without the latter it's a happy day for the grafter.

Nevertheless, the stick has to strike the offender if only to put a stop to wastage of fund and teach others the lesson of probity. But that stick should know no rank. In fact, the higher the rank of the person disciplined, the better is the impact.

For long term control, a sustained educational effort involving the family, the school, the community and the church should be waged. Focus would be on values formation touching the individual in his formative years starting at age six or seven, then continued throughout his adolescent and early adulthood. Values are deeply held convictions which guide a person's behavior and decisions. This being so, a sustained process of embedding concepts of what is right and wrong needs to be carried out in the home with parents, preferably, acting as teachers.

President Aquino of course can do only so much in solving poverty and corruption, what with only six years for a term. Yet those years would be sufficient to set an example of a no-nonsense and conscience-driven leadership. Sufficient too to teach the people their role in making this country a better place to live in for themselves and for their progenies.

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