By their outward looks, they may appear to belong to different social levels. A jeepney driver, on one hand, earns his wage by plying his route. He literally bites dust in search of something to provide his family with. No one breathes the polluted air more than him. His discomfiture is seen from the sweat on his forehead that he wipes of using a towel that he hangs around his neck.
On the other hand, an ordinary bank teller drives his mortgaged car to work. He is seated in the air-conditioned comfort while working for his salary. His long sleeves and tie present a dire contrast to that of the driver’s outfit.
One such driver I conversed with said that his take home earning is about three hundred fifty pesos daily, that is after paying for the diesel that runs his jeepney and the rent for his vehicle. Curiously, it is just about the kind of money (maybe a little more) the bank teller gets, after the usual deductions.
If the driver and the bank teller are of more or less the same incomes, there is no reason the government should view them differently. Since the former is realistically not situated less in life, he should not have more in law than the second. Conversely stated, cannot the bank teller (or other similarly positioned employees) be entitled to the one thousand one hundred pesos given to the drivers by the government allegedly to cushion the impact of the spiraling cost of diesel fuel? May I further as if this is how the government construes this famous Magsaysay line?
The answer is and must be in the negative. Our government does not mind the teller because he does not usually join rallies and demonstrations to denounce the apparent greed of oil companies. In other words, he does not present an actual of sight of public unease.
Case number 2, a local item. I have not heard the honorable Cebu City Councilor Alvin Dizon use the Magsaysay line in his much publicized clash of opinions with the honorable mayor. He missed the most potent democratic argument although he might as well say that the settlers along Mahiga creek have less in life so that they must have more in law. But, can this line be really said in all honesty?
In the city of Cebu, there are thousands of daily wage earners who are just renting homes. In my lady Carmen’s business, for instance, more than half of her workers are home renters. They do not own the houses they live in because, in the first place, they do not have parcels of land to build their houses on. Their moral foundations too, tell them that it would be unlawful for them to put their homes on somebody else’s vacant lots or even on river banks. Yes, their mental frame is on the side of peaceful and non confrontational living.
But, these bank teller and other similar daily wage earners are as homeless as those owners of structures built along the Mahiga creek, only they prefer to avoid becoming a burden to private land owners and the government. Yet, no one seems to take up their cudgels. Why?
If Hon. Dizon uses his oratory to pressure the city government into providing the Mahiga creek with relocation site and financial assistance, he, too, must consider that they are not the only ones “who have less in life”. There are thousands of other daily wage earners who are similarly situated. They must also be considered as among those with less in life such that, if this is how the Magsaysay quote is interpreted, they are equally entitled to “more in law”
I am sure though that this is not how this bombastic line of Magsaysay’s should be interpreted. This is a misunderstanding of the philosophy. And I believe that Hon. Dizon, given his more profound study into our nation’s life, will realize that he is likely supporting the cause of only a smaller segment of our people while turning a blind eye to the sad predicament of the more numerous ones.